If you follow Chintz on Twitter, Google+, or Facebook, you might have seen yesterday’s link to the short film (above), First Kiss, which was released just over a week ago on YouTube. It shows a group of people who have never met before kissing for the first time. It’s awkward, emotional and, in my opinion, absolutely breathtaking, not least because it shows just how powerful, intimate and erotic the simple act of two sets of lips meeting can be.
After watching it, I did a bit of Googling. Who was the woman who produced the film, Tatia Pilieva, and how had she conceived of the idea? After a little bit of poking about, I came upon this Huffington Post article in which she talks about the film and how it came to be.
‘When I need cheering up, I often open a folder on my laptop entitled KISSES. Sometimes I look at it even when happy, wishing to be happier. The KISSES folder consists of short videos of my husband, Andre and I kissing in different places over the last 9 years. The kisses vary – some are shot underwater where you barely see our faces, some in hurricane like winds in Joshua Tree, others in bed while on the phone with the post office trying to track down a lost passport. But they always make me feel better about life.’
Tatia then goes on to talk about how the film became a collaboration with a friend, Melissa Coker, founder of clothing company WREN.
And this is where romanticism and cynicism start to collide. A friend, who had seen the film a little earlier in the week, alerted me to this piece in the U.K.’s The Independent titled ‘First Kiss viral video was just a clothing advert starring actors’. According to the writer:
‘True love is dead and everything is just a cynical plot to extract your money, it emerged today, when the First Kiss video featuring “strangers” making out was found to be just a commercial for an autumn/winter clothing line.’
Which leads to an obvious question: even though this film was eventually shot with a commercial motivation in mind (the promotion of WREN), does that detract from the actions of those who feature in it and the emotions they evoke in the viewer?
Normally, I’m a bit of a cynic. And I’m not keen on marketing ploys. But I’ve got to say that I don’t subscribe to The Independent’s assertion that because someone is an actor by profession it makes their contribution to First Kiss any less valid so long as they were, as Pilieva asserts, genuinely kissing someone for this first time. To my mind, this a beautiful little film, thoughtfully conceived, and realised through commercial contribution. If WREN hadn’t invested in it, we (over 63 million of us at last count) wouldn’t have seen it. And I, for one, am happier having watched it. Like Tatia, seeing these beautiful kisses made me feel better about life.
I guess that makes me a hopeless romantic. But you know what?
I’m proud to be one.
I agree. The commercial component of the film is virtually invisible. I don’t look at the clothes, I look at the faces. I concentrate on the awkward giggling, the tentative touches, the final dive into intimacy with a stranger. None of it relates to WREN and if you hadn’t pointed it out I would never have known. At best it might make some observant people ask ‘what’s WREN?’ if they look at the titles, but other than that, the execution of the idea is delightful. And appeals to the hopeless romantic in us all.
Thanks for sharing Jane. x