The Stranger Revisited


The entire movie was narrated as if the character with the glasses (stephen grant?) was completely detached from the goings on. Note how when he stood up and answered the telephone on the tower roof he was shot at. This is because in my opinion, HE was the one shooting people from the tower. 'Walt' was an invention in his own head, as was 'Walt's girlfriend' as was the girl he helped out of the elevator who was experiencing sleep deprivation, as was the girl who was nice to him and put sprinkles on his cupcake. The entire movie is told to us by the mediating personality, which was the one who was supposedly getting the coke and walking down the college quad area with the systems professor. From the point, you see the movie from the detached perspective of the Stephen Grant 'boring, stranger-like personality' ... detached, cold, wondering about mundane things like index cards, always detached, always boredly commenting on events that would make most of us viscerally afraid. Note that the 'Walt' character looks astonishingly like Charles Whitman. When he waves to his girlfriend, the one that he says has disappeared, her parents don't exist, her grandparents say they are childless, etc etc... when he is waving to her at the airport he smiles and that is so dead-on charles whitman I think they included that smile just for effect. The deal here is this. I think that the stephen grant guy was always being beat up on and ostracized at school, didn't know what major to take, he was a very indecisive, very sort of... 'stumble through life detached' person. He was pushed to the brink by things like being locked into the orchestra section of the theater, etc. Even note how the character walks around the catwalks above the 'stage' where all the action and 'drama' is going on, always above it, always detached... never participating in life. When he finally 'snaps' and starts shooting people from the tower, he notes it as if someone else is doing it. The person doing the shooting is named "Walt Whitman' this was a man who was a gay poet. Perhaps this represents the soul of the Stephen Grant character, for which he was ostracized and pursued and beaten down all the time. Thus, 'Walt' ... becomes 'Charles' and starts shooting people when he has had enough. The 'girl' with the sleep deprivation experiment IS Stephen Grant also. After being awake for something like 100 hours, he snaps. He becomes paranoid. He begins to vanish. The 'mediator' personality that is. The one who bought the coke. The one who is detached, observant, non-emotional. Not involved. The 'stagehand' of life. The guy 'above it all'
and 'Charles' surfaces. The girl is sort of the one who surfaces when 'Stephen' the original detached guy is finally fading out and disappearing because he is dying from loss of blood and suffering delusions. Note how she 'visits him in a spacesuit' and pours decorations on his cupcake. This is because he is literally that far away from what is happening right in front of him. She needs a spacesuit now to get to him and help him, comfort him as he lay dying. At the end, he does die. He doesn't even notice it but he got shot by one of the swat people... which is why 'no one ever found walt' you really think no one ever found walt or never discussed the issue again? Of course this means that Stephen DIED. He then goes to wherever you go, to some 'netherworld' but to him it is the same world as before because even when he dies, he doesn't go down into that stage and participate either. He goes right up to the top, into the dark.. it gets darker and darker and darker... get it? He died. I don't understand how people can't spot such obvious symbolism. I've read all the other posts regarding this movie and I just can't understand how at least no one 'got' the idea that all the characters are the same person. Even the systems professor was 'Stephen the boring-guy' after a fashion... he programmed the first-person shooter that Stephen was so into. There's more to elaborate on re: this GEM of a movie, but I'll wait for any replies or comments I suppose. Anyway, WATCH this movie on IFC. Immediately. It's great and the movie just flies by.

--xst

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Wow. I never even thought about that. Great job.

It's only a state of mind.

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