Text: The little Trojan horse under the scorching sun
I was moved and warm, but I didn't know where to start. The few lines I typed were deleted over and over again.
Maybe it's because I haven't reached that age, and I'm afraid I can't explain the comfort of that kind of emotion. Recently, I watched a few movies in which the protagonist was an elderly person. Getting old is a life trajectory that everyone has to face. All are appearances, and the most terrible thing is: loneliness.
The film "Soul of the Night" tells the story of two elderly people who talk to each other and resolve the anguish in their lives. The pace of the film has been kept unhurried and slow, the tone is soft, there are not too many fluctuations, even death is a dull sentimental, and then accept it.
I can't remember if it was the grandfather in "The Intern". He once said that at their age, perhaps the most attended party is funerals, which is true and sad.
Different from the family light comedy style of the "Family Suffering" series directed by Yamada Yoji, if "Family Suffering" is about the real problems faced by people in old age, such as "divorce crisis", "Should it be? Continue to drive" and so on, then "Soul of the Night" focuses more on the spiritual level of fit.
After 48 years with little contact, Eddie Moore (Jane Fonda) suddenly appears in front of Louis Waters (Robert Redford) and invites him to visit occasionally Sleeping at home, not for anything else but just wanting to have someone by my side who can talk from time to time.
The two people who were almost strangers went from being awkward at the beginning to slowly trying to get to know each other and warm up the night. The two of them spent their whole lives in this familiar bed. Facing the unfamiliar person, they were exposed one by one, some cheated, some Losing a child, they also experienced strong winds and waves when they were young, but when they look back at old age, there is not much emotional fluctuation. one time.
The starring Jane Fonda and Robert make the characters even more full, perhaps because they also stepped from their green youth to their twilight years. The photos of the master creator when he was young will still be amazed by "Yan". It turns out that the youthful youth and high spirits of the past are not worth the traces left by the passage of time.
Whether in "Soul of the Night" or "Family Suffering", I prefer female characters. Although Hirata Fukuko (played by Kazuko Yoshiyuki) in "Family Suffering" is positioned as a traditional Japanese family Women spend their whole lives meticulously for their husbands and children, but in their later years, they are determined to live for themselves once, sign up for novel writing classes, and file for divorce with a firm stand. In the second part, they even leave the tedious life. The other half of the earth sees the aurora. Although far away and not even represented on camera, there is a stark contrast between the beauty in words and the filth in real life.
In "Soul of the Night", Eddie Moore, a very assertive female representative, took the initiative to ask Louis to come over for the night. Facing Louis' fear of the gossip among the neighbors, she just said lightly and let them go, fearing people's words all her life , and should live for herself once, so she refused Louis to enter from the side door, but welcomed him generously from the front door.
In the face of her son's accusation, the scars of the past were ruthlessly uncovered, dripping with blood. On the one hand, it was for "selfish" happiness in her later years, on the other hand, it was compensation for her son's lack of maternal love and responsibility for her grandson. She also gritted her teeth and made her own choices. , neither procrastination nor hypocritical, just like her in Louis's impression, she is calmer and more decisive than a seven-foot man in dealing with things.
But after a busy day, he returned to his room, picked up the mobile phone that Louis had given him, and dialed the string of numbers. A familiar voice sounded. Although he was in two places, his feelings and companionship were still close enough.
In fact, "Soul of the Night" reveals a very profound social phenomenon: empty nesters.
With the development of society, the problem of aging cannot be ignored. In 2012, it was introduced in the first national seminar on intelligent elderly care strategy that by 2050, more than 54% of the elderly living alone and empty nesters will be in my country. After reading a lot of news, parents fall , but the children only exist in the address book, and there are also many public service advertisements. In order not to annoy the children who are working hard in the distance, parents often report good news instead of bad news. Until something really happened, there was no time to regret it.
For the lonely and widowed elderly who have no children, they need more care from the society and neighbors. In 2015, a man named Ovie decided to die. Ovie lost his wife and lost his job in his later years. He recalled how much pain in his life, So he decided to die, but the humane neighbor conveyed love and hope of life to him in the ordinary daily life.
Sometimes rich material is not as good as short-term companionship, and sometimes a warm greeting may save a lonely soul. There are several scenes in "Soul of the Night" that I particularly like. Eddie and Louis bring their little grandsons Jamie and Adopt a dog to go camping and roast marshmallows together. It turns out that when we are old, we can live wonderfully, warmly, and not alone.
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