Compared with "I Love Huckabee" and "The Mechanic", "Fantasy Jacket" is more difficult to interpret. This is just like watching TV shows like "The West Wing", most of the time I don't know what to understand of.
But there is one thing that I am willing to believe. Under the surface of combining various movie elements and styles, there is a clear idea in it. Here, I would like to use the new term "new idea film" proposed by the mainland director Haoran. I believe that, at least in our opinion, this kind of American film can be called a new idea. However, sadly, maybe we are The influence of too many fake "new ideas" mainland movies has affected our judgment in this regard.
I still continue to use the interpretation of "Artificial Intelligence", starting with the director's creative ideas. Of course, due to the limitations of subjective and objective factors, there are naturally inappropriate aspects in the details, but I believe that people who have worked, studied, and lived in the United States have more advantages in this regard.
I feel that director John Maybury still uses war's distortion and damage to human nature as an entry point. From the beginning of the Gulf War, as well as Jack's home state of Vermont, it is not difficult to get such an inference.
On March 1, one-fifth of Vermont small towns will discuss the role of the state's National Guard in the Iraq War and whether U.S. troops should be withdrawn from Iraq, the Christian Science Monitor reported on February 28. out. Opponents called the Iraq solution "nonsense" on the town meeting agenda, complaining that the good guys disrupted the annual meeting to discuss issues such as snow shoveling or school roof repairs. Supporters, however, see the Iraq war as a central issue in the town: it concerns the lives of men, women and children, work and even breadwinners.
Vermont has always been actively involved in social affairs. After the main fighting in Iraq, all 50 towns in the state put the Iraq solution on the agenda of town meetings. Town meetings are a time-honored tradition in New England.
However, the director did not want to tell the story from the traditional perspective of facing the cruelty of the war, directly showing the psychological shadows after the war, or the different viewpoints among the people.
There is a section in the film where Jack is regarded as a suspect for killing a police officer, which looks very abrupt, and then Jack is found not guilty because of the mental sequelae left in the war. Then can we understand it in this way, this is itself a thinking about whether it is a crime to start a war?
Jack was injured by a child in the war, so he brought out his thoughts about the war, but the director did not go down this road, but started anew: Jack was determined to kill the police in action, but mentally Can be forgiven, and this mental trauma can be linked to war, which is to infer a certain point of view, in the name of war, killing is innocent.
After entering the mental hospital, Dr. Baker applied Jack's claustrophobia therapy, that is, being put on a restraint garment and locked in a morgue. Although this can also be regarded as an outdated and illegal therapy for patients to "face death". But at the same time, you can also see Dr. Baker as someone who has a negative, hostile attitude towards the conduct of war. This can be seen from his recounting of the treatment of former patient Ted Casey, that he is skeptical of war "madmen" like Jack, thinking that they are not crazy and should be responsible for their actions.
At the same time, the director also did not indulge in this mutual hatred, but led his thinking to a relatively bright side. Of course, it seems unrealistic to directly face, appease, and resolve this kind of contradiction. Therefore, in addition to the two time periods of the Gulf War and the hospital in 1993, another "death and then life" began in 2007. . There, in addition to having feelings for Becky, Jack's equally important task is to find the cause of his death and try to change it. This can actually be seen as a reflection on the distorted years in reality. This, for the passages of Dr. Baker and Lawrenson, still depends on the complexity of the time paradox. In 2007, Baker told Jack the names of previous patients, and in 1993, Jack told Baker again, which actually corresponds to the interdependence and mutual cause and effect of different views on war among the people, and it is not difficult for you It was found that Dr. Baker was also experiencing psychological torture. And Laurenson's treatment of epilepsy seems to imply the need to use extraordinary means in extreme environments.
Compared with these events that are somewhat "fateful", Jack's intervention in the Ji'an family, who can be regarded as independently raising their daughter due to the war, is more proactive, thus achieving the result of defeating fate.
Therefore, if you only look at it from the perspective of "suspense, supernatural, thriller, horror, love", "Spiritual Jacket" seems to be easily regarded as "a very representative empty work in pseudo-suspense films". But as long as you are willing to uncover these easily lost appearances, you should still be able to discover the true feelings hidden in them and face the reality.
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