the trailer before watching the movie. We all think this is a new magical blockbuster, but when it comes to watching the movie, why is there such a long foreshadowing? Why do you say goodbye so many times? Why leave another story at the end?
Let's not worry about which story is true or false, let's start with the foreshadowing of the movie at the beginning! ~
Pi, the protagonist of our story, was born and raised in India. This is a country with a strong religious atmosphere. It can be said that it is the country with the richest religious diversity in human society and human history.
India is located at the confluence of east and west. It has been conquered by the Aryans since ancient times, and later encountered wars such as the Alexander Expedition, until the British colonization in the 19th century. Coupled with the trade exchanges during this period, the civilizations of the two systems of the East and the West are intertwined and collided here.
Few of us today associate India with the word "Hellenic". However, the word "Hellenic" refers to the East that was conquered by the West. This kind of civilization presents "mixedism"; What can be embodied in religion is both "pan-god worship" and "mixture of gods."
Therefore, Pi's growth experience naturally faced the mixed environment of India, with two different worldviews: the "tradition" (mythology, religion) inspired by his mother's stories and the "new school" (rational) that his father taught him. These two contradictions have spread to their dining table. What is the use to see the truth?
The answer to this question is like a story described in two different narratives in a movie.
One is the truth, and the other is the fact.
The West, represented by Greece, invented Logos, abstract concepts, reasoning systems, and rationalism. The classical Greeks believed that the world is a complete order and reason, and the whole world and mysteries can be understood and described.
The East represented by India is non-conceptual and mysterious. It is expressed through myths and symbolism, and wisdom is hidden in myths, rituals, songs and dances, rather than expressed through concepts.
When the ancient Eastern and Western civilizations first began to converge and collide, Western rationalism brought a period of repression and dormancy to the mysterious inspiration of the East, and then it turned into a liberation in expression. The East began to try to speak rationally, turning ideas into concepts and rational forms. Modern religions began to sprout, and Eastern civilization ushered in a new life from a spiritual level, and at the same time nourished the Western world.
Our popular religions today: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism all broke out in that era.
In India, religion and mythology are constantly evolving, evolving, and revising like science today. From Brahma to Vishnu, from the early Buddhism to the later Buddhism, the precision of the theological speculation and the beauty of the implied expression can be described as breathtaking.
As mentioned in the movie, late Hinduism believed that life that existed before the world began was called Vishnu. The world started from his sleep. In his deep sleep, a golden lotus grew from his belly button. Brahma was born in the lotus, and then Brahma's dreams, ignorance, desires and delusions created other lives. And the world where Brahma lives is called the Goddess Maya, she is Vishnu's wife, the universe, the great hallucination.
This is a typical Indian worldview. The world is illusory and dreamlike.
And what is the movie? Movies are about the art of dreams. Where movies and religion coincide with each other is that they are both the intersection of the Western system (rationalism) and the Eastern system (mystical inspirationalism).
In this movie, the conflict and fusion of rationalism and perceptualism are presented to us as the theme.
Modern society is dominated by the Western rationalist system. The Eastern spirit is divided into an undercurrent of the surface and the undercurrent, and this undercurrent is the purest and most instinctive tendency of the Eastern spirit.
The young Pi's name "π", pi, is an infinite, never-regular, and never-repeating decimal, that is, "irrational number". The discovery of irrational numbers is in opposition to the so-called "reasonably existing numbers", and is known as the "first mathematics crisis" in history. At that time, the Pythagoras School was an organization integrating politics, academics, and religion. They believed that everything in the universe was absolutely rational and orderly like mathematics. It can be said to be the most famous religion in human history that advocates rationality and order.
When Hippassos, a disciple of this school, discovered irrational numbers, other people in this school panicked him into the sea and put him to death. The charge is similar to "blasphemy" in other religions.
If the world is absolutely rational, why are there irrational numbers? Compared with the religion that advocates rationality, we recognize the existence of irrational numbers and the limitations of rationality.
This corresponds to what the mother said at the dinner table. First, he acknowledged what the father said, the fruits of scientific development; and then said, but that is to let us know the outer world, but there is no way to exhaust our inner.
We can ascertain the circumference and diameter of a circle, no matter how the external conditions of the circle change, but the soul of the circle: "π", is an irrational number.
Pi's first girlfriend, Ananti, who is dancing, is a character inserted by Ang An.
Song and dance has a special status in India. It is the oldest classic in Indian history. The four "Vedas" were laid down. One of them is "Samoveda". It is easier for everyone to understand if the phonetic text is written. "Sāmaveda"-the witchcraft and magic of human civilization and culture to entertain the gods by singing and dancing or psychic have inherited the name of "samo"-shaman. The shaman here is a general term, not exclusively Shamanism. In the movie, it is especially emphasized in the dance class that they have to contact and communicate their energy with the gods through dance. So the dancing girl is also a witch, a shaman.
Ananti is a typical oriental tradition. The difference between her and Pi who received the new school education is revealed in the zoo. Pi believes that tigers love performance, just like dancers, while Ananti said that it is listening to all things in the world attentively. The tiger is not so superficial, and the dance is the same.
Therefore, it is easy for us to understand that a shaman witch attaches a red string to Pi who is about to travel. This is a kind of witchcraft, blessing, or in a more straightforward way: amulet.
I guess here by the way the name of "Ananti", but it's just a guess and it's not exact. "Nandi" is the mount and pet of the Indian god of dance Shiva, the partner of the gods, and the representative of the Indian "sacred cow". According to legend, on the back of every sacred cow, there is an incarnation of Lord Shiva watching the world. However, the pronunciation of "阿" is generally negative, but not complete.
Ananti's foreshadowing was buried until the "Cannibal Island" appeared behind.
Our protagonist Pi said at the dinner table that he wanted to be baptized, but the shipwreck really changed him.
I was still exclaiming for the magnificence of nature before, and immediately fell into the panic of catastrophe. During the long-term drifting, Pi said that he could not distinguish between dream and reality. In fact, when facing the catastrophe, the mysterious inspiration in the protagonist's heart has been radiated.
Animals are kept in cages. Why do they all run out as soon as they encounter a shipwreck? Why does the zebra swim out of the aisle without the door open? Or is it because they are actually simulacrums of the characters and souls of the characters on the ship?
Let’s try to follow the second story and the Canadian writer’s summary:
Suixi Buddhist sailor, who only ate gravy bibimbap, ate “meat and vegetables”, jumped onto the lifeboat and broke his leg during a shipwreck. It is a zebra that is preyed on the grassland. If you want to ask why it happened to be a zebra instead of a bison, then just think about the sea soul shirt worn by a seaman.
The cook who has corrupt moral character and can't eat without meat is the nasty bandit robber on the grassland—hyena.
As a botanist, Pi's mother, who does not give up his faith, is a kindly wise man in the forest-orangutan.
Only the tiger Richard Parker and the boy Pi appeared at the same time. Why?
In the famous poem of the British poet Siegfried Sassoon: "I have a tiger in my heart, sniff the rose, and examine my heart, dear friend, you should tremble, because that is your true face." Human nature has two sides. Everyone has a tiger in his heart, representing the primitive, inner, and instinctive side of a person. And outside the tiger's den, there are roses growing.
Ancient Christianity has always been plagued by an "evil problem". The question is: if God is what we claim to be all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-good, then the world and mankind he created must also be all-good. He must hope and be able to eliminate sin and suffering. But the world is still full of suffering, there are still sins in the world, and people are so dull. Why does God do nothing about the suffering and sins of the world and people? Isn't it self-contradictory?
The subsequent answers to this question led to various "theisms": God's creation of man is not completed, but is ongoing. Choose spiritual souls in purgatory. If the world is free from suffering and evil, and the kindness, justice, courage, perseverance, generosity, intelligence and knowledge of mortals are meaningless, such a comfortable world makes people have no goals and cannot develop human morality. Therefore, in order for mortals to participate in God’s sacred cause, the subjective initiative and responsibility of human beings have meaning, and in order to perfect human freedom, God must be absolutely self-disciplined and self-disciplined, so that He appears to be completely inactive. Your own responsibilities have meaning.
And man’s imitation of God’s self-discipline and self-restraint is called rationality. Deep in the human heart is a fierce tiger, out of self-discipline, the tiger's den is covered with thorny roses.
And Pi is the poetic (meaning) expresser of this story. The tiger is a pun on his inner (primitive, inner, instinctive) imagery.
If you understand this metaphor, then the story of the boy Pi on the lifeboat is easy to understand. Why does the absent tiger jump out after the orangutan (mother) is killed? Why is he hostile to the tiger in this way, because his reason and his nature are contradictory. He is a religious believer, but now he kills people; he is a vegetarian, but he needs to fish and eat meat; he lost everything in a shipwreck, in the boundless sea, he instinctively tends to despair, self-rejection, and even suicide. So he must be wary of his own instincts and fight his own instincts. In order to survive, he has to learn to live with his instinct, help his instinct, and tame his instinct.
Pi tied the food to the small raft outside the lifeboat, also worried about eating uncontrollably. But it was overturned in the sea by a big wave set off by a sudden fluorescent whale. What does this episode mean?
I still remember that Pi started fishing and caught the "Ghost Knife". After he knocked the fish to death in a panic, the fluorescence of the fish body instantly went out. He cried and said, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" and thanked Vishnu for saving them as a fish.
In Hindu mythology, Vishnu often incarnates in various images to save mankind. The first image is to be transformed into a fish, saving the ancestor of mankind in the flood.
Vishnu also has a famous saying: I am the destroyer of time, everything.
We look back at the image of this whale, a humpback whale, with a big mouth, huge wings, sudden appearance, and a huge body representing force majeure. The curves drawn on the surface of the sea and the rotation of the body when leaving are all in line with the simulacrum of time.
It can be said that the two "appearances" of Vishnu, one was to save Pi's life with fish as food, and the other was a long drifting on the sea, the passage of time and accidents on the sea consumed Pi's food and sharpened Pi's Will, spiritual growth.
Tiger vision-Tiger's vision. Pi was asking what it was looking at, and then he tried to stare at the water like Richard Parker... Then, the sea was penetrated layer by layer, and the first thing he saw was that Pi was able to imagine with reason and past knowledge. The things and sights obtained, followed by pure imagination, and finally, the most unforgettable memory deep in his heart...
The storm on the sea again, Pi has nothing, and the strange celestial phenomena appear, making him feel that he is the manifestation of God. Just like Job's questioning and praying to God in the Book of Job, the God in the Book of Job also appeared in the whirlwind. When faced with such a scene, Pi felt like ecstasy for the first time, but it was different. This time, he had gone through the baptism of suffering and there was no playfulness in his heart. When he opened the tent and wanted the tiger Richard Parker (his primitive, instinct) to take a look at such a scene, Richard Parker was infinitely frightened and unable to hold himself. In the end, he had to hide in a tent to survive the storm, but Richard Parker (inner) stayed outside in the storm, and did not come back to rely on Pi until the storm was over.
After the storm, the teenager Pi became weak, and Richard Parker was also in a state of weakness. He sadly said to it: "We are going to die." He placed the tiger's head on his lap. This was the first time he had consciously been so close to the tiger, lowering his eyes, as if waiting for death.
The picture suddenly melted to the "uninhabited island". I have three explanations here, but I don’t know which one to choose. Say it all out and let everyone choose.
The first explanation: The island is a combination of the mysterious guardianship of Anandi's witchcraft and the dreamland of young Pi.
The reason for this explanation is: We mentioned earlier that the girl Ananti is a shaman witch, and he tied Pi amulet before Pi's journey. Young Pi had realized before the storm that he could not distinguish reality from dreams. He felt that he was dying. As we mentioned, when he put the tiger's head on his lap, the hand rope tied to him by the girl Ananti had an inadvertent close-up, touching the tiger's head. At this time, the picture began to melt to the "uninhabited island".
But at this time, the cannibal side of the "uninhabited island" did not show up. The island at this time was a life-saving island. From the "dying moment" they became capable of ascending to the island, where there was plenty of food, the moss and roots of young Pi, the meerkats of Tiger Richard Parker, and the fresh and sunny weather. Enough for them to rejuvenate here.
Young Pi was grateful for the island and tied the hand rope Ananti gave him, the only meaningful item on his body, to the roots of the island.
So is this due to the fulfillment of Ananti's blessing and guardianship on the mysterious inspiration? This kind of blessing and protection is not perfect, it can only be a temporary abode, providing temporary rest.
Assuming that this statement is true, it would be easy to explain from a distance that the floating island resembles a woman lying flat on the sea. The essence of shamans and wizards pursuing mysterious spiritual abilities is to let themselves be close to gods and imitate gods, and witchcraft is the overflow of energy in the wizards, so Ananti’s blessing and guardianship also have her own characteristics: female, Indian of. So the image of the island is a woman, but also an imitation of Vishnu floating on the ocean of no cause. Secondly, Ananti's Indian characteristics and Pi's memory of India also make the island bear the simulacrum of Indian society. The meerkats on the island are simulacrums of the Indian society. The different features of the day and night are also different features of the Indian society. At the beginning of the movie, it was also paved. Pi's family also left because of the advent of "social night".
Just where Pi was resting, the truth of the island was discovered in the lotus-shaped fruit within reach. It is also like his memory of Anandi: the lotus is hidden in the forest. The forest is usually a perilous image. There are many meanings of the lotus flower, and it is suitable to represent the spiritual rebirth of the religious nature. For example, the most typical story: Nezha cuts flesh to return to mother, deboned to return to father, and finally forms a new body with the purity and spirituality represented by the lotus flower. That's right, Nezha's story originated from India. But such an explanation is far-fetched after all, and Pi's spiritual improvement was not completed on this island.
But the reason I personally prefer this explanation is that when the boy Pi found out that the island was a "nightmare", he did not immediately "woke up", but prepared enough food and got enough rest before leaving the island. It seems that there is a guiding force in the dream.
Generally, people who have experienced this mysterious guardian dream will feel that their body energy has been restored to a certain extent after waking up. Then he and Pi left after preparing enough food on the island. It is more consistent for him to continue to persist for a while at sea. But this is only an explanation.
The second explanation is that the island is the dying dream experience of young Pi, but it still has Ananti's protective role.
In the debilitating state before death, people will enter various end-of-life experiences. Most of these experiences are dream-like, not to mention one by one. And dreams are inevitably the satisfaction of desires and the reconstruction of disordered memories. Therefore, it is the desire and memory of the young Pi that built this island.
However, if people indulge in this kind of dying dream of satisfying desires, they will lose their will to survive and cause real death.
Also young Pi, out of gratitude for the island’s life-saving, tied the hand rope given by Ananti to the roots of the island. And rest in a hammock on a nearby branch. After that, the strangeness of the island night began to appear. Pi woke up at night, and when he was confused about this, he touched a lotus-shaped fruit within his reach, and inside the fruit were teeth left by someone before, reminding him that this is a cannibal island. Why is it such a coincidence?
First of all, the place where young Pi rests is not far from his hand strap. Secondly, the image of the lotus here is suitable to be interpreted as: two different levels of the world, like the crossing and communication between underwater and above the water. It's not that Ananti knew Pi's crisis sent him a message at this time, but that Ananti's blessing and guardianship manifested in this dream world.
But when the teenager Pi found out that it was a nightmare, he didn't immediately "woke up", but it was where I was more confused.
The third explanation: The island is just a dream after the boy Pi is weak and fainted. Dreams are the satisfaction of desires and the reconstruction of disordered memories. Besides, it doesn't make any sense.
Pi boarded on the beach, crawling on the beach, breathing weakly. Feel the beach as warm as the face of God. Richard Parker walked slowly into the jungle without looking back. There appeared the line that is now popular: "Life may be to let go, but unfortunately, we failed to say goodbye to it."
In the original book, Pi said: "I hate my nickname as an endless decimal point. Putting everything to a proper end is a major event in life. Only then can you let go, otherwise you will always have it. What should be said but not said, your heart is full of regret." But life does not always have the opportunity to be a perfect ending.
The first thing in the movie is for Anandi-I don't remember if I say goodbye, and the second is I remember that it was too late to say goodbye to my parents and brothers during the shipwreck, and I remember Richard Parker-and left without looking back.
It is said that this is the feeling that Mr. Li Ang has the same feeling that he has no time to say goodbye to his parents, so he was specially added and emphasized.
Regarding Richard Parker disappearing into the forest without looking back, I would like to ask everyone, if you are familiar with cats, cats and dogs, if you encounter a similar situation, based on your intuition, will he turn his head? Don't say look at the protagonist Pi, even look at the sea?
There are a lot of real over-explainations about this on the Internet. For example: "The tiger's head never looked back represents the father's initial education of Pi. The tiger has no soul. What you see in his eyes is only his own shadow. The tiger never thought about being friends with you." or It was "He followed the guidance of God and rode in a small boat toward the other side of the animal nature. But at this time, he still could not completely escape from the animal nature, and carried the tiger to continue. Until the end, the tiger walked into the jungle, Disappeared. Pi cried a lot, because the animal nature of humans helped mankind survive and survived the most dangerous moments. And when people pursue infinitely and approach the divine nature, the animal nature will leave without being noticed. "
The explanation I just want to give here is: remember that the tiger represents the most primitive instinct deep in Pi's heart. It is not a real tiger, and human instincts cannot be simply judged good and evil, or "beast nature that needs to be separated." Instinct cannot be stripped away by anyone. In the words of a netizen commenting: If you want to defeat or cut off your animality, and then obtain God's salvation, then it will become a plot to kill a tiger, rather than learn to coexist with it.
The tiger's departure, into the deep forest, is not simply leaving. What's in the deep forest? Hidden lotus-rebirth and sublimation of levels. Going back to the hidden depths of Pi, he no longer needs to be so obviously opposed to reason like drifting on the sea. It's not really leaving or seceding.
Pi, who has experienced shipwreck and drifting at sea, his instinct would not allow himself to look back, it's just that simple.
When we returned to the second story with the Japanese. Which story do you prefer?
The first story is mysteriously inspired by the Eastern system, with incredible events and/or symbolic (allegorical) expressions.
The second story is rationalistic in the Western system and can withstand the verification of logic and experience.
In the film, the storyteller Pissin does not ask the author which story do you think is true, but asks, which one do you like better?
Should we also pay attention to this detail? Don't ask which story is true, but ask yourself, which one do you like better?
Because truth is not the subject of the movie. It can even be said ingeniously that one is the truth understood by inspiration, and the other is the reality examined by reason.
The knowledge established by reason and rationality is useful, as Pissin said, it can help people survive in difficult adversity, but this is only an auxiliary function, and what supports people to live is still human instinct. Only when these two abilities of humans are at the same time, interdependent and alert to each other, is the truth about the survival of the protagonist Pi.
Pissin said when the author chose the first story: "So you follow God."
Why? As mentioned earlier: Modern religion is an interweaving fusion of rationalism and mysterious inspirationalism. Modern religion is neither purely rational nor purely inspired by mystery. It requires you to have a rational choice, and it also requires you to have an instinctive perception, not to be partial.
Although the film is paving the way for many religious elements, the main thrust of the film itself is not religious. As Li Ang said in an interview: "Faith is not the same as religion. In fact, you can't go to church or enter temples at all if you are drifting in the sea. The religious rituals of the world have been completely stripped away."
Finally, I talked about tigers. Richard Parker's name. Because I'm really afraid of being misunderstood.
In 1884, the "Mignonette" yacht sank. Four survivors boarded a rescue boat and were trapped in the Atlantic Ocean. In addition to captain Thomas Dudley, first mate Edwin Stephens, crew Edmund Brooks, and one named Richard · Parker (Richard Parker)'s 17-year-old male servant, he is also an orphan. Because he didn't listen to dissuasion, he drank sea water and became weak. The remaining three people discussed twice whether to kill one of them and make the others live. For the first time, they chose the form of drawing lots. Because Parker was very weak, they did not participate in the drawing. But when the lottery result came out, it was repented by the winner. After a second discussion, they chose to kill Richard Parker, who was so weak that he was dying, and was eaten by others, so the others on the lifeboat were able to survive. This is the later famous "Queen v Dudley and Stephens" (R v Dudley and Stephens) in ethics and law. ——According to the facts found by the jury, the judge declared the defendant guilty of intentional homicide and rejected their emergency asylum defense. The defendant was sentenced to hanging, but was eventually pardoned by Queen Victoria on the advice of Sir Harcourt, who supported the prosecution.
In fact, the three people on the ship participated in the murder of Richard Parker, an indisputable capital crime. However, due to the special circumstances at sea, seeking pardon from the Queen also cleverly resolved this public case. It is also a typical example of the combination of rationality and sensibility.
In addition, "Richard Parker" also appeared in other shipwreck and shipwreck stories. The author of "Life of Pi" believes that the coincidence brought about by this name must have its meaning. So this name was given to the tiger in the story.
Many people think that the name of the tiger is a metaphor for the fact that the protagonist cannibalize. But I think this is a slippery slope of over-interpretation and logic. In fact, in the original work, the protagonist Pi once wanted to kill the tiger Richard Parker, and he also conceived many methods for this. Therefore, as a target who was almost murdered in a shipwreck, the tiger is called Richard Parker, and he deserves it.
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