The protagonist of the film "Me" is Thomas (Tom), a real estate gangster. His father was a scoundrel and his late mother was a pianist. The story begins in the twenty-eighth year of his life, when he met his mother's music manager Fox by chance, which triggered Tom's motivation to resume his piano skills. This remake of 1978 James Toback's "Fingers" is said to be Harvey Keitel's acclaimed early performance (interestingly, his later role in "The Pianist and Her Lover") Also learns the qin), although this film was released on a DVD in 2002, it is still little known and has not been able to meet Taiwanese fans, including the author. Therefore, it is impossible to compare the similarities and differences between the two films here. However, as far as the film as a whole is the creativity of the director Odia, when I walked out of the theater and recalled the shy and pleasing smile of the male lead, I was a little disappointed—not to mention Disappointed, but kind of left out. After thinking about it carefully, this actually comes from the "expectation error".
Where is the error? First of all, we have seen quite a few movies about pianists, such as The Piano (1993), The Pianist Shine (1996), The Legend of 1900 (1998) , "The Piano Teacher" (2001), "The Pianist" (2002)... We expect the protagonist's amazing talent to shine through his own spiritual suffering; however, Tom in "I" is not like a big David Helfgott finds the explosiveness of playing in the melee of the melee, nor the legendary 1900's stunt of sliding and playing the piano in the cabin, he does not refuse words or live in times of war, he is neither insane nor insane. No self-harm, the point is, Tom didn't stand out, all he had was his little mediocrity and all kinds of struggles with his parent-child relationship. However, how does the character of an ordinary man make this film?
Tom is a mix of his parents. He is often ordered by his father to do some wrongdoing, and he is best at solving problems with violence. The deceased mother evoked the piano memories that he was familiar with when he was a child. The music could regulate and release his tense emotions, allowing him to temporarily escape from this state of being unable to move forward or stop. One of the themes in the film is the influence of both parents on Tom (or rather, it was brought about by blood), which makes him often forced to fall into the quagmire of blood relationship and is eager to get rid of it. As Tom's friend in the opening credits: "Finally, Lao Tzu becomes my son, and, worst of all: I can't end it." He's pulled between the role-switching wrestling—how to be the subject under the gaze of the Other ─It has always been a key study in Western psychoanalysis. This is like another kind of "father forcing the son to rebel". If you look at the concept of "debt to each other" in the Eastern Reincarnation, Tom seems to be paying off his family debt, and he will clear the relationship after paying it off (but if the problem is not death , still unable to pay off. And it was his father who caused the trouble, not himself).
Before viewing the film, the message from the brief film promotion was: This film is about crime and art. Thought: wow, what a wonderful impact this inciting combination creates…. But in fact, "crime" is not the theme, and it has nothing to do with "art". Another theme in the film may be "ordinary". Why do you say that? Tom is a solitary young man living in Paris, maintaining the dignity of the middle class. If he resumes his piano skills at the age of 28 and changes his career, it implies that he is not young enough nor old enough to start anew in his life. He may have dreamed of becoming famous overnight, but a short, intensive training session is not enough, and there are many distractions in the day - several clips (though some are superfluous) show the clutter of Tom's life. : Dealing with his father's case, helping a friend tell a lie, spending time in a nightclub, dropping a mouse into a house in the middle of the night, having a relationship with a friend's wife, etc. Excluding the above, the most dedicated moment in his life was to learn the piano at the home of "Miao Ling", an Asian student. He practiced the piano not to pursue art or to show surging emotions, but to practice a desire for self-identification and to find comfort. Noticing that Tom was playing Bach's "Toccatas" in the film, he checked the dictionary and found that this is a track that emphasizes fingering, and the fingers must chase the speed of the piano sound. And in this pursuit of notes, doesn't the steady pace and sequence also symbolize a regular training of inner order? The presentation of the film is actually very realistic. As the director said in an exclusive interview with 'Weekly Screenings': "I don't believe the audience will want Tom to become famous in one fell swoop, because it's too unreal." So when Tom should collapse and face his own aberrations At the same time, he put on his headphones as if nothing had happened, stepped out of the street corner, and continued to listen to his electronic music in the sun. Because "abnormal" is the fact of his world, the problem he has to face, even if it's purely to prove himself.
In this role-oriented film, the performance of the actors supports the skeleton of the whole film. Herman Duris, who plays Tom, has already made his name with "Spanish Flat", and viewers who have seen this film or "North Africa" may not recognize these characters as Kate Hudson in "Love Co-op". Silly little French boyfriend is the same actor. Holman does not have perfect facial features, but his flexible acting skills and his own affinity make his performance successful. In the film, Danfu guest-starred as his father's girlfriend and the Asian piano teacher played by Linh Dan Pham. Although there are not many scenes, they are all very interesting female characters. Especially the scene where Miao Ling and Tom shouted at each other in Vietnamese and French really made the audience laugh; it was a real cultural intersection, they shouted at each other in a language they didn't understand, but with such strong emotions" "Expression" seems to understand the meaning of the other party.
Again, since it is related to music, I have to mention the soundtrack of this film. In addition to Baja and Brahms, the film also features Berlin electronic music duo Electrocute, French electric beat Telepopmusik, rock band Bloc Party and The Kills and other multi-phone elements. One of The Kills' "Monkey 23" can almost be used as a summary of the film. The lyrics are only two lines "There's a monkey on my back/Makes me talk like that/There's a monkey on my back/Makes me act like that." The English slang term "monkey on my back" refers to the mental baggage or obstacle caused by personal problems .
The English title of "I" is translated as "The Beat That My Heart Skipped". What does that "stop the beating heartbeat" have to do with fingers? Tom's fingers are the fingers of violence, the fingers of music, the fingers of soothing a lover, and the most sore joints on the fingers are most likely the split conflict of the parental role in him. I remembered the night before the audition in the movie. Tom decided to go to sleep early, so that his friends who were ready to smash the house and drive people came to the door. He couldn't resist their demands. Playing silently in the air, the surrounding dust floats - maybe it's exercise anxiety, maybe it's intoxication, or maybe it's a self-clarification state across scales in order to eliminate inner confusion.
That scene was beautiful.
I saw him wandering between two lives, unable to choose but "distracted". In the second that was interrupted, the fingertips fell in the air, and the heartbeat went beating.
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