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Arts
Wednesday, March 3, 2021 — 7
Indigo Sparke has a way of
gathering the stars and keeping them
in her pocket, handing them out on
her guitar strings as she sees fit. The
Australian singer-songwriter’s debut
album, Echo, surrounds you, yet never
leaves you feeling claustrophobic. It is
as wide open as the deserts she drew
inspiration from in the making of this
album.
This openness is reflected in
the way the album seeks the right
questions, rather than the correct
answers. The songs often embark
on mini philosophical quests, each
anchored
by
Sparke’s
languid,
melancholy tones and simple guitar
backings. Her sound evokes the
centering gravity of Bedouine, or
perhaps Angel Olsen at her most
simple and haunting. Although the
album is mostly Sparke and her guitar,
with the barest touches of piano,
percussion and bass here and there,
these all come together to make a sum
that is greater than its parts.
In “Colourblind,” the guitar and
tambourine slowly gather their things
and enter the album. There is a patience
to her voice, the pace at which she
moves through the piece. How do those
we surround ourselves with affect the
way we see the world? This becomes
the first of the many self-reflective
inquiries the album inspires. Sparke
continues to question and explore in
tracks like “Everything, Everything”
and “Baby.” The lyrics in “Everything
Everything” surrounding death make
it a fitting closer to the album. Her
whispered tones enhance the song’s
mystery and magic. As she affirms
that “Everything, everything is dying”
and “Everything is simple,” there is
no dread involved. It doesn’t even feel
like a resolute stamp marked “END.”
It asks of the listener what it means to
die and what it means to live. There is a
peaceful transformation of something
often viewed as a spectre of fear
and suffering into a straightforward
communal experience.
“Baby” is the lead single off of the
album, in which Sparke submerges
you in a lake of melancholy and pulls
you out by the grace of her love. Echo
evokes strong visuals; in this one,
Sparke is surrounded by glowing
balls of light, as she sings of “energy
balls all around us” in an exploration
of universal energy fields. Through
the music, she asks us and herself:
What brings someone comfort? What
pushes someone? Can it ever be the
same thing?
Comfort and unease coexist in a
strange balancing act on this record.
In tracks like “Golden Age,” it is
difficult to say if the warm grain of
the guitar pulls you to a more familiar,
tangible reality, or if its swooping
chords shoot you off into space again.
Even while singing of old, long-
term loves, there is always a feeling
of everything changing, of new
things arising; your skin gives way to
goosebumps.
Sparke’s struggles with her own
eroticism are delicately approached.
“The witch of desire” greets her in
“Undone,” while in “Carnival” she
asks “Will you be mine?”, struggling
to connect with something so she
doesn’t lose herself.
With “Wolf” comes Sparke’s
deepest approach to her sexuality.
As her female lover beckons her,
“Come upstairs, let me show you all
the parts you haven’t seen / There’s
a hell, there’s a heaven, there’s a
universe exploding,” the impact of
these experiences is hard to deny. Her
grand lyrics and ghostly vocals make
you pause every so often to catch up to
what you are feeling.
The funny thing about love is
no matter who you are, how many
relationships you’ve had or how close
you are to your family, there’s always
more you can learn. Love is a never-
ending lesson. In this spirit I write
to you, as a 19-year-old girl who has
watched a lot of television, to share what
I’ve learned — amateur to amateur.
While, in my opinion, love languages
don’t fully capture the boundlessness
of what intimacy with another person
can mean, I do think they’re a good
place to start the conversation. They’ve
certainly expanded how I interpret the
different ways that caring for someone
can manifest, so I thought I’d go
language by language, show by show,
to describe how my ideas about love
have grown over the years.
Physical
Touch
—
“The
Handmaid’s Tale”
Physical touch has always easily
fit into my understanding of love, as
there often aren’t words to describe the
feeling of wanting to comfort someone
or show them you’re there for them.
Yet what I didn’t understand until I
watched “The Handmaid’s Tale” was
the extent to which physical touch can
palpably define the way our lives feel.
“The Handmaid’s Tale,” based on
Margaret Atwood’s novel, is the story
of a fundamentalist Christian society
dictated by strict rules — particularly
for women — and the notion that
someone is always watching you,
should you slip up. Handmaids are
under constant surveillance and in
an environment that seems to be the
furthest thing from love. Bearing
children
is
methodically
done,
and any sort of love or kindness is
something that sneaks through the
system, not caused by it. Interestingly,
it was precisely the way the system
stripped away the protagonist June’s
ability to be close to others — and be
touched outside of a sexual context
— that made me realize how physical
closeness fosters emotional intimacy
even outside of a relationship. The
lack of physical touch heightens
June’s isolation, and I couldn’t help
but feel touch-starved with her.
Without physical connection, life
seems robotic, cold and dreary. After
watching the show, I felt newfound
gratitude for the ability to hold
people close and how it can serve as a
reminder that you are not alone.
Words of Affirmation — “Sense8”
I’ve seen “Sense8” multiple times
since I first watched it when I was 15.
With every watch, I’ve noticed new
lines in the show where characters
have said the right words when other
characters needed them, and it made
all the difference.
In “Sense8,” humans known as
“sensates” are psychically linked with
seven other individuals spread across
the world. Sensates are able to take
in the senses of the other people they
are connected to and communicate
with them, even appearing to be
in the same room as their fellow
sensates. Over time, the main group of
sensates in the show grows closer and
closer, understanding each other’s
personalities, feelings and stories at
the deepest level. I think it’s because of
the deep bonds the show establishes
that it is able to depict words of
affirmation that hit profoundly.
I mean, in what other show can you
get quotes like “The real violence, the
violence I realized was unforgivable,
is the violence that we do to ourselves,
when we’re too afraid to be who we
really are,” and “your life is either
defined by the system or how you defy
the system,” as advice?
Quality Time — “Avatar: The
Last Airbender”
“Avatar: The Last Airbender” was
a phenomenal show for a multitude
of reasons, but while the show’s
compelling
character
arcs
may
include many important lessons about
love, I realized that I couldn’t help
but feel the love present in even the
most filler of episodes in the series.
I loved all the episodes of “Avatar”
in which the gang simply stops at a
village or town on their journey and
spends time together, learning how
to do what’s right. “Avatar” was a
great series because of the chemistry
between the characters, which comes
through even in the more dramatic
episodes. I learned that, when it comes
to love, the smallest moments can feel
the most meaningful.
Acts of Service — “Gilmore Girls”
When I think of characters that
remind me of acts of service, Luke
from “Gilmore Girls” is the first
person who comes to mind. Luke
wasn’t one for expressing his feelings
in words, sometimes to a fault, but
there’s no one I can think of who
has more consistently shown up for
the people in his life by offering care
through his time and skills. Luke
loves cooking, fixing things and
making sure Rory and Lorelai are fed
and safe. Yes, Luke’s a good partner
to Lorelai and good father figure to
Rory, but he’s also the sort of guy I’d
love to have as a neighbor. Despite
his grouchiness, we all know he
cares. I may not be as handy as Luke,
but I still channel my inner Luke
when I refill the Brita pitcher for my
roommates, or bake cake pops for
my friends when they’re stressed or
even just check in with them to see if
there are ways I can help, rather than
simply telling them I’m thinking
about them.
Receiving Gifts — “New Girl”
Ah, gifts. The forgotten love
language. To be quite honest, I still
feel a little hesitation whenever I
hear that someone’s primary love
language is gifts, but at the same time
I’ve realized it also doesn’t get enough
hype. There’s no moment in television
that has shown me the power of giving
gifts more than Season 3, Episode 13 of
“New Girl” in which Nick, a character
who can only be described as a hot
mess, puts together an extremely
thoughtful gift for Jess, who has
always wanted a great birthday. I don’t
know why, but watching someone
who never has it together spend a lot
of time to show how much he cares
makes me feel incredibly soft. I’ll just
say Jess was not the only one crying
by the end of the episode. The episode
taught me that amid the hustle and
bustle of life, even when everything
seems like a mess, just taking a little bit
of time to show someone you’ve been
thinking about them can remind our
loved ones that we care.
Minari has a lot of names. I’m not
talking about the film, but its namesake,
Oenanthe javanica. For the uninitiated,
it’s an herb used in a variety of cuisines,
prepared by itself or added to elevate
an existing dish. In Korea it’s called
minari; in Japan, it’s called seri. Here
we call it Japanese parsley, or Chinese
celery, or Indian pennywort, or Java
water dropwort or just plain water
celery sans any national distinction.
As one character remarks, “It grows
anywhere, like weeds … rich or poor,
anyone can enjoy it and be healthy.” So,
it’s got a lot of names.
This weed of 10,000 names and
10,000 homes neatly sets up the
enduring metaphor of “Minari.” The
film is Americana in celluloid but also
a prototypical immigrant tale, for isn’t
America supposed to be the monarch
of immigrant tales, in lip service if not
in unvarnished truth? The movie’s
also one of those classic fish-out-of-
water, family-seen-through-the-eyes-
of-a-child stories that are practically a
genre of their own. “Minari” fits in as
a faithful example that will no doubt
resonate with many an immigrant or
displaced person. But none of that is
to say “Minari” is a formulaic stock
film — it’s imbued with an incredible,
enchanting specificity that can only be
spun off the vagaries and vicissitudes
of lived experience.
Shaped by writer-director Lee
Isaac Chung’s (“I Have Seen My Last
Born”) early childhood, it follows
a Korean husband-wife duo and
their Korean American children as
they try to navigate the turns and
bends of agrarian life in rural 1980s
Arkansas. The child observer is young
David Yi (Alan Kim, in his debut),
a sweet, chubby-faced kid with a
heart condition. David is, of course, a
fictionalized, de-aged Chung. David
spends his days trouncing around
the Arkansan backcountry with his
sister Anne (Noel Cho, in her debut),
a dutiful older sibling that weathers
microaggressions like a champ and
his grandmother Soonja — a crass
crone with a jovial nature played with
incredible charm by Yuh-Jung Youn
(“The Bacchus Lady”).
If David is the beating, slightly
arrhythmic heart of the film, it’s
his parents and the assimilation
anxieties they represent that provide
the catalyzing force and anima of
the film. Steve Yeun (“Burning”)
and Han Ye-ri (“Champion”) give
quiet yet full-bodied, heart-grasping
performances as Jacob and Monica.
They’re professional chicken sexers,
an oh-so-unglamorous line of work
involving adorable little chickens that
you condemn to either be tossed in a
furnace or raised, fattened, squeezed of
all their eggs and eventually McNugget-
ified (depending on the parts between
their legs). Monica is a city-bred
woman who misses Korea with ardor,
but whose only focus is bringing in the
dough to support her children. Jacob,
on the other hand, has big, American
dream-inflected ambitions that extend
beyond being an arbiter of the fate of
poultry. After arriving in their new
pastoral, podunk life in Arkansas, he
explains to Monica that it’s the soil that
brought them there: “The best dirt in
America,” he excitedly claims. Jacob
sees the opportunity to feed thousands
of Koreans with a little taste of home.
Monica sees dirt.
Dirt is something of a focus in
“Minari.” The film carefully considers
the natural beauty of the land: rolling
fields, babbling brooks, winding roads
hemmed in by trees and trees and
trees. The idyllic scenes are contrasted
by family tensions and the looming
specter of financial catastrophe, both
aspects accompanied bewitchingly by
the film’s light, languid soundtrack.
But Monica’s not wrong, either. Dirt
is dirt, and people seldom imagine
their future in dirt, whether or not a
few pretty things grow out of it. It’s a
lonely, uncertain life for immigrant
Koreans in the homogenous alabaster
expanse of rural Arkansas. Culture
shock runs rampant and goes both
ways: Just as kids make fun of Anne
and David’s language and faces, the
Yis are endlessly put off by the locals’
Bible-thumping and reliance on things
like dowsing wands — “Koreans use
their minds,” Jacob reminds his son.
This mélange of identities and the
category crises that ensue are the
film’s quarry. What does it mean to
be Korean when you’re no longer
in Korea? What does it mean to be
American when you’re not from
America? Can Grandma smell like
Korea, even if you yourself have
never smelled Korea? (That last one
is courtesy of David.) It approaches
these topics with a tender and earnest
touch, never failing to inspire a laugh,
a tear or poignant pause with each
carefully framed slice-of-life moment.
“Minari” the film experienced
a bit of a category crisis as well. Is it
“Minari” the American movie, or
“Minari” the Korean movie? At the
Sundance Film Festival, it snagged
both the U.S. Dramatic Grand Jury
Prize and the U.S. Dramatic Audience
Award, a rare confluence of accolades.
But, at the Golden Globes, it was
relegated to the Foreign Language
Film category. It won the top prize
among foreign language films but
was disallowed from competing in
the Best Drama category due to its
Korean-bent language. It’s true, the
film is mostly in Korean, so subtitles
are a must for the non-fluent. But let’s
be clear: It’s all a load of malarkey. The
original question was not meant to be
profound, for it was no question at all.
“Minari” is as American as apple pie,
not in spite but because of its Korean
furnishings.
But these categories, as crisis-
inducing as they can be, are
ephemeral. Like all the great fish-out-
of-water family stories, it’s less about
being a fish-out-of-water and more
about being a family. Korea, Arkansas
— dirt is dirt, and a family can grow
anywhere.
‘Minari’ serves up a soul-touching slice of Americana
Indigo Sparke leaves questions,
not answers on ‘Echo’
What television has taught me about love
SARAH RAHMAN
Daily Arts Writer
ROSA SOFIA KAMINSKI
Daily Arts Writer
A24
Design by Caitlin Martens
JACOB LUSK
Daily Arts Writer
YOUR WEEKLY
ARIES
Be careful with privacy issues this
week, Aries. What you think is yours
to share may well not be. This is
particularly true if you think you are
helping a friend or a colleague – be
very careful not to jump
the gun.
AQUARIUS
GEMINI
Mars’ arrival in your sign is big news
this week and you’ll be feeling
energized, optimistic, ambitious and
capable. This translates into
increased vigor in all areas of your
life, but perhaps especially in your
personal life.
SAGITTARIUS
CAPRICORN
SCORPIO
CANCER
Something is hidden from you,
Cancer, and you can’t stand that. The
urge to dig deep and to ferret out the
truth is exceptionally strong this
week, not least because Mars begins
to transit your secrecy zone.
TAURUS
With Mars arriving in your money zone
this week, Taurus, you may feel driven
to increase your income in whatever
way is currently possible. Obviously,
this is a helpful and very motivating
influence in some ways,
but you may also start to
feel very materialistic.
VIRGO
PISCES
LIBRA
LEO
The arrival of Mars in your
humanitarian zone brings out the
best in your zodiac sign's
warm-hearted nature, Leo. You’ll feel
driven to help others, whether that’s
in a practical sense, or
through donating money,
or through raising
awareness.
Read your weekly horoscopes from astrology.tv
Ready to shine, Virgo? Mars arrives in
your career zone this week, pushing
you into the spotlight and
demanding that you showcase your
talents. It’s a brilliant week for job
seeking, interviews,
promotions and long
overdue recognition for
your hard work.
Studying is highlighted this week, and
with Mars arriving in your higher
education zone, it’s a brilliant time to
start a new course or start working
towards a qualification.
Mars’ arrival in your passion zone sets
the tone for the week – you can expect
a lot of memorable moments in a
relationship, but there is also intense
jealousy here, and even anger. Check
your motives very carefully
and be scrupulously
honorable in your actions
towards your partner.
Mars, the planet of passion, arrives in
your zodiac sign's love zone this week
– that has to be good news, right?
And it is, especially for a tired or
flagging relationship, where Mars can
help you rediscover why
you fell in love.
Mars arrives in your vitality zone,
Capricorn, making this an incredible
week to set new health and fitness
goals. You’ll be motivated and full of
positivity, which you can use to set up
a new regime or lifestyle.
Are you ready to party, Aquarius? Mars
arrives in your joy zone, urging you to
do more – much more – of whatever
makes you happy this week. From
creative hobbies, dance, art and music
to more time spent with your loved
ones, it’s all about whatever
makes you smile.
A family impasse could finally be
resolved this week as Mars shifts into
your family zone. This energy enables
you to take the lead and to force
matters to a conclusion, but not
necessarily quietly – there is anger
here, and frustration too.
WHISPER
“I’ve been thinking a lot about
the big bang.”
“Do you ever wonder why are
we alive?”
“Go outside and get some
fresh air!”
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