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Review: Innocence (2004)

Review: Innocence (2004)

Innocence/纯真 (2004)

Lucile Hadzihalilovic导演的作品《纯真》(2004)讲述的是以艾瑞斯(Zoé Auclair)和比安卡(Bérangère Haubruge)为代表的一群少女的故事。

Lucile Hadzihalilovic’s film Innocence (2004) tells the story of a group of girls represented by Iris (Zoé Auclair) and Bianca (Bérangère Haubruge).

 

这群少女都在年幼时被放在棺材里送进森林中的一所神秘的女子学校中学习生活,以束发的丝带颜色划分年龄/年级。这里乍看起来是女孩们的伊甸园,但是这里禁止外出,年龄最大的孩子离开后也没了音信,听说,从这里出去的人都不会记得这里……电影也着重塑造了这些少女在这种环境下的心理变化,体现在她们的情感需求因难以得到满足而产生的各种情感变体和扭曲。比如艾瑞斯对比安卡的依赖,她几乎把比安卡当作了妈妈。这种把亲情转化到对最大孩子的依赖的情况同样出现在比艾瑞斯大一岁的塞尔玛(Alisson Lalieux)身上。塞尔玛所依赖的大女孩不见后,她气愤地砸坏了镜子,后来她还打了艾瑞斯,等等,这些似乎也暗示着现实生活当中女孩成长过程中可能出现的各种心理问题。

 

These girls are put in coffins and sent to a mysterious girls’ school in a forest to study and live. They are divided into ages/grades by the color of their hair ribbons. At first glance, it seems to be an  Eden for  girls, but it is forbidden to go out here, and the whereabouts of the eldest girls who leave  are unknown. It is said that girls who leave the school  will not remember it …The film also focuses on shaping the psychological changes of these girls in this environment, which is reflected in the distortions of their emotions due to their unsatisfied emotional needs. For example, Iris becomes dependent on Bianca. She almost regards Bianca as her mother. This transformation from family affection into dependence on the eldest child also occurs in Selma (Alisson Lalieux), who is one year older than Iris. After the elder girl Selma relied on disappears, she angrily smashes a  mirror, and later  hits Iris. These actions seem to suggest various psychological problems that may occur in the growth of girls in real life.

 

关于这部电影的主旨,以我个人的解读,这部片中虽然男性极少出现,但全片所讲的都是瘆人毛皮的男性凝视。有关这点,电影神秘诡异的氛围不光来自导演的光影设计和配乐风格,更是于细节处见魔鬼。全片中男性只有两次正式的出现(我不清楚男大夫给老师打针的这处细节中存不存在有关性别的含义)。第一次就是剧院的阴影,通过声音我们能听出这些处在阴影中的观众正是男性。结合芭蕾舞的看点和对蓝丝带女孩严苛选拔的情节,电影从女孩们登场开始就把大量的镜头都集中在了女孩们的腿等等身体部位上,而凝视这些部位的明显不光是女孩们自己,还有镜头本身,而镜头代表的似乎正是男性的目光……男性的第二次出现则是在结尾,而且是在公共场合、在阳光下,大女孩们见到了真正的男性,而我认为这个看似美好的结尾正是全片最为毛骨悚然的,其可怕之处就是对应了片名,彻底的“纯真”——即自我的丧失。结局之前有不少相关细节,比如比安卡扔掉了观众扔给她的手套和玫瑰,我认为这代表她彻底摒弃了自己的欲望,走向了彻底的“纯真”。她可能只想出去,也可能什么都不想要。总之,她就是以这样的状态来到了外面的世界,遇到了男生,而我认为她的这种状态可能正寓意着极端男权对所谓圣洁女性的全部幻想……蝴蝶的这个意象也可以拿来佐证我的观点。在生物课上,老师对女孩们说她们都会化茧成蝶,那么老师怎么说成蝶之后呢?“看,它去繁衍后代了。”那么我们换一个角度,把蝴蝶当做生命活力的象征。电影中另一种对蝴蝶的展现就是大女孩的芭蕾舞剧。这场舞中,蝴蝶的结局是全都死掉了……那么综上所述,最后所谓化茧成蝶出来的女孩,等待她们的很可能是被物化,是直通死亡,她们已然只剩下一具空壳……不过这仅是我的个人解读,可以反驳。比如,最后比安卡在临走前从自己的盒子里翻出一张男性雕像的纸片,这可能就是之前她对男性的全部认知,那么她也可能是有所好奇和欲求的,但是即使如此我看这种欲望也并不多,不能说明她有足够的自我。

 

As for the theme of this film, in my personal interpretation, although men rarely appear in this film, the whole film is about the  male gaze. In this regard, the mysterious and strange atmosphere of the film comes not only from the director’s design of lighting and color, and the style of the soundtrack, but also from other details. There are only two formal appearances of men in the whole film . The first is in the shadow of the theater. Through the voices, we can tell that the audiences in the shadow are male. Considering the highlights of ballet and the plot of the strict selection of blue ribbon girls, the lens frequently focuses on girls’ legs and other body parts from the beginning of the girls’ debut, so it is not only the girls themselves who gaze at these body parts, but also the lens which seems to represent the male gaze . The second appearance of men is in the ending. This time, in public and under the sun, the eldest girls meet a  real man, and I think this seemingly beautiful ending is the most creepy part of the film. The terrible thing is that it corresponds to the film title—the complete “innocence”, which means the loss of ego and desire. There are details that indicate this before the ending. Bianca throws away her  gloves and a  rose thrown to her by the audience. I think it means that she has completely abandoned her desire and moves towards complete “innocence”. She may just want to leave , or she does not want anything. In short, it is in this state that she comes to the outside world and meets boys, and I think her state may imply all the fantasies of extreme patriarchy about the so-called holy female. The image of the butterfly can also be used to support my point of view. In biology class, the teacher tells the girls that they, like caterpillars, will all turn into butterflies, and what does the teacher say about butterflies? “Look, it’s going to reproduce.” Then let’s change our perspective to take the butterfly as a symbol of vitality. Another representation of butterflies in the film is the eldest girls’ ballet. In this dance, all the butterflies die in the end. So to sum up, the so-called girls who like butterflies emerge from cocoons are likely to be materialized and face death directly. They have only empty shells left. But this is only my personal interpretation, which can be refuted. For example, before Bianca leaves, she takes out a piece of paper on which there is a drawing of a male statue from her box. This may be all she knows about males before, so she may be curious and eager about meeting real males, but even so, I don’t think this plot shows much desire in her, that is to say, it cannot show that she has enough self.

 

今天是妇女节,时至今日,女性仍在社会中遭遇着很多如我影评中写到的及影评之外的各种问题和不公。我作为一个男生,也在用着诸如文字之类的方法,反思着男权社会的种种问题,尽绵薄之力来支持女性维权争取性别平等。这仍有漫长的路要走,人类社会的进步仍需努力,善良的人们也会一直努力下去的。最后,祝普天之下的女性节日快乐!

 

Today is International Women’s Day. Up to now, women still encounter many problems and injustices like what I write in this film review and outside this film review. As a male, I am also using methods like this to think about various problems of the patriarchal society and doing my best to support women’s rights and strive for gender equality. There is still a long way to go for this. The progress of human society still needs a lot of work to do, and good people always work hard on it. Finally, I wish women all over the world a happy International Women’s Day!

 

Written by Yudong Liu (刘煜东) for The Film Dispatch

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