(Spoiler) The creators of "After Leaving Him" (Her) and "After Her Disappearing" (Him) are really courageous, and even these healing literary and artistic sketches have dared to separate and market them. It is not the first and second episodes that will be screened in Hong Kong at the same time, but the same story (originally called The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby), which is narrated from two perspectives of male and female protagonists (divided into two versions of Him and Her). After a couple broke up, they have different experiences and mental journeys, but the most interesting thing is that there are subtle differences in their common memories and experiences. It is not accurate to say that this drama is "one chicken and two flavors", because in addition to the two versions of Him and Her, there is a third Them.
The materials used in the two "...After" are similar to the Belgian film "Broken House". They are both about the husband and wife who embarked on a divergent path of life due to the difference in pace and form of mourning after the death of their child. In the two movies, the husband is more anxious than the wife to restore daily life to the original state, but the wife can't get out of the valley of sadness for a long time. The original name of "Broken" The Broken Circle Breakdown has reminded that this story is not a healing type, but a wound and a tragedy to the end. Because the death of the child cruelly revealed the deep differences in beliefs between the husband and wife about whether there is a god in the world, whether there is another possible world, etc. For mothers who have lost their children, the hope must be "Science" is found in the faith, but her husband keeps obstructing it.
The wives of "Broken" and "After" both tried to leave their husbands, and they were also depressed to commit suicide. The former was eventually driven to a dead end by his husband, while the latter attempted to commit suicide and slowly resumed his journey. If "distance" is the key to grief (at least for the women in the play), then the creator of "...after" Ned Benson bestows the distance between the two movies on the heroine Eleanor- That is almost the distance between the two worlds. The original title implies that the heroine is more important than the male protagonist. If you watch Him first, you may feel puzzled and stop here; if you watch Her first, you may want to watch another version to fully understand the whole story.
"After She Disappears" (Him) is boring because it is too realistic: How to find his wife and continue working is a real problem, and tears must be put away before we can go on. The protagonist stuffed all the children’s relics into the storage room, and his grief was only suppressed and postponed (the image showed the character’s inner emotions outside, maintaining a low blue tone), and the work became his own. Excuses, he had to face it until his business failed. When he finally moved, he had the courage to open the door of the secret room after several hesitations and touch the old objects of the dead child. In terms of narration, Him also suppressed the incident of "the child died" to the latter part, so that the audience has not been aware of the reason for the relationship between husband and wife, and can only guess through clues.
Her is more beautiful, the story is open and not suppressed. Although Eleanor was sad to self-destruct for a time, she has been working hard to "return to normal life", but her husband has become the biggest obstacle, and she must leave to avoid going to ruin. She left home to go home - when she returned to her natal home, her parents still kept the room she had when she was young.
Her is richer than Him, because although the latter is constantly acting but only spinning in a frame, the former allows new possibilities to emerge through constant dialogue with other people and repeated retrospectives of the past. This kind of healing process is circuitous but intensive, and it is also an opportunity for continued growth. "Broken House" involves the relationship between religious beliefs and mourning. The male protagonist only allows an absolute "real world", which stifles his wife's hope of finding a way out in other "possible worlds", and eventually breaks completely. "...After" is divided into two plays, allowing two different situations to coexist in the same event, which shows that the strategy of splitting into two plays is not just Ned Benson's use of editing techniques to achieve commercial goals, because Him and Her are not the same. Different parts of the story world are combined in two ways, but two "possible worlds" are juxtaposed and contrasted. Through the distance between the two worlds of difference, Eleanor was able to abduct him from the sad prairie where his child was lost.
Originally published in "730 Perspective" September 22-23, 2014
View more about The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Her reviews
