No one can do anything in the face of fate

(Text / Yang Shiyang)

how to say? "Foxtrot" is filled with an absurdity and a quirky temperament as soon as it opens. It is always chilling, gloomy, but occasionally pierces a section that makes people laugh, but it seems that people can't laugh , was soon overshadowed by the lingering coldness and solemnity. It jumps between different temperaments like this, creating an indescribable special tone, mixing the genres of family dramas and war films, neither venting the emotions in the family nor laying out the scene of the war, it Paradoxical, but the accident is so powerful. The director Maoz himself said that he wanted to present the temperament of ancient Greek tragedy in this film. Indeed, to a certain extent, it did, using a modern story to present the classical implication-pathetic emotional atmosphere , the reincarnation of fate, the hand of fate with nowhere to escape.

The story begins with a funeral. The camera is staring at the mother's face, and then, the figure is dizzy, revealing a painting in the porch behind, abstract lines, intertwined, like a random wave, like an orderly, exuding a strong mental frenzy temperament, the camera turns a corner , revealing his shocked father standing there. This layer-by-layer revealing and peeling off is like a prophecy of the future story. Everything is hidden layer by layer, waiting to be unfolded slowly.

"Foxtrot" is the kind of movie that is suitable for watching the details carefully. Compared with the evolution of the plot, the symbols, metaphors and the spiritual crisis behind the rich details are more interesting content. The abstract painting hanging in the entrance, the floor tiles with geometric patterns covered in this mansion, and the windows with matching squares and circles are all showing meaning through a clear composition, everything is layered and arranged, full of dizziness but not stop emphasis on order. This is the characteristic that "Foxtrot" wants to show, chaos and clarity, nonlinear and linear interference and entanglement.

The funeral was solemn, and relevant personnel from the army came to tell the parents the news of their son's death, but immediately, this solemnity was pushed to the extreme and a sense of alienation and absurdity emerged, and the soldiers were trained to faint. His mother was injected with tranquilizers and, like taking care of the wounded on the battlefield, cooperated to send her to the bedroom, set an hourly alarm for the man to remind each other to drink water, and bluntly talked to each other about the details of the funeral. The director mentioned in an interview that this is basically the case when the Israeli army goes to report a funeral, and there is a set of efficient procedures. And when this process is artistically presented in the room full of metaphors, there is an indescribable feeling that death is coming quickly, but the acceptance process of loved ones should be slow, but here , this kind of sadness that should be relieved and absorbed is incorporated into a set of military disciplines, the absurdity is highlighted again, and even more absurd is that when the sadness is about to be confirmed, the reversal comes again, and the parents are notified, There was a mistake, the victim was another boy with the same name and surname, but who knows this is not good news, just the beginning of another fate joke.

Then, everything moved to the battlefield scene. This story is divided into three acts, and space has become another important narrative basis for "Foxtrot". Room-battlefield-room, like foxtrot, pan, back, pan, return. In a seemingly symmetry, balance and closure, those subtle changes are exposed. From the surface, everything has returned to its original position, the closed loop has been completed, and balance has been achieved, but in fact, everything has been completely changed on the inside. This is the What this movie wants to convey. So, to sum up the plot of this movie is nothing more than a false death and a real death, and the intimate and grand flow of consciousness intertwined between the two.

If the room in the first act is absurd, then the absurdity of the battlefield in the second act is even stronger, and a surreal smell is added to the strong, the camel that passes by here every day outside the desolate post, a With an innocent expression, he faced the same innocent soldiers on duty. It is more like exile than a battlefield, and more spiritual exile than exile in reality. Several people discuss their own life experience together. This life experience hides a grand history and condensed personal experience. The solemn spiritual throbbing and the hot intertext of sexual enlightenment, the classics echoing the pornographic magazines, all these subtle whispers are melted into the cold and muddy reality.

This story tells the story of the cycle and the inescapable desolation. Young people escape from the fire of war, but die on camels that seem harmless to humans and animals. Is it funny, but it is extremely desolate. Perhaps the most unspeakable word is "destiny", in front of which no one can do anything. In the poster of this movie, there is a cross-pasted × with adhesive tape on the human face. The mark comes from the sensitive part of the cover of pornographic magazines. The seal to cover it seems to be taboo, but it is full of charm, just like this hidden and unexpected life. .