What is the world like after our death? If we still feel after death, how will we feel the world? "A Ghost Story" (English name A Ghost Story), the title sounds like a ghostly horror film, but it tries to answer such sad and philosophical questions. Its plot is so simple that there is no way to spoil it——
The hero C, died in a car accident. After his death, his ghost, dressed in white sheets, came back to visit his girlfriend M and his former residence.
This is an authentic literary film.
Director David Lowe didn't seem to do anything, but just made up a pair of ghost eyes and let them observe and experience our world.
These eyes saw that a friend left a note to M, asking her to be sorrowful. Seeing that M was in grief due to C's death, overeating and vomiting-after M had eaten this meal for five minutes, the ghost watched her quietly for five minutes. I also saw M's daily life after being single: bathing, sleeping, watching the rain, and changing bed sheets. Once, M took a man home, and C's ghost signaled her dissatisfaction, causing some books to fly out of the shelf. Then, M packed things and moved away from the house. Before leaving, she hid a note in a crack in the wall.
A new family moved here: a woman, her two children, C's ghost smashed the table and bowl, scaring the family away. Soon after, new residents moved in and held parties here. A chattering man talked at the party about the temporary existence of life and the death of all things. Then, the old house was demolished. C's ghost remembered M's hidden note, and was about to read it. The house collapsed. Urbanization has advanced to this paradise, and new office buildings have risen from the ground. C's ghost climbed to the top of the building, looking at the buildings and lights in the city, put down his nostalgia, and jumped down from the building.
C is not the only ghost in the world. There is also a ghost in another house adjacent to C's former residence. He greeted C's ghost silently through the window, saying that he was waiting for someone. "Waiting for whom?" C asked. The ghost said he forgot. After the two houses were demolished, the ghost said "I don't think they will come back" and left the world.
Before C and M moved into this house in the countryside, there were ghosts staying here. When it was still a wilderness, this ghost once witnessed a family driving a caravan to come here. They made a fire to cook, and then they were killed by bows and arrows until they turned into a pile of bones. Every move of C and M, this "older" ghost is in sight. After M moved away, he read M's note hidden in a crack in the wall, and suddenly disappeared, leaving behind a pile of sheets collapsed into a pile.
In ordinary supernatural movies, ghosts are invisible, and people are frightened by these invisible forces. This movie goes the other way, telling it from the perspective of a ghost. Therefore, we project sympathy on the ghost. We feel their nostalgia for the world; feel their anger at "the dove occupying the magpie's nest"; feel their utter loneliness, therefore, the silent dialogue between the two ghosts will give us a wonderful sense of comfort .
The most important thing is their helplessness towards the changes in the world and the vicissitudes of life.
In this regard, the title "Floating Life" is used very appropriately. These two words are derived from the sentence in "Zhuangzi" "It is born as if it is floating, and its death is as if it ceases", which means that we are born in the world as if we are floating on the water. The starting point of the movie is death, and the end point is life.
There is a quotation at the beginning of the film, taken from Virginia Woolf’s short story "A Haunted House": "Whenever you wake up, there is a door that closes gently." It is obvious, "A Haunted House". The overall idea of "Haunted House" was copied from "The Haunted House". In other words, Woolf inspired David Lowe.
In Woolf's novel of less than 1,500 words, a couple who had become an ancient couple returned to their old house to search for the treasures they had hidden here. At the end of the novel, the living person asked the couple, "Ah, is this the treasure you buried, the brilliance in the heart?" The so-called treasure is nothing but the joy of their lives. What C's ghost can't let go of is the joy of the past-after death, everything before life becomes joy.
The form of the film is quite individual, putting yourself in close proximity to the possible feeling of a ghost. The slow movements, the still shots, the quiet sound, and the restless music all make us feel like we are in an endless funeral.
In fact, no matter what the ghost feels, we cannot simulate it correctly. Because none of us have experience as ghosts. It is impossible for us to know what the dead feel about the living. What the creator can do is to replace this feeling with a certain feeling. The strange thing is that this feeling of being a substitute comes from a perspective opposite to that of the ghost's eye.
It's like, as mentioned above, a living person goes to the funeral of a deceased. Or, as you are now, visiting your old childhood house, looking for and reminiscing about the past that has disappeared. It is a kind of sympathy and mourning for things that are still (but must pass). Like the Monkey King at the end of "A Westward Journey: Cinderella" watching the love on the wall, watching all living beings, and flying dogs; also like Puyi in the Republic of China in "The Last Emperor", visiting the Forbidden City.
They are living people, but in another sense, they are also ghosts. Monkey King is the ghost of the Monkey King, while Puyi is the ghost of the annihilating dynasty. They see the world with ghost eyes, so they see completely different things from the boring. The enlightenment of "Floating Ghost" is the same as the above two masterpieces, that is-
Even if we are not dead, we can still create a pair of ghosts and ghost eyes for ourselves.
Besides, we are all ghosts of our own past.
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