American director Nicholas Pais's debut film, "Mother's Eyes" (2016), is a black and white image, creating an extremely thrilling picture, with a long-lens perspective, slowly entering, highlighting the gradual change of the character's psychology. What amazes me is that such an unbearable and cruel plot allows us to see the extremely quiet and beautiful pastoral scenery. This contrast makes the viewer feel as dead as an alien planet, and takes a deep breath, lamenting why the director is like this, is the ultimate beauty, a sad horror.
This reminds me of the utopian films like "House of Dogs" and "The Lobster" by the Greek director Ogerslans Moss, but the difference is that "Mother's Eyes" is positioned in the growth of the heroine Franny from childhood to adulthood The process, it was her isolated life, forged her cruel and concealed cold temperament.
The free-range, windward growth, or the steady and good manners, or the two poles, are all aspects of growth, which undoubtedly have an immeasurable impact on the acquired personality. How did Franny grow up? Has she transcended these growth patterns and leapt into a weirdo like never before?
Yes, she has an alien mother who resembles a human imagination, and it is this eccentric mother who has shaped this daughter. Little Franny's contact with this world is only her parents, and she has no way of knowing what the outside world is like. The distortion of her heart since she was a child can only make her growth more heavy, and it also adds a "quietness" that does not match her age. It's been a horrible growth.
Besides, they are an outsider themselves, and they are inseparable from the outside world of life. Her parents were originally from Portugal, and her mother was an ophthalmologist who hoped that she would become a surgeon when she grew up. But the closed environment in which she grew up was destined to prevent her from integrating into the outside world in her entire life. She was used to life in this independent kingdom.
All because a daredevil Charlie broke in with a pistol and changed everything for her. In the name of the bathroom, Charlie asked Franny's mother to lead the way, but he killed her frantically. Then his father, who returned from the outside, heard the movement, and quietly subdued Charlie, chained him with heavy chains, and imprisoned him. In the barn next to the house, at the same time, his eyes were gouged out. Since then, Charlie has been dark, and life is better than death.
In a quiet situation, the father and daughter basically did not speak, but just sat in the living room and watched TV. TV became their constant company and the only way for them to communicate with the outside world. If there is a happy thing, it is that the daughter asks her father to accompany her to dance, which must be repeating the situation when her mother was alive. Portuguese aria dance, melodious and filled with a hint of sadness. As a viewer, I can't help but ask: How long will they last for such a dead time?
The funny thing is that little Franny is in charge of feeding Charlie. Not the slightest fear. She will ask why you are doing this. He said you let me in, I feel very excited, are you going to kill me. No, why should I kill you, you are my only friend and I will take care of you.
The so-called care, that is, she made him so lingering. Strangely, the calmness of the little girl surprised the audience. The mother's poor education had penetrated deeply into Franny's blood. Father is more like a trance and dead wood-like existence.
Time grows like wild grass. As Franny grew up, she couldn't bear such loneliness, and sure enough, she killed her father silently, and she would rather be alone. But every day is the same as talking to him and giving him a bath. Don't think she's a necrophile just because she can't stand the long night of loneliness. It wasn't until after the corpse that she turned to intimacy with the dying Charlie, but it didn't last long before Charlie "goodbye".
For her, the world is black and white, and white is only the background color in the dark, which is even more hopeless than black and white, because the world has never been clear to her, only boundless darkness.
Mother's eyes are the guiding light for her twisted growth. Often when she has no masters, she will go up the mountain and kneel in front of her mother's tomb, and speak reverently, hoping for some kind of inner guidance. But she had to act lest she be killed by this extreme loneliness. The long shot freezes at her first drive. Once in town, she stops outside a ballroom and the same long shot freezes her sitting quietly in her car. She is waiting for prey.
An Asian girl came over to strike up a conversation. Got into her car and came to her home. It may be that the Asian girl also felt lonely, she wanted to be close to Franny, and even wanted to be intimate with her. She wants to know more about Franny. when she asked about her parents. Franny said nonchalantly that my mother was killed, my father was killed, that's all. This frightened her, and she wanted an excuse to leave, but Franny stopped her quietly. After entering the tiger's mouth, how can you leave it, another pair of bright eyes has been taken away.
Then, in the long shot of the distant view, Franny was standing on the side of the road in front of the fortified forest, and finally a car came over, and she hitchhiked smoothly. In the car, the hostess was driving with her little baby Antonio next to her. Franny begged for a hug.
After repeated requests, the woman's hesitation is no longer, then all right, you hug. Franny took the baby and said thank you coldly, this is the best gift you gave me (this also reminds parents that when a stranger wants to hug the baby in a small environment, they will proceed with caution).
The woman felt bad, but Franny ran out of the car with Antonio in her arms and rushed home quickly. The next thing, of course, this woman also suffered, her eyes were gouged out, the same heavy chain blessing, dark barn. She groped in secret and kept calling out to her lovely Antonio. But doomed to futile. Little Antonio is well taken care of by Franny, and she wants to experience what it's like to be a mother. Or she was repeating the scene with her mother when she was a child.
Likewise, Franny educates Antonio in the way her mother raised her. One day, little Antonioni found the woman in the barn and scared him back to the house, and Franny told him that it was not real, it was just a dream of yours.
Next, it made Franny even more uneasy. She sat on the edge of the bed and read to Antonio: "Cut out the noise, remember the silence, whether it's fair to you or not, the universe has never stopped evolving." There is a bit of a bleak smell of farewell.
Because the woman in the barn groped and struggled to climb out of the barn with an iron chain, and crawled to the road in step, and was rescued by a large truck. This corresponds exactly to the scene at the beginning of the film.
The police swarmed in in the night and dashed forward. She wakes up her "son" and says eagerly and flustered, you know I love you, no matter what happens to you, don't try to change how you feel. Gunshots were heard immediately. It all ends with Franny's disappearance. The utopia built by her parents came to an end.
In this paradise, the actions of the parents undoubtedly affected the daughter, and penetrated into her blood, allowing her to inherit and develop it both inside and out. When her mother's eyes were closed, she wiped out the eyes of strangers who had only one relationship with her. She hates other people's eyes so much, just because she doesn't want to observe the outside world, only hatred is left. This also means that Franny's gaze and vision are gone.
When the road goes to the dark, there is no fear at all, and she does not care about the outside world. She can do whatever she wants in her kingdom, she absolutely controls everything in the kingdom. By extension, a dictatorial closed regime ends up like this.
Almost all the scenes of her father and her violence are cut out in the film, except after stealing the baby. She still retains a bit of humanity, only to say that this humanity is precisely derived from animality. She needs to find her own sense of existence from little Antonio. She needs to find an heir to an independent kingdom.
What I want to say is that most new director's debut films like to take the sword out of the way, or use too much force, and this film is no exception. It is so cold, absurd, and dangerous, but it is so beautiful that it makes people feel a little shudder. Apparently, Nicholas Pais takes the film even further, arguably going further than Oggs Lance Moss' Houndstooth, not just horrifying, but also somewhat disgusting. Either way. Maybe, he just wanted to make a thriller with an artistic approach, that's all.
2016, 12, 14
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