in the nature of things

The central image of in the nature of things is the Forest – sometimes fearful, sometimes a refuge, always mysterious, and the multiple associations and myths embedded in it – myths within which we live and which live within us – our collective history. But, unexpected moments, intensified fragments, catch us unawares – the present confronts us. For Emmanuel Levinas, the face-to-face encounter with another is a privileged phenomenon in which the person’s proximity and distance are both strongly felt. “The face opens the primordial discourse whose first word is obligation…the face speaks…the first word of the face is ‘Thou shalt not kill’; it is an order.” Emmanuel Levinas “in the nature of things” continues my examination of the oppositions played out dialectically and enmeshed in our experience of living: culture/nature, lived history /recorded, belonging/destroying, communal/individual, innocence/danger, young/old, living/dying. This is an autumnal film – twilight – a film of old age. Just as Forest is a transitional space, so Old Age is a transitional time.