Stillness as an existential exercise
One of the most sublime scenes of Andrei Tarkovskyâ??s film â??The Mirrorâ?? presents us a woman waiting for her husband. Itâ??s said that during the shooting the actress didnâ??t know the ending of the scene, she had to wait, only wait. The director didnâ??t tell her if her husband, absent for a long time, was going to appear at any moment or not. The actress, Margarita Terekhova, presents us a hair-raising interpretation, leaning on a fence, in front of an open field, she projects her waiting in an absolute way. She has no expectations. Her waiting exceeds its temporal dimension. Nor she, nor the spectators have any reference about when the waiting started or when itâ??s going to finish.
In the pure act of waiting, accidental aspects as who or what is being waited for, till when or since when it is going to be waited for, donâ??t matter at all. This act takes part of a paradoxical loneliness. She is alone, but itâ??s not a heart-rending loneliness; itâ??s the loneliness of the one who waits for something to come.