External beauty has always exercised a particular fascination in the history of humanity, influencing behaviors, choices and values. In contemporary society, the obsession with physical appearance has become even more pronounced, fueled by social media, advertising and television. This theme, also thanks to a recent film I saw at the cinema, invites me to offer food for thought on the implications of pursuing external beauty “at all costs” and on the risks that this search entails.
The film in question is “The substance”, the protagonist crushed by the weight of advancing age which will exclude her from the cruel and golden world of television, takes a substance which will allow her to generate a younger version of herself with which she will have to alternate (one week each) for the rest of his/their lives.
Very soon the desire to stay young will take over, destroying the body and, above all, the mind of “the other”.
In a very science fiction way, the film proposes a very current topic; this internal struggle that can arise, with the risk of becoming ill and destroyed, between our inner world and the external world that surrounds us, where our body occupies a material space visible to ourselves and also to others.
But what is beauty?
Among the most beautiful stories of love and beauty told, I remember a man with monstrous features who, with his kind heart, makes a woman fall in love (Beauty and the Beast), I remember the fairy tale of a woman madly in love with a man with whom she did not he had never even seen the face (Cupid and Psyche), a hunchback with a deformed appearance but a kind heart (the Hunchback of Notre Dame), a green ogre who teaches us to go beyond appearances (Shrek).
It is obvious that the harmonious features of the face and body can, at the beginning, make us get closer to someone. But has it never happened to you that you no longer even find a person beautiful who didn’t resonate with you inside?
And on the contrary, has it never happened to you that while talking to someone you fell very much in love with them and they didn’t respect any aesthetic standards, neither yours nor those imposed by society?
I think that the more harmonious the relationship we have with ourselves, the more others can grasp our true value from outside and above all we are at peace even with our defects, and maybe we even like them!
I think that the more our inner world doesn’t work as it should, the more we will look outside ourselves for perfection that makes us feel accepted by others.
As many stories talk about this topic; just think of Narcissus who, so in love only with his own beauty, will never know love from and for others, Dorian Gray who, in order to keep his own beauty unchanged, comes to terms with the devil, damning his soul and, even if faced with more lightness, in the film “Death Becomes Her” where two women in constant competition with each other in an attempt to excel over each other are no longer able to separate a boundary between good and evil, right and wrong.
It is true that we live in a world that can make us feel inadequate, that seems to choose us more for how we appear than what we are and think (and this treatment is increasingly reserved for women) but there is a greater truth to which we should cling: no matter how much effort we might make, we will still change and, fortunately, we will grow old (which if you think about it could be a privilege), so let’s work to increase our inner beauty because it will be the only beauty that we will be able to preserve until the end and that eyes capable of seeing will recognize Always.
I am convinced, also considering that it is a theme that painting, literature and cinema have always addressed, that I won’t tell you anything new but in recent years (as I mentioned at the beginning) social media have greatly encouraged an aesthetic, social model , economical to pursue at all costs and so it seemed right to me to write these two lines to send a message to all the teenagers (and maybe not only) who read this blog: True beauty is our uniqueness and has nothing to do with the hair color, height, weight, the clothes we wear; true beauty is what we are capable of perceiving even in the dark, with our eyes closed. It’s the sound of a voice, sensitivity towards oneself and others and…
….add everything that feels good to you!
And then let’s think about it, of all the characters I have described, who do we have a beautiful image of? Shrek or Dorian Gray?
Valeria Verna
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