Eight years have passed since "911", but Americans still have lingering fears, always thinking that third world countries will produce terrorists. It's just that this time, it's not a Muslim with a big beard, but a cute and cute manic beauty patient.
On the surface, the film is about a mentally ill person from a third world country who uses the "love" of Americans to create terrible incidents, but think about it carefully, if this family is really perfect, how could it be so easy Was beaten down? This film fully exposes the deep worries of the American people from one aspect: on the one hand, there are many internal contradictions and problems; on the other hand, people from evil countries outside have ulterior motives, and they have obviously received their own favors and still spend all day long. Conspiracy, 911 is a proof. This post-911 complex, Americans have yet to let go.
In the film, Kate and John's home is a typical middle-class American family with everything enviable: decent jobs (one is a piano teacher, the other is a designer), two smart and beautiful children, and villas, cars, etc. . But when you look at the gorgeous surface, there are undercurrents: the husband once cheated and had an affair with a neighbor; the wife still concealed the truth and pretended to give birth after the third child was stillborn; and she was drinking and had a relationship with her mother-in-law Nervous, so that in the end no one wants to believe and help her; the beautiful daughter is deaf and mute, and the son likes to hide in a wooden house in the woods and read adult pornographic magazines...
The appearance of the "orphan" Esther was actually just a fatal blow to this already riddled family and accelerated the outbreak of conflicts. Maybe this girl who never grows up has used a lot of horrible and unbearable means to achieve her goals. She is cruel, unscrupulous, unloving, sinister and vicious. These characteristics are very in line with the American imagination of the people of the third world countries. To describe her as a psychopath who is good at disguising, the director is really polite, and at the same time successfully avoids the suspicion of "slandering" the Estonian people (what would happen if the girl came from China today? It is estimated that the director will be drowned by Chinese saliva. ).
It is said that the film encountered complaints when it was released in the United States, because one of the lines: "It is impossible to love an adopted child like one's own child", which made the caring American people very dissatisfied. . You must know that "fraternity" is an important part of the values of the American middle class. It is because of this that they go to third world countries every year to adopt orphans (with UN Charity Ambassador Angelina Jolie as the most important part) represent). If you question that ethos, you're shaking the foundations of America's long-held beliefs.
The horror part of the film is handled well, and the director is skillful in rendering the atmosphere (although the plot is not lacking in holes). However, for all middle-class American families who are keen to adopt children, the depiction of the spiritual crisis behind the film will make them even more fresh in their memory. If you find that your love has been thoroughly used and eventually become a weapon to hurt yourself, how can you make those Americans who believe in "fraternity" feel embarrassed?
Therefore, the real panic created by Esther was not a simple family crisis, but a profound crisis of belief. Murder and love are only bloody on the surface, and what is destroyed is only a simple body. If someday Americans get worried, they feel that people from third world countries are unreliable, and they think that their good intentions are regarded as donkey liver and lungs. Poor countries are all terrorists, that's bad!
One additional point: There seems to be an obvious bug in the film. When the hostess Kate called the Sarang Academy to verify the identity of Esther, the front desk who answered the phone did not speak English and asked someone to pick it up. But later, when Esther's attending physician called Kate to tell the truth, he spoke fluent English and didn't need an interpreter at all. Is English already so popular in Estonia?
2009.12.14
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