One, the introduction
On the recommendation of a friend of mine, I just watched this movie the other day. This is a very good movie. I was thinking too, but didn't really want to write anything. It's just that I saw some of the movie reviews, and it really doesn't make sense. So I want to write a good article, mainly for thinking about the content of the story. I don't know who gave me the confidence that I thought was the most correct. I have it anyway, hahahaha!
Second, the structure of the novel
In fact, this is a movie that is very close to the novel. This statement may feel a little detached. Because today's entertainment movies focus too much on visual effects, it is even less like a novel, not even a story. At most, a hundred-word description is written based on the movie. The movie is still old school, and watching it is no different from the experience of reading a novel.
It reminds me of the composition of Milan Kundera's "Light" and "Immortal", the structure of four people, two by two, and there is an accidental interweaving and dialogue between the four people. The key is to have a division of labor. Milan Kundera always divides the two women into emotional and rational, but he divides the labor of men a little more complicated. Thomas in "Light" is a man who uses reason to assist sensibility, and let wisdom assist desire. And Franzi seems to be emotionally suppressed by reason, and his behavior is gentle, but he shows childlike incompetence in eroticism. Agnès and Laura in "Immortal" share the two extremes of reason and sensibility. Paul is more complicated, an ordinary person who has a little bit of everything and cannot be unified. Rubens is simpler than Paul, and his breath is very similar to Agnès. The film also adopts the structure of four characters, with slightly different roles.
Marcus is an overly rational person. His emotions were restrained for most of his life, just like a gentleman. One of the major characteristics of a gentleman is that he can't speak clearly, which is the so-called implicit. The collision between him and the female bullfighter is intense, and even both sides will self-hypnotize. When he once released the passion in his body, the scene was as intense as fire, and the atmosphere was also suspected of narcissism. Does Marco care about his lover? Of course care. Does Mark know how to listen? Of course I understand, and it is a high-quality man among men. Does he really know women?
The female matador represents the violent and impermanent side of the earth, and is prone to storms and splits. There is no logical unity in each part of the personality, and the most important point is incomprehensible. Marco didn't know what she was talking about with him, he didn't even know what she was thinking. Is this the fault of Marco? Marco's intellect and mind are mature enough. It can only be blamed on the elusiveness of women. Women are born to confuse men.
The male nurse is a very emotional person. His greatest characteristic is not dullness, love and infinite patience, but calmness. He is a feminine mediocre man. His psychology is very special, which is emphasized repeatedly in the movie. His life was so narrow, he knew so little, but he was still peaceful. He's a weirdo, and the reason he can happily take care of this woman for four years is because he's taken care of his mother for twenty years, which is a very natural transition. He felt comfortable with everything. "Shrinked Lover" is the enlightenment to him who is long late. He said he was confused by seeing it. Since people grow up, they must be enlightened. He doesn't have too many moral considerations because the world is too small for him. And what I want to emphasize is that the director is clearly de-sexing. The director actually wanted to avoid the act of sexual intercourse, he just needed to convey to the audience that the two people had sex. Sexuality is not the point of the movie at all. Rape is also not the focus of the film. Precisely speaking, the moral aspect of rape is what the movie is about, but the sexual activity of rape is not.
The female dancer is basically a symbol. She represents the best state of life for women. Young, beautiful, toned and moderately fit, biologically optimal for fertility. The movie doesn't let her say anything, that is, erases her inner world, which is a clear reinforcement of the state she symbolizes. She is Eve in the Garden of Eden. It is impossible for a male nurse to resist the temptation of the flesh to his reproductive desires. The whole process is shown simply and abstractly by visual images, which are the fruits in the Garden of Eden. Her attraction to him is undistorted and inevitable, and this part of the plot is an abstraction of the complete mechanism of natural life.
Third, the so-called communication
The female dancer actually communicated with the male nurse. She had just taken a shower at home and was startled by his presence, but she believed him. It was a very, very superb line performance, and the male nurse's body movements and tone showed very real sincerity. The woman believed him. This exchange is very important. A man gains a woman's trust, which is enough to change his psyche.
Ma is a good listener. I don't think the phrase "as if I've been saying it" should be interpreted to mean that he doesn't really listen to women. He had appeared beside her just to listen to her talk. I think that sentence should be interpreted as: I make myself clear, but you are still unfathomable. So that when she suddenly wanted to say something, Marco was not used to it. The female bullfighter is an extremely hysterical person. She is also very violent with Marco's possessiveness.
The greatest amount of communication in the film is between two men. The male nurse told Mako the importance of sensibility, and Mako told him the importance of reason. In the end no one gave in. But it is the one who exalts reason who suffers for this, which also constitutes the tragic meaning of this movie. The male nurse's emotional expression of Marco is so moving that the film achieves a rare sincerity in this part. Intimacy is a complex mechanism, and we cannot simply cut it into love, family affection, friendship, love for the opposite sex, love for the same sex, love for relatives, feelings with only desire and no love, and so on. This division is crude, wrong, and dangerous to use to guide life. The male nurse's affection for Marco is pure need. That shot of kissing the back of her hand and then putting it on her palm is perfect.
This is not a movie about love, this is a movie about communication. The name of the movie is not taken lightly.
Fourth, reason and emotion, maturity and naivety
Get out of the plot. Why does the movie have to arrange for both women to stop talking? This arrangement is an interesting idea. When the other party is silent, what you know and think has to be only about yourself.
After the two women were silent, Marco discovered one secret after another about her, and in the end he could only come to one conclusion: I didn't know anything about her. This symbol is actually the ignorance of reason proclaiming itself in the face of natural life.
The male nurse declares that she knows everything. In the simple concept of life, femininity is the lowest evaluation of unqualified men, such as lines sissy. Other bad comments on men are based on the containment of their overdevelopment, such as despotism, cruelty, fornication, injustice, insidiousness, vileness, callousness, mischief, etc. The crowd gave the male nurse the lowest rating, arguing that he was not qualified to be a man. Marco is without a doubt a man who is well-received. Male nurses are like Adam in the Garden of Eden. His pure, beautiful, chaotic heart was not for the crowd. Marco is an excellent social man. Mark told him so, but he didn't listen, because he didn't need it either. Sensibility is the interior of life, the source of vitality, the mother of desire. The sensibility is transcendent, and the sensibility believes in miracles. In fact, sensibility does not need rationality, and only has a place in complex social creatures such as humans. Reason is often an interpreter in human behavior, neither a driver nor a decider. So although Marco is smart, he still knows nothing and still lives so passively. Male nurses don't need reason. But society needs it, so the behavior of male nurses is deprived of the crowd.
Fifth, the actor of the male nurse
His face is so strange, and his back is so lovable. Maybe the director went to great lengths to find him? The way he appears in the movie is enough to say everything about the character's connotation. As I watched his back running away, I felt the warm love of a father for his son. This is the most wonderful, superlative and most fascinating part of this movie for me. Many moviegoers always ignore this, the looks and figures of the actors are carefully designed and arranged (good movies, serious movies). I don't know if people who don't notice this are because they're not good at reading words, or if they're not good at connecting a lot of things.
Six, about sexual behavior
I repeat, the film is absolutely intentional to downplay sexuality. The fact that the male nurse impregnates the female dancer, the film also only talks about its social response and weakens the obscenity aspect.
I don't know why so many people talk so much about this matter. Any woman who doesn't agree is rape. Since rape, everything is denied. On the contrary, I think that if, as you said, the director's work has always been committed to expressing the female-centrism, then you insist on rape, which just proves the director's high regard for women. Come to think of it, no matter what a man does for a woman, as long as he shoves his penis into her vagina without her full consent, the man deserves to die, and everything will be wiped out and not accepted. How is this extremely paranoid evaluation standard different from the indiscriminate killing of tyrants? Then why don't you say that "Shrinking Lover" is also rape? Did she say he could enter? If you report them, does the court have to take the case too? At the end of the dance, three or four men keep holding a woman up, even reluctant to let her walk on her own feet, which shows the director's understanding of the relationship between the sexes and the society's different treatment of the sexes. Some things, women say no, just no.
Milan Kundera says the novel is outside the moral critique. I just thought he was talking about the psychology of writers, but now I find he is also talking about the psychology of readers. Some people grab a certain detail of a movie and exaggerate it for the highest weight evaluation, which constitutes a kind of vulgar censorship. Some people shout every day how the art of the present is subject to the interference of non-artistic considerations. How sad is it? What is the difference between such a film and accusing it of sheltering rape, and discussing it under a magnifying glass? Obviously those who only focus on rape are the most ignorant of other aspects, right? If such critical criteria were followed, let alone art, sooner or later, even sex education materials would not be produced.
Serious novels and films with aspirations are not meant to educate anyone. Not even cross talk. Good and evil, the author will naturally touch on it from time to time. Things are not just as simple as good and evil. Morality is only an attribute of social life. If we all have to take care of people who "value morality", we can only write about morality. Even so, I would like to say, if I can only write about morals, how should I express morals? I definitely want to write both the moral and the immoral. How to delineate the meaning of a thing without comparing its two poles? So only allow yourself to be in contact with moral people, and his moral discrimination must be low. It is often the most unethical behavior that manifests the necessity of morality.
This is a good movie for adults, not kindergarten, elementary, middle school, high school, or adults whose minds must remain for kindergarten, elementary, middle school, high school students.
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