The 3 Reasons Aging Is So Terrifying In Movies & TV  Trope Analysis - video Dailymotion

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00:00Even more than spooky creeps and things that go bump in the night,

00:03there's one thing that seems to strike fear into everyone's heart.

00:06Aging.

00:07Oh, I'm like the Crypt Keeper!

00:09From modern horror like The Substance to classic films,

00:13the terror of realizing the clock is ticking down on your life

00:16has long been a topic of interest and fear for creatives.

00:19So let's take a deeper look at what specifically makes aging so terrifying.

00:24This is life's ultimate cruelty.

00:26It offers us the taste of youth and vitality.

00:30And then makes us witness our own decay.

00:33And why it's actually one scary thing that we should learn to embrace.

00:38The most outwardly obvious side effects of aging are also the ones people,

00:42at first at least, fear the most.

00:45Wrinkled, wrinkled little star.

00:49Hope they never see the scars.

00:52Aging often feels like some nebulous, far-off thing.

00:55Until you begin to see and feel the earliest signs sneaking in.

00:59A wrinkle popping up that doesn't go away, no matter how hydrated you are.

01:03A body ache that lingers long after it should.

01:06Given how incredibly beauty-focused so much of our society is,

01:10it can feel like these signs come in an avalanche.

01:13Once you notice one thing, you can't help but notice others.

01:16It can feel like you don't quite recognize the person you see in the mirror anymore.

01:20The face and body you came to understand as you, slipping away.

01:25Replaced with something similar, but never quite the same.

01:29And beyond that, other people start to notice as well.

01:32And it can totally change how they treat you.

01:35So it's not surprising that many people will go to some pretty great lengths

01:38to try to stave off the physical realities of aging to any degree they can.

01:43I had a little Botox, and some collagen, and a chemical peel, and something with shark DNA.

01:48Admit it.

01:49I look ten years younger.

01:51And while this used to be a concern that would begin cropping up around middle age,

01:55now, thanks to the ubiquity of social media, film, television magazines, billboards,

02:00and a seemingly endless stream of content,

02:02warning us that while we should for sure love ourselves,

02:05we'd love ourselves more if we never aged.

02:08This problem has begun stressing out even people who are still in that youthful phase of life.

02:13And of course, because society places so much emphasis on women's looks,

02:17most of the horror associated with aging exists in the feminine realm.

02:21Men might be able to become silver foxes,

02:24but women are expected to constantly be tweaking themselves to keep up appearances.

02:29As you know, I have always loved my body just the way it is.

02:33But I have decided that I might be ready for bigger boobs.

02:36Since when?

02:38Since I had a cold, hard dose of reality.

02:42From this.

02:43This battle between one's idealized younger self and faltering older self,

02:47and the societal pressures women in particular face to constantly find ways to freeze or turn back the clock,

02:53plays out in a very literal way in recent horror film The Substance.

02:57Demi Moore plays Elizabeth,

02:58an Oscar-winning actress who found her career waning as she approached 50,

03:03at which point she's even fired from her TV hosting gig.

03:06She's introduced to the titular substance,

03:08a chance for a piece of her to return to that youthful era.

03:12One single injection unlocks your DNA,

03:16starting a new cellular division that will release another version of yourself.

03:21But of course, it doesn't end up being the dreamt of return to form,

03:25or at least not for very long,

03:27because everything has a price.

03:29Because in the end, you can never really undo the forward march of time,

03:34and trying will only tear you apart.

03:37I put so much pressure on myself.

03:40It's what I did to myself because of that.

03:44While the physical changes of aging can come as a shock,

03:47the psychological effects can cut even deeper.

03:50When I was 18, I could do anything.

03:54My emotions were so close to the surface,

03:57I could feel everything easily.

03:59As we move further and further down the timeline of life,

04:01the reality that no matter what we do,

04:04there will be an end,

04:06can be daunting.

04:07Where you had once settled into things just for now,

04:10but always planned to go after what you actually wanted later,

04:13you begin to realize that there might not be a later

04:16where you can make it happen anymore.

04:18Happy birthday, Grandma.

04:20It's better to be over the hill

04:22than buried under it.

04:26That's funny.

04:27It can feel like your options have been whittled down,

04:30the boundless opportunity of youth

04:32replaced with responsibility

04:34and having to worry about more than just you.

04:37All of a sudden, I'm this overburdened mother.

04:40I barely got to do it, Zach.

04:42I barely got the chance to be a person.

04:44And for many of us,

04:45because we've been on such unsteady ground,

04:47it feels like we're constantly behind.

04:50So it can feel like if we could just get a little more time,

04:52we could figure everything out.

04:54But instead, the clock keeps ticking away.

04:57I can't get off the couch.

04:59I got kicked out of my apartment.

05:01I can't pay any of my bills.

05:03My car is a piece of shit.

05:04I don't have any friends.

05:06There's so much pressure to do everything,

05:08to be everything you've ever wanted to be without compromise,

05:11that if you don't fit everything in,

05:13it can start to feel like you failed.

05:15But everyone's like, oh, go overseas, do you see?

05:17Do your overseas experience, it's gonna be great, which is fine.

05:19That's totally fine.

05:20But I don't have anything to show for my time here.

05:24There's also the element of feeling like you're being replaced before your time.

05:28Every year that you age is also another year

05:31where yet another crop of younger, fresher, shinier people

05:34pop up to do everything that you wanted to do, but better.

05:37I should have just retired and gone out on top.

05:41Who are you kidding?

05:42You could never retire.

05:45You're gonna be up on that stage until you die.

05:47Having to contend with feeling like you missed your shot,

05:50to be the person that you wanted to be,

05:52or even just to get your life together,

05:54can feel genuinely horrifying.

05:56Older than Stephen Sondheim when he had his first Broadway show.

06:00Older than Paul McCartney when he wrote his last song with John Lennon.

06:04By the time my parents were 30, they had careers with steady paychecks, a mortgage.

06:10The idea that the world is changing, but you're not a driving force,

06:13but instead one getting left behind,

06:16can totally topple one's sense of self and leave you feeling totally unmoored.

06:20I am big.

06:23It's the pictures that got small.

06:25And of course in our modern era, this all dovetails with the competing notions

06:28that we should love ourselves exactly where we are,

06:31and appreciate what we have,

06:33and that we should constantly be working to improve ourselves

06:36and doing whatever we have to do to make it up even one more rung of the ladder.

06:41As we see play out literally in the substance,

06:43this kind of split of the self only really leads to destruction.

06:47Not even the toughest final girl can run from aging forever.

06:51It's the one thing that will always catch up to us eventually.

06:54And so that generally leads to the final major fear associated with aging,

06:59the unknown that comes after, and what you leave behind.

07:03It makes sense that we're afraid of death itself.

07:05It's something we don't understand, can't control, and can't avoid.

07:09We never know when it's going to come for us or how.

07:12And we have no idea what happens afterwards, if there even is an afterwards.

07:16Maybe it's better, maybe it's worse, maybe it's nothing at all.

07:19But on a more tangible level, we often also fear what we are, or aren't,

07:24leaving behind when we do finally shuffle off this mortal coil.

07:27We spend so much of our lives so concerned with what we're doing, how we're perceived.

07:43And the older we get, the more we start to realize that what we've done is who we are.

07:48I thought that small talk was too small, I thought big talk was too pretentious,

07:53I thought music was noise, and I thought art was bullshit.

07:58The choices we've made, the things we've created, the things we didn't do,

08:01all come together in the end to create a legacy of us.

08:05And that is pretty scary.

08:07Which can lead to people making some rather rash decisions to try to set the record straight,

08:12while they still can.

08:14Why do you want to go back to a place that's done nothing but hurt your feelings?

08:17Because I want those people to know that I'm not a joke.

08:21And that I've won.

08:23So all of this is pretty horrifying.

08:26But does it have to be?

08:28We can't stop aging.

08:30But really, that isn't a bad thing.

08:32It certainly can be scary to feel the time slipping by,

08:36to see yourself and the world around you changing,

08:38and to feel like you're losing any control you might have thought you had.

08:41But aging is a part of living.

08:43It's in fact one of the most integral parts of our existence.

08:47That we don't stay static forever,

08:49but are constantly evolving and growing as we continue to experience life.

08:53So here I am, laughing and learning.

08:56Indeed, we're lucky if we get to age.

08:58Because many people don't.

09:00Angelina Jolie, who has had to go up against the pressures

09:02that come with being one of the world's most beautiful women aging in the spotlight,

09:07told British Vogue,

09:08I do like being older.

09:09I feel much more comfortable in my 40s than I did when I was younger.

09:12Maybe because, I don't know, maybe because my mom didn't live very long.

09:16So there's something about age that feels like a victory instead of a sadness for me.

09:21I think it's an honor to get older.

09:23Not everybody gets to get older.

09:24I know we're obsessed with youth.

09:26I would not go back if you paid me.

09:28My skin was tighter.

09:30Sure, my stomach was flatter.

09:32But, I am so much more comfortable in my skin.

09:35No matter how much we may want to hold on to our youth,

09:38either out of our own desire or outside pressures or both,

09:41it's just not something that we'll ever realistically be able to do.

09:45And focusing so much of our effort and attention during our short time on the earth on that

09:49only works to make us more miserable.

09:52Chasing youth is just futile at least.

09:54Oh, it's the one thing you're never gonna catch.

09:55You're never gonna get there, so it's like, why not just embrace what's going on?

09:58And as enticing as being young forever may initially sound,

10:02it would actually probably be pretty terrible.

10:05But you never grow old.

10:07Yes.

10:07But everybody else will.

10:09I'll have to watch everyone around me die.

10:12This is not a dream, this is a nightmare.

10:14Instead, we'd be better served by making the most of the time we do have,

10:18instead of wasting our energy on trying to hold on to such a small, fleeting sliver of it.

10:22Which is certainly easier said than done.

10:24Especially in a world that's constantly telling us that our value is in our youth

10:27and our ability to maintain it.

10:29The difference is now, I can catch myself.

10:32I can go, yep, I don't like that loose skin.

10:35But you know, it is what it is.

10:37But that's all the more reason that we should instead focus our efforts on trying to break

10:41down and get rid of those societal pressures that make us feel like we should be lamenting

10:46the loss of our past, instead of appreciating where we've been and looking forward to our

10:51futures, however they might look.

10:53Year of Penny!

10:54The year's been over for a couple months now, Penn.

10:56Well, not the fiscal year of Penny.

10:58Suck it, taxpayers!

11:00That's the take.

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