MovieChat Forums > Frantic (1988) Discussion > Recurrence of garbage truck.

Recurrence of garbage truck.

posted 18 years ago by kessinger-1
28 replies | jump to latest

During the entire movie there are (too) many shots of garbage trucks. Not only of them driving, but frequently picking up trash.

Right near the beginning of the movie there is one, aswell as in the end.
In both scenes Ford and his wife are in a taxi and have to wait for the truck to pick up the trash (?). Polanksi even choose to have a shot of one driving away at the end.

This really struck me, as I can't think of any meaning why he has so many scenes with these trucks.

What do you all think of the meaning of this?

[–] regahsof 9 years ago

Read all the other posts, and I don't think there's a deeper level of meaning necessarily other than to say, possibly hinted by someone else, that nothing was gained by this trip to Paris. At the beginning in the downtown part of Paris we see the garbage truck, just an emblem of a moving, functioning society, and then in the end we see the truck, an example that society continues to move along, regardless of what is happening in your life -- perhaps a sort of anonymity of the city type idea -- and that things are right back where they began a couple days earlier for Ford and his wife. Nothing was gained. It's almost like nothing happened. Deja vu. Same garbage truck, happens to be a different day, though.