tiprr 9

“This is the typical structuralist process of moving from particular to the general, placing the individual work within a wider structural context.”

“In the structuralist approach to literature there is a constant movement away from the interpretation of the individual literary work and a parallel drive towards understanding the larger, abstract structures which contain them.”

Must the structure be abstract?

I listened to Ang Lee’s commentary on the film and he actually tells us where to start.

“I think Tibetan symbolism is a good place to look into the piece”

He says this just as the faux monk hits his head on the Tibetan prayer wheel or mani wheel (pictured at the end of Jason Hagey’s response).

“And, ah, yeah, there are a lot of little things in there people can dig into, I think (laughter). But I hope the film is like a maze.”

Take the following with a grain of google image search salt. When Clive Owen looks in the window at the tied up monk, he is looking between the legs of a statue. The camera moves and reveals the statue and lingers on the details. The Dakini, a female Buddhist deity, is the helper of those in pursuit of spiritual well being and enlightenment. As she poses in an enticing stance, she dances overtop two human figures symbolizing her presence and her position as a goddess. This deity is shown wearing a necklace made of skulls and drinking from a skull, signifying the demise of ignorance and unawareness of man. After seeing the monks and being unaware of this statue, Owens reenters the house and saves the boy.

The Tibetan symbols are interesting, but looking at the larger structure often removes some meaning of this film for me because the larger structure is a commercial. That is the context of the creation of this film. BMW hired Lee to make a short film using their product. Lee includes a highly choreographed driving “fight” scene with the cars on the dock. The previous film Lee directed (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) was a box office success and has many highly choreographed fight scenes which leads me to believe that is why he was hired. Plus, the next film Lee directed is Hulk, which leads me to believe that the band-aid at the end is a pitch to see his next film.

At one point in the film Owen reverses his BMW into another car violently pushing the other car out of the way for a heroic escape. The next time we see the back of the BMW it’s in pristine condition because this is a commercial.