"Back to You" by Selena Gomez

There was a tweet I read a while back that asserted that "You can think Selena Gomez's music is terrible and think 'Love You Like a Love Song' is the greatest song in the history of mankind. People like us exist!" I found it funny because that song is legitimately manufactured and awful yet hyper-catchy and captures a feeling that we've all gone through at some point. I do not fully agree with the tweet because I don't think Selena Gomez's music is completely terrible, even the early stuff. Lately, it's gotten considerably better, which is why I think she's one of the few people who has made the successful switch from Disney start to pop idol. The artists who have longevity are the ones who can consistently transform themselves and still retain the je ne sais quoi which brought them public attention in the first place. It's harder than it sounds, especially when you're not fully in control of the music you're producing.

Recently, she dropped two new singles - (not so) coincidentally, they were released on the first day of Scorpio season. Personally, I think this was intentional because both songs were about the transformation she had to go through to get over Justin Bieber and Scorpio is the sign of transformation and rebirth. Celebrities have been a lot more open about their interest in spirituality, including more woo-woo aspects of the New Age, and astrology in particular has gained a lot of traction in the past year. As much as I like to think I'm a trendsetter, I'm honestly just riding the wave and not resisting what I'm being called towards. The first single, "Lose You to Love Me," was a personal ballad about how she felt so low after their breakup. How she felt she deserved the poor treatment, how she let herself forget her purpose. Really hard, deep stuff that I'm sure isn't easy for anyone to face. And she kept taking him back, because her self-esteem was so broken, she didn't think she deserved better. The second single, "Look at Her Now," is a dance song that celebrates how she's thriving after the train crash of her and Justin's relationship. She mentions that she "dodged a bullet," which she might have. Ironically, Justin Bieber and his wife have been on the defensive, saying Gomez put out these songs specifically to hurt Justin. Hailey Bieber has told reporters that he's "distraught" and Gomez is being cruel by airing out their dirty laundry. But it's art. And he clearly didn't care how much he hurt her when it was happening, so why should she censor the truth about the pain she went through just to make him more comfortable? That's not a man, that's a boy, which is why his mama (oops...wife) is speaking on his behalf. And that's about the extent I'll get into celebrity drama for today.

Obviously, based on her recent power moves, Selena Gomez is now genuinely starting to get over Justin Bieber. However, "Back to You" came out in 2018, after their most recent break up. The song is bittersweet - the melody is fairly upbeat but the lyrics are tinged with a sadness only wisdom can bring about. The message in the song is simple - their relationship wasn't great, it may have even been a mistake, but it's a mistake she would make again in a heartbeat. Every time. That's it. That's the song.

We never got it right

Playing and replaying old conversations

Overthinking every word and I hate it

'Cause it's not me ('cause it's not me)

And what's the point in hiding?

Everybody knows we got unfinished business

And I'll regret it if I didn't say

This isn't what it could be (isn't what it could be)

Let's talk about the video. I'm a Francophile in the worst way, which means I've watched way too many French movies. Most of which were made in the 1960s. Lucky for me, that's the whole aesthetic of this video. Complete with subtitles that don't exactly match the words they're speaking. It has it all - the camera shots filtered through colored light, the chic clothes, the nonsensical meet-cute that spurs the whole video into action. The lyrics of "Back to You" bring to mind a classic Jean-Luc Godard film, "Breathless," in which Jean-Paul Belmondo plays a petty thug whose reckless actions bring about his demise. Throughout the film, he turns to a naive, American love interest, Patricia (played by Jean Seberg), who he doesn't treat all that well but who seems to love him - but she betrays him, partially as a test for herself to see if she really does love him. Belmondo's character has a specific quirk where, when he's thinking, he runs his thumb across his bottom lip. At the end of the movie, as Michel dies, Patricia replicates this same quirk as she speaks the last line in the movie. I've interpreted this as, having fallen in love with this scoundrel, she has taken on some of his traits and, in a way, a part of him will always be with her. In a way, their attraction is ill-fated - they are both enamored with a romanticized image of the gangster lifestyle, which ultimately leads to the tragic end of their relationship (and Michel's life).

In  more light-hearted version of this same plot, the "Back to You" video shows Selena and a Bieber doppelganger meet at a party and she proposes stealing a car. It's all fun and games until there's real consequences involved. That's when the conflict starts. It escalates until he screams at her - "You're too passionate!" And, dear friends, if anyone calls you "too" anything, that's a bad sign. Especially if they say you're "too much" - that just means they're used to not getting much and they're afraid/anxious of not being to reciprocate that. At this point, Selena announces she's going back to the party. Back to the moment when they met. And what does she do? She does it all over again.

Chaos theory hinges on tiny, seemingly insignificant events cascading into each other randomly in order to produce each moment. In a way, it makes the way things are unavoidable. In order to get to this moment - this moment right now - everything had to go a specific way. Otherwise, this moment would be different. Our reality would be different. I try not to think about the "what ifs" because they don't really exist. Right now, those possibilities are dead. I will never be this old or this young ever again. I can't go back and change my major in college. Or where I went to college or even where I was on a particular day. What I can change is how I color those decisions - were they mistakes? Or were they just the best choice available to me based on the information I had at the time? The thing to embrace about this song is she doesn't assert that her feelings are wrong - she just says this is how she feels right now. That's just how it is and she can't help it. She has a lot of compassion for herself in this song and I can image her writing in her journal, one night after it's all over for the umpteenth time, spilling all these thoughts onto a page. I feel [blank] [blank] [blank] (I imagine she says "I feel" a lot because, like me, Selena is a Cancer). No judgement. And thus ends a rather lengthy rant that went in every direction all at once and back again.

"Back to You" Video

"Why Don't You Do Right?" as performed by Amy Irving

I've been obsessed with this song since I first saw "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" which - full disclosure - was legit one of my favorite movies growing up. I loved Jessica Rabbit - I thought she was very glamorous and being a jazz singer in a smokey cabaret sounded like a pretty good career option. Still think I could pull it off, if I really wanted to.

I've been feeling a little uninspired lately. Just a short bout of anhedonia, nothing I haven't been through before but all I've really wanted to do lately is read and sleep. I read a passage from a psychology text today that said it's important to schedule in things you like to do, even if you don't feel like doing them. Like getting up to do yoga and meditate, even though I'm still tired when the alarm goes off. Or writing something, even though I think it's going to be shit. Morning car rides are important - because I genuinely enjoy driving (I've been known to get lost on purpose, just to drive around a little while longer) and it's my time to enjoy music. Lately, I've been listening to Spotify's Taylor Swift mix a lot. Her songs paint such a fantastical, romantic picture of life, even the sad and angry ones - her Cancer moon is so obvious in her art (because Cancer placements, no matter what happens, we believe in True Love above all else - and Taylor Swift's love life has inspired basically her whole discography) and I'm surprised I didn't see it before. I'll save my "Why I Love Taylor Swift" essay for another time, but for now, I'm just trying to climb my way back to Hopeful Jess, because I miss her.

However, that leads us into today's topic, which is one of my favorite film styles - film noir. True story: I have written several essays on the topic of film noir in French to get my second degree (which is in the French language). No, it was not easy, but it was fun, if only to fall in love with Alain Delon and, to a lesser degree, Jean-Paul Belmondo. There are twitches and habits I still do today only because I saw Jean-Luc Godard's "Breathless." Film noir and noir-ish literature are critical to the dieselpunk aesthetic, for obvious reasons. It was a genre that evolved primarily from the late 1920s to the 1940s. As such, the bulk of the classic noir films were made pre-Code, which set moral standards on films, meaning that they get closer to some of the darker themes that you generally don't see in popular films made in the 40s and 50s. Pre-Code films were able to get away with more violence and sexual innuendo, which is what gives film noir its flavor.

You had plenty money 1922

You let other women make a fool of you

Why don't you do right, like some other men do?

Get out of here and get me some money too?

You're sitting there wondering what it's all about

You ain't got no money, they will put you out

Why don't you do right, like some other men do?

Get out of here and get me some money too?

When someone mentions anything "noir," you probably get a picture in your head, particularly one of a gritty crime drama that's shot in black and white. Usually with a plot that could've been ripped from a story in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine (a mystery/crime fiction digest I read a lot of when I stayed at my grandparents' house during summers). As a genre, noir tends to rely heavily on it's archetypes - the Private Eye, the Femme Fatale, the Crime Boss, et cetera - and the plot is very character-driven. However, it should always be noted - with all good narratives - it follows a fairly predictable story arc (which, inevitably, mirrors aspects of the Hero's Journey - always gotta bring things back full circle). The familiar film noir plot goes a little like the following: Our Hero (or, in some cases, Anti-Hero) is down on his luck. Perhaps he's fighting an addiction - alcoholism is common in film noir, especially in films from the 20s and 30s - or maybe his wife just left him, he's broke, his business is failing, or some combination thereof. That's when a feminine character - often a Femme Fatale, but sometimes just a Damsel in Distress - comes to him with a problem to solve. A quest, if you will. This is not a love story, my friends. Not usually, anyway. Yes, there will be sexual tension but most often, this woman is leading him into some sort of danger or quandary. Sometimes, she's even implicated in the trouble, like in "The Maltese Falcon" and the Hero (in this case, Humphrey Bogart) turns her in to the cops. Or maybe she's an innocent bystander who watches the Hero find some way to fuck up all on his own. You never can tell with film noir - its characters kind of do whatever they want, regardless of whether or not its logical. And, a lot of the time, they end up dead. Jean Paul-Belmondo at the end of "Breathless?" Dead.

The point I'm making is that you can't really pin down film noir as a single plot. The closest thing you could call it is a style. The lighting, the costumes, the music, the gritty realism, a stark commentary on morality, and a less-than-happy ending - these are the elements that define noir. And, much like porn, you know it when you see it. A few memorable films that I would classify as noir (some would disagree) that I recommend:

• Breathless directed by Jean-Luc Godard - You fucking saw this coming. But seriously, brilliant film and one of The Essentials (which are movies you have to see if you want to understand anything about film-making).
• Le Samouraï directed by Jean-Pierre Melville - Because everyone should fall in love with Alain Delon at least once.
• Rififi directed by Jules Dassin - The climax of this film is a 25-minute heist scene that is filmed in complete silence, a truly remarkable act of cinematic brilliance.
• Casablanca directed by Michael Curtiz - Arguably the greatest movie of all time (and definitely Top 5 in films you have to see in your lifetime), it's a beautiful yet tragic love story that combines all the great elements of classic film. Some would argue that it's not noir, but if we're defining it as a style, I think all the key ingredients are there.

As always, thanks for reading!

"Why Don't You Do Right?" Video