I saw Call Me By Your Name twice in February at Berlinale 2017 and to this day the viewing experiences themselves, combined with the context of how and why I got to Berlinale and my personal circumstances of the time of my life they took place in, have been the most powerful and life-changing confrontations with art I ever had, and might ever have in my life.
I will spare you the details, but this film reshaped my view on life itself, my sexuality, my purpose, my relationship to myself and others. It freed me of psychological barriers through its entirety, but especially the monologue and the following ending, who are to me, some of the very purest wisdom ever distilled on film.
The power of the cinematic language shouldn’t be underestimated and Call Me By Your Name is a showcase of stunning mastery of latter. It feels like the sun-soaked crossroad of a painting, a poem, a musical composition and yet the most plain and realistic aspects of life.
This fusion of naturalism and a multi-levelled poeticism is maybe what makes this so profound. The film establishes a poetic realism, something that feels hyperreal and unreal at the same time, mirroring the emotional perception that the film sets up in his main character over the course of its narrative.
The words out of Michael Stulbargh’s mouth are more worth to me, than almost everything anyone has ever said to me in my life. Some things take forever to realize because we are so caught up in our emotional state and get short-sighted to stay sane. He just says it out loud. Suddenly you understand and something inside of you, that held you back, breaks into a thousand pieces that turn into teardrops flowing down your cheek. And then Elio feels the same and you see a mirror of yourself on-screen and you can’t help but cry until you are weak. The Sufjan Stevens song never stops playing in your head.

And then you start your life.