Debating some important points -- Why is Alex 'forgotten' by all?

people who love this movie , should check "Kárhozat" out.

I saw the ring-returning scene as Alex's way of allowing Aimee entrance back into her real - married - life. With her ring back, there would be no evidence left of their affair. And it also means that Alex no longer feels that he must meet her again as that was the pledge behind the giving of it in the first place. Alex sees that he has failed the test (whatever it was - faith, love, desire, fear) so he gives her the ring back. It's only fair that he does so. They are both released from their moment of romance.

I think that everyone forgets because Alex makes certain choices and adaptations in this movie. Whenever you make a choice there are consequences, some expected others completely out of the blue. To illustrate just how total a choice can be, Alex is forced into a world that is not his. His flat even disappears.

I got another feeling when that happened: When all the familiar people in his life don't know him, he still has that one possibility: Aimee. He made that choice and she knows him, she still remembers him. It brings the choice into stark focus because everything else has virtually disappeared. Each time he makes a choice he falls again (the man running downwards thing) and lands in the choice-he-made world. We don't completely invent our world we only outline it. We try and make sure certain things are in it, but most of it remains unknown territory - Here There Be Monsters. Then, when he is supposed to meet Aimee to go to Rome, he finds that his old girlfriend - even though she doesn't remember him - seems to be falling in love with him all over again. This touches his heart so deeply that he allows it to cost him his relationship with Aimee. He doesn't realize it, but he has made another choice and now he will have to adapt again.

Alex wasn't real at all, but Aimee and her husband where real. Her husband's book was about Aimee and Alex, and his identity loss was a message to the audience that he was in the book rather than real. That is my interepretation, and I know that it leaves questions still. I own Reconstruction and loved Elsker dig for evigt/Open Hearts, but I cannot find a way to buy Elsker dig. Please let me know if anyone knows. I'm in Iowa, U.S.A. and have looked online on Amazon etc.

In some ways I think this film is a "mission statement" of Boe's. This is his film "debut", the first film he made after film school and it seems as if the film really has no *single* plot. Instead, it is a framework within which he has constructed several vignettes, tied together by the characters and in some regards the narrative and within that structure he presents several cinematic devices he will use to evoke specific responses from the audience. One such device is the male construction of a female character that is contrived as almost a concept rather than a real character, a bit of utter egotistical hedonism. Aimee *to Alex only* is a rather fanciful manifestation from the male ego. She is looking for someone that looks *just like Alex*, in fact you could say that she is waiting FOR Alex. She is tailor made for his advances, immediately open to him, responding favorably to any comment, desirous of him, wanting him and only him. She is dissatisfied in her current situation and she is absolutely open to anything, willing to do whatever, utterly beautiful, and absolutely accepting of no commitment, but aching nonetheless for any morsel of Alex's self that he is willing to give her. She is everyman's wet dream, falling head over heels for Alex after only a few moments time, so much so that she is willing to accept whatever he will give her.

Alex is also a fanciful construction of a man by the female ego. Again, he is tailor made for Aimee. He is single, good-looking, utterly attracted to her, completely desirous of her the moment he meets her, willing in fact to give up *everything* for her. All she does is look at him a couple of times and he chases Aimee and dumps his girlfriend to follow her. He is completely willing to do anything she wishes, and she can discard him at any moment, all she need do is forget him and walk away, leaving him devastated in her wake.

Both characters are each other's "dream" lover. Each character falls in love at a single glance. Each character is willing to do anything and to endure anything. And each character is forgotten in an instant, and being forgotten devastates each character. Aimee's husband, Alex's father and Simone are simply adjunct "props" to heighten the intensity of each other's fantasies. Aimee is willing to leave her husband for Alex, and Alex is willing to leave Simone for Aimee. Additionally Aimee is able to make Simone and his father forget him, to further serve her fantasy. He can leave with her and there is nothing to keep him from doing so. In fact, she is the ONLY person in his life, he MUST go with her or he has no one. She is his only reality now. The converse is also true, Aimee's husband, even though he knows he is losing her, still leaves her after a single phone call so that she is accessible to only Alex.

Simone, the husband and the father are also "fantasy" constructions. Simone is utterly in love with Alex, willing to do anything, willing to accept even the most cavalier treatment. The same can be said for the father, who Alex leaves coldly in the restaurant, yet the father accepts this and leaves wanting more time with his son. The husband knows of Aimee's affair, but is willing to forgive her completely, realizing the mistake he's made and desperately seeking to reverse the damage to retain his perfect wife.

The husband also conjures up a perfect "male" image of the wife. She is stunningly beautiful, she waits for him dutifully, she suffers any slight, and there are no consequences for his actions. As a matter-of-fact, even the affair she has with Alex is a fiction that HE has created. In the end she leaves Alex, she even FORGETS Alex to remain with her husband, even after he promised to go away with her and right then gets a phone call from his assistant and leaves her once again. She still goes with him when it is all over.

The point is that really ALL of the characters are fantasy constructions of one another. The scenarios that they get in are specifically suited to fulfill their desires, and they are specifically made to evoke certain emotions and responses from the audience. In essence Boe has made a film where he is saying, "Hey look, I can manipulate you any way I want. I can make you feel happy, sad, sexually excited, I can make you completely care about any character I wish, no matter how badly they might act to one another, and I can create situations that go no where, but while they do you are completely enthralled."

Boe is making several statements with this film. One, he is illustrating his technical and narrative skill, proving that he has the ability to take an audience wherever he wishes and make them feel whatever he desires. Secondly he is exposing the devices that a filmmaker uses as *devices*. He is pulling the curtain back from the wizard and saying, "Here I am, I am pulling these levers and pushing these buttons, and even though you KNOW I'm doing that, you will still respond as if I weren't even here." It isn't an egotistical statement, but rather a mutual acknowledgment that these are the devices which both of us have to work with, and we both know that's what they are, no one is fooled or taken by surprise by them, but this is what we have to work with. We acknowledge together that we BOTH are "film smart"; we both know the tools, the devices. I as a director am not trying to prove that I know more, and you as the audience are not going to reject my attempts so that you can prove that you see the wizard and aren't fooled. Together we agree that we both are aware of everything that is going on, but I as the director want to do "this and that" to you the audience, and you want "this or that" done to you, and both of us appreciate, respect and need the other to get what we want." Look at the title; it is called Reconstruction, which says it all. “Here are the devices we have to works with, watch me reconstruct them in interesting ways”.

All the characters are fictional! There is not one "real" character in the film. There are never any “real” characters in a film, unless it is a documentary and that is not the "pure cinema" that Boe wants to work in, and his audience wants to experience.

There are *many* themes in the film, some here have mentioned them. The "grass is greener" message is clear in that Alex gives up his girlfriend to have an affair with the very same woman! Maria Bonnevie plays both women for that reason, but also for Boe to show that he is able to cause you to hurt for Simone and cheer for Aimee even though they are the same woman. He is able to cause you to completely differentiate between them, even though they are exactly the same woman.

Other themes include the paradoxical situation of possessing something (or someone) only by not possessing it, or rather losing something that we have already lost. Alex must not look back for Aimee or he loses her, but if he never looks back he never *has* her. In essence he must give her up to not have her, which is actually impossible, or more accurately it is exactly the same thing. Whether he looks back, or never looks back, he will never "possess" Aimee. If he never looks back he is never with her, if he looks back she disappears, what is the difference? More importantly WHY won't he look back? Because he hopes that *one day* she will be with him, OR because he knows she will always be behind him. So, he may not "possess" her, but nobody else will either. The message here is if you don't possess something, letting it go is really freeing YOURSELF. If he looks back, he KNOWS she is gone, it is over. Either way he will never interact with Aimee again. The choice is simply a matter of facing reality. When he turns around, he is in control; he makes a choice and regains all the power in the situation that is futile anyway. If he never looks around he is in constant fear and doubt while never being with her anyway. Fear of losing what he doesn't have anyway motivates him to continue the game.

Most of us have been in a similar situation, maybe we are in a relationship that is completely unfulfilling, but if we try to change things we know that our partner will leave us. So we are in essence in a non-relationship and we are afraid of losing what we don't even have. Why? Fear of being alone, but more accurately the hope that one-day things will change in an unchangeable situation. We are living a lie, but willing to continue lying to ourselves for fear of being alone, when we are actually "alone" already. The status quo is a powerful thing, and something that most people will fight for when they'll fight for nothing else, including a situation that would be actually BE fulfilling!

Anyway, I believe this movie is simply a statement by Boe that he knows how to make a film that will move us, a film that we will want to see. He is also drawing out "his audience", those people that like what they see. He is making a statement that he is not interested in a certain moviegoer and he's getting that out of the way right up front with is "debut" film. This is the message of a very confident director who is looking well into the future. He knows what he wants to do and he's advertising for an audience AND financers that will want to support his vision. It also may be an example of the kinds of stories that he wants to tell when he has the budget and the opportunity. It's more or less an advertisement to the film backing community that here is a guy who wants to make these kinds of stories, and is very capable of doing so, so "come on board and pony up the money if you like what you see".

"...nothing is left of me, each time I see her..." - Catullus