MovieChat Forums > The Congress (2014) Discussion > (spoilers) Finally saw it and have a ton...

(spoilers) Finally saw it and have a ton of questions...

posted 10 years ago by chaxy
30 replies | jump to latest

I waited a very long time to see this and I finally did, the anticipation was killer and after finishing it last night I can say just how disappointed I was with the way it all turned out...

It had such a great beginning, a little slow here and there but that doesn't bother me much in movies/shows. It's the "twenty years later" where Robin is driving... what's happening here? Why is she going to the Maramount Hotel? Why does everything turn animated and why does the security guard before she takes the drug tell her the rules of the animated world?

What is the animated world exactly and why did she have to step into it? What was the ending all about? I understand she was eager to find her son, but did she ever? Was all of this made-up in her head? Why did it turn into her son's story in the end? I was so confused from the moment she took the drug that it was very difficult to watch/finish, but I sat down 'till the end only to have the question mark above my head fill my entire living room.

Could someone explain/elaborate what actually took place and happened after she steps out of reality and into the animated world? Visually, the movie was great, but... I was left pretty disappointed. And profoundly confused.

Would love to read some thoughts/opinions, too--thank you!

[–] Gage86 10 years ago

Hello,

I live in MD and am trying to figure out how/where I can see this film. Can you help?

[–] chaxy 10 years ago

My friend works in the industry and I was able to borrow a screener DVD of this.

[–] eviltimes 10 years ago

yts.re

[–] ludovico_88 10 years ago

It's the "twenty years later" where Robin is driving... what's happening here? Kind of vague... Robin Wright is driving a porsche 20 years in the future? Why is she going to the Maramount Hotel? To renew her contract. Why does everything turn animated... It turns animated because she odorly injects a chemical combination that either turns everything she sees into animation (as in, whatever your mind wishes your reality to look like) or she enters a coma where everything from that point forward is just Robin's isolated imagination. I still have my doubts but I think there's a small chance the latter is the correct answer. ...and why does the security guard before she takes the drug tell her the rules of the animated world? Because he was probably being paid to do so.

What is the animated world exactly and why did she have to step into it? She probably didn't have to but the "animated world" according to Miramount was supposed to be an utopic world where everyone could be what they wanted. Reeve Bobs explains this well in the futuristic lecture. What was the ending all about? I don't know exactly what part of the ending you're referring to and even I can't explain everything (obviously) but ultimately, It was about Robin's decision of going through an experience that could or could not allow her to find her son. I understand she was eager to find her son, but did she ever? Possibly. Was all of this made-up in her head? Possibly. Why did it turn into her son's story in the end? It didn't. It turned into how Robin perceived her son's "story" to be in order to predict how he would chose to act when he entered the "animated world". At least that's my take but I may be the minority.

Now to you...

I was left pretty disappointed. And profoundly confused.

Did confusing you take a role in leaving you disappointed? If not then what did? If so then why is "confusing" a bad thing?

vibes atm: http://tinyurl.com/ny63vgs

[–] evil_henchman 10 years ago

If everything was in her imagination, when she went to the animated world for the first time, then why would they ask her there to renew her contract? Doesn't this mean that the animated world has to be real, at least to some degree?

[–] ludovico_88 10 years ago

It's been some time now but from what I remember, "the congress" was an imaginary world shared by everyone. To some extent you'd see the "real things" and to another you'd see your own interpretation of it.

I believe there were places that had diferent degrees of one's interpretation. I believe that was explained when she ventured into the outside animated world where nature communicated more with one another. I think.

Sorry if this wasn't very clear..

vibes atm: http://tinyurl.com/ny63vgs

[–] haggar 10 years ago

When Wright takes the antidote and "returns to the real world", she sees people as they really are. Fair enough - but they are all clothed! Some relatively heavy winter clothes, too - no onesies or swimsuits. Meaning, they were taking them off and putting them on, probably daily. If nothing else, then to perform basic bodily function (I can accept well enough that they would not bathe). So how does this jive with their "can be whatever I want, even a centaur"-theory? Wait, there's more: these people are supposed to survive somehow - meaning, they need to eat actual food and drink actual water, in order to sustain themselves physically. And perhaps sleep somewhere where they don't die of exposure. How do these people do all this, if in there is no 1-1 relationship between the shared world of the cartoons, to the real world? *beep* me, in this shared world of cartoons, even virtually blind people can somehow act like non-blind ones! Better living through chemistry?

Ultimately, who the heck takes care of all this unproductive humanity? So I understand that the hallucinating ones are the great majority of humankind, while a tiny elite elected to stay in the real world. Do these elites cater to all the others? Because, from what I could see, in this "I do what I like"-world, not much productive work was going on.

And how the heck did the flying thing work? In the real world is this person, dressed in his/her ragged clothes, walking like a zombie, while in their imagination they are flying like birds. Isn't there just a tiny bit of discrepancy between what is going on in these shared minds (let's not forget that none of these are just personal, but shared hallucinations - if you think you're flying, so does the whole friggin' humankind!) and the real world?

BTW, why does the real-world-living elite live in bloopin' zeppelins? What up with that?

[–] Pandroid 10 years ago

This. ^^

I thougt that people in real life would be sleeping inside a chamber a la the matrix, or in bed until they finally die. It turns out they were wandering around like zombies. Why? and most importantly, how?

[–] 10 years ago

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[–] ixusillwrath 10 years ago

I couldn't possibly be more diametrically opposed to that.

Zero Theorem felt like a tangible reality. This felt like a poorly thought out dystopia.

Let's say you inhale some chemical that makes you think you can fly. Now you're sailing over NYC like a bird. What is the real you doing in reality? Making 'vroom' noises and smashing your head into a wall?

I think the 1992 B-movie 'Mindwarp' aka 'Brainslasher' managed to tell this tale in a much more contemplative manner, and it featured cannibal zombies riding around on tractors. Also a little-known film called 'The Matrix' managed to sneak this theme in to moderate success.

[–] Etxpeme 8 years ago

Let's say you inhale some chemical that makes you think you can fly. Now you're sailing over NYC like a bird. What is the real you doing in reality?

Making 'vroom' noises and smashing your head into a wall?

This, exactly. Why couldn't they?

[–] Etxpeme 8 years ago

I believe the hallucination is not actually shared. Did you see any characters in the background talking to each other? I checked it, and none of them were talking. They were just there together. The only ones talking are Robin and Dylan.

these people are supposed to survive somehow - meaning, they need to eat actual food and drink actual water, in order to sustain themselves physically. And perhaps sleep somewhere where they don't die of exposure. How do these people do all this, if in there is no 1-1 relationship between the shared world of the cartoons, to the real world?

Someone else somewhere else said that the people dressed in biohazard suits probably had something to do with it.

Ultimately, who the heck takes care of all this unproductive humanity?

Indeed, we didn't see any production going on but that doesn't mean there are people somewhere on factories working their asses off hoping they win some lottery (like in Michael Bay's The Island) or they do their time (like in a prison) waiting for their time to get high and cross over.

And how the heck did the flying thing work? In the real world is this person, dressed in his/her ragged clothes, walking like a zombie, while in their imagination they are flying like birds

As someone else answered you, they go around making vroom noises and flapping their arms around.

BTW, why does the real-world-living elite live in bloopin' zeppelins? What up with that?

It's called science fiction.

These answers are just my personal interpretation. Things my brain has come to believe in order to make sense of this movie. With movies there's no way to know what things are a result of the director's mistake and what things are actually unanswered to make the viewer think. So, the movie could very well be a nonsensical mess and I could be the idiot overinterpreting stuff.

However, I don't think those mistakes actually matter to the ones who made the film. In this particular movie, substance is more important than the way it's delivered, so I wouldn't spend much time trying to make sense of things that don't have to make sense.

[–] 8 years ago

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[–] BigBudde 10 years ago

Yeah, I had some of the same questions. Mainly, where are their 'REAL' bodies while they are in this hallucination state. anyone have some idea, or was this left vague on purpose?

[–] chuck-526 10 years ago

My thought is not so much "left vague on purpose" as "didn't give a rat's a$$ about literal or symbolic".

I took it more as a satirical send-up of the old "watch the fireworks while they hump" trope, with the fireworks being replaced in this case by a crash, an explosion, and a conflagration.

[–] umme4uke 10 years ago

ok, just saw it and my thoughts are this:

The ending was purely from Robin's POV. As Keitel said to her, she was afraid, until she became a mother.

Then she discovered her daughter had became a mother and was happy for her but that her son was still looking for her - so she decided to return to the fake world and live the lie her mind created that she was with her son.

On a deeper, thematic level, this explained why such a future could come to pass and why cinema and society is going the way it is going - people are developing a preference for ignorant bliss over truth.

[–] sarastro7 10 years ago

It's not so complicated if you are familiar with Stanislaw Lem's novel, The Futurological Congress. Society has declined, except in the development of hallucinatory chemicals, which everyone takes in order to lead a bearable fantasy life. Essentially, the animated world was the real world, only seen through the eyes of the people on the hallucinatory drugs. Real assassinations and revolutions could take place there (note that the revolutionaries were wearing gas masks; they must have been seeing the real world).

Before entering the "animated world", Robin Wright had been living in the world as it looks without the drugs, although she may have been in a part of it that wasn't so poor. Once she got into the animated world, she ended up being frozen for 20 years, and by then the world had deteriorated much further, leading people to live even more far-fetched fantasy lives via the drugs.

The only thing I don't get is the very end (did she assume her son's appearance??). But I guess that's just Robin's own fantasy.

As for the sex scene, I think it was real, and may even have impregnated her, as is hinted at towards the very end (the breast shot). Something about planting new hope, perhaps; giving her another child in place of the one she lost? I dunno.

Overall, I liked the movie but was a little bit disappointed by it. As has been fashionable with the science fiction of the past several decades, it toned down the big ideas and world-building in favor or much more character development. I personally prefer my sci-fi to be more idea-driven than character-driven. All that character stuff is just pandering to mainstream tastes, which are deplorably devoid of imagination. :-/

I rate the movie 7 stars out of 10.

[–] GataGris 10 years ago

sarastro7, kudos. I love your post.?

[–] c_a_d 10 years ago

After reading the wikipedia page of "The futurological Congress" i think the same but, i have the same questions like the other user. In real life people can't fly so, where they were in real life while flying in the animation and how these people are actually living, sleeping, eating, etc etc. Maybe the guys in suits are supporting them but what's the purpose of all that?

[–] 10 years ago

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[–] chuck-526 10 years ago

... and may even have impregnated her, as is hinted at towards the very end (the breast shot).

Besides the breast shot there are brief scenes of shadows in a delivery room including a nurse carrying a baby away, and of her laying in a hospital bed reaching for her baby.

However her animated self looked much much younger than we're used to, the male in the photo is different from any we've seen before, and we saw Aaron both reflected in the photo and playing.

So while that could be a reference to a new birth as you suggest, it could also easily be a reference to her memories of Aaron's birth.

[–] Kent_Kainer 9 years ago

I'm also confused by the ending.From what we know her son is blind and deaf by now. He wouldn't react to her calling his name nor would he see her and well she looked actually like him.So confusing. ---Lincoln Lee: I lost a partner.Peter Bishop: I lost a universe!

[–] babetteflix 10 years ago

We thought that when Danny Huston's character came in with the goons she was giving in to her prohibition of Nazi scenes, and at the end when they had sex she finally did porn.

Also, I briefly looked up the 1971 Stanislaw Lem novel on which this is based and it involves LSD (which fits for 1971, even though the author was 50 at the time). In the novel the hero drinks tap water at the 164 story hotel and hallucinates on the drugs in the water.

Very weird and trippy but we liked it.

[–] babetteflix 10 years ago

We thought that when Danny Huston's character came in with the goons she was giving in to her prohibition of Nazi scenes, and at the end when she they had sex she finally did porn.

Also, I briefly looked up the 1971 Stanislaw Lem novel on which this is based and it involves LSD (which fits for 1971, even though the author was 50). In the novel the hero drinks tap water at the 164 story hotel and hallucinates on the drugs in the water.

[–] ayemaya 10 years ago

From my perspective, there where not actually "2 PHYSICAL worlds" but only one. This perspective is from the very brief scene almost immediately after she took the cyanide pill and returned to the "real" world - when the people whom she saw as animated suddenly became "real" as depressed, indigent zombies with the few "elite" hovering over them and watching them from the zeppelin. The real depressed zombies were actually "reality" but they were physically drugged, and/or in mind control, and/or in denial of their current condition and surroundings. Taking the "drug" was not necessarily taking a physical "drug".

When she stepped out of "reality" and into the "animated world", it was after the 20 years had expired and maybe, she was becoming depressed from not seeing any future to her life and needed to "escape" into the "animated" world through drugs or denial.

After the second time she fell asleep for 20 years, when she chose to see "reality", she had become indigent and depressed like the majority.