Note: The spoilers in this article involve several excellent works such as "The Fantastic Drifting of Pi", "Malicious" (novel), "Shutter Island", "Fight Club", "Very Suspects" and so on. If you haven't seen the above works, but want to watch them in the future, please continue to watch the following.
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Two stories
If there is no second story at the end, Juvenile Pie can only be regarded as a memory Just like a fantasy movie. It should be said that Ang Lee's approach to the entire film is indeed visual. 3D is perfect and dreamy, and this approach has been successful in terms of expanding the audience for commercials. But if the script is just like this, it is estimated that Ang Lee will not make this film, and there is no need to write this film review. The so-called take what they need, the example of "The Dark Knight" tells us that commercial films can also have depth.
So let's focus on the second story. I think it is because of the second story that the whole film reaches a height that is worth exploring.
I think the film "Youth Pie" is Ang Lee's deconstruction of the theme of "faith". It says what "faith" means to an ordinary person.
Narrative Trick
First of all, the work "Youth School" has shown an attitude from the very beginning, which is a narrative trick.
I can't verify where the narration method originated, but the narration should be carried forward through Japanese mystery novels. The biggest feature of narcissism is that, to put it bluntly, it is deception. It is similar to using a literal "magic" technique to deceive the audience and deceive the readers. In Baidu Encyclopedia’s words, narrative tricks are the result of the author’s use of the reader’s preconceived notions to make the reader “believe” in a certain event or situation, and finally cause the reader to be surprised. In a common saying, you have been deceived, and the person who deceived you is not the author, but the "character" in the work. Yes, good narration can have the effect of having the character face the reader directly.
There are very few excellent works that use the narration technique, and many of the works use the narration very bluntly, narrating the eccentricity for the sake of the narration. Seeing this kind of crappy work usually really breaks the book. However, once the narration technique can be self-justified, the motive of narrating will often become a bridge for readers to penetrate into the heart of the character, because the executor of the narration is the character, not the author. And such a work must be a masterpiece in itself. Essentially, you read this work when you want to understand why the work uses this narrative trick, or when you understand the character's motivation for using the narrative trick.
For example: Keigo Higashino's "Malicious" is a typical narration masterpiece. The protagonist himself is a writer, and almost half of the novel "Malicious" is written by this writer. As readers, we naturally take these words as clues, as the protagonist's confession. However, what if the text itself is fake? What if the characters themselves were written by the protagonist to mislead others? Until the end, you will find out that I was deceived by these words! This is a very classic narration. However, this is not the end. The point is, why does the protagonist write these "words"? What was his motive for writing these deceptive words? When you think about it, you will be deeply shocked by the layout of this work. This is the deep "maliciousness" hidden in "Malicious".
This narration technique has also been cleverly applied in movies, and "The Usual Suspects" is one of the classics. I don't want to go into details here about the plot design of this movie. When I saw this movie back then, I was truly deceived. That's why, when I watched "Youth Pie" today, when our "adult pie" shoes started telling stories, I had a hunch that I was going to be deceived.
Of course, the point of "Youth Pie" is not to be deceitful. No one actually takes Pie's first story seriously. However, Ang Lee put all the brush and ink on the first story, which formed a huge contrast with the second story after that. But the point of the film is, why did Pi make up this story? When we answer this question, we can complete our understanding of the work. We'll talk about this later.
Let's take a look at these two stories first. According to the timeline, the first should be the second, which is the real version of the story.
Real-life version of the story (Pi's self-reported)
In the film, the real-life version of the story is spoken by the young Pi at the end, it is very flat, there is almost no decoration, and it does not exceed 5 minutes in total. But from the expression of the youth school, there are a lot of details described. If you just want to make up a story casually, these details are completely unnecessary. Apparently, this is the real story: the story
described by the young Pi is this: the
cook, the mother, the sailor, Pi, and the four escape into the boat. The cook led everyone to make a raft. The sailor's leg was broken, and the cook said he would be amputated, and the sailor died. Not enough supplies, the cook began to eat the dead body of the sailor. Mom couldn't take it anymore, and she argued with the cook. Mom told Pie to escape to the raft, and the cook killed her. Pi gets angry and comes back and kills the cook. Drift alone until rescued.
The reality is that simple. But if that's all there is to reality, there's no need for Pi to make up another version of such a fantastical story.
Pie didn't finish everything.
Why do you say that?
From the reporter's conversation with the adult faction, we heard the reporter clearly articulate the metaphorical relationship between the two stories. The orangutan is the mother, the zebra is the sailor, the hyena is the cook, and the tiger refers to the anger, evil and desire for survival in Pi himself, or the "real personality" of Pi, while the "teenage Pi" in the first story himself , is to send his ideal personality, or "belief personality". As can be seen from the first story that Pi made up, Pi separated his two personalities on the ship very clearly. Tiger and Pie's performances also very clearly reflect the personalities they represent. For example, in the face of a storm, the "belief personality" sect marveled at the miracle of God, and even wanted to embrace it, but the "real personality" tiger was frightened to death and showed a strong desire to survive.
When I first saw the reporter point this metaphor, I thought Ang Lee was superfluous. Is it necessary to explain it to this point? Wouldn't it be better to leave some space for the audience to discuss? But when I look back after watching the film, I think it was really necessary. Because the space left by the director is not here, but is, after knowing this metaphor, how would you view the first story?
In other words, the problem is that if you compare the first story with the second story, in the second story, when Pie kills the cook, it is equivalent to the first story where the tiger kills the hyena. This is just the beginning of the first story. What about the part after the first story? What about the part of "Pi and Tiger Drifting" that took a lot of time to describe in the second story?
Clues If
you want to know the later story of the real-life version, think about several key clues in the first story:
1. Food
The problem of food runs through the entire story line. Please pay attention to some details. At the beginning, there were supplies on the ship, and they were moved to the rear of the ship and dragged on the "raft". Later, the food was knocked away by the "Luminous Whale". I tried to catch the fish but couldn't catch it, but the fish swam to the door on its own, and later the flying fish jumped onto the boat by itself. Train the "tiger" with food and drive the tiger home. Then there was a storm and the food was gone. I was so hungry that I just drifted to the "Cannibal Island", where the tiger had meerkat and fruit to eat. See the "teeth" in the fruit. Save a lot of food and leave the cannibal island. Finally rescued.
2. Pai's "turf"
became afraid of tigers and hid on the raft. After that, I wondered if it could be like this forever. I tried to drive the tiger away but failed. Later, I saved the tiger and went back to the raft by myself. Later, he successfully trained the tiger with food and shared the raft with the tiger.
3. The relationship between Pi and the tiger
Pi was very afraid of the tiger at first, and later wanted to drive it away, but rescued it anyway. After training, I can get along with it. Share food. After passing the Cannibal Island, instead of leaving the tiger on the island, Pi called it back, relying on each other to move on. After being rescued, the tiger left without turning his head.
4. Animal carcasses
In the first story, Pai deliberately avoided dealing with "animal carcasses". When the hyena was killed by the tiger, the body was obviously still there, so where did the body go? Is it thrown away? Or was it eaten by a tiger? It is not stated in the story.
5. The name of the tiger
Richard Parker, which is actually a common name for shipwreck victims in real life or fiction, one of whom was eaten by fellow shipmates in Poe's novel. This metaphor basically picks out the whole real story.
The real-life version of the story (later story)
From the explanations above, combined with several metaphors, I believe that everyone basically already knows what the real-life version of the story I want to tell is:
After Pie kills the cook (using him the knife), facing so many corpses on the boat, I don’t know what to do with it. So he left the body on the boat, hid himself in the raft (leaving his sins on the boat and avoiding it), and took some food (supplies weren't as much as we saw). After a period of time, the food consumption was almost gone (the fresh water can catch the rainwater, but the food is real), so he had to try to fish (he was originally a vegetarian), but the success rate was very low. Eaten raw (a shock to faith). The raft was dangerous, he wanted to get back on the boat, he wanted to throw the body away, but in the end he didn't, and went back to the raft, but with all the supplies. When the storm came, he had to hide on the boat. The storm blew the raft away, and all the food was gone. Pie felt like he was dying. Finally, the desire to survive prevailed over reason, and he began to live by eating the corpses on the ship. finally rescued.
The reality is that simple. Simple but unacceptable.
So, Pie needs to make up another story. Not for others, but for yourself.
In the first story
, although I don’t know much about schizophrenia, I have seen some works about schizophrenia (or dreams and fantasy), such as “Shutter Island”, “Fight Club”, “Mulholland Drive” and so on. This type of film has one thing in common, that is, fantasy or dreams have reasons. The most common situation is that when people can't even accept some of the things they do, their self-defense mechanisms will "Make up" some "facts" to deceive yourself. While Pi isn't seriously schizophrenic in this film, when he is rescued, he also desperately needs a story to sidestep those facts. So he made up some stories about his rafting process:
1. Why didn't he stay on the boat in the first place?
Because there are tigers on board.
——Actually, he was afraid of the corpse on the boat, and he was afraid of facing the fact that he had killed himself.
2. Where does the tiger's food come from?
Fish, and flying fish, will get into the net and "fly" up by themselves. It was given to us by "God" to keep us alive.
- There are actually no tigers and not so many fish. "Eat raw fish" is a big shock to the party. If it is said that killing the cook is just for a momentary impulse, eating fish is to "break the precept" on your own initiative. He needs a reason to convince himself that God's will is the best reason.
3. After the storm, the food is gone, what should I do?
Drift to the "Cannibal Island" and found something to eat.
- Note that the shape of the cannibal island itself is a lying human figure, including the metaphor of the teeth, and it is clear that the "cannibal island" is the metaphor of the corpse. It represents Pi starting to eat the corpses on the boat, but, on the other hand, it also represents Pi's inner faith being swallowed up by this sinful act (Cannibal Island).
4. How to get along with "tiger"?
At first there is conflict, avoidance, then try to train it with food, then can coexist peacefully, and then depend on each other, but not become friends. After being rescued, the tiger disappeared without looking back.
——The relationship between Pi and the tiger represents the choice between one's inner belief and the desire to survive. From the initial fear and avoidance, to the later control, to the time of starvation, there is no morality, belief or survival.
Pi cried when he talked about the tiger leaving without looking back, and he also talked about his father, who he said never had a chance to say goodbye. Because in Pi's mind, tiger and father refer to the same thing - "reality". Pai said that without a father and acting according to the "real" laws of existence, he would have been dead. Yes, "reality" kept Pie alive while drifting. But after being rescued, from his own heart and morally, Pi couldn't leave behind his real self, or even "goodbye" to it. Judging from Pai's reaction, he didn't despise that self, he just regretted that he couldn't say goodbye to that self, and even felt a little guilty because he didn't feel like facing the "real" self. Ang Lee's point of view is very objective.
In the end, when he was rescued, survival was no longer a problem, but what Pi needed was how to throw away his sins and how to save his soul.
Whose soul did God save? After being rescued, the "motivation"
pie of the narrative can't face his own behavior, so he made up the first story according to his own beliefs. ' motivation. This first story is full of the exchange between Pie and Tiger, which represents a dialogue between faith and reality.
Pie itself is a synthesis of belief and reality. His father taught him to question faith and face reality (because his father's illness was cured by "real" science), and his mother taught him to believe in faith and to believe in miracles (the only difference between mother and family) fetters). He himself believed in three denominations at the same time. However, the mother who believed in the faith the most, died in front of him by the chef's knife in a very realistic way. This is the greatest irony for Pi's faith. Therefore, Pi cannot allow himself to accept this reality version of the story. Although only reality can keep him alive, he needs a story of faith to save his soul.
However, Pai himself is not a schizophrenic, and he knows very well which version is the truth. However, if he accepts this reality, if he loses his belief, in the later life, he will not be able to go on normally and face his heart. He needs this first story to support the rest of his life.
Why is the first story so fantastical? Because this story was told to Pie himself. This story is not for facing the law, facing the moral condemnation of society. To insurance investigators, Pi also naturally spoke out that version of reality. What's the problem? In both versions, everyone is dead and the ending is the same. What's the point of going after the "true" story?
So when Pi gave both stories to reporters, he didn't ask each other which story you "believed" (because the question didn't make sense), he asked each other: Which story do you prefer?
That's right, that's exactly what the director is asking us: which story do you prefer? It's not a faction's problem anymore, and it's not a director's problem anymore. This has become our own problem. This is the real motivation of the film's narration. Through the strong contrast between the two versions of the story, the audience can reflect after watching the film. Are you facing reality, or are you chasing faith? It's not actually an option, and I'm sure most people (including myself) have the same answer as the reporter. We all love that first story, that we still have faith. However, when you believe in and pursue your beliefs, will you make realistic moves when you are really faced with the kind of situation you are facing? What will we do with our beliefs then?
Finally, what is faith? The sentence that broke the question was uttered by Pi's mother:
Reality focuses on people's external performance, while faith focuses on people's inner peace.
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