A marvelously sad movie that is entirely misinterpreted again and again here.
It is about paradise lost. And the tragic steps a father takes to keep his family together in (eternal) peace. Heart rending salvation through destruction.
A newly activated highway destroys a family's tranquil life. They cannot stay because there is no peace there. They cannot leave because despite the oppressive traffic, their roots remain there.
The husband gradually seals them in, in a bid to keep the noise from an outside world they no longer recognize out.
By my interpretation, the mother dies there, powerless to stop the loss of her idyllic family. The father decides to complete the walling-off of the home as the mother "sleeps," despite the fact that his car is being towed away outside (as he no longer has any need for such material objects), and despite the fact that the opening obliterated by the final brick was their final means of ventilation. He gives his young son a "sleeping pill" and tenderly carries his limp body to bed. His younger daughter does not wish a pill. A rapid scene change makes her means of "sleep" ambiguous. But it is paced with a sense of finality, tragedy, and desperation on the part of the father, not of violence nor of physical suffering.
The daughter who left home briefly returns, only to find the home a crypt, figuratively and literally (I maintain), with no doors or windows. No way in or out. And she leaves.
Interpreted in this light, the ending makes perfect sense. The mother suddenly "awakens" from her "sleep," immediately sledgehammers the cinder blocks covering the door, and emerges into the sunlight, followed by her family. The traffic sounds now seem distant and quiet, as they walk together in the fields, happy in the sun, the highway never in shot, paradise restored.
But why is the highway suddenly quiet? Because the family are no longer there. Their physical forms are still entombed, but their souls are free and together, back in the pristine fields that they loved when the highway was vacant. It is their spiritual forms we are watching, absent of all material possessions, walking together, happy and free forever, back to the existence they recognize and love. The tone is not of triumph over obstacles overcome, but of tragic bliss achieved at a heavy price.
All this imagery is on screen, as a lovely cover for the Bowie song, "Wild Is The Wind," plays. A love song whose chorus features the line, "(My Love,) Don't you know you're life itself?"
And so, I maintain, this film is about the question, "Is a life that has its foundation of love destroyed really any life at all?"
A wonderful ending subtly bittersweet makes this a film worth watching.
It is about paradise lost. And the tragic steps a father takes to keep his family together in (eternal) peace. Heart rending salvation through destruction.
A newly activated highway destroys a family's tranquil life. They cannot stay because there is no peace there. They cannot leave because despite the oppressive traffic, their roots remain there.
The husband gradually seals them in, in a bid to keep the noise from an outside world they no longer recognize out.
By my interpretation, the mother dies there, powerless to stop the loss of her idyllic family. The father decides to complete the walling-off of the home as the mother "sleeps," despite the fact that his car is being towed away outside (as he no longer has any need for such material objects), and despite the fact that the opening obliterated by the final brick was their final means of ventilation. He gives his young son a "sleeping pill" and tenderly carries his limp body to bed. His younger daughter does not wish a pill. A rapid scene change makes her means of "sleep" ambiguous. But it is paced with a sense of finality, tragedy, and desperation on the part of the father, not of violence nor of physical suffering.
The daughter who left home briefly returns, only to find the home a crypt, figuratively and literally (I maintain), with no doors or windows. No way in or out. And she leaves.
Interpreted in this light, the ending makes perfect sense. The mother suddenly "awakens" from her "sleep," immediately sledgehammers the cinder blocks covering the door, and emerges into the sunlight, followed by her family. The traffic sounds now seem distant and quiet, as they walk together in the fields, happy in the sun, the highway never in shot, paradise restored.
But why is the highway suddenly quiet? Because the family are no longer there. Their physical forms are still entombed, but their souls are free and together, back in the pristine fields that they loved when the highway was vacant. It is their spiritual forms we are watching, absent of all material possessions, walking together, happy and free forever, back to the existence they recognize and love. The tone is not of triumph over obstacles overcome, but of tragic bliss achieved at a heavy price.
All this imagery is on screen, as a lovely cover for the Bowie song, "Wild Is The Wind," plays. A love song whose chorus features the line, "(My Love,) Don't you know you're life itself?"
And so, I maintain, this film is about the question, "Is a life that has its foundation of love destroyed really any life at all?"
A wonderful ending subtly bittersweet makes this a film worth watching.