Having seen the movie, I was wondering about the movie's main topic. In the Eighties it was apparently interpreted as either a feminist or an apocalyptic story, but for me it seemed to be more about depression and how people act when dealing with such an illness (the most telling moment being when the woman found the Wall right on her doorstep once.
How do you think about the story?
I found it very similar to Lord of the Flies. People cut off from civilization let their survival and primal instincts take over, and, sometimes, descend into savagery (as when the bull is killed). The main difference is that here there is no way out.
The wall itself is very likely a mental projection, as she has shut others human beings out of her personal sphere. Her surroundings provide her with the necessities in order to survive, no more, no less. The fact that she never goes on a long quest to find remnants of civilization points to the interpretation that she doesn't want to "go back" to having to interact with other humans.
Or, as Pink Floyd put it in the movie of the same name: In perfect isolation here behind my wall. She never really wishes for the civilization to come back, as well as she adapts very, very quickly to the new world - which, and because, she has constructed in her own mind.
I thought it was a metaphor for the loneliness of this planet, in that, no one knows why we are here, and no one can escape existence, or death. The earth itself is the wall, we just can't see it. You are born alone, and you die alone. Oh, and thank god for dogs.
shareThat's how I was starting to see it. But then I was wondering how the mysterious man fit into the picture.
>>>Only he is lost who gives himself up for lost.
I didn't get the impression she's so comfortable with the isolation, though. Accepting, but the film felt rather bleak most of the time.
And at the end, as she's writing her last letter, stating it's her last, and saying she's going to go outside to feed the white crow... I wondered if she was going to end her life. I know that earlier she mentioned she was 'too old to seriously consider suicide,' or something along those lines. But I felt that the crow was a symbol for death, and the fact that it was the white crow meant she was going happily, or at least contently, to death.
"The fact that she never goes on a long quest to find remnants of civilization points to the interpretation that she doesn't want to "go back" to having to interact with other humans.
Or, as Pink Floyd put it in the movie of the same name: In perfect isolation here behind my wall. She never really wishes for the civilization to come back, as well as she adapts very, very quickly to the new world - which, and because, she has constructed in her own mind."
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I considered that interpretation too, but actually, she tries all the avenues around the wall. She even gets hurt trying to crash through it with her car. I'm not sure what else she could have done to get through. At some point she had to turn attention to her survival and accept the wall. Banging her head on it daily wouldn't have done much good now, would it?
I think she wants very much for civilization to come back. She mourns it repeatedly.
Sorry to ask this, but does anything bad happen to the dog? My dog almost died last month, and I don't want to see a dog in peril...I've had enough of that lately.
If not, I look forward to seeing it when it opens in a couple weeks. :)
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The book is very beautiful. I did read the book after the movie. The animals and her relation to these animals is very well (intense, rich and crystal clear) written.
shareDoes the book explain the barrier?
shareNo. There are some hints about the cold war, military experiments and so on - but they stay just guesses. In the film, no explanation at all.
shareNo, it does not.
When I read it, I got the feeling that the barrier was in her own mind, and that she had isolated herself with the basic necessities of life. But that's just my interpretation.
Well, yes, but nothing too graphic .... it's a film for dog lovers too, as the 'mans best friend' thing is there all the time.
shareI don't seem to have seen it very similarly to anyone here so far, although i have seen elsewhere (not on imdb) that i'm not alone in how i perceived this film. I'm responding here in one post to several commenters in this thread ...
First, if it has anything to do with depression, which you suggest, i'd have to say it would be, in part, a depiction of how one fights depression – which she does not in fact succumb to.
Second, when the wall comes right on her doorstep, that is in a dream/nightmare her first night after discovering the wall, when she catastrophizes that it may be closing in on her even more.
While I can imagine metaphorical readings such as those suggested wherein the wall is seen by some as only being a projection or symbolizing an interior wall of her own, I think the story is readable importantly (and most simply – Occam's Razor interp) as a science fiction story of an actual (albeit mysterious) wall that is real and external to her … and which obliges her to find in herself resources of survival – physical and mental – that put us, the viewer, in the position of imagining (and being in some awe) of her strength of will to live in the face of such unimagineable surreality of existence and abandonment by and from all that is known. Even Lynx had begun the story being wary of her and snapping at her (the day Lynx's owners left on their walk), so it was not a given that she had anyone to feel alliance with … and yet ultimately (and accelerated by the loneness and trauma) because of the nature of Lynx being a dog ("addicted to humans" as she says) and she herself being susceptible if not addicted to connection wherever she could find it (expanding her boundaries of what she is drawn to for connection, as symbolized by the white "albino" crow at the end – irony that her boundaries (the wall) have totally closed in on her but what witness her actually expand her boundaries of selfhood into a near-seamless immersion into an alien environment to find harmony within it and within herself (her "calm").
I didn't see a Lord of the Flies connection because, in contrast to it, The Wall focuses on the constructive and resilient and admirable response to such isolation, not to the more destructive responses that LoF does … In The Wall, we have only one (albeit brutal) moment and character in the story who brings in that element – significantly, yes – reminding us by contrast of just how rare and yet natural it is to respond to one's environment with a spirit of harmony and how tragically frequent it is to find instead the savage response.
And I definitely think the evidence presented in the film precludes the possibility of suicide that some suggest here. The white crow symbolizes her connection and mirrors her own (unwitting) ostracism from the world of her species (and that the only apparent remaining member of her species has far less in common with her than do all these other creatures); the crow does not, imho, augur suicide.
Yes, you've beautifully articulated how I felt about it, thank you. She says something about the ridiculousness of her previous pride in former self-concept as an independent entity, as she comes to sort of dissolve into oneness with her environment.
In some ways it reminded me of The Incredible Shrinking Man; the self-identity being destroyed and regenerated as part of everything else.
I think the story is readable importantly (and most simply – Occam's Razor interp) as a science fiction story of an actual (albeit mysterious) wall that is real and external to her … and which obliges her to find in herself resources of survival – physical and mental – that put us, the viewer, in the position of imagining (and being in some awe) of her strength of will to live in the face of such unimagineable surreality of existence and abandonment by and from all that is known.
by cetaylor3 » I don't seem to have seen it very similarly to anyone here so far, although i have seen elsewhere (not on imdb) that i'm not alone in how i perceived this film. I'm responding here in one post to several commenters in this thread...
Depression and isolation.When there's no more room in hell, The dead will walk the earth...
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The only thing I couldn't understand was that when she first encountered the wall, on that narrow road; why didn't she try to go "around" it?? i.e. get in the stream and see if the "Wall" actually carried on into the stream? She just took it for granted that the Wall only stopped her passage along the road? I mean, it might not have been carried on in that stream which was right next to the road?
Plus; she said something about digging underneath "the wall" to get out!! But she never tried it! I don't think there was a real wall; I think it was all in her head, and that's why a man suddenly appeared and killed the dog! Because there simply was no wall; she wanted the seclusion.
The other point! In the car scene; where she crashes it... Is that a radio playing??? (or was it just a CD?) If so; where was the transmission coming from? And why didn't she try and drive the car back to the lodge?? She could at least have had music playing if she had done that.... The car looked as if it was still drivable, even though it was pretty damaged.
If it was just in her head, why did the dog hurt himself when trying to pass it?
And why was the man suddenly appearing looking like he had been lost in the woods for months? By that conclusion, none of this could've happened, so the dog never hurt himself and never got killed and there was no man.
But where are her sister and brother in law then? And what was with the couple at the cottage?
I believe in the book she did try digging underneath, but it did not work. You could not get above, birds hit the wall, and underneath.
And how would she get in the stream? And what would happen if she hit the wall, how would she get out? I guess it was too risky to actually try. Didn't look safe to me.
In the car that is a CD. She tried getting a radio transmission but it did not work. And maybe she did not want music?
Die Wand conveyed that we all, meaning humans and other forms of life, are part of the same existence. Since the woman was visiting the countryside to hunt, she must have saw herself (as part of the human race) being superior. Yet, long-term isolation and close contact with animals/nature not only made the woman realise we are all part of the same existence, but that life can be horrific due to nature's indifference.
I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not
In a letter just prior to her suicide and after the murder of her children Magda Goebbels explains the quandary quite well.
"The world that will come after ... will not be worth living in and therefore I have taken my children away. They are too dear to endure what is coming next, and a merciful God will understand my intentions in delivering them from it. That we can end our life with him is a mercy of fate that we never hoped dare for. "
The world that will come after the wall will not be worth living in. Yes, Magda Goebbels really believed in her wall. We all create walls separating ourselves from reality.
During this movie there are many manifestations of the wall. Of the old people the woman says their death was merciful representing the death of the weak and helpless in the first wave of Nazi euthanasia. The clothes hanging in the tree represents those lost in the holocaust. The woman contemplates shooting the fox [Hitler], but decides he is only a manifestation of the wall. When the man arrives innocents die. Carpet bombing does not seek out only the guilty. The woman feeds the crow not as a death wish, but in the hope that in the future there will come acceptance for those that are different. For her the wall will always be there as long are there are memories.
What is the wall? For us in can be almost anything - a cult, religion, a political movement, or madness. In short, any obsession can shut us off from reality.
In the book by Marlin Haushofer The Wall was created by the Big Lie put forward endlessly by Joseph Goebbels and others: the betrayal, "the stab in the back", the conspiracy of international jewry. For many the consequences of WWI , especially in Germany were destruction by inflation, economic depression, unemployment and the complete absence of any living faith. Most people were swept away by these consequences and became easy believers in the Big Lie. As Martin Niemoller eloquently states in his poem "First they came for.." few had the foresight or the courage to speak out about these untruths until it was too late and the wall was in place.