To tame the reptilian mind?

A Nearly Normal Family (Swedish, Season 1, E1-E6; 2023)
Director: Per Hanefjord

Maybe there is no one there watching you. You are just out there alone on the small blue dot amid all that emptiness.; a blob in that awful waste of space. That’s all. Above us, only sky, and there is no hell below us.

Perhaps the wise men who came long ago knew about this all the while. They also knew that an observing eye in the sky ensured conformity and obedience. Could they know about the double-slit lamp examination findings and how the results vary when an observer is included in the experiment? The reality changes when observed. Putting the fear of prancing eyes would ensure people act within social mores. That would prevent straying from the needs of the societies, sticking together against the elements of Nature and from predators eyeing the exact needs.

As time passed, things were added and amended to suit the demands of the times. A certain amount of legitimacy was sealed by infusing a divine infusion into the equation. For a while, things went on smoothly.

The great leap forward in the sciences made people question many of the so-called God-sanctioned laws they had blindly followed. Words like empowerment, personal spaces and choices began to be mentioned. Suddenly, the religious fervour lost its lustre.

The world then noticed that everyone had their own vision of the world, and they wanted to live it as they chose. Life rules do not matter anymore. Rational reasoning took precedence. Unfortunately, humans are not so disciplined. They let their heart and minds sway. Soon, they fell prey to their primal needs.

Getting into mess after mess, they soon realise that religion, whether a God existed, paved a safe journey to the destination.

This thought went through me as I watched this miniseries about a pastor, his philandering lawyer wife, and their precocious teenage daughter. The daughter, when she was 16, befriended an older boy who sexually assaulted her. The family decided not to report the rape to the police. The daughter grew up with unresolved issues, opting out of her studies but continuing her carefree social life. One day, she is accused of murdering a 32-year-old young man who turned out to be her lover.

Life takes a turn for all three. The rest of the story is about how the family stays together to resolve the issue at hand. As if realising that divine guidance is necessary for peace of mind, the series ends with the daughter lighting a candle at a church when everything is resolved.

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A tit-for-tat does not toe the line!

Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (2005)

Director: Park Chan-wook

Koreans seem to have a tradition of feeding on white tofu, which is symbolic of starting all over again. It is symbolic of wanting to turn over a new leaf, leaving the lousy past behind and starting anew. This is much the same as when one confesses in a Roman Catholic booth. All his sins are purged, and he begins life on a new slate.

Is it really that simple? To put your past behind you and move on as if nothing happened. I suppose that is why cultural practices and religion offer an olive branch to wrongdoers, assuring them they deserve a second chance in life. Devoid of these, if Man were to carry all the burden of guilt all his life without atonement. If Man were held responsible for all his actions without reprieve, he would probably end up dragging his past mistakes as a grinding mill around his neck to end up being a raving lunatic. Suicide would be their only outlet to relieve them from this misery.

As mentioned in the movie, the protagonist, a prison inmate after a murder charge that she regrets, feels a certain glow on her face after a prayer. She feels rejuvenated, like she has shed a layer of dirty skin off her body. It is atonement for her sins.

Conversely, instead of pursuing a passive route to make amends, one can follow the path of vengeance. One eye for an eye, as they say. At the end of the day, does avenging really give satisfaction to the soul? The ghost of their previous mistakes will still haunt them till the end of life. Do two wrongs make a right?

This film is the last of Park Wong-nook's Revenge trilogy.

A naive 19-year-old girl, Geum-ja, is a national sensation for kidnapping and killing a 6-year-old boy. In a typical Park's storytelling, the narration is non-linear. The composite of the whole story comes at the end. The primary school teacher, Mr Baek, kidnaps his students for ransom to splurge on himself.

Geum-ja, a single mother of a young child, was blackmailed by the teacher to kidnap a child. In the end, Mr Baek collects the ransom and kills the children, but Geum-ja goes to prison when she naively takes the blame for the crime she did not commit.

Notice the figurines in the background.

Judith with the Head of Holofernes. Created by Donatello

The epitome of sex and violence. Holofernes, an Assyrian general,
wrongs a beautiful young widow. She retaliates by decapitating
her aggressor when he is inebriated. Note: Display of nude
figures in public is acceptable in Europe but is frowned upon by
the same people when it comes to ancient Hindu temple carvings.

Her inner realisation opens in prison. She garners support by helping out bullied inmates to build a network of grateful inmates. After her incarceration, Geum-ja returns to find her daughter already adopted in Australia. She goes on a crusade to get back her estranged daughter and avenge Mr Baek. With the help of the investigating officer who put her behind bars, she tracks down the parents of the kids that Mr Baek killed and arranges to face-to-face meet with a gagged Mr Baek. Geum-ja puts forward all the pieces of evidence that incriminates Mr Baek as their kid's killer. As expected, the outburst of emotions of aggrieved parents was anything but civil.

The funny thing is that even after getting even with Mr Baek and getting back her daughter, Geum-Ja is not happy. The ghost of all her actions, inactions and the consequences of her doing still haunts her day and night.

An eye for an eye not only leaves the whole world blind, but it also leaves a hollow so deep in the soul that it manifests in recurrent nightmares and loss of peace of mind. Perhaps Nature has a better way of getting wrongdoers.

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Just not in my backyard please!

Otters go sightseeing
in Singapore

You say they were here before you. Before you cleared the greens to build your homes and offices, they had theirs. That is how the world goes, is it not? One dominant species or even within species trying to dominate the other is part and parcel of life on Earth.

You sing your victory tunes when India's legal system proclaims River Yamuna as a living entity with rights. And the Native American Courts are looking at possibilities of defending rivers and lakes against errant developers who have no qualms contaminating Nature and destroying natural habitats in the name of development.

And you were happy when your backyard was featured in numeral documentaries and nature magazines for bringing back the fauna and flora that were lost in the name of wanting to catch up with the wave of industrial development. You proudly displayed greenery-filled pictures you snapped of your once backwater country on your wall.

Now it seems that Nature is back with a vengeance.

The cuddly and seemingly animals have outgrown their cuteness. Their living spaces seem insufficient, and they have ambitious plans to displace you or perhaps just build a symbiotic relationship with you. But you cannot stomach the idea of sharing your neighbourhood with them. I interpret your message as wanting them to live happily anywhere but not in your backyard. 

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No free fling!

Kaanekkaane (As you watch, Malayalam; 2021)
Director: Manu Ashokan

Just like how my friends put it bluntly, "there is no such thing as a free f*ck! Everything has a price tag." No one is willing to give up something so intimate to them without any attachment. Something so personal surely carries with it excessive baggage and expectations in ROIs (Return of Investments). Affairs of the heart are never rational. The thrill of tasting the forbidden fruit digs one deeper and deeper into a heap of hopelessness. 

When you are not on the wrong side of the fence, it is easy to be judgemental. Sitting in the comfort of the armchair, it may sound prophetic to pass laws on what a person should and could do in a particular situation. We must remember that rules are made for others to follow. When it affects ourselves and our dear ones, we look for loopholes or, worse, shift the goal-post.

This intense family drama is told and acted in a very sober way without much dramatisation, perhaps at the end, but precisely for the right reason.

Paul, a civil servant at the land office, visits his grandson after about a year. Paul has not gotten over the death of his daughter, Sherrin, who succumbed to injuries in a hit-and-run accident. Paul's son in law, Allen, is now re-married, and his new wife, Sneha, is pregnant due any time. Paul was about to see another lawyer to appeal his daughter's case in the higher courts.

As he tries to build a relationship with his grandson, Paul realises that Allen may have got intimate with Sneha before Sherrin's demise. Slowly, everything falls in place. Sneha may have been a demanding lover, pushing to go to another level, and Sherrin's accident could have been a convenient death. Or was it murder?

Paul does his own investigation and determines that Allen had decided not to help Sherrin when he saw her sprawled by the roadside after the accident as momentarily he thought her death would ease matters with his demanding lover. It was just a temporary lapse of judgement but was long enough to take Sherrin to the point of no return.

Paul started blackmailing Allen with this theory and a recorded confession; Paul finds himself in a quandary. When he is about to tell Sneha about Allen's confession, he finds her unconscious in her home with an obstetric emergency. The idea of abandoning Sneha crossed his mind as that would mean he may gain possession of his grandson, and Allen was already going insane with guilt. Sanity prevailed in the end.

Sneha is sent to hospital; she survives and delivers a healthy baby. Paul realises that the same evil thoughts that almost made him leave Sneha to die must have been the sinister idea that took the better of Allen, causing Sherrin to die.

Paul returns to his hometown, deciding to put a rest to pursuing Shireen's accident any further. Man is not infallible. Sometimes we make the wrong decisions when clouded by emotion. We fail to make rational decisions we would otherwise make and live to regret them every living day. To forgive is divine, they say, but the long arm of the law will still get you.

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