#cmbyn analysis

I tried to find screencaps of each shot I talk about in this post, but they were kind of difficult to come by, so I threw what I could in there, and as for the rest...I hope I explain the shot I’m referencing accurately! 

First, there are the swim trunk shots — where Oliver’s trunks are hanging from the faucet of the tub. The faucet is dripping, just as Elio’s (and Oliver’s, but we’ll focus on our boy elly belly for the time being) feelings are beginning to trickle out, or at least, he’s beginning to become aware of what his feelings are exactly. He’s never experienced this before, and he’s slow to let this foreign emotion spill out in the slightest. 

I’m building up to the good stuff, I swear!

Then comes the shot just before Oliver’s “listen to this drivel,” that shows the fountain (it’s more like a faucet for the pool?? but idk what else to call it) letting out a steady stream of water into their lil swimming trough. Their exchange here -- “that’s the kindest thing anyone has said to me in months” -- opens Elio up to the thought of giving himself over to feeling, maybe even letting himself think that Oliver could be feeling just as he is. The feeling faucet™, is beginning to fill Elio’s emotional tub (there’s gotta be a more eloquent way for me to say this, but here we are).

Then there’s the shot preceding Annella’s story time. We all know the story of the princess and the knight, that mirrors Elio and Oliver almost exactly (shouts out to Annella, we stan the queen of quietly meddling) -- I DIGRESS. It’s storming, and the rain is heavy and unrelenting; the shot shows the peach trees and the rest of the orchard getting hounded by the storm, much like Elio’s own whirlwind of emotion underneath the surface. He’s confused, troubled over what he’s feeling for Oliver. Troubled over whether or not it’s right, whether or not it’s possible that the feeling could be reciprocated, whether or not he should act on it. “I’ll never have the courage to ask a question like that,” he says. But then what happens the next day?! 

The next day: Oliver sitting on the edge of the pool, with his foot swaying idly in the water. Literally dipping his toe in the pool of this thing they’re on the precipice of (it’s love, bitch!! letting yourself love and be loved!!) After they conclude that the princess says it’s “better to speak,” well...Oliver speaks. “Why don’t we go together” -- not an outright confession of wanting, but a subtle volley of the ball back into Elio’s court. The best way Oliver knows to communicate how he’s feeling. And then Monet’s Berm happens. *cries*

Then we approach a sort of stalemate. Sitting water, if you will. We see Elio swim, but here, the water -- it’s more of a cleansing he’s chasing. Trying to wash away the feelings that are persisting after the Berm, perhaps? In and out of the water, he pops up out of the lake with the Star of David on his neck, in his mouth. With Oliver is distancing himself, that’s Elio’s way of being with him again. To be connected through their shared faith, if nothing else. In and out of the water with Marzia, trying to wash away his craving her, his craving Oliver. With each dip and reemergence, Elio wanting something different -- going back under again and again because he’s unsure of what he wants, or should want, each time he thinks he’s made up his mind. And after the midnight scene, his and Oliver’s morning swim was probably meant to bring him some clarity after his (sexual/moral) identity crisis. Water is cleansing, but it’s also literally fluid, fluidity. It can take countless forms. You can have rain, snow, ice; it can be cold or hot or anything between the two extremes -- be a lake, river, pool, ocean. Just as love has infinite forms -- wanting man and/or woman, the love you have for your family, your friends, star-crossed love, calling-the-other-by-your-name love. Endless variations.

And then, ladies and gentlemen, we have fucking Bergamo. This is the love dam breaking. A deafening, constant, roaring roll of water, of love, flowing hard and fast. In this place, the two of them can be wholly themselves, completely in love, without the weight of their inevitable goodbye, of judgment, of anything from the outside world. They know no one there, only each other. They can just be. Running up these mountains screaming “Love My Way,” calling each by the other’s name at the top of their lungs. The enormity of their love, of Elio accepting that he is in love, that this, arguably most important human emotion, is being reciprocated and the fact that they’re living in this bliss even for just a few days, is manifested physically in the shots of these unbelievable feats of nature. And love is a feat of nature in and of itself. There’s an air of mystery around a waterfall as well -- I don’t know how to describe it, and I don’t know how many of you have ever witnessed one in person -- it’s so loud, so impossible to ignore, so crazy to witness with your own eyes. You just have to stand there and take it all in. This is that moment for Elio and Oliver, taking in everything that their love has to offer them in this heartbreakingly short amount of time. I’m crying ?????

And then, just like that, Oliver is gone. And the winter comes. The Berm has frozen over, the home, the town in which they spent all of their time together has all but been buried in snow. The water has frozen, the love has frozen. It hasn’t disappeared, it’s just...existing under the ice. And it may take a while, but ice always, always thaws. 

So my mom and I were talking about cmbyn because thats just part of our everyday routine now and this is what we came up with:

Did Oliver love Elio more than Elio loved Oliver? Also known as: The hottest take I’ll probably ever try to explain on the internet.

Each chapter of the book follows a different love of Paul’s life, but I want to focus on the Star Love section specifically. @thestarsaregivenonceonly Jen, all your talk about “and when they were brought together, they collided like stars,” in your post about Elio and Oliver’s farewell made me think of this IMMEDIATELY -- and also cry, but that’s beside the point. 

Anyway, here I go y’all. I apologize in advance, this is gonna be LONG!!!

For those of you who haven’t read it, here’s a real simplistic backstory on this chapter -- Paolo (Paul) and Chloe have fallen in and out of each other’s lives roughly every four years since they were in college, and our first quote comes as they reunite at a dinner party. 

“’There’s a life that takes place in ordinary time,’” I said, “and another that bursts in but just as suddenly fizzles out. And then there’s the life we may never reach but that could so easily be ours if only we knew how to find it. It doesn’t necessarily happen on our planet, but is just as real as the one we live by--call it our ‘star life.’ ...” (p. 194)

If this shit don’t make you think of Elio and Oliver, I don’t know what will. UGH. I’m gonna drop more quotes excerpts on y’all before I actually go off off. We’ll come back to this one though. The next one comes later that same evening, in a phone call after they’ve each gone home from the party. 

“I didn’t know why I was upset. “Because my heart is racing right now and it’s been so long. All those years and it won’t go away,” I said. Her words about loving someone without being in love with him were coming back to me. I felt their lure in my body. I just loved her, loved her with heartbreak and resentment, because we’d wasted so many years, because there is no love without desire, diffidence, defeat ... “We’ve misspent years of our lives--we’re both living the wrong life, you and I. Everything about us is wrong.” 

“Not fair. We were never wrong. You and I are the only thing right in our lives--it’s everything else that’s wrong.’” (p. 201)

Are you crying? Because I’m crying. Perhaps I’m a little too attached to these characters that I love so much, but I see Elio and Oliver in this entire exchange. It’s heartbreaking, speaking with the great love of your life, “““the one that got away,””” knowing that you’ve been kept apart by nothing but yourselves. I can’t help but feel like this is kind of what we’ll get in the film’s sequel; it definitely mirrors what happens in Ghost Spots. (Side note: I don’t know if anyone has read The Light We Lost but.....1) ya need to and 2) this shit ^^^ is hurting my heart)

But wait! There’s more! Paul has a cancer scare and: 

“’Not to sound presumptuous, but I kept wondering what would happen to you when I was gone.”

“If you die before me? ... If you die there’ll be nothing left, nothing at all. But you know this” ...

“But we’re never even there for each other.”

“Means nothing. You’re always there. ... And what if I should die?” she asked.

“If you die, there’ll be nothing too, just nothing.’” (p. 208)

BUT WE’RE NEVER EVEN THERE FOR EACH OTHER. MEANS NOTHING. YOU’RE ALWAYS THERE. I cannot. When I read this part, and the strikingly similar one in CMBYN, my eyes literally flood. There is no stopping it. Ever. I will say though, that reading this interaction I felt like Paul is speaking more as Oliver, and Chloe more as Elio? idk if I’m explaining that right?? This and another scene (that I won’t go over here) really solidify that for me, but I don’t want to spoil it or put the whole fucking book in this already-too-long post. Is anyone even still reading ???

This next one coming from Chloe:

“Here’s what I find unbearable ... The thought that I could have lived through all the years in between to arrive at this moment on this courtyard with you and still feel I haven’t budged an inch undoes me totally. I’d give anything not to know that the girl who was twenty at the time and who waited for you to come upstairs that evening would end up having to live through so much nonsense only to find herself back where she started, almost eager to see it happen all over again. It’s as if part of me had dug its heels in, never left, and simply waited for me to come back ... My marriage never happened to me. I’m not a mother ... They belong to one itinerary. I’m talking about the other, the one we stumble in and out of every four years ... Our star life, yours with mine.’” (p. 216) 

See, here I see Chloe as Oliver. And Elio’s “Would I start again if I could? In a second” reflected here as well. I guess that’s probably the point though, yeah? Elio is Oliver just as Paul is Chloe. 

a lil one next, but it almost makes me the saddest. 

“’Two days,” I said. 

“Two days.”

What we meant, though neither of us was going to say it, was, a whole lifetime in two days.” (p. 218)

All I can think of is Rome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I’m cRYING !!!!!! Both of these couples have stolen a few precious days away together, where they can just be. Be completely themselves, completely happy, and completely, unabashedly in love. A few days of bliss, in their star life before they return to their comas parallel lives. 

I’m almost done talking in circles, I swear! Just two more!!! 

(Chloe) “’Your hell--and it’s mine too--is that even when you’re with Manfred, you’ll want to be with me again. You and I don’t love the way others do--we run on empty. ... I could tell you to be happy you have him, but it won’t help. I could tell you to be happy we’ve got two days, but that won’t help either. You’re alone, as I’m alone, and the cruelest thing is that finding each other and saying let us be alone together won’t solve a thing.”

I loved her more than ever now.

“How do you know me so well?”

“Because you and I are one and the same person. Everything I said about you is true about me. In a month from now, but not now, we’ll wake up and realize that this here was the wine of life.’” (p. 230)

I mean....COME ON. My heart hurts. this here was the wine of life. Reminds me of Oliver’s “Your best moment?” and both of those motherfuckers answer Rome, ((((((i’m crying again))))) Rome was the wine of life. Also, “you’re alone, as I’m alone” -- they’re both living presumably full, successful lives, but since they’re not each present in the other’s none of it matters, and their little time in their star life isn’t going to change what they’re going back to. I should not be writing this at 2am I am diSTRAUGHT. 

Alright y’all I’ll finally shut the hell up after this one:

“’Why have we waited so long?”

I didn’t know the answer. “Maybe because what we want hasn’t been invented yet.”

“Maybe because it doesn’t exist.”

“Which is why I dread how this ends.” ...

“I know one thing, though,” she said without turning around.

“What?”

“This doesn’t end, whatever happens. Never, never ends.” I tightened my arms around her. “Star love, my love, star love. It may not live but it never dies. It’s the only thing I’m taking with me, and you will too, when the time comes.” (p. 233)

Now this. THIS is what is implied in the ending of Call Me By Your Name, both the book and the film. Their love never ends. Even after periods of little to no communication -- be it twenty years or every four, it never, never ends. Star love. Now I’ll loop back to the first quote I dropped in this post: “... And then there’s the life we may never reach but that could so easily be ours if only we knew how to find it. It doesn’t necessarily happen on our planet, but is just as real as the one we live by--call it our ‘star life.’ ...” 

If only we knew how to find it. 

I CAN’T TYPE ANYMORE I’M A MESS BYE 

What ‘Call Me By Your Name’ Means: I wrote this sober, which is probably a shock to some people 

Postcard/Cor Cordium: how two Italian words ruin my goddamn life

Why Oliver’s Love is Valid: self-explanatory

Why the Freezer Scene is my favorite: controversial!

The San Clemente Syndrome: watch as I try to understand something that goes over my head!

The Rome Party (from the book): I went to a party, got emotional and then wrote this

What Mystery of Love means: how it relates to the story 

Oliver and Loneliness: (a kind of collab with liv @terxture)

hello! in order to properly answer this question i listened to mystery of love on repeat laying facedown in a dark room (just for some context) sorry this is so long i have too many feelings 

ok, so, i have always loved this song, but never really listened to it in an analytical way, and doing this wrekt me beyond belief. first we need to establish that sufjan stevens is a genius that was able to weave stories in songs that also parallelled the movie like this is some inception shit. you care about the characters in the song just as much as the characters in the movie!!! (see also: visions of gideon) now im going to point out some lines that i think solidify for me why it is so special to the story

“Boundless by the time I cried, I built your walls around me“ this line for me represents the fact that the reason elio had to not approach oliver is that he thought that oliver hated him: aka he put oliver’s walls up for oliver (r u crying or is it just me?)

“Shall I sleep within your bed“ this for me is the blurring of lines between what is elio’s and what is oliver’s and what is both of theirs (the room is the biggest thing because most of the time it’s elio’s and for the summer it’s Oliver’s but also belongs to both of them

also all the mentions of water and drowning feel important because the river is such a key part of the movie and their relationship there are all kinds of aspects that can be seen as being reborn/baptized that much smarter people than me have figured out and the concept of whether or not their love can dry out. i don’t know much about rivers but i am pretty sure that even if a riverbed is dry, with a big enough rain it can be replenished (so there is no neccessary end to elio and oliver)