1. The grievances and grudges of the bottom, middle, and high-levels (not)
First of all, this is of course not only a movie that engages in high-high-high drinking and drinking so that everyone can watch how unbearable this high-rise building is. The high-rise building where Dr. Laine lives. There are three levels, the bottom, the middle and the high. This naturally makes people correspond to the stratification in society. From the beginning of the story, there is a seemingly peaceful state in the tall buildings. People who can get along with each other talk together, hold parties together, and do things that are not ashamed or embarrassing. It looks like our harmonious society on the outside. And this harmony and calmness always makes people feel that something is wrong. After all, if there is a hierarchy, there will be inequality, and this kind of hierarchy difference is very harsh in a tall building. Here you see that Dr. Laine is a decent person. When he first arrived, there was the social celebrity Charlotte. He accepted the invitation of the top Royal and brought a bottle of Riesling to the banquet. It turned out that the upper-class residents simply ignored it. set. (The setting here is quite clever. The high-rise residents dress like the drama queen. It seems that Laine is even more out of place and humiliated.) Even Laine is treated like this on the top floor, let alone the bottom. Resident. This inequality is also what Wilder hates most, as said in the film. But Wilder's hatred of such inequality is not justified. In other words, for most people, the hatred of inequality is not justified. What everyone hates is the state of "you have and I don't have". What they think is "why do you have me?", so after a swimming pool was blocked by a small party opened by high-level residents, Wilder took a bunch of children over. boundary. Having a party that belonged to them was a really crazy start.
What's interesting is the reaction of the upper level to this party. They have their own countermeasures. They also have their own parties, but their methods are more sophisticated. It cuts off the supply of resources. After the party at the bottom, the top Simmons and Royal and his wife said this when they were discussing how to fight back against the residents at the bottom: "The foundation of modern economic prosperity is healthy and healthy competition, but you are right. We must overwhelm. They (lower households). We must confiscate all necessary resources". This feeling echoes the voice-over of Charlotte and her son when she blows bubbles at the end of the film: "A free corporate system is necessary but not sufficient. There is only one economic system in the world, and that is capitalism. The only difference is capitalism. Is it in the hands of the state, or most of it is in the hands of people outside the control of the state. As long as state capitalism exists, there will never be political freedom." After World War II, the United Kingdom continued to implement Keynesian economic policies until the late 1970s and early 1980s. However, in the 1970s, there was a state of "stagflation". The background of the original work is in the 1970s, and perhaps it was dissatisfaction with the phenomenon of state power interfering in the economy at that time.
I have seen the interview and said that due to Ballard's own experience, he is very interested in the state of human nature in extreme environments. So the problem came. What kind of side will people behave when they don't have the necessities of life such as water, electricity, and food? The residents of high-rise buildings did not let us down. Everyone fell into a state of complete madness. The crazy state of the upper level is sex, and the lower level starts to compete for food, hoard food, or "someone trades his wife for food" as the dentist steel said. This is also a way of showing whether the society can be good in the future. People's dependence on various resources and technology, to a certain extent or under a certain environment, will transform into human madness. Everyone started fighting, fighting, wanting to change, wanting to change, not only between your own levels, but also between levels. Of course, all of this is afraid of the frantic struggle for the necessary resources at the bottom, but it comes from the party opened at the top and the melting pot they deliberately created.
2. All kinds of people in tall buildings
The people in the tall building are not inferior to the splendor of the tall building itself. From the bottom to the top, everyone seems to be living constantly refreshing their cognition, refreshing the three outlooks, and refreshing morals and ethics. To be reasonable, in fact, good or bad is a difficult criterion to define. Everyone's behavior is in the service of the word "humanity".
Wilder, who has a haircut that looks like a disgusting version of Lennon, seems to be a person who hasn't washed his hair for three years. He appears as a "rebel" in the film. You see that he is working tirelessly towards exposing and opposing this inequality building. He takes a video camera and records with blood everywhere like a passionate person. In any case, it is good to be conscious and respond to this inequality, but as said before, his anger at this inequality is not out of genuine kindness. Just like his pursuit of Charlotte, in addition to Charlotte's own "charm", perhaps she represents a high-class life that he thinks he should belong to. Regardless of his wife's disregard, repeated dislikes, and finally took the money away when he started his own "career" (oh, I can't stand it anymore), I can see the complexity of this man. Of course, human beings are complex, not just Wilder.
Compared to Wilder's image, Dr. Laine's image is much more handsome. Anyway, it's basically a state where you can't control it when you see him. The girls also described "You are definitely the best amenity in the building". But this does not mean that Dr. Laine is a little cute. He has characteristics of his class. There are also advantages and disadvantages of human nature. After being humiliated, Munrow used his own way to play a free fall; in the end, he did not attack Wilder. He grabbed the gray paint when everyone else was grabbing food... He is a person who wants face and has his own judgment. He was a somewhat indifferent person, but also a sentimental person. He said that he couldn't bear Wilder's dog-killing behavior, and after all he roasted his dog legs in the last depression. He can interact with people like Wilder, but at the same time, as the top three said: "I think he knows his own height."
As the top floors of tall buildings, these figures headed by Royal also have their own characteristics. Strange, but it is also because of strangeness that it is different. Judging from the film, the person Royal is similar to but different from the others on the top. Of course, he is the planner and designer of the building, but he does not seem to be as extreme as the people around him in terms of party or other aspects. Moreover, Simmons and Wilder both said to him the word "hide". Simmons thought he was hiding on the top floor, and even said that he was not actually work for Royal, but work for building. But Wilder thought he was hiding in women. Behind his skirt, the women around him finally stunned Wilder to death. Perhaps it is not Royal who is the decisive factor in this building, but the building itself and the talents in it. The symbol of women may be more prominent than the symbol of the builder of Royal.
In addition to these typical people, there are also other people and small details running through it. For example, Charlotte’s son Toby is a sneak peek at the late stage holding a kaleidoscope, Royal is peeking at a white dog, and Wilder’s curly assistant—Talbot, a psychiatrist [From the film, this man is a Freud Mystery: At the beginning, when I walked out of the building, I took Freud's "The phychopathology of everyday life". The supermarket scrambled there while holding the camera while talking about Freud's theory: Freud's preconscious, subconscious Human desires (especially sexual desire), instinct theory and psychoanalysis are more or less projected in the movie], Royal wife and actress Jane have such a little les behavior, funny and nagging dentist steel , With a haircut with a split in the middle (Brother is the star of "The Nine Secrets" and "Mad City", and he looks very tender under normal circumstances. See the
picture below)
Ah wrong, put Wrong picture
And when Wilder's wife sent the children to the babysitter, the songs the children sang and the lyrics are so weird? Isn't it the screaming song of Mary Shaw? Anyway, if my child sings like this, I would be surprised.
3. Skyscrapers and Snow Country Trains?
These two horizontal and vertical spaces must be reminiscent. But if the two are the same, of course they are still different in general. Put the two together, and don't discuss who is better or whether the two are good or not, just because the protagonists of the two movies like it very much. If there are similarities between the two films, they are both dystopias. Both have the concept of "levels" and the differences and contrasts between levels, as well as the opposition and contradiction between levels.
But looking closer, in the Snow Country Train, the "leader" thing runs through the movie. From the last car to the engine, it is the young leader Curtis, played by CE, leading a team of people to fight all the way, accompanied by the right-hand man Nangong rescued halfway. Minxiu, just like a clearance game, every time a new carriage is opened, it is like a new world. The carriage and even the engine in the front are like an unknown world. Every time they pass through one, Curtis's team will suffer correspondingly with the corresponding suppression. This loss is physical and psychological. For Curtis, the experience along the way is more than just inequality. Unlike the human kaleidoscope in the tall buildings that slowly exploded and burst into madness, the Snow Country train became heavier as it went to the front of the carriage. Finally, after Curtis reached the engine, he faced the struggle and torture. Compared to the different choices of the two leaders, Gilliam and Curtis, whether this difference really exists is more meaningful.
In addition, there are many things that I don't understand very well, such as the French-speaking female cashier in the supermarket, the black goat and the white horse, and so on. Of course, my understanding of many of the above-mentioned things is not necessarily correct, I hope I can criticize and correct me. All of it is just not looking at Seng Ge's body. Than Hart. Hehehe.
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