Although the theme of "The Baron in the Tree" is obviously different, "True Detective" is undoubtedly a good story. In "True Detective", the person who "refuses to go to the ground" living on the tree is Rustin Cohle, regardless of whether he wants it or not. Why is he so? In the mouth of the heroine Maggie in the film, Rust is different from his partner (Maggie's ex-husband) Martin Hart. He always knows what he wants, so he "doesn't mind living a solitary life." This character first reminded me of Larry in Maugham’s novel "Blade". He saved him because his comrades sacrificed himself in the First World War. He made up his mind to put the marriage contract and all the worldly behind so that he could spend his entire life. Answer the ultimate question like "Why is there evil and pain in the world?" Rust is certainly not a philosopher. The similarity between him and Larry is that the death of others makes them fall into a predicament in life. For Rust, this incident was the unexpected death of his daughter.
According to Rust's narrative, the departure of his daughter quietly disintegrated his marriage with Claire, and he had to resort to frantic work to prevent him from being overwhelmed by this pain. This man who had lost the motivation for life but had no courage to commit suicide chose to "live" as a "drug undercover agent". The "live" here is quoted because this highly dangerous work can make Rust so close to violence and fear. On the one hand, violence and fear can make him temporarily forget the pain of bereavement, and on the other hand, it can A negative way out is possible: dying under the gun of a drug dealer may be more like a "decent suicide." (Think about why Wittgenstein participated in the First World War-"A decent suicide!") In addition, because he was good at it and liked to work with violent people. Over time, violence and fear have become Rust's abyss, and "when you stare into the abyss, the abyss is also looking back at you" (Nietzsche), this life has become another addictive "drug". According to what Rust once said, "My life is an ever-expanding mess, a cycle of violence and depravity." We can understand the impact of Crush (Rust’s undercover personality) on Rust based on our own experience of loneliness: a solitary person is bound to enjoy loneliness and hate loneliness. He enjoys loneliness for some reasons, such as being unable to stand normal. Social life requires time to be alone, etc. He hates loneliness because he realizes that loneliness is ugly, and he also desires to communicate with others deep in his heart. In short, he realized that being alone is not good, but he could not choose the good. By changing "loneliness" to "violence and depravity", we can understand what Rust's original sin is.
Subsequently, Rust shot and killed three drug dealers in Houston, thus ending his life as Crush. He did not accept the "mental pension" that seemed to have won the lottery prize, but "the murder group who wished to go anywhere". So, in 1994, he came to Louisiana and became a partner with Marty. In 1995, he and Marty jointly started the investigation of the "mysterious religion" case. As he himself said, at this stage, he has “spent a lot of time and energy to adjust his nature”, so for Marty or anyone else, he will not “change himself easily”, otherwise he will renew Back to the violent and crazy state of Crush. He grasped the life-saving straw of handling the case well, and struggled out of the quagmire that Crush was stuck in, but then climbed onto the tree he found for himself, refusing to have a spiritual communication with anyone. Rust chose the murder group as the original intention of ending Crush's identity. There may be two reasons: First, the bright side of his integrity, intelligence, sensitivity, and perseverance makes him competent for detection work, and also allows him to still be the real murderer in his life. In the process of using the law to gain meaning-especially the crime against the child, this is also related to his bereavement; secondly, he has not yet become a complete "birthman", it can also be said that he has The world still has some nostalgia, so "I want to keep a place in the group." Obviously, in order to truly achieve this, in addition to conditioning one's own nature, two types of people must be alienated, namely, those who he doesn't care about and those who care about. Alienating people who don't care is because Rust doesn't bother to contact them, because this kind of contact is meaningless according to Rust's philosophy. Alienating people who care about themselves does not want their problems to cause them trouble and pain. Therefore, he must alienate everyone to protect his own stability, thus creating a certain "anti-social personality". Another point is that Rust's own mention of not being able to approach "other people's family" will remind him of his own past. (This can also explain why he chose to drink before going to Marty's house because he needs to numb himself). All of the above are the reasons why Rust believes that "life on the tree" is necessary for him.
However, based on work, he has no way to alienate Marty. Because they are partners. Compared with Rust who lives on the tree, Marty is a thoroughly secular person. I believe many viewers have the same feeling that we can see our original sin in Marty: superficial, sleek, sophisticated, sometimes sympathetic, sometimes unprincipled, the lower body directs the upper body, and an indifferent attitude towards the true feelings of the family . The most terrible thing is that, like many of us, Marty refuses to admit that he has these problems, and refuses to regard these "banal evils" as a kind of "evil": after Marty was derailed by Rust and "sniffed", Rust threw it away. One sentence summed up the root of Marty's problem-"People who don't know how to feel guilty tend to live well." When Marty beat the "adulter" and staged a farce, he asked Rust regretfully afterwards, "Is a man OK? Falling in love with two women at the same time" was also pointed out by Rust-"This kind of man would not love at all"-then Marty asked Rust again, "Have you ever thought that you might be a bad person?" Rust told a cigarette while smoking He "the world needs bad people to shut out other bad people." Poor Marty may not understand at all. Rust is talking about his own "bad" at this time-the "bad" obsessed with violence and fear-not the "bad" of Marty. What's more, Marty has always felt that he is not a bad person before, and he has a set of reasons for himself.
The story of Socrates once told us that perhaps the greatest wisdom is to recognize one's ignorance. If this sentence is generalized, then the beginning of virtue may be to recognize one's own sins. Marty has been alive and unconscious, until the Dongchuang incident, he didn't realize that he was also a guilty person. But he is very sociable and familiar with the survival rules of human society, so he doesn't need to be as smart as Rust to be decent. So Rust needs him, he needs him to do things that he can't do, can't do, or don't want to do (for example, reporting is something Rust doesn't want to do). On the other hand, the reason why Rust is not completely alienated from Marty lies in the efforts of his wife Maggie. As a woman, Maggie can look at Rust's life from a new perspective. Although she doesn't know much, she perceives Rust's desire to "fall down the tree and land" with the instinct and affection that are unique to women. With little understanding, she believes that Rust is a "good person", "responsible" and "righteous", and believes that family can bring "warmth" to Rust, so she strives to promote Rust's return to a normal life through a new marriage. Of course, Rust can also feel Maggie's intentions, and this kind of intentions has caused Rust to some extent. In other words, he needs a kind of solitude to live "life on the tree", to solve the case in hand, to maintain the "self" he adjusted; but as Maggie said, Rust is obsessed with cases. His mentality is that he is afraid of loss and the changes brought about by his new family life. Because change is not necessarily good. As his later girlfriend Laurie pointed out, Rust before 2012 was indeed a "contradiction." He will still struggle. This is because even if you are as tough as Rust, you don’t really like loneliness. The reason why he lives alone on a tree is not the best choice, but a kind of "to pass for him and the people around him." "s Choice.
The non-existent "gunfight in the forest" changed some things, but after all, nothing changed. It is said that the change is because Marty began to "change the wrongs" and Rust started to consider the possibility of starting a family again after "the real murderer" broke the law. But just like the M theory described by Rust in 2012, "Time is a circle", nothing has changed, but it has fallen into reincarnation again. In 2002, Marty finally crossed the line again ("Is this a deposit?" in 1995, the phrase Rust became true). And because the "Yellow Robe King" is still at large, Rust has fallen back into a near-paranoid case. At the same time, Rust ended his cohabitation with Laurie. On the surface, he explained: “It’s difficult to live with me. Over time, I become like criticizing others, and people around me will unhappy". But in fact, the real reasons may be many. The murderer who is still killing women and children makes it impossible for Rust to sit on the sofa calmly and watch soap operas with his lover, and his long-term self-destructive tendency makes him unaccustomed to this sudden happiness, not to mention Marty's god of this relationship. In summary, the problem they encounter is a problem that both men and women encounter-"reality". Anyway, Rust decided to leave Laurie and go back to the tree again, or that Laurie did not drive him off the tree at all. And Marty's problem is much simpler, he just releases the previously suppressed things again. The theory of circular time tells us: "People don't change" (People don't change), so there is no "self-improvement" at all.
The two men returned to the beginning of their lives in 2002, but Maggie changed their relationship. But I think Maggie is at best an appreciation for Rust, not a true love. She really loves Marty. Ten years later, she still cares about Marty and hopes that Rust will not put Marty in danger again. But ten years ago, she had to retaliate. She had to do something enough to hurt her husband to get rid of this "liar bastard" (Rust's final evaluation of Marty). Is Rust interested in Maggie? This was Marty's main concern later, because it was related to whether his old partner should be responsible for the breakdown of his family. The sentence "everyone has their own choice" is enough to show that things are not just the result of alcohol, and Rust also thinks Maggie is a "good woman." Anyway, Maggie took advantage of Rust, and the damage to the self-respecting Rust can be imagined. This time he had to stay away from everyone again, but this time, like the first time, this alienation was not entirely the result of his personal will, but a fateful "catastrophe" like the daughter left him. But from another perspective, saying that "everyone has their own choice" means that Rust believes that he is actually responsible for this matter. And he also chose to let things happen that night.
"People who don't understand guilt tend to live well", this sentence is also true in reverse-"People who understand guilt often live not so well". So, with self-blame and guilt, Rust exiled himself to his native Alaska, where he lived a life like a crane for eight years. It was not until the Lake Charles case in 2010 that he was dragged back to Louisiana, a land of right and wrong. Ten years later, Rust and Marty are still continuing their reincarnation. In Marty's words, they all "have changed, and none has changed." If 10 years ago Rust still had a glimmer of hope for the family life under the tree, and only the yellow robe king stood between him and this life, then in 2012 Rust "knowed himself" more thoroughly. Simply put, he no longer struggles with whether he should return to a secular life, so he maintains a more detached posture about many things that he would never take care of. The tree to solve the crime was his cross, and he crucified himself on it. Either all the murderers will be arrested, or they will go mad or die. For Rust, there are no other options. On the other hand, Marty is also living in depression. With a person's life, health problems, and relationship with his daughter, Marty finally eats up the evil and alienates his family from him. He may understand guilt, so he can only make it harder. He just stood outside the former family, but didn't know where to go.
Ten years later, the reason for the two reunion, as Rust put it, is "a man remembers his debt." Ten years later, Marty still couldn't and didn't want to understand Rust, so he understood this sentence as a hint that Rust asked him to forgive him. But Rust's original intention was that the two of them owed the victims an explanation. 17 years ago, an outraged Marty shot Reggie in the head. This move made Rust understand that he and Marty share a common bottom line, that is, they cannot tolerate violence against children. So Rust comforted Marty, who was anxious after the murder, "I'm glad you can persist," because Rust did almost exactly the same thing: shot and killed a drug dealer who gave his child methamphetamine. Of course, Marty's shot also helped the "true murderer" escape possible tracing. If Rust hadn't interrogated the drugstore thieves in 2002, the hidden true murderers would probably have gone unpunished. Therefore, Rust believes that this case is not his own debt.
Going back to the case itself, the evil and cruelty of the murder group is using the "Siyuan Project" (similar to China's Hope Project), which is a form of charity, to target children who are impossible to guard against and who are inherently poor. Even if many of them survived, they also left with lifelong sequelae, either insane, or reduced to marginalized people in society. Not to mention the horror that happened on the video tape. The reason for Marty's resignation was that he saw the mutilated body of the baby in the microwave oven, and the reason for Rust's journey back to sadness was that the murderer was still causing more tragedies. So Rust asked Marty to put aside his grievances and grudges and face their common conscience together with him-their hatred of darkness.
Many people think that the ending of the story is very abrupt and lacks dramatic elements. This kind of comment is not unreasonable, especially for those who are used to the "big reversal" ending of traditional detective works, the final solution of "True Detective" seems to be too anticlimactic. However, as Rust reminded the audience in the first episode, the real opportunity to solve the case may be a small detail that you missed. If you discover this detail, you will be shocked, and the real culprit will come to light. For these two types of screenwriting methods, my personal view is that the cleverness of the story is of course very important, and it can also play a role in attracting attention. But better playwrights are not willing to substitute for the audience to think, nor are they willing to simply use PPT to list the information read by the protagonist on the screen. The work he must create is not only the result of his own thinking, but also can inspire the audience to think about the characters or cases on their own. When handling the case, Rust did not show off to the audience the information he obtained through the Palace of Thinking like Sherlock did. He does not have the magical skills of Sherlock, but just like the title of the film, he is a real detective. He is just a little smarter and sharper than the average person, not to mention he has his own personality problems. This kind of uncomfortable "reality" requires viewers to invest more energy in researching and interpreting the works, so that we, who are busy working from 9 to 5, may be accustomed to the "fast food culture", thus ignoring what it contains. Profound. But in any case, it cannot be said that this kind of work that requires human thinking to understand is not a good work, because if the original intention of a literary work is to save thinking, then it is almost impossible to be the best work.
The ending of "True Detective" happened to not make this mistake, and it succeeded in raising the story into a thought-provoking mood. The metaphor of Christ Jesus being off the shelf is already very obvious. When Rust drew out the "Langinus gun" that stabbed him and wanted to die, the light of a flare illuminating the darkness, but disappeared in a moment. Rust eventually survived and is still agitated for the "fish that slipped through the net". But what makes him really unable to let go is not just that justice has not been completely done, but just like his final confession, when he was on the verge of death and plunged into the darkness of nothingness, he was ready to die, but At this moment, in the abyss of death and darkness, he suddenly felt a force greater than death and darkness, and this force drew him back from the abyss. This is the love her daughter has for him. To untie the bell, you must tie the bell: it was the pain of bereavement that made Rust step onto the branch seventeen years ago and began to escape the self-destruction of the world, and after seventeen years, he opened his heart knot and finally returned to the world. , Still his daughter. At the end of the story, love finally defeated death, and Rust was resurrected in the world like Christ Jesus, completed his own salvation, and walked out of the reincarnation in which he was personally trapped. At this moment, Rust, who walked off the cross, also walked down the tree that separates the world from self-he opened his heart to Marty, and Marty, who also experienced all of this, was also moved by the depth of Rust’s love for her daughter and started to slow down. Slow to understand the world of Rust. At the end of this oldest story, Rust walked down the "tree of self", but did not return to the earth symbolizing the dunya. He may have risen into the sky like a baron on the tree, and became a light in the night. The stars that light up the human soul.
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