The film The Grace of the Hedgehog is based on the best-selling novel of the same name by French author Muliette Barbery. The film tells the story of an 11-year-old genius girl, Baroma, who tries to escape her absurd fate by committing suicide. When she was ready to complete the last thing in her life, making a movie, she met the concierge Lady, who was similar to her situation, and was inspired and influenced by it, had an epiphany about the meaning of life, and finally got the story of growth.
Through the camera of the protagonist Baroma, the film constructs a powerful "gaze of the other". In the interaction and conflict with other "gaze" eyes, this gaze has become a tool and a weapon of resistance for Baroma's understanding of the adult world on the one hand, and an important means to assist her in self-thinking and self-growth on the other hand.
"Gaze" is a new concept that has emerged in cultural studies and literary criticism since the second half of the 20th century.
Gaze generally refers to "a way of seeing with the power of action, the entanglement of desires, and the sense of identity." Through the analysis of the subject-object relationship in gaze behavior, gaze theory can better clarify the connotations related to power, identity, and desire implicit in visual behavior.
In my opinion, "The Grace of the Hedgehog" is essentially a film about the growth of children, and the core of its internal contradictions is also concentrated in the conflict between adults and children, which is especially expressed in the gaze and gaze between the characters.
Next, I will interpret the use of Lacan's "gaze theory" in this film from three aspects: "from the adult gaze, the adult world under the anti-gaze, and the self-gaze", and the protagonist Baloma's growth process under the "gaze".
The following is roughly divided into three sections:
The Gaze from The Adult: As a child, Baloma is inevitably ignored and disciplined by adults; but she is not enslaved inside, and as an awakened person, she escapes the confines of the adult world in her own way
The Adult World Under the Anti-Gaze: Through the anti-gaze of the camera, Baloma highlights the ugliness and hypocrisy of the adult world, and is also bound like a goldfish throughout his life, with an infinite sense of anxiety and absurdity
Self-gaze: Reflecting on the self in the eyes of the fictional "other", and through her gaze at Herni and contemplation of death, Baloma understands the meaning of life
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" >01, the gaze from the adult: Baloma, as a child, is inevitably ignored and disciplined by adults; but she is not enslaved inside, and as an awakened person, she escapes the confines of the adult world in her own way</h1>
As a talented girl, although she has a superhuman mind and can understand the hypocritical and ugly nature of the adult world, because she is still an 11-year-old child, Baloma has to be stared at by adults all the time, becoming the object of restraint and discipline.
(1) Baloma's "gaze" situation is manifested as her implicit "aphasia" state in family life.
Although she can express herself, adults have never faced the content and value of her words. Adults simply "gaze" at her, intending to make her what they want her to be, without caring about her thoughts and voices.
There is a scene in the film that reflects the fact that Baloma is "gazed at". Baloma's sister invites her boyfriend's family to dinner. At the dinner table, adults are engaged in seemingly warm but boring conversations. The perceptive Baloma noticed a mistake in the guest's conversation, and she immediately corrected it, but the adults present only felt that it was a lack of hospitality. Her father looked at her with a sharp gaze, hoping that she would stop speaking impolitely. But Baloma continued to expound her views until she was finally interrupted and locked in a room for reflection.
From this scene, it is clear that Baloma, as a child, is oppressed and bound in an adult-controlled society. She can only passively accept the oppression from adults, but cannot have the right to resist, and once she tries to make dissenting voices, the end can only be ignored and punished.
(2) Despite his inability to resist the fact that he was disciplined, Baloma was an "awakened person" and did not become a slave.
The clever Baloma could not resist the daily routine, but she did not form a psychological mechanism of self-surveillance and became a enslaved person. This is exactly why Baloma "likes to hide" and refuses to communicate with people for real purposes.
The title of the film, Grace of the Hedgehog, is also a metaphor for Baloma's way of living. Like a hedgehog, "covered with spikes like a hard fortress," Baroma uses her indifference and avoidance to resist the approach of others. In this way, she can maintain her own life pursuits. In Baroma's words, this pursuit is "chasing the stars, not spending their whole lives in a fish tank like a goldfish."
As an awakened person, Baloma is well aware that only by escaping the "gaze" of adults can she maintain her nature and not be imprisoned by the fate of adult society.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" >02, The Adult World Under the Anti-Gaze: Through the anti-gaze of the camera, Baloma highlights the ugliness and hypocrisy of the adult world, and is also bound like a goldfish throughout his life, with infinite anxiety and absurdity</h1>
Anti-gaze, also known as "confrontational gaze", is widely used in the cultural analysis of feminism and postcolonialism, emphasizing "challenging authority with opposing, resisting postures" and "dissolving the power of the gaze".
At the beginning of the film, after a shocking monologue by Baloma, the director uses a long sequence of shots to represent the theme of Baloma's "anti-gaze": Baloma holds her camera, and the camera seems to be aimed at the world around her, as if aimed at the audience off-screen.
Baroma confessed as she filmed: "My Mount Everest is making a movie, a film that reveals why other people's lives and my life are so absurd." If it's all meaningless, then at least the soul needs to face it bravely. ”
Baroma wants to escape the oppression of the actual order by committing suicide. But unlike other suicidals, Baloma is a "suicidal" who has not lost enthusiasm for life. For her, suicide is not a passive abandonment, but a rebellion against the absurd fate of adult society. "Making a movie" is part of her rebellious behavior, through the camera, a powerful "gaze carrier", forming an "anti-gaze" of the adult world.
The uneasiness, avoidance and rejection of those adults who are usually on their toes are facing the camera held up by Baroma are caused by the pressure of Baloma's "anti-gaze" of adults.
Baloma's father, a "successful man" who looks glamorous to the outside world, is sad all day long, worried about his work and trying to maintain his authoritative image in the family. Every day before entering the house, he must smoke in front of the house, and then hide the cigarette butt under the door blanket, not wanting others to see his cowardice and uneasiness.
Baroma's mother, on the other hand, was visibly anxious, sensitive, neurotic, and often out of control. She does a lot of things every day to reduce stress, but the results are counterproductive, falling into anxiety and even having emotional breakdowns because of some small things.
In the picture under Baroma's lens, everything seems bleak and full of distorted graininess - the director deliberately uses this inferior image to metaphorically describe the ugliness and hypocrisy of the adult world under the "anti-gaze".
Baroma uses the goldfish in the fish tank as a metaphor for the true state of existence in the adult world. In her view, the life of an adult and the life of a goldfish are essentially the same, both are a kind of fate. Goldfish are kept in fish tanks for the rest of their lives, just as adults are limited to their own origins and circumstances. At the beginning of the film, Baloma explicitly says, "I'm not going to go to the fish tank." "Her dream is to live beyond the absurdity of fate.
Through the film, you can see that the adults around Baloma seem to have suffered the curse of fate, and they are either desperately chasing and afraid to ask for it, or they have already gained and are afraid of sudden loss. In my opinion, the adult world under the "anti-gaze" shows a sense of anxiety that has nowhere to hide, and a sense of absurdity that is powerless to resist fate.
<h1 class= pgc-h-arrow-right >03, Self-gaze: Reflecting on the self in the eyes of the fictional other, and through her gaze at and contemplation of death, Baloma understands the meaning of life</h1>
(1) Through the camera, some kind of "gaze of the other" is fictionalized, and the thinking of one's own life is formed in the form of confession.
Baroma not only gazes back at the adult world, but also at herself, which is how she thinks about life. The realization of this "self-gaze" is mainly formed through Baroma's confession to the camera.
Using the camera, Baloma conjures up a sort of "gaze of the other," constituting a force for reflection. Through the "gaze" of the camera, Baloma clearly realizes the illusion of her own existence, and firmly recognizes that she, like other adults around her, cannot escape the fate of "living in the fish tank". Thus, the result of Baloma's "self-gaze" is a firm determination to escape fate by suicide.
However, in the second half of the film, Baloma hesitates again, confessing: "If we can still become our own who we have not yet become, can I ignore the arrangement of fate and live my true self?" ”
Apparently, at this point, Baloma was shaken by her decision to commit suicide, and this vacillation stemmed from her gaze at Honey.
(2) Through her gaze at Honey, Baloma sees an existentialistic life.
The concierge, Honey, in the face of the doomed absurd fate, does not despair and gives up, she believes that the meaning of life lies in the process. For Honey, it doesn't matter whether life has meaning or not, the process of enjoying life is enough to make life full of meaning.
Baroma re-examines the meaning of life through her gaze at Herni, and once talks about chocolate to hint at the meaning of life she has learned in Hernie. Baroma said: "I wonder what is good about chocolate, is it itself, or the art of chewing chocolate with teeth? I prefer to let it melt slowly on the tongue. Honey seemed to understand What Baloma was saying, and she replied to Baroma with a meaningful smile: "Yes, changing the way you chew chocolate is like tasting a new dish." ”
Baroma's gaze at Honey, like the gaze of a baby facing a mirror image when Lacan discusses the "mirror phase," is essentially an identity gaze that helps her to re-examine herself.
Although Baloma saw in Hernie the possibility of a new life, she was still hesitant to choose a life path like Herni. At the end of the film, she still faces sleeping pills several times and falls into contemplation, which can explain her inner hesitation. What really made her have an epiphany about life and reconstruct herself was Honey's death.
(3) Honey's death allowed Baloma to understand the meaning of life.
Horney's unexpected death made Baloma realize that death is no longer the most ordinary thing in the world, nor is it a happy relief, but everything stops abruptly, and you can no longer see the person you love, and you can no longer see the person you love.
Through Herney's death, Baroma sees the precious element of life that she has ignored, love. At this point, Baloma understood the meaning of life, but also in the pursuit of love.
In my opinion, at the end of the movie, Baloma solemnly accepts the copy of Anna Karenina handed by Ozu, which means that Baloma will be like Honey, bravely pursuing the love of life, to the meaning of the process of life.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > concluding remarks:</h1>
The film "The Grace of the Hedgehog", in the interweaving and conflict of various gazes, completes an existential exploration of the meaning of life. Everyone's life inevitably needs to face oppression from others or society, and what we have to do is not to be passive and resistant, but to find our own way of survival in this environment and enjoy the process of life.