For this independent film, I want to give a couple of simple comments in some specific aspects.
Although it seems short and simple in content, it is actually rich and deep in meaning.
First, the attitude of people towards sea is affected by that man.
people who live by the sea are always holding veneration and awedness towards the sea. They live by the sea and depend on the sea. The ocean can provide their food and also easily deprive all they own. The scene that surviving people still live in the devastation by the sea after the tsunami indicates that how people depend on the natural environment they used to live with. These people choose to linger out their feeble existence. However, the man's behavior of building a boat with garbage encourage these folks to challenge the thing they used to respect and fear.
Second, the attitude of people towards their life stituation is affected by that man.
After the catastrophe, people don't stand up and rebuild their home. Instead, they revel; they drink and they burn. all of these not express their joy; instrad, all come from a sort of nihilistic choas standing for an innocent hopelessness----they have nothing else to do and have nothing left to lose. Nevertheless, that man's behavior awakens them from their meaningless revelry and delusion, and makes them to face the reality.
Third, the belief of people towards God is affected by that man. Some people who are not disordered also don't come down to earth. They choose to turn to God to seek hope and peace. Actually, the one who can offer help is not God or the priest. That religious leader cannot do anything to change the situation except for mourning death. Yet their faith is challenged by that man's behavior. They realize that praying and blessing is only a spiritual sustenance. They should do something practical. Even that priest offers his help with donating a wooden cross to bless the safeness at the sea.
Finally, the hero, the silent man, who lose the one he love in the disaster, is not an agitator with heart-stirring speech, but a soundless doer who cheers up people with actions. He is also a dogged and clinging guy who never abandons hope and surrenders to reality although there is little hope to rescue those people so many days later. His persevere and faith affects those folks and make them give out their only 'treasures' one after another. TV set, radio, skate shoe and birdcage, no one knows how these mess could help at the sea, but they just want to grip any chance they might get. When people find the ones they love at the sea, they know they have made the best choice----where there is life, there is hope.
In the end, I think these words from film will perfectly express the theme: "I try and think about how this storm and all these people dyin' was all a part of God's plan. But mostly, I just stare up through the water hopin' I can have one last look at them."
Jesus Shaves
15 years ago
Hal,
ReplyDeleteNihilistic chaos/innocent helplessness. There is something terrible but perhaps beautiful in the way that tragedy allows a return to innocence when nothing else can, though it is an innocence forged in fire, flood, etc.
The poet Anne Hebert says that most people come into the world only once, but that poet comes into it twice--
I wonder if that isn't true for everybody at least once in their life, and for some more than others.
Jess,
ReplyDeletewhen a catastrophe distorys people's all properties and goods, it also washs all the social values of these people. whoever one used to be and whatever one used to have are all not important. However one used to be, good or evil, it doesn't matter. Facing the disaster, everyone is equal. It is a kind of bleaching. people will start to live their new lives again after the catastophe, and it is a kind of rebirth for them.
As i know, many Chinese people still hate Japanese people today because their deeds during the war. However, when the big disaster happened in Japan recently, many Chinese people's attitude changed. Althogh there are a few extreme Chinese people jumped out to post something on the Internet about that all of these are the judgment that Japanese people deserve, there are more Chinese people don't agree. Many Chinese people choose to pray for Japanese people on the Internet and organize a lot of online donations. This is what people should do.
In my oponion, the tsunami also washed away the prejudice and hostility of some conservative Chinese people towards Japanese people. Maybe it is just a matter of time before it ends. It also helps to change many obstinate Chinese people's mind. History is our lesson but not our life.