Before we get started, Here's today's "Too Sexy for IG Photo" that I include with every blog post. Is it totally unrelated to this post? Yes, but I gotta show off my art somewhere so I don't feel like I'm constantly doing things that don't amount to anything. Enjoy:
One of my favorite movies to come out during the pandemic was Eurovision on Netflix and when the world started to open up again, I found myself asking "Hey, did you see Eurovision?" to anyone I interacted with hoping to get into a deep discussion over it. As I awaited their response, wondering if they would be as enamored with the surprising heartfelt storyline, great costuming and singing, or even gushing over the beautiful landscapes of Iceland and Scotland - I instead experienced a wave of what I can only describe as 'secretly deep media discussion blue balls' as each one of my friends and family members responded to my question with "Play Jaja Ding Dong!"
For those who haven't seen the flick, it follows an Icelandic band dubbed Fire Saga made up of our leads Lars and Segrit. While they have a handful of more meaningful and complex songs, their usual hometown audience only ever wants them to play 'Jaja Ding Dong' - a silly and surprisingly sexual song that is fun to dance to. I've been trying to figure out why this 'Jaja Ding Dong' response bothers me so much, after all, by the end of the movie the main characters realize this song brings their loved one's joy and play it for them happily. After each encounter I had resulted in the same response, I started to work out that the problem isn't them.
It's me.
Over the past few months, I've slowly realized that my brain sees certain media, stories, and characters differently than most. This isn't a bad, good or better way of looking at things, but it's a me thing. When I like a thing, it keeps me up till 3 am thinking about the aspects I focused on. I've kept my poor sleep-deprived husband up to listen to me ramble on about the failings of Voltron season 8 and how that season alone undoes everything the show built more times than I can recall, which he does happily, bless his sleepy soul. Other times, I'll re-watch/listen on repeat to the thing I'm fixating on to grab every detail I might have missed. So when I get up the courage to talk about a thing I like and others don't see it as I do...it just..well, it feels bad man. A perfect example of how I feel is found in the start of Eurovision itself when we first meet Lars as a sad shy little boy, absolutely loses his shit hearing ABBA's Eurovision song 'Waterloo' for the first time. To him, this song pulls him out of his depression of losing a parent, it becomes his driving force as a musician from this moment on. His passion at this moment even inspires Sigrit, who later we find out was a deeply shy child that never spoke, to get up and dance along with him. The adults in the room see his dancing as just silly and laugh.
Now I'm not here to say that Eurovision is an Oscar-bait drama or fancy art film only 1% of the smarts can understand - no. It is a fun comedy at its core. I guess what I'm saying is that Eurovision itself is kind of a perfect subject to explain how I interpret media as a whole and I wanna share that with you, mostly because I feel very alone with my way of thinking and I'm hoping someone else can relate to me. Secondly, because I like learning about how the human brain works and I figure most other people find this fascinating as well, I hope anyway...Well here goes:
Part One: Sigrit
Sigrit is the main character of this movie as far as I am concerned. Sigrit throughout the movie maintains rather quiet energy and can come off as passive as she spends the movie following Lars' dream and... (I fear I might be losing my Intersectional Feminist Club Card yet again as I type this)... maybe that is ok. Sigrit seems to be the happiest when she's creating music with her partner and is excited to help her poor hometown by winning a large contest. She is content playing 'Jaja Ding Dong' - it makes her loved ones happy and she has no artist ego to push.
Is society ready to discuss that not every woman wants or realistically can be the girl boss?
Are we ready to discuss that producing on a smaller scale is also a totally valid way to make a living? My memory is and always has been pretty shaky, but I do vaguely remember the time before social media... and my goals were so different then. I was totally content with living in my hometown, living a quiet life, a life where only a select number of people knew my name. Admitting this seems sinful, as almost everything I do is online. Not wanting or aiming to be the next ultra mega-popular artist and still wanting to pursue your passion is a worthwhile endeavor. Honestly, this realization is partly why I started this blog. Blogging is an archaic form of digital expression and like... why? Why did we all decide as a culture that blogs were out? I feel Miss Capitalism stepped in and saw there really isn't much money to be made on a person's unfiltered rambling and thus, the monetization of social media apps was born. More recently Tiktok has been the cause for many short attention spans and oversaturation of quick consumable content. While it may not be popular or cool, I hope you take to reading this blog or someone else's quietly with soft music playing in the background. It's okay to take an hour to do something slow, something that may not be monumental or something no one might ever see.
Sigrit never compromises her art or her integrity and truly I wish I had better words to drive home how incredibly challenging and powerful this trait is. Throughout the movie we find that Sigrit's dream isn't winning Eurovision, it's just to create music with her partner for her friends and family. Not for awards, fame, or money. In this post-pandemic "everything you do must bring in money" age, this extremely simple concept of just creating for you is still a revelation for me. The quiet power of Sigrit standing up for herself and her art when Lars and Team Iceland wanted to commercialize their song isn't lost on me. While completely different avenues of creating, I do share this feeling with Sigrit. It often feels like the world wants me to change things about how I do things. Maybe if I cover up more I'll get a brand deal. Maybe If I do more Tiktok dances I'll make more income. If I just got my implants removed I'd have more commercial appeal. It's admirable to me that Sigrit confidently says no to a surely more lucrative career. Sigrit says no because her heart isn't in it. She says no to running off with a beautiful man because they have nothing in common. In turn, she gives me the power to continue to do what I like, even if it's just something I enjoy with a small number of people. At least I can stand behind it, good or bad.
This brings me to the next power move Sigrit teaches us and that is that there is grace in how you handle failure. After their Eurovision performance goes incredibly south, Lars runs back home while Sigrit stays to face her peer's judgment head-on. As A Womanâ„¢, I struggle to tell you how important this moment is to me. I think a lot of women grow up knowing their losses mean more and it stings for longer. Failure is something I hid. I never discussed my deep-seated self-hatred for my art style, my body, or even my dyslexia. I tried to hide all these fears and failures from the public to match those around me who I thought also had it all together. Clearly, this isn't true but it's a hard habit for me to crack, and seeing Sigrit just own her shitty performance on a world stage with confidence is kind of a big deal. How often do we see women fail like this in popular media? Media often frames women-centric films as the underdog to hero/geek to chic/mary sue - all of which are fine but not very often do we see women fail and survive. Ultimately this movie is all about failure, Fire Saga doesn't win the contest or lasting fame, but it's not sad, life goes on and there is more joy to be had.
Part Two: Alexander Lemtov
At first glance, Alexander might seem like he is the movie's villain, but never lives up to anything other than being the best boy throughout the entire film. While he is extremely closeted in his personal life, it's clear he is gay. His closet-ness is understandable. He's in a position that grants him great wealth, luxury, and fame, but that comes with a price. Eurovision calls out the strict anti-gay stance the Russian government has on its people. Through Alexander, we see how dictatorships affect their people on a more day-to-day level. Sure we can all denounce acts of war, cruel punishments caught on camera, extreme propaganda films, and riots. These are big, loud actions - but there's even more that we don't see. The quiet culling of free internet access, secret abductions of gay Russian activists, and queer employment discrimination are also things happening but lack the shock value as most of these are not often filmed or spoken about to the outside world. Alexander is doing what he needs to do to survive. He's playing Jaja Ding Dong (metaphorically speaking of course) because he knows it pleases others and keeps him safe. Ultimately he uses his freedom as a famous pop star to travel over the world hosting parties that probably allow him to have secret boyfriends - but that's all they can be, as we briefly see at the end of the film as Alexander turns down a possibly more permanent romantic partnership with the Icelandic choreographer. Alexander laments that he'll never have what Lars and Sigrit have. While I am an advocate for more positive queer media that are not based on tragedy, it's also a fine line to walk as not every member of the LGBTQ+ community has the freedom a lot of us enjoy. Even if our freedom isn't perfect or without struggle, some have even less.
Before we get all in our feels about this harsh reality, there is a rebellion in Alexander that is blatant and takes center stage - literally. His music is incredibly queer, from his lyrics to his choreo. Through his career, he can surround himself with other gay people and play it off as it's his posse. Alexander is fighting back, right in front of the face of those who fund his existence and that's fucking badass.
Alexander is also kind, thoughtful, respectful, soft-spoken, and extremely empathetic. These are not often qualities we see in Russian characters in popular media, let alone ones that are set up to be the conflicting character of the story. Alexander is the only one to stand by Sigrit when Fire Saga fails. He's the only one who asked Sigrit what her passions are and he's the only one who supported her going back to Lars, even if it caused him pain as he was losing a possible way to get his government off his back by way of a fake hetero public relationship. He's a complex character who I hope we see more of. If we are ever blessed with a sequel I would love for Alexander to be the focus and maybe find a way to fully embrace himself.
Part Three: Lars
I know a lot of online creators who also deal with the same thing: "I can't post black and white images because my audience won't like it," lamented a famous Instagram model I know. "I wish I could post sexier stuff but I'd lose my brand deals," said another content creator. Being boxed up is limiting, it kills creativity. So they just keep posting the same material even if it's on autopilot at this point. Don't do something clever, just play JaJa Ding Dong. Lars is tired of being trapped in this loop of what he considers to be unartful music. Sometimes I catch myself thinking about these things in my work. Apologies to anyone's virgin ears, but I make a living by making content that people jerk off too. I'm not solving world hunger or furthering humanity as a species and that gets to me more often than I'd like to admit. I'm not sure where this innate pressure comes from when you decide to pursue an atypical job, but there is a deep-seated pressure to be the best or top of your field. Maybe this has to do with the much bigger topic of how we treat art as a whole, as it's often seen as unimportant unless you have your work in top galleries or reach #1 on the music charts. It's seen as a waste of time unless you become well known. Maybe we all struggle with it, I hope so at least.
One popular way creatives deal with this pressure is by pushing themselves too far and too much. Lars' arc also encapsulates the problem with hustle culture. To put it in simple terms, hustle culture values craft building over all else. No time for dating, interpersonal growth, or hobbies. It's just "work all the time and you'll make a lot of money." But that's not true, is it? Everyone can't succeed at everything nor is it healthy to prioritize one's goal while ignoring other important aspects of life either. According to the basic hustle culture guidelines, Lars did everything right and still lost. This was a crushing blow to him and people like him because there is no safety net - there is no plan B. Lars is unprepared to deal with his failings and reverts back to doing a soul-sucking job - which isn't the answer either. Eurovision shows us that Lars can still have a music career and a fan base even if it's not the whole world he's playing for. There is nothing wrong with pursuing your passions while balancing out the rest of your life with other healthy relationships and activities. While I definitely know what it's like to feel the pressure to create content every waking minute and feel like a failure when the image, video, or idea does not go viral, I also think this is a more male-centric issue, one that can cause a lot of stress, health issues and serious mental anguish. The best thing about this arc is that in failing the contest, Lars is forced to open his eyes to all the other aspects of his life he was ignoring. He finds purpose and love in it. In the end, it's Lars who learns he needs to be more like Sigrit. He learns his way of doing things wasn't working, his priorities were out of whack and he was the one who needed to take a backseat to let Sigrit shine. Maybe this concept isn't revolutionary but I sure as hell wasn't expecting this in a Will Farrell movie and I was delighted to see this approach.
His musical talent aside, his appearance also is called into question within the movie and in outside discussions of the film itself. The second most common thing I hear when engaging in Eurovision discussions is how unrealistic it is that someone as beautiful as Sigrit (Rachel McAdams) would be so smitten with someone like Lars (Will Farrell). This line of thinking means two things. The first being that modern celebrity culture really has a firm grip on our brains. We are unable to see value in a person past their appearance or the much darker second outcome that all attractive women are shallow and can not see value in men who are also not attractive. Neither outcome reflects greatly on us, so I offer this stunning revelation: personality goes a hell of a long-ass way.
If you made it to the end here, thank you, I could probably go on longer about this but I'm going to stop here to let you take in how my head works, it's a lot, huh? Imagine having to deal with this like, all the time. Anyway, I'm off to go shake my tits on my OnlyFans! Jaja Ding Dong everyone!!! :D