From the viewing experience, the narrative technique of this documentary and the case itself are fascinating enough. I like the switching between the blurred police enforcement footage and Sharon's lively Facebook posts; I also like the director's alternate control of the timeline flashback sequence; to a tragic ending that seemed to have long been expected.
As I watched it, I thought back to the title from time to time: "family next door". At first, I also wondered if this was a hint that the final killer was the neighbor who provided surveillance video and pointed out that "something was wrong" with her husband. Later, as the analysis of the case slowly unfolded, I gradually understood the meaning behind the name.
Whether in an individualistic society like the United States, or in China, where the pace of life is gradually becoming faster, "neighbors" represent more of those who live by our side. unfamiliar" people. It is not difficult for us to find that if we want to describe the neighbors we often meet in the elevator/corridor, even if we are really unfamiliar, we can give a few approximate labels. This might be "pretty polite", "doesn't seem very friendly", "seems to be a busy person", etc. In this film, the husband is such a "good neighbor father" in the eyes of his neighbors and colleagues. Combined with the ending that contrasts so much with his character at the end, the director seems to imply that such a cold-blooded murderer may exist in your family next door.
However, it is not enough to understand that such a terrible event may have happened to you and me. We don't pay enough attention to those next door families. In the end, we still haven't paid enough attention to the issue of domestic violence. This may be because too many incidents like this are just a story that happened to others, and domestic violence is only a story. Exist on the far side of the screen. However, the bloody data at the end of the documentary tells us that the irreversible consequences of domestic violence are not far away from us. Only when both witnesses and bystanders take active action against this wide-ranging social problem, the same tragedy It won't happen in either your family or the family next door.
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