On the day when "Alien Awakening" was dominated by a couple of couples, as a single dog, I turned to "When the Monster Comes Knocking" that was not much of a concern.
When I watched the trailer, I thought it was probably a children's adventure fantasy film like Spielberg's "Dream Giant"
But after watching it, I found that the film that won 9 awards and 3 nominations for the Spanish Goya Awards is not as "childish" as its name suggests.
The film has many metaphors, and there are many angles that can be interpreted, and I just want to talk about the most cruel and cold side
Looking at the essence through the phenomenon, this story is actually piercing the shell of the fairy tale and revealing the cruel and realistic laws of growth
There were many problems in the life of young Connor
Mom got cancer in chemotherapy, and the situation was getting worse every day, but she kept hiding the truth from him
Dad left them and went to the United States to start a new family
It was not pleasant to get along with my grandmother, and I had to endure bullying from my classmates at school
He always repeats the same dream at night, in which he loses his beloved mother
It was in this state of mind that the tree spirit monster voiced by Liam Nissen appeared
The tree spirit appears in front of Connor's door at 12:07 every night, neither helping Connor solve the problem nor hurting him
Just nagging and nagging to tell a story to Konna
And these three stories of strong fairy tale style, but solidly tell the three "anti-fairy tale" adult truths
The first story tells the story of a typical evil witch and prince's revenge
But when it comes to the ending, it is discovered that the witch has both evil desires and innocent victims
The prince became a beloved king, but also a murderer who hand-bladed his girlfriend
In the traditional fairy tale, such a dark setting will probably be destroyed
But this is the most realistic first adult law:
There will be no pure good people in this world, and there will be no pure bad people, and many people are in between, and every story, every person has two sides
The second story tells the story of a feud between a conservative and rude pharmacist and a priest
The priest preached against the old medicine of the pharmacist and refused to give him the yew tree that would cure everything
But after his daughter fell ill, he tried everything to no avail
He had to turn to the pharmacist for help, so that his daughter could give up everything, including faith
The pharmacist refused
Faith is half a cure, faith is gone, and I can't help it
And here comes the second somewhat helpless adult rule:
There is nothing we can do about many things, the only thing we can do is to believe, and even if you have a strong belief, the end of the story will not change
The third story is even more frustrating
Connor was fed up with his classmates' ignorance, but found out when he rebelled and searched for his own sense of existence
After the invisible person is seen, it will be the same loneliness
Yes, all three stories reveal a negative energy of pessimism and despotism
It doesn't taste like the healing system of dream burning at all
And when the tree spirit finished telling these three stories, forcing Xiao Kang na to tell his nightmare
He finally told the truth about the "great rebellion"
He wanted his mother to die soon, because he could no longer bear the pain of fearing the disappearance of the loved ones in his life
In fact, the whole film only gives an adult truth through such a magical way of expression
Accept the reality, when it's time to let go, you can only let go
While this doesn't sound like a perfect healing rhetoric, it's really the only way out, isn't it?
Too many fairy tales give people the illusion of nothingness, people expect this, look forward to that, expect too many things that cannot be achieved
But to grow is to break through the shell of these illusions and idealism one by one, and to accept the simple and real process
How to achieve this cruel process? There is only one way
Since you can't change objective things, you can only adjust your mentality
Everyone understands the reason, but how many can really do it?
With the help of the tree spirit, Connor found his own peace of mind and completed the growth process of a boy to a man
Such an allegorical story is not the warmth of traditional fairy tales
Those fairy tales that we once believed in were torn off in the film with the mask of goodness and beauty
Goodness and beauty are both packaging, and "truth" is what the world itself looks like
Accept it or not, he will not change anything for you
This is the law that the adult world must face
At the end of the film, Konna accepts everything that cannot be changed
Since life cannot be saved, why not say goodbye when separated?
Let it go, time will heal everything
Although this adult fairy tale is not easy to fully understand, even if it is just for the imaginative influence style
It is also definitely worth the return fare