The above is an academic interpretation of free will, and the title and plot form a strong contrast.
Leo, a restaurant handyman and a long-haired man with violent tendencies, runs to the car after a dispute at work. During the drive, he saw a woman on a bicycle, and he skillfully prepared tools and dragged the woman up a deserted hillside, cruelly indecently assaulting her. This scene is very cold, just like a documentary, watching without any expression, the woman is powerless to resist, Leo punches and kicks the woman, and then vents his lust like a beast. After venting, Leo wanted to look into the distance alone and thoughtfully. At this time, the woman was about to escape but fell down the hillside and was injured. When Leo went back to get medicine to treat the woman's wound, the woman escaped. At this time, someone passed by and found an abnormality. Li Ao was unable to drive, so he could only hide in the woods. At night, he was caught by everyone and then beaten.
Nine years later, when Leo was granted parole, he learned that he had trouble controlling his sexuality and was violent. Accompanied by a social worker, he was referred to a printing shop, and the boss hired him after asking in detail about his experience. Since then, his heart life has begun, and his image has undergone significant changes, from long hair to short hair, it seems that he has agreed to say goodbye to the unbearable years before. Soon, in the boss's office, he met the boss's daughter, Natty. The trajectory of two people, brought together.
Leo's life seemed uneventful. Sexual desire, the most primitive desire, has always been suppressed by him. Just in his room, he would masturbate to the TV, and a lot of the time, he would do pull-ups with the social worker who became his friend. Sometimes they also go to the taekwondo club to learn together, in order to consume their male hormones. During this period, Leo was impulsive, facing the visiting waitress, the strange girl at the station, but in addition, Leo still longed for the appearance of love, although he did not understand what love was.
Natty's sudden phone call tied their lives tightly together. From the first encounter in the supermarket, the conversation in the cafe, the harsh words to each other, to Nadi's phone apology, and the final taekwondo club Tina's vent, this series of shared experiences seems to be the same as any other couple, everything. Everything seems to be the same as normal people, and even the rhythm of the movie is getting more and more protracted at this time, but it doesn't matter, since it is very realistic and close to the overall style of a documentary, it is natural to have patience to watch the 2 and a half hours of the movie.
Natty went to Belgium to make chocolate, and Leo seemed to be calm during this period. On one occasion, a store clerk who tried to model his body entered her room, but he took control. Since it is control, this is enough to show that Leo's desire has been suppressed all the time, he has not really gotten rid of the influence of sexual desire on him, his life has always been very painful, and he has been struggling and wandering between human nature and animal nature.
Leo eventually went to Belgium, where he was devoutly pursuing Natty, and sensitive and vulnerable. At first, he had to find a hotel by himself, rejecting Tina's suggestion to stay with him, and finally he stayed with Tina because there was no room available in the hotel. One night, he restrained the whole night, and in the morning Natty got up and hugged him, he refused, resisted, he fell in love with Natty. The next day, after a holy musical baptism, Leo, cried. The two are together. In the evening, Leo and Natty ML for the first time, Leo and a woman for the first time in a tender way. After the end, the two cuddled warmly. However, the most heartwarming part of the film, the director still did not use warm lighting and lyrical music. The cold bystander continued from beginning to end.
Natty and Leo were in love, and Leo was with him, eating, going out for a walk, like any other couple. Natty prepared breakfast for him, and the two flirted with each other in a large white tub filled with water, seemingly having a good time. Just like the restless tattoos on Leo's left arm and chest, Leo's life will not be so simple, so plain and full of danger. In Leo's project of holding up Natty's passionate ML in the corridor of their apartment, the director has clearly hinted to the audience that Leo's bestiality has not been domesticated, and that expression reminds me of Prynne in Last Tango in Paris Spend.
The good times didn't last long. On a night when Nadi went out for a drink and dinner, outside the shop where Nadi was drinking, he was in a bad mood watching Nadi chatting and drinking happily with others. On the way home, he blocked the way of a MINI car, and the lady in the car let him leave impatiently. Leo got in when the woman entered the garage and the garage door slowly closed. Suppressed sexual desire burst out at this moment, he rudely cursed and hit the woman's head, the woman screamed, cursed, moaned, and finally became silent. After Leo molested the woman, he got out of the garage and walked back to the apartment with heavy steps.
Leo washed his blood-stained hands regretfully, but he couldn't wash away his guilt. Natty went home, and Leo pretended nothing had happened. The next day's breakfast, the atmosphere was unprecedentedly depressed, Natty seemed to have found something unusual, and Leo silently prevaricates. One night, Leo finally couldn't hold back his guilt, he confided his past to Nadi, and then he let Nadi's pleading to keep him and walked away.
Natty finds the former victim, and she uncovers the deepest wounds in the victim's heart, revealing the scars that have been hidden and suppressed for 8 years. In the cafe, the victim took advantage of Natty's convenience, she broke into the bathroom, cruelly took revenge on Natty in the way Leo had done.
Natty called Leo's friend, who lied and said she wasn't in Berlin. Natty came to Berlin intuitively, and she found Leo again. At this time, Leo was going through the most depressing and guilt-ridden period in his life. During the tracking process, Natty thought that Leo was going to commit murder, but Leo was preparing to face death at this time. Leo came to the hotel to buy your seaside, facing the sea, the gloomy sky, the dim sunshine, everything was preparing for Leo's death. One night, Natty sneaked into the bathroom of the hotel where Leo was staying, and she came to the bathroom of the room, and the camera gave a close-up of the blade. After this subjective shot, Tina left the hotel and returned again. She found that Leo was going to commit suicide. There was no one in the house, and she ran to the beach again. From a distance, she saw Leo sitting alone on the beach. She ran to Leo and tried to stop him. Leo was very determined to die. He cut the arteries in his right and left hands respectively. Nadi watched helplessly, and Leo leaned on Nadi in relief.
The next morning, the morning sun rose, and Natty hugged Leo's stiff corpse, refusing to let go.
This is a film that reflects the rapist more objectively. The director records it almost entirely with the attitude of a bystander, and endows a prisoner with a flesh-and-blood soul. It expresses the director's meticulous interpretation of the criminal motive and criminal psychology, and the director's sincerity is also that this 2.5-hour movie will not let people fall asleep. The contrast between the evil and the good aspects of human nature is directly touching. Only German films can present such a masterpiece so rigorously.
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