What a Dystopian nightmare! First there's the Hotel environment where you're under pressure to partner up or else… And then there's the woodland commune where your brutalized if you do partner up!
So what is the theme here ~ that we need freedom around gender and romantic and mating choices, and that we live in a world that is too dogmatic on the issues?
More like the settings act as vehicles for exploring or making fun of human coupling .
shareThis unsettled me slightly, too.
I figured the movie was a comment on two diametric forms of totalitarianism - social pressure to be part of a couple (the minimum-sized unit for a cohesive society) versus social pressure to be free and unattached.
What puzzled me also was the ban on fornication among the singles in the woods.
fornication leads to things like affection and attachment which leads to coupling. or in a vaguer sense you can simply think of it as the parallel to the ban on masturbating in the hotel.
shareI think you are more correct than the people who've replied to you. I think it exposes and challenges audiences to consider the notion that our culture's conceptions about 'normal' or 'acceptable' relationships is not necessarily based on anything less absurd than those presented in the movie.
More importantly, it invites examination into what 'love' means at its core. Are people really in love if they share interests or talents or qualities? Is fitting a comfortable, socially acceptable model what it means to have a substantial relationship? Or is there something about the person you love that makes them uniquely qualified to receive your affections? Would you be willing to change to make yourself more appropriate for your partner?
Notice in the movie that neither of them considers the idea of trying to be happy as a couple without that shared quality. It's simply beyond their imagination, having come from a world in which it is accepted by everybody that that just isn't how romance works.
I don't know if there's a suggestion that we need 'freedom' in these areas, or whether it's rather that freedom is impossible in these areas because our very conceptions of romance, love and normalcy depend upon our culture.
What I do think the point is, is to get people to consider these ideas and question their own assumptions.
Thank you so much for responding and getting me to think about this some more, and in ways more satisfying than the movie itself prompted.
I think my biggest problem was that I had been looking forward to this with delicious anticipation , all of which swirled down the drain in the actual watching of it.
I don't mind that it was edgy and funnily tasteless at times. I do mind that no measure of love ever prevailed.
I do mind that no measure of love ever prevailed.One could argue that Ben Whishaw's character "loved" his wife so much that he was willing to permanently fake a bleeding nose for it. And Colin Farrel's character eventually blinded himself in order to be with Rachel Weisz' character. Sure, those things are arguably not as dramatic as Romeo and Juliet committing suicide, but I'd say it does count as *some* measure of "love"...
I don't conflate masochism with love, but I can see where this plot does.
shareMasochism means deriving pleasure/arousal from mutilation or physical abuse. I don't think that applies to the characters in this movie (apart from maybe Heartless Woman). Whishaw and Farrell mutilated themselves as a sort of sacrifice, not because it excited them (nor their partners). Hence it's not masochism.
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Keiko Matsui & Carl Anderson - "A Drop of Water"
http://youtu.be/kPUENUUuqSk
Well, that definition of masochism is right out of S&M games. But there's a broader spectrum in psychopathology, including partners who feel they must self-sacrifice in order to be accepted, and that's what i mean here.
Bottom line: I found the plot depressing.
Colin Farrel's character eventually blinded himself in order to be with Rachel
That is an interesting point -- the cinematic signs DID point to her waiting a loooong time for him. The waiter showing up ... the abrupt fade-to-black. Makes it even MORE depressing (if that's possible) -- but you may be right. Thanks.
share