Audrey, you killed short form for me.

Roman Holiday didn’t kill my love for short form content.

Mainly because it never was love.

It was more of a voluntary sedation.

Downtime became dopamine-time: scrolling, chuckling, reading comments.

It’s like getting the climax of a film over and over again. But you never recall them, because they lack depth, any substance at all, really.

I’m not here to shit on short form content.

I’m just now aware that it was indeed a sedation, that I never truly enjoyed it, thanks to the movie Roman Holiday.

You probably won’t watch it, mainly because you’ve never heard of it, it being 70 years old, and in black and white.

Released in 1953, starring Gregory Peck and introducing Audrey Hepburn, the film’s about a frustrated princess who escapes her palace and goes on an adventure with a journalist.

A fun watch. It won three Oscars. Again, you probably won’t watch it.

The movie draws out in a classic way: two strangers meet, share a bit of romance, and have a kiss or two. It builds and builds, allowing the viewer to feel like they know where all this lovey-dovey behavior is heading.

All leading up to the climax, the last ten minutes. The movie does not end how you think; it doesn’t end how you want. It loops the two main characters back together, most likely for the last time, among others to whom they cannot show their desire. So they stare at each other, sharing a secret, one only they know, and you, the viewer. Then they walk away from each other forever.

It’s because of this misdirection, catching me off guard, that I felt pause.

For what seemed like just another movie, this bittersweet, unexpected ending is, in my view, what made the film.

And after the credits roll, I close my laptop, lie there, then reach for my phone, ready to look at shorts, then think:

It’s not the same.

I think it’s only when we’re hit with something that enriches the soul, striking a chord, leaving you with a mixture of emotions you don’t know what to do with, that we can break free from the clutches of the hollow and empty.

Art has a healing ability. That’s what Roman Holiday was for me.

As for the artless:

It scratches an itch.

But it is fleeting, never addressing the root problem, always leaving you hungry for more.

And so you eat and consume and eat and consume, only to never, ever feel full.

Or so I think,

George