Oscar-Winning "Sentimental Value": Why Things Suddenly Mean the World to Us
At last! They've gone and done it. A ripple of excitement went through the auditorium at this year's Oscars when Joachim Trier's "Sentimental Value" was named Best International Film. I was watching it live and thought: finally, Norway gets its due. The industry's been whispering for years that the Scandinavians were due another big win – and now it's happened. It takes something special to create a film that creeps up on you so quietly, yet causes such a stir.
The story follows a family in Oslo, sifting through their late mother's flat. They're standing there with boxes full of bits and bobs: an old fountain pen, letters with yellowed edges, a chipped coffee pot. None of it's worth a penny on the open market, yet they'd fight tooth and nail to keep it all. I know the feeling. That one book that still smells of your gran's house. Or the frying pan that always made the best roast potatoes. It's that phenomenon, that invisible glue that binds us to our things.
The True Value That Doesn't Come with a Price Tag
We Brits are known for having a keen eye for value – but we're not talking about property prices here. It's what you might call sentimental value, the emotional worth an object holds for us. It completely defies market logic. In the film, it's a simple guitar that belonged to the father, barely playable, out of tune. But the daughter is desperate to keep it because it's tied to her entire childhood. It's moments like these that Joachim Trier captures so masterfully. Little wonder the film now has an Oscar – it shows us that we're all sentimental collectors at heart.
Books as Silent Witnesses
This week, I stumbled upon an English book in a bookshop: "Once Upon a Tome: The Misadventures of a Rare Bookseller". It's about an antiquarian bookseller in Bath who deals every day with other people's sentimental attachments. People bring in old books that are essentially worthless – but tucked inside is an inscription from 1923 or a pressed forget-me-not. Suddenly, the book becomes a treasure. It's the same kind of magic you see in the film.
Sometimes I think: the things that truly matter to us don't have a price. They're just there, like quiet companions. I got to thinking about which objects hold the most sentimental value for me. These are my top three:
- My dad's old, worn-out record that he left me – it skips at the best part, but that's precisely what makes it special.
- A little thank-you note my niece wrote me as a child, which she once slipped under my front door.
- An old wall calendar from 1999 that I just can't throw away, because I used to jot down my homework in it every evening.
I bet everyone has a box in the loft or a drawer full of things that would seem completely baffling to anyone else. But that's the beauty of it, isn't it? "Sentimental Value" has now taken that idea all the way to Hollywood – and frankly, it's exactly what these quiet treasures deserve.