"Why are you always looking for evidence of existence, you treat your stories and experiences like raw eggs, as if only you can understand."
"Photos always Can't catch up with reality (so I keep comparing photos and reality)."
Philip, a down-and-out reporter, had the above conversation when he wanted to sleep at his ex-girlfriend's house, and her ex-girlfriend told him, "You are in a hurry. Find someone to talk to, but I can't comfort you." She knew that he had always been like this. This conversation is also an overview of Philips' real-world mentality. The photograph materializes the time and space that has passed away, which is precisely because of the insecurity about the existence of the self, that is, the relationship between the self and the world.
Philips is a swaying bum, struggling with a sense of disorientation in life. When alone, he is like a naughty child, throwing a tantrum at the things around him, entertaining himself, and talking to himself. "Talking to oneself is actually more like listening than talking." For example, when driving, you deliberately close your eyes for a while and then open them again to feel the pleasure. Sometimes it seems a little dull and numb, which is the external behavior of a brain that is constantly thinking and full of various sensitive thoughts. This kind of lonely experience, I believe everyone has had it.
In front of Alice, Philips will still behave like a child, but he has another child as a playmate. Alice only knows "I'm hungry!", "I need food", or crying, no complicated thoughts. Philips will be infected by Alice's simple life attitude and thinking, so he does not need to take pictures for a while to find and prove his existence.
In a big city like New York, the pace is so fast that people lose their sense of time. TV shows are forever chanting, "They all want something from you." This is a satire on America's overly commercialized social climate. And Alice's mother Lisa's boyfriend is someone who is completely integrated into the city's life atmosphere. Perhaps for him, life already has a firm sense of direction. Drinking Coca-Cola and listening to black music, Philips felt only noise and confusion in the atmosphere that symbolized the strong surrounding of American culture.
Alice's dream about being strapped to a chair to watch a horror movie is also a reflection of the lives of these adults. So when Alice asked Philips why he wanted to go back to Germany, he replied: "No money!" Because of the compromise of real life, he had to endure mental hardships, and real life was a nightmare that he had to experience. He only had naughty resistance, so when he was reprimanded by his superiors, he still took out his camera and took pictures of people.
Alice took a picture of Philips and told him: "This way you can know what you look like." When Philips took his picture, it was Alice's shadow, and I have to say that this plot was a stroke of genius. Does Philips focus on criticizing objective reality and forget to add itself to objective reality?
Several major adults in the film have similar moods and are reluctant to listen to each other's confessions. Philips' ex-girlfriend said, "I don't know how to live, no one ever taught me." In the same struggle and tired of being alone with each other. And loneliness makes them unable to communicate, because everyone is addicted to their own world.
As the first in a series of Wim Wenders road films, the narrative structure has been largely embodied. The relationship between this dumb uncle and the super loli has been in the process of trains, planes, and cars, constantly changing the scene. Wim Wenders' films are always a group of lonely people, helplessly drifting away from the world. In a daze, they were constantly looking for comfort and support, dull and panicked. In his "Under the Berlin Sky", angels and circus actresses like to speak alone, often silently staring at the things in front of them, thinking, like delicate and wounded animals.
Philips' self-lost can never be avoided. The relationship between people and the world is a question that can hardly be answered, but cannot be avoided.
Apparently Wim Wenders doesn't think he can answer this question himself, although he deeply feels it, and uses his film language to show this confusion, people seem to be able to comfort each other, this comfort is short-lived , Emotional, evasive, unable to resolve the embarrassment of one's own existence, unable to obtain true and complete redemption.
Kafka thought this problem was impossible to solve, so he said, "How can you be happy in this world unless you escape into it?" In his virtual world, man is always in a blind state. In the middle, or blindly marching, or blindly fighting, all this is fruitless. There is no difference between humans and any other animals in this world, or even the existence of any other thing, as if it is just a physical and mechanical existence. Self-increasing pain, God has not given more than that. However, Kafka is not completely desperate, the existence of human beings is meaning, and everyone is an existentialist Sisyphus.
What can we do? Everyone exists in various ways, and it is impossible to claim that his own path is the path to the exit. Moreover, even if your path is right, I believe you are lonely. People have become accustomed to difficulties and doubts, so that even if the right path is in front of him, he will avoid it and choose the other one, which is the opposite. It seems that we can only insist on ourselves, no matter what is wrong or right, and add some opportunities for ourselves to find, try as much as possible, and constantly expand the breadth of life, looking forward to a certain collision, a certain breakthrough after a sudden enlightenment. Maybe at the end of life, some people think that they are just a vagabond after all, no different from those mediocre people who have never fought. Others may finally realize that the struggle of this life and the colorfulness of this life have become enriched and enriched by exploration, although they did not find an exit in the end, and this tortuous road is full of the footprints of pathfinders. The valleys of the world still echoed their footsteps, and at this moment, they were gratified and satisfied.
P.S. "desperado " by The eagles
desperado, why don't you come to your senses?
Desperado, why are you so obsessed?
you've been out-riding fences for so long
now
oh you're hard one ,
Oh you're a stubborn guy
but I know that you've got your reasons
these things that are pleasing
you can hurt you somehow don't you draw the queen of diamonds boy (In America, the queen of diamonds stands for violence) she'll beat you if she's able you know the queen of hearts is always your best bet . (Queen of Hearts represents kindness) now it seems to me some fine things have been laid upon your table but you only want the ones that you can't get Desperado, oh, you ain't gettin no younger Desperado, oh, you ain't gettin no younger
your pain and your hunger
they
're driving you
home
freedom, oh, freedom well that's just some people talking
freedom, freedom,
your prison is walking though this world all along
your sins are spreading all along the whole world
don't your feet get cold in the winter time
the
sky won't snow and the sun won't
shine
It's hard to tell the night time from the day
you 're losin
' all your highs and lows, ain't it funny how the feelin' goes away?
Isn't it funny that you will lose all your joys and sorrows?
desperado, why don'
t you come to your senses desperado, why are you obsessed?
come down from your fences, open the gate
Open up it may
be raining but there's a rainbow above you you'd better let somebody love you You you'd better let somebody love you before it's too late .
View more about Alice in the Cities reviews
