gemini rites #12

bleaching my eyebrows and getting a lil weird w it

I.

The Helsinki Film Festival (aka Love & Anarchy) takes place at the end of September every year. This year I was a volunteer for the third time, which meant that I got to see as many films as I wanted with my staff pass.

(spoiler, despite my big plans I only saw 4 films this year due to catching a gnarly cold at the end of last week. alas.)

My favorite film was one that I couldn’t understand. I almost didn’t go after seeing in the program that the film only had subtitles in Finnish, with spoken languages of Persian and French. But then I thought to myself — well, I’m working on my French again anyway, and I know a little bit of Finnish, so between the two maybe I’ll be able to follow along.

As it turned out the film was about 10% French (specifically Canadian French), and the rest was in Persian. I understood maybe one sentence out of the whole film. Based on the audience the dialogue was very funny, and honestly the visuals were so incredible and wacky and surreal that the whole experience was still highly enjoyable to me. Also to be fair, I live in a place where I don’t speak the native language and never know what’s going on so I think my tolerance for not being able to understand dialogue is pretty high.

the film :

Universal Language / Directed by Matthew Rankin.

description (credit to Wikipedia)

The film is set in an alternate reality in which Persian, rather than English, is the dominant language of Canada, although it remains in coexistence with French.

Described as a “surreal comedy of disorientation” set “somewhere between Tehran and Winnipeg“, the film blends the initially unrelated, but gradually converging, stories of Negin (Rojina Esmaeili) and Nazgol (Saba Vahedyousefi), who find money frozen in ice and try to claim it; Massoud (Pirouz Nemati), a tour guide in Winnipeg who is leading a confused and disoriented tour group; and Matthew (Rankin), who quits his unfulfilling job with the government of Quebec and travels home to Winnipeg to visit his mother.

universal language (2024)

II.

After I left the theater for Universal Language I stopped by the big grocery store to get sexy focaccias for dinner. It was after five and the place was bustling. As I was going about my business, bumbling through the aisles like a bee with a pollen coat, I noticed that an older woman was standing at a distance watching me. I didn’t give it much thought until I noticed her again, in a different part of the store. And then again, in yet another aisle. The third time I caught her eye and she turned around with comedic speed, pretending to study a wall of artisanal ciders.

Being that I was still immersed in the surreal world of the film I had just seen, I became convinced that this woman was either a) going to try and kidnap me or b) was me from the future. I left the store pretty quickly after that.

III.

I now have bleached eyebrows. I wasn’t sure about them at first, but once the initial ‘wow I look like an alien’ thoughts died off I found that I quite like them. I’ve noticed that people have been weirdly nicer to me since I’ve changed my look. I also feel like I have a greater openness to strangers, as if there was something about my brow gel that was serving as a shield(?). Lately when I’m out and about I get the sense that I’m the mayor of Helsinki, like everyone is happy to see me and let me hold their baby. I have not held any babies. But you get what I mean. For a more specific example, I made a pharmacist laugh really hard the other day after saying the word ‘mucus’ in a funny voice. Would that have happened if I had penciled in my eyebrows? Maybe not.

IV.

Went for a walk a little later than I normally do the other day, around five pm. I cannot express just how many people were out walking their dogs. It was like a freaking dog parade. I saw so many different breeds! Notable mentions:

• very small very plump pug with a bright pink harness and an Aura of Authority

• extremely droopy basset hound chugging along

• a flock of three regal greyhounds all wearing full sets of pajamas

V.

Put myself on the waitlist for Finnish classes. I told Ville that if I don’t get in I’m going to take Chinese instead. In response he said “why.”

I’m actually so serious though…my brain is hungering for a language class.

VI.

What I’ve been writing to (pretty much on loop):

VII.

Been quiet on here because I’ve been working on my novel A LOT. Here’s a lil snip from the draft:

God, how hadn’t she realized it before? The terrible seclusion of the campus, the city? Jude had done her research, looked at maps. She thought she had known where she was going. But it was only then – with the sky so low and black that she could feel it, pressing against her shoulders, her limbs – that Jude understood just how far she had ventured from her old life. She never would have thought she would miss the haze of light pollution that had smudged out the stars in California, but she missed it now; the distinct separation between earth and sky, the known and the unknown.

VIII.

During the aforementioned film festival, I had a shift helping run an actors workshop. Specifically, the workshop was about self-tapes. The participants had to apply to get in, and I guess it was really competitive. There were a few big Finnish actors in the group which was fun (like Alan Wake!)

fun fact apparently he lives in my neighborhood

I ended up sitting in on a 4 hour session where a very sweet Irish casting director (he had done the casting for Vikings and talked about that A LOT, lol) went through the group’s self-tapes one by one. We watched them on the big screen and he gave feedback. My main takeaways were:

• wear blue if you have non-brown eyes

• natural lighting is more flattering

• if possible, get an off-screen partner that matches the gender of the role

• WEAR BLUE IF YOU HAVE NON-BROWN EYES

The wear blue thing was SUPER important. I’ve never considered being an actor and don’t think I will be recording a self-tape any time soon, but I tried my best to absorb all the info. Who knows.

On the second day we worked with a German casting director. This time the actors performed in pairs and I was tasked with filming them. It has literally been years since I worked with a camera like this, so that was pretty wild.

IX.

Recently finished reading Ninth House and its sequel Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo. And my god. I have not chomped through books like that since I was a teenager. I find it difficult to read contemporary books these days, especially fantasy. But these were the perfect blend of good writing, incredible research, darkness and depth. Hell Bent kept me entertained while I was sick in bed for days.

X.

While I was sick I also finished the second season of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Incredible TV. But that night I had a fever and my dreams were just mormon women screaming at each other on loop. Wouldn’t recommend. Extremely excited for season 3.

That’s all for now, talk to you later <3

xx Sidney