About halfway through Todd Haynes’s May/December, Natalie Portman’s character places her hand on top of another – an X-ray image of an anonymous stranger’s hand and the bones inside. It is as if, merely by touching the facsimile of a skeleton, she might gain access to the meaning that the image implies. This moment in the film simulates May/December’s driving interest: simultaneously suggesting the presence of psychological depth and its ultimate elusiveness. The film laughs at Elizabeth, and us, for being foolish enough to believe that the snapshot of a skeleton means we should know anything about it other than the fact, not feeling, of its broken bones. In doing so, it strikes at a far-reaching faith in mimetic representation’s omniscient capacities, and the flawed logic that underlies such an enduring investment in finding a perfect match between form and feeling.
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