Mirror

The best way to describe Mirror is to call it Tarkovsky's most personal film. I also found its remembrance metaphors so familiar and the art of reflecting the human soul onto a consumable piece in such a fascinating way left my mouth wide open. The film overflows with memories, dreams, history, poetry and pieces that expect the viewer to connect the dots. You almost never see Aleksei as an adult for the entire movie , you just hear hım. Whilst on his bed sick, his mind freely wavers through his regrets, passions and of course memories. His mother is alone and his father is absent. In his childhood, nature related elements are stronger. The symbolism shows itself through the entire cinematography with the slow motion, the house ascending and tons of water-fire symbols throughout. What makes Mirror even more interesting is that after all the crazy resemblances and heavy symbolism, the film also includes real footage of historical events from his childhood. The documentary-like symbolism HAS to be my favourite part because it tells us that the personal and public mind are very dependent on each other. Through the phone calls and his son Ignat, we see that Aleksei has repeated the same mistakes as his family and how deeply his father's absence has affected hım. He is just as fragile in relationships. The film ends with the mother being shown in all two time signatures: Almost squeezing the entirety of time to a brief moment. Memory isn't linear. You don't remember your life scene by scene: You remember a smell, a face, the sound of rain and then suddenly you're ten years old again. A movie that makes you feel like you're remembering someone else's life while also somehow remembering your own. Tarkovsky captures the strange way guilt, childhood, love, and regret all coexist in our minds.