Underneath the ancient ship more than 1,300 years ago, facing the boundless universe. A breeze brushed across his face. Under the boat is not a river, but a solid land mixed with the scent of green grass. It was night now, and the sky was full of stars, each of which was many times bigger than the earth that carried the earth underfoot. Time is boundless, and the universe is boundless.
How insignificant a person is.
I can't imagine what Edith feels like lying on this boat right now. The director's long shot hangs in the sky, holding Edith in the center, but it is extremely small. This shot is a perfect metaphor for the "person": "I" is everything, and it can be nothing. In front of the ancient ship representing history, we see the fate of hundreds of millions of people surging surging over a long period of time. Edith's husband and cousin, who could only go to the battlefield as a screw in World War I and World War II, may not even be counted as a splash in the torrent of human history. The rhythm of the entire film, including the long-scenario scheduling, seems to be fragmenting the story, fragmenting everyone, and rendering personal powerlessness. A large number of long-shot beautiful scenery pictures make our protagonists seem so lonely in this world. The hot and cold relationship between people, the on-and-off narration, like a breathless breath, is as heartbreaking and unsettling as Edith's heart attack. In terms of plot, the name of the movie is Digging, but the movie is full of details that seem to have nothing to do with Digging, such as the wrecked pilot who suddenly fell from the sky, and for example, it took a lot of time to talk about Edith going to London to see a doctor, and Peggy and her Husband's feelings, her husband's orientation, and Brown's emotional line. These things, which have little to do with digging, may take up more than half of the entire movie set time. It can be seen that the real theme of the film is not to dig this thing. What the film wants to express is that each person, as one fragment after another, is small. Human beings have this noble spirit and are able to find their place against the grandeur and nothingness of this world.
Edith, she stood in the ancient ship and looked at the stars and the sea, facing her sick body and short life. She is not powerless. There will be happy tears in her eyes because she is not alone. The love between her and her son binds them together; she and Brown admire each other, and the mutual understanding and respect through the difficult times together bind them together; Brown and his wife support each other, and his wife will come to visit him thousands of miles away, Backing him up with simple truth and emotion when he's lost; and Edith's accidental kindness to Peggy; Peggy and Robert's fiery love: under the broken house, under the orange sun, Peggy and Robert are in love, and they're tight close together. All those nihilistic attacks, the unpredictable fate of tomorrow's pilots, are now insignificant. Human beings are too small and fragile. So we try to love, to find these connections and moments that make our lives meaningful, so that we don’t get displaced and disappear into a corner.
Or, like Peggy, we are scared, lost, and feel insignificant. But in the photo, we saw the moment when we discovered the gold coins, the fragments of independent people, we saw our own existence and the traces we left behind. At that moment Peggy burst into tears: the sense of belonging and weight generated by the connection between himself and human history is a magnificent emotional impact. As individuals, we come from nothingness to nothingness as fragments. But if it is used as a puzzle, it allows us to see the huge human soul that we have become a part of from the perspective of a third party. Brown also said that he does archaeology to let people know where they came from and where they are going. In other places, in the distance, you can see yourself.
Then there is the noble quality in each person. I appreciate the politeness in the gestures of the characters in the film, the neat self-respect in the costumes, and the respectful sense of family, love and friendship, and sense of responsibility they have for each other. After all, in the midst of torrents, if you are at ease, you will always have a direction.
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