This film was Kubrick's last work, and he died four days after the film was completed. At the same time, this is also his most satisfying work.
Let's start with the simple ones. This movie is different from some of his other obscure works. It is a good-looking movie to watch it intuitively. The suspense is heavy, the atmosphere is tense and solemn, the scene is weird and full of mystery. From religious ceremonies to mysterious and strange parties, intense "trials", the woman who saved the hero, the nightmare of the abnormal rental shop owner and his daughter, and his wife, until the end of the film, the ambiguous conversation at the pool table, the director also Did not give the audience a clear answer. Indeed, I think if there is a clear answer, the focus of this film will be crooked.
The background music at the beginning of the film explained to the audience: Lord Kubrick has arrived. Kubrick is probably the director who loves symphony in movies. At the same time, the three tense climaxes of the film (religious rituals and the identity of the protagonist were discovered, the mysterious messenger who got off the Rolls-Royce car, and the mask appeared next to his wife’s pillow) using the monophonic piano accompaniment, pushed the atmosphere of the film to the culmination. I can't breathe. The soundtrack is another unforgettable factor in this film.
Let's look at the actors again. The starring actors are Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. They had been married for seven years when this movie was filmed, which happened to fit the character set in this film. So for the couple's "seven-year itch" or similar situations in the first half of the film, they did a great job. Especially Nicole Kidman, when the husband and wife talked on the bed, the performance was extremely vivid.
Let me now systematically elaborate on what I have observed and thought about while watching this film (in order to be afraid of forgetting, I also watch and remember, which is rare for me).
Important advice: There are a lot of spoilers below. Those who have never watched a movie are best to watch the movie before watching.
The first few lines of dialogue in the film reflect that the protagonist and his wife are wealthy people, at least an upper middle class. And they also brought out that the party they were attending was a gathering of more high-end people. In this party, every word of almost everyone was hypocritical. For example, the conversation between Tom Cruise and the pianist is full of false politeness. At the same time, Nicole Kidman dancing with the Hungarian playboy showed her loyal but very lonely mood.
The scene at home after the party shows the fact that even husbands and wives are performing false communication in an empty space. Thanks to the host of the party, and showing his face to the family of the deceased patient, it all shows that these hypocritical behaviors have penetrated their minds. The scene of condolences to the family members of the deceased was a show of the emptiness of the middle class to the extreme. Every sentence was very decent and contrived. The family of the deceased patient and his boyfriend did not even meet their mouths when kissing. Every detail illustrates this point.
The frank bedside conversation between husband and wife is the first highlight of the film. This paragraph vividly depicts the subtle relationships and contradictions between a couple who have been married for a certain number of years under the seemingly ordinary and harmonious relationship. If you listen carefully to every word they say, you will find that none of their seemingly absurd conversations are making trouble out of nowhere. The truth of this passage even made me think that I might also have this situation.
After this conversation, the emptiness and anxiety in the hero's heart are completely exposed. Wandering aimlessly in the street, like walking with corpses, is not trying to deliberately do bad things, but also does not want to go home, and at the same time lie to his wife. Lie to the family, find prostitutes, go to bars, spy on mysterious parties, the empty soul of the entire middle class is vividly performed this winter night in the film.
Then came the climax of religious ceremonies and parties in the whole film. This filming also highlights the director's skill. Absolutely limited, but full of mystery and a little beauty. The owner of the shop that rents out the dress has a completely different attitude towards his daughter before and after it is also very strange. This section is the climax of the concentrated expression of the hypocrisy, emptiness, and evil nature of upper-class society.
All the heroine experienced, the heroine also experienced it in a dream, and briefly said it out of her mouth. This shows that the problem occurs in both directions at the same time.
The large headline "Lucky to be alive" in the newspaper that Tom Cruise bought when he was stalked also reflected his situation at the time: he was threatened and the mask girl who rescued him died mysteriously at the party. These mysteries and pressure always erupt when the lost mask appears next to his wife's pillow, and the hero finally collapses.
With the development of the film, these mysteries and atmosphere intensified. However, the heroine in the film did not make any comments about the mysterious appearance of the mask. The conversation between the hero and the wealthy friend at the pool table was threatening or comforting, or frank or frank. , I changed several statements and used several hypotheses, but there was no conclusion at all. This also seems to imply that the audience, what the truth is, is actually not the point. We are not purely pursuing mystery and suspense. What we have discovered from all this is the most important symbolic meaning.
The last line of the whole film is absolutely loud and loud.
After thinking about it so much, I felt that I definitely lacked a lot of observation ability, thinking ability and mental realm, so I went to look at other film reviews. Part of the content of one of the articles is quite deep and powerful as follows.
http://www.visual-memory.co.uk/amk/doc/0096.html
First of all, the names of the heroes and heroines. The heroine is called Alice, and her first sentence is "How do I look like?" In the first half of the film, what she does is to dress herself up and make herself look better. Her husband is called Bill, and the first sentence he appeared on the scene was "Did you see my wallet?" Throughout the film, he kept paying for purchases, paying the clothing store owner, and paying the taxi. The driver, pay the prostitute, pay the hotel front desk, etc.
Generally speaking, women are commodities, and all they do is dress up and make themselves more valuable. This is the case with middle-class heroines, the mysterious woman at the party, the daughter of the owner of a clothing store, the prostitute on the street, and even the youngest daughter of the couple. In the film, Nicole Kidman's tutoring his daughter to do arithmetic is to calculate who has more money, and the youngest daughter's Christmas gifts and room furnishings are similar to those of the street prostitute's house that the protagonist is looking for. And men are the ones who buy goods like women, and all interactions between people are transactions without identity and personality. All the promiscuous people at that party wear masks, which is a concentrated expression of this position.
In this way, the theme of the film has risen from the hypocrisy, emptiness, sex, problems between husband and wife, etc., as I thought of, to the height of the unified point of sociology.
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