By Karolina Kezdi

I spent 12 hours on someone else’s couch

The security guy at the Tate Modern told me: “I’ve checked this bag before.” Always be memorable, isn’t it?  Even if that means an oversized cotton printed tote bag and a tenderly open mouth with teeth and the text shit written on it.

I decided I’ll watch the whole real-time movie about the time before the exhibition closes.

The Clock is Christian Marclay’s installation, a 24-hours long montage of thousands of well-known and lesser-known film and television images of moments when the time is expressed or when a character interacts with a clock, watch or simply a particular time of day.

In the first few hours, I couldn’t stop myself. “This is the Angel Heart” “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” Where is the time here? Ohh, the radio… tricky!” “She’s in the Three Billboards Outside of… something, she’s married to one of the Coen brothers, what’s her name?” “I’ve been in this building!” “Pierce Brosnan is the best James Bond” “What language these two are speaking?” “Easy, that’s The Silence of the Lambs” “Who has dinner at 5 pm?!” “Nooo, I want to know what’s her answer! How can I find this movie?! Note to myself: teens in a hospital, the beach blonde guy is psycho” “He laughs exactly like Marc” “Marilyn Streep was young?”

The movie flows in real time, so the film functions as a working timepiece in itself, you can use it to tell the time at any moment. I checked my phone several times, always worked. But I lost in time. This movie is timeless, even if you saw the exact time in every second. I knew what o’clock it is, but how I felt it was different. Always quicker or slower. Why?

I have to confess three things:

1. I read the dilemma in the family WhatsApp group of the girl next to me about Granny’s 74th birthday, who hates birthdays. P. S.: They will take her for an early lunch next Sunday, anyway.

1. Although I packed a gallon of coffee, celery and carrot sticks for fake popcorning, I have to admit, I napped a bit. Comfy seats in the dark are tempting. Not just for me, the man on my right was snoring. (Fun fact: I think I’m the only living person on this planet who loves when someone snoring next to me because it reminds me in half-sleep and half wakefulness, I’m not alone. Who I love is here with me.)

1. I was wondering sometimes. I feel massive guilt when I should focus, but my mind is over the rainbow. It’s pure procrastination to do what you have to.

I came out from the Macbeth, and I couldn’t tell what happened on the stage, but I had pretty decent ideas about how to reduce knife crime. I strongly believe, and always telling all the world and his wife: art is something you don’t have to understand, it’s about thought and emotion – provocation.

Maybe I should keep my own advice?

I thought about every scene as one thread of the story, like different dimensions of the same day. Everyone in the movie (Dracula, too) is a different persona who’s living in the same word at the same time, and doing different irrational things all the time.

Insights… Insights are everywhere.

Gift:

Final Cut Ladies and Gentlemen This movie has the same structure, just it’s about ladies and gentlemen namely love. And just 1:25 hours.