Carlin is always very calm, with the courage and wisdom to face the truth, she doesn't want to Self-comfort, self-deception, unwilling to suppress all the unbearable things into the subconscious, even if the truth makes her crazy, makes her scream in despair, and makes her nervous, she must tear off the surface of all things hypocrisy and recognize the cruelty. fact.
In one scene, Carlin and Maria had dinner after Angelus’s death. When Carlin talked about how to dispose of Angelus’ inheritance, he suddenly stopped thoughtfully and said: "This is a fact. What I consider is our gains and losses. I used to think about it. It’s really disgusting, shameful, and it’s always like this.”
Even if it’s him, Carlin has to examine himself with the calmest look, and when She saw that she, just like other people, lacks the ability to love, cannot get rid of the constraints of the laws of biology, cannot do unconditional love at all, and she keenly realizes that conditional love is fundamentally ruthless and hides behind it. With cold reason and hidden calculations of gains and losses, Carlin fell into despair completely, because she found that what she asked for was something she couldn't do at all and couldn't overcome it, and the indifference of others that she couldn't bear. Both selfishness and selfishness can find a shadow in one's own body, which can not help but produce a kind of cold and terror that invades the bone marrow.
In "Shouts and Whispers", Bergman did an experiment with love, putting love to the test in extreme situations, just like Kafka made Gregory turn into a beetle to test love, like Akutagawa Dragon In that way, let the sick wife’s legs be crushed on the ruined wall to test love, whether love can really be selfless and unconditional, and love will not lose when facing death, ugliness, and everything that can cause disgust. Its original color was nothing more than the rationality of following the principle of seeking advantages and avoiding disadvantages hidden under the veil of selflessness. The test of love directed by Bergman was brought out by Angelus' death.
The dead Angelus still yearned for the love of her sisters, hoping that the two could hold her hand to warm her, and leave when she is no longer afraid. Karin said: "No one will do what you say, I'm still alive, I don't want to touch the dead you." This sentence implies the logic of conditional love: when someone can give to another person Love only occurs when the satisfaction of needs is brought, but not when one person cannot meet the needs of another. Whether love occurs or not depends only on one's own inner needs, regardless of whether others are heartbroken by it. In the final analysis, what we have is only a personal consciousness. We cannot have the consciousness of others, and we cannot fully stand on the stand of others and have the feelings of others. Once the boundary between self and non-self disappears completely, the self will be gone. So, is it really that easy to overcome this deep-seated selfishness? Is it really possible? Can people's shortcomings be overcome?
We can achieve sympathy and compassion, but sympathy and compassion are far from the love from the heart. A neurotic perfectionist like Carlin will not be satisfied with just getting the sympathy of others. She wants that kind of sentiment. Naturalistic love from the heart, that is to say, the love Carlin wants to meet two conditions: from the heart and unconditional. The logical contradiction lies in: if you want to be love from the heart, it must be naturalistic love, and naturalistic love must follow the principles of rationality. It is conditional love. Then the love from the heart and unconditionality cannot be satisfied at the same time. .
The scene of Maria’s love in the face of the test is even more exciting. When Angelas asked her to hold her hand, her pitiful eyes soothed the heart, and the words were so sincere and touching: "I will not lose Don’t care, do you know how uncomfortable I am?” Maria told about the fact that they were playful until dark and the sisters hugged each other in fright. Maria didn’t lie, she always recalled the beautiful situation when she was a child. It is the precious thing she desires in her heart. However, as Angellas’s bruised hands slowly pulled Maria’s face towards him, Love failed to withstand the test after all, revealing its rationality of seeking advantages and avoiding harm, and creatures have an attitude towards death. Natural fear easily defeats the selfless love that we think we can do. Human owes originate from natural life. There is no transcendence in the divine world. It is a delusion to try to overcome the laws of nature within natural life.
It should be said that this contradiction between the desire for love and the inability to love constitutes a theme of the whole movie, just like every time a sister’s story is told, half and half of the profile will appear, that is us The symbol of self-contradiction. On the one hand, each of us has a hysterical desire for love and cannot tolerate others' indifference and selfishness. On the other hand, each of us lacks the ability to love. The coexistence of inner desire and deficiency determines the inevitability of despair.
Another very artistically appealing play once again made us deeply feel this kind of despair in our hearts. After the quarrel, the two women cried and hugged each other. How much they yearned for the intimacy and deep communication brought about by love. The sisters caressed each other affectionately and talked eagerly. Their behavior showed their unstoppable desire. And why is speech silent? We can only hear the wailing of the cello, which may imply a lack of the ability to love, and the two people's attempt to communicate with each other is nothing but a meaningless and futile effort. This kind of silent speech and exaggerated behavior constitutes a powerful artistic tension, which makes our hearts vibrate in silence and face the tragic facts.
The other two protagonists in this play, Angelus and Anna, also have profound meanings. Both Angelus and Anna believe in Christianity, which makes them different from the non-believers of Carlin and Maria.
In Bergman's words, Angelus is a man who doesn't hurt his heart, doesn't cynical, and doesn't hate him. While praying for Angelus, the pastor said: "She is a child of God, and her faith is stronger than mine." In the last scene of the play, Anna read Angelus’ diary, which was recorded in the diary. When Angelras and the sisters were sitting on the swing that they used to swing in childhood, Angellas’s inner monologue: "The people I love most in this world are by my side. I can hear their voices and feel them. The existence of, and their warm hands, I really hope this moment will last forever. I sigh with emotion: “Pray, this is happiness, I don’t need anything anymore. At this moment, all of this is the most perfect, I am grateful, and life is bestowed on it. All of mine.'"
Why didn't Angellas fall into despair like Carlin, is it because she didn't see through everything like Carlin? Probably not, Bergman once wrote that Angelus is the eye of observation and the conscience of recording everything, full of insight. Angellas can see the cruelty of the world and the fragility of human nature, and can appreciate the desire and struggle of the human heart, but she will not pursue the ultimate and perfection like Carlin. Carlin cannot accept a life full of regrets, sins, and deficiencies. , And Angelus believes in God. Liu Xiaofeng once said: “God is hurt so that our injuries in the misunderstanding of life will no longer hurt our life imagination. The marks of injury and misfortune dissolve into the will to cherish life." “Neither escape nor attempt to transcend the paradox in life, but it does not just recognize that the paradox of life is fundamentally unsolvable and the fragility of human nature, but cherishes the paradox of life. On the fragments of Chinese love.” Yes, the shouts and whispers between Carlin and Maria, the test of love in the death situation, all make us deeply despair of trying to transcend the paradox of life, then, we may We should cherish the happiness felt in a moment like Angellas, let those moments of fragmented happiness embellish our painful journey of life, and let it present the unique beauty of despair.
And the role of Anna is also an extremely important person. Angellas’s thoughts are only telling us what kind of mentality should be used to face this indifferent world, and can the indifferent world be truly redeemed? ? Can the human heart overcome the laws of nature with divine help? Anna used her actions to give us a less convincing answer, or that the answer was too hasty and did not go through serious and meticulous tests at all. I think we want to be clear in the movie "Shouting and Whispers" The answer is probably not possible, I will continue my thinking in Dostoevsky's "Idiot", the newcomer Myshkin.
View more about Cries & Whispers reviews
