Um, yeah.
That wasn’t me!
That was one part I didn’t like, it took away from the ambiguity a tad.
Was everyone in the meeting room seeing them as well? They all looked a bit freaked out.
I thought it was done to purposefully remove the ambiguity. I don’t think we were supposed to take this movie as a metaphor; I think the idea is that these bizarre golems are actually, physically there. I think that was also highlighted in the opening shot, in which the concrete monster’s feet are making that creepy thunk noise. That noise didn’t seem hallucinatory; it sounded perfectly real.
This would also answer Sage Rat’s question of why everyone ran away; if this were actually happening, in the real world and not the movie world, it would be terrifying.
Granted, the monsters could (and presumably do) have metaphorical import, but I think the idea is that something inexplicable has happened. We don’t know why; it’s just happened.
In a similar vein, consider:
Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams to find himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect.
That’s impossible, of course, just like being followed around by gigantic concrete monsters. But that’s the only fantastical detail in The Metamorphosis; for the rest of the book, everything is perfectly realistic. These are real people, in the real world, dealing with an irreducible and incomprehensible fact.
I’m also reminded of the movies Touch and Last Night. Real people dealing in natural, human ways with impossible mysteries.
ETA: HazelNutCoffee, I think you’re right; I think everyone saw all of the monsters, and was just too freaked out and terrified to do anything but go through the motions of a normal day.
I think that’s the point of the film. That our modern urban landscape is fake and inorganic and unsettling and that we force ourselves to go about it as if nothing is wrong.
The concrete man tries to be friendly and entertaining (it does a little dance and all) but it just seems creepy and unnatural.
That was the (somewhat more than half-serious) point of my first response.
I thought it was great, except for the music. The “music” was pretty uninspired scary sound effects stuff, and the film seemed better then that.
Than that.
No, a couple of the things are from the lobby of his office building.
The other office workers seemed all too aware of their critters, and completely unnerved by them.
On the other hand, the doctor examining the protagonist couldn’t see the thing.
I’m sort of leaning toward msmith537 and Ogre’s interpretations.
pout
I still want my own Cylinder Man to dance for me*. I’m going to hold my breath and then you’ll be sorry!!!
*a pony would be an acceptable substitute, however.
The sense I got from it most was guilt, I think. If I had to hazard a guess at it, it seemed like humanity as a whole, or the golem-having people in particular, had done something dreadful that caused the golems to appear. They aren’t dangerous, or anything, but being followed by them is a reminder of the dreadfulness of the act. The desperateness of some of the people with them didn’t strike me as “Oh crap, there’s this weird thing!” just because they didn’t look surprised about it. It was more like “I really, really don’t like this”.
Perhaps the golems are looking for company or pets and they just don’t understand how to interact with humans. The golem did a little dance for the protagonist at first and didn’t really do anything other than follow him around.
The one thing I noticed was that the cement man had a blood stain on its head.
Perhaps relevant, perhaps not.
:: does Cylinder Man dance ::
Holy shit. That was amazing.
i’ve seen a ghost movie a long time ago with the same mood (except for the dancing part). a ghost would just stand right next to an oblivious pregnant mother and wait for reincarnation. the protagonist could see these ghosts and reacted the same way.
Going back to my original analysis, we don’t know if they are dangerous. They aren’t acting threatening (other than simply following their human around), but it’s pretty clear they could be if they wanted to. The concrete man is big, heavy and made of concrete after all.
Also, the creatures don’t display any emotions. They have no facial features so that in and of itself is unsettling.
That was after our protagonist fell and cut his head, wasn’t it?
No, right from the first shot it has it (before it does its dance.) You can see it pretty clearly in the download version. It covers most of the thing’s left half of its face.
Loved it. Excellent use of CG, as well. Very convincing.
My thoughts are these “golems” are monkeys on the back of people in our modern era. They represent their jobs and responsibilities, the things they have to do, and eventually burn them out. Everyone has duties that tie us down in ways that we can never be free. They’re haunting. They’re reminders, even when we try and get away for a while. And they take the form of aspects the characters dislike the most.
What does your golem look like?
Like a 10-foot, drippy agarose gel with indistinct DNA bands. :mad: