The Dutchman Rex and his girlfriend Saskia drove to France for vacation, got off at the gas station Saskia and went to a convenience store to buy a drink. Who knew they never returned, as if the world had evaporated, there was no news for three years. Many police investigations were unsuccessful, but Rex did not believe that his girlfriend had left without saying goodbye, and had never given up looking for it in the past three years.
Frenchman Raymond, a chemistry teacher, has a happy family, a kind wife and two lovely daughters. This typical French middle-class man showed all kinds of weird behaviors from the moment he appeared on the scene: He took a bottle full of potion and came to a holiday house in the country, numbed himself with anesthetic, and has been practicing something... Various signs indicate that he It should be related to Saskia's mysterious disappearance, and he hijacked Saskia in the way he kept practicing.
The two began to meet, Raymond finally met Rex, confessed to him the whole process of kidnapping his girlfriend, and told him his story. However, he didn't mention a word about what happened after the hijacking. Rex must drink the sleeping pills-infused coffee to experience it for himself. Rex couldn't help being tempted to get the truth and drank coffee...
In fact, this story is not complicated at all, and it does not have the elements of horror or thriller in the general sense, nor does it have any bloody scenes. Even when watching the first half, You will feel a little bored. But its significance lies in: it uses the image of ordinary people to portray a kind of psychology, this kind of psychology actually exists in each of us, but if it cannot be controlled, the result is unpredictable. This is also the reason why this film is called a horror film: people, the most horrible thing is actually their own heart.
It is said that "Mysterious Disappearance" is not a horror or thriller in the general sense, but it does not have too much suspense. Basically, as soon as Raymond appeared on the stage, the audience identified him as the culprit of the mysterious disappearance, and knew how he committed the crime, and even understood many details. This is obviously different from a Hitchcock-style movie that does not reveal the murderer until the last minute, but the driving force that supports us to continue watching comes from the fact that we want to know why the murderer did this and how he disposes of his "prey." So in this sense, it seems more appropriate to say that this is a psychoanalytic film.
The film is adapted from a novel called "Golden Egg". In the film, Saskia had a dream about being imprisoned in a golden egg before disappearing, and Rex also dreamed of a similar situation in the process of searching for his girlfriend: they were trapped in the golden egg, floating alone in the golden egg. Space, passing by. So he had decided to give up searching and set off again, and this dream seemed to have become a slogan: They really met again in this way, at the price of never returning.
Let us focus more on Raymond. He admits that his personality has a slight abnormality that is not easily detectable, and uses his own growth experience to explain the reason for his strange behavior: a 16-year-old boy jumped off the balcony on the second floor in order to resist fate and break the routine. Folding the left arm and breaking two fingers: "Is it destined to not jump down? How could it be possible that I won't be destined to jump down? So in order to break this destiny, someone must jump, and I jumped down. "At the age of 26, in order to save a little girl who fell into the water, he didn't hesitate to jump into the dirty river in the country, admired by his daughter, and proudly called him a hero. So he became suspicious again, thinking that this compliment was worthless, "Unless I can prove that I am absolutely incapable of doing anything evil, like water and fire." It is these weird thoughts (weird? Isn't it? Has it ever appeared in your and my head?) It directly led to the eventual tragedy. In the film, Raymond suffers from "claustrophobia"-fear in a small, dark space. This is why he gives the police a reason not to wear a seat belt when driving. Therefore, he used a method that he considered to be clever to resolve this fear-to pass this fear to others! Undoubtedly, the "golden egg" that appeared repeatedly in the dreams of the pair of fateful mandarin ducks symbolized another dark, enclosed space, and their dreams became a destiny for them. At the end of his life, Rex seemed to reunite with Saskia at the end of the tunnel in a trance. Here, the long and dark tunnel has also become a symbol of enclosed space.
There are many details about Raymond. For example, his cautiousness: use himself as a test product to test the relationship between the dose of anesthetic and the time of coma, repeatedly drill every detail, test whether the screams of himself and his family at home can be heard by neighbors, and record every time he talks with a woman. For example, his ruthlessness: he is merciless to beautiful women and tortured Rex with dates, but he hides in the dark and arouses his curiosity a little bit; such as his high IQ: he knows ordinary people well. Therefore, playing Rex between the palms, knowing that curiosity will inevitably drive Rex to choose to experience the same experience as his girlfriend-the only way to find the truth, even if the ending is fear and death (but this ending For Rex, it is also the satisfaction of getting the truth, although the price is destined to be ruin). Therefore, I think the image of Raymond has its typical significance in psychological research (personally think that the significance of this image is no less than that of the male protagonist in "Mentally Ill").
I have seen comments about the film on the Internet: "You have to endure nearly 100 minutes of preparation for this film. The last 4 minutes will surely shock you. If you want to select the 10 best endings of all time, I will give it. Cast one vote". The ending may seem unexpected, but in fact, when you think about it carefully, due to the layers in front of the film, such an ending is the only reasonable one. This film was shot in 1988 20 years ago. In 1993, five years after the film’s release, the director himself shot the Hollywood version of the film, and had a brighter ending where evil was punished, but the response was mediocre (IMDB score only 6 points). The director also mentioned in the DVD highlights that the new ending has been criticized by film critics because the film company and producer wanted to give the film a more positive ending and decided that evil must be punished; but this is not his own. The will, but the rights game at the upper level of the film company finally changed the ending of the film.
The last two points I want to say are: First, don't touch up with strangers easily. If you have any difficulties, you should find more police uncles to solve them; second, if you are Rex, will you continue to pursue the truth or choose liberation?
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