First, the disaster caused by separation anxiety
19 had no parents, and her adoptive father died when he was very young. He has never been able to form a relatively stable and lasting attachment relationship with others. John Ball used the word "attachment" to describe our strong emotional connection with a specific individual in life. After a few months of birth, individuals gradually form close feelings with their caregivers to practice. After many babies form a basic company, they will also show obvious anxiety when their mothers or attached objects leave. For example, a 15-month-old child cried when she saw her mother going out shopping, and even wanted to go with her. This kind of reaction of children is called separation anxiety. Generally, separation anxiety appears at 6-8 months, reaches its peak at 14-18 months, and then the intensity and frequency will gradually decrease in infancy and childhood. However, school-age children and even teenagers will also show anxiety and depression when they have to be separated from their loved ones for a long time.
So, why do children feel anxious about being separated from their attachment objects? From the ecological point of view, in fact, many situations faced by babies actually contain natural danger signals; In the process of human evolution, these environments are so frequently associated with danger that human fear of them becomes a spontaneous response with biological basis. Once the baby has the ability to distinguish the familiar from the unfamiliar, and the familiar guards the separation, the baby will instinctively be afraid of strange faces (in ancient times, it is likely to be a beast) and strange environment.
and 19 is afraid of the location of the landing site rather than going to land. When he was going to get off the boat for the beautiful girl, she stopped halfway. I saw the skyscrapers in new york City in the distance, and the smoke was endless. He was lost and finally returned to the boat. As 19 himself said: "The city is so big that there is no end in sight. Where is it?" Can I see it? Even the streets are countless. Find a woman, build a house, buy a piece of land, open up a landscape, and then go to a dead end together. Too many choices and complicated judgments, aren't you afraid of a nervous breakdown? Land is too big. It is like a big ship, a woman and a long route. I would rather give up my life than live in an endless world. Anyway, no one in this world knows me now. I stopped halfway, not because I could see it, but because I couldn't see it ... "So, even though I was worried about the beautiful girl, he still couldn't muster up the courage to get off the boat, because in the process of walking through the countryside, he was faced with a city countless times larger than the boat and thousands of streets, and he was at a loss and shrank back.
When he was a child, his adoptive father once said to him, "There are big sharks on land that will eat people." Although it sounds ridiculous, 19 really felt that there were "sharks" on the land, which was dangerous in location and had too many choices. Although the ship is also very big, it only carries 2 passengers at a time. The ship has a head and a tail. The same is true for keys, which have a head and a tail. However, in 19, land seemed endless, and it was a long route, too strong perfume and too beautiful woman. All this is beyond the range that 19 can expect and control.
At the end of the film, Max tried to persuade him to get off the boat and start all over again after finding him. However, in 19, there was a kind of anxiety and anxiety in the implementation of land. He said that there were too many unknown things and too many choices, so that day would be a mental breakdown, so he would rather give up his life. And he has no identity. He was born in the sea, grew up in the sea and died in the sea. No one remembers him except Max, and his life ended on the boat.
didn't p>19 ever think about getting off the boat? Except for that time as a girl, deep down, he is looking forward to landing. He got the land of a big country countless times in his imagination and dreams. When he first met Max, he described New Orleans as if he had lived there for a long time. In fact, he only got this information by calling strangers and talking to others. However, his desire only stays at the level of consciousness, and he has no courage and can't go to land.
2. Unconventional but self-trapped
The 19 in the film is gentle in appearance, but sometimes likes to challenge the convention. . After Danny died in an accident, he inadvertently came to the first-class ballroom and played the piano without a teacher, attracting countless surprised and curious passengers. Surprised, the captain stepped forward and said, "19, according to the regulations, you shouldn't play the piano here!" " At a young age, 19 said, "Fuck the rules!" Shelley, the originator of jazz, boarded the boat to challenge 19. After being ashamed of his superb piano skills, 19 stood on the boat and said, "Fuck jazz!" " Moreover, during the usual performance, he often improvises, and the rest of the band has to remind him often: "19, please play according to the music!" " Unfortunately, such a reminder can only last for a short time. With the flash of inspiration in 19, touching music flowed out of his hands at will. One night when Max first boarded the Virginia, the wind was strong and the waves were rough, and the whole ship was constantly rocking. Max suffered from seasickness, staggered and threw up. At this time, 19 appeared, and they sat in front of the piano, released the foot brake and played the piano. The two of them glided along with the piano like running water, so carefree and free and easy, as if they were flying freely. They glided across the corridor in the moving music and bumped into the captain's room.
It can be seen that Page 19 is a person who likes to break the rules and is not afraid of convention. However, on the question of whether to go to land, he turned the ship into a big cage and turned himself into a prisoner. Developmental psychology tells us that when young individuals explore the outside world, they initially take their attachment objects (usually parents or other feeders) as the axis and move within a certain range. After exceeding a certain range, individuals will feel uneasy. However, with the safe base of attachment object, individuals will gradually get rid of anxiety and actively explore the external environment. And 19 is the lack of a strong safety base, beyond the scope of the ship, he can't control his inner anxiety clearly. She doesn't want to give in to the outside authority and conventional development, but she has to give in to her inner limitations.
Third, the lack of sense of identity
Besides the fear of the unknown, the greatest sorrow of 19 is that it has no sense of identity. The film mentioned many times: 19 had no birth certificate, no birthday and no identity on land. It's like this man has never been born. When he goes to heaven after death, God will feel strange that this man was born in a boat, grew up in a boat, died in a boat, and never set foot on land. According to Eriksson's theory, the most important obstacle to the development of teenagers is to gain a sense of self-identity-a stable and coherent perception of who they are, where they are going and where they are in society. Self-identity is formed in dealing with many choices: what kind of career I want, where I belong in the world, and so on. Eriksson used the identity crisis to describe the confusion and even anxiety that these adolescent individuals will experience when they think about who they are now and decide "what kind of self can I (should) be". If teenagers can survive this crisis smoothly, they will move towards a mature life path. In the film, 19 seems to have been thinking about this problem all his life, but he has never been able to solve it satisfactorily. He doesn't know where he should go, what kind of person he should be if he can live, and what position he is in the big world. Therefore, he can only stay on the boat and keep repeating the bumpy journey.
Fourth, imagine another ending
We can imagine what would happen to him if he really came to land in 19 for the sake of girls? The fairy tale ending is that he will find a girl, then fall in love, get married and live happily for a lifetime. But think rationally, he has an identity on the ship, a piano player; He is valuable, and tourists get pleasure from his music; He has friends, and the piano is his friend. Listen to his heart. Without all this, he will encounter a series of maladjustment problems. He has no identity, no relatives, and only knows the girl and his father. He is used to the bumpy life on the ship, and I'm afraid he can't adapt to the stability of the land when he gets ashore. He may suffer from insomnia at night and find it difficult to sleep in a house on land. He has no other skills, he can only play the piano. However, he plays the piano very casually, just out of interest, not utility. He is used to being lonely and not good at greeting people, so he has only one friend, Max. He may be afraid to go out, because there are too many strangers and too complicated and chaotic streets, and he will be at a loss. He may be flustered and unable to maintain a basic life.
I'm afraid p>19 decided never to get off the boat again after considering these. He has been integrated with the ship and cannot be separated. His inspiration for playing the piano often comes from the guests on board. All kinds of people at the first-class ball, such as the old woman who murdered her husband, the middle-aged man who indulged in the past, the prostitute who saw through the world of mortals, and the third-class passenger who stole the dress to expect an affair, all became the inexhaustible source of inspiration for playing the piano in 19, and 19 also used these inspirations to interpret the inner world of all sentient beings. Everything in the world is like half the passengers on the Virginia. Get on board, get off, get on board and get off again. It goes on and on, bouncing back and forth between the bow and the stern. For 19, the whole world passed by him, and any disguise and mask were so vulnerable and unobstructed in front of the flowing music. With 19 aunts stroking the keys, a person's life could be spiritually freehand in the music, so although he was at sea, he had already seen the prosperity and loneliness, glory and desolation of the world on the road.
There is a clip in the film in which the third-class passengers are happily surrounding 19 and listening to him improvise the piano. At this moment, suddenly someone shouted: America! Everyone ran away with a bang, leaving a lonely 19. Yes, all the passengers on the ship have ideals and ambitions, and each has its own destination. But 19 didn't. He didn't have a destination. He drifted around like a leaf. He also has a desire to communicate with others. He will call strangers and talk casually. Maybe he wants to form some kind of connection with the outside world by phone! At the lively and rich ball, he was free and generous. However, more often, his figure is particularly lonely. Fortunately, he met Max, a true friend in music and soul.
At the end of the film, 19 resolutely chooses to live or die with the great ship * * *, but Max's persuasion can't make him change his mind. Therefore, Max respected the decision of 19 and let him stay on the boat, which truly realized "born in the sea, grew up in the sea and died in the sea". This fairy who fell into the mortal world is finally going back to heaven. Is there a piano in heaven? There must be, because heaven is where there is a piano. Although analyzing 19 from a psychological point of view, he should be a person with specific psychological problems, at least he is a person with unhealthy psychology and imperfect personality, but I prefer to regard him as a person who guards the ideal. When the Virginia is about to be demolished, people are rushing to evacuate the sea, while 19 calmly faces the crowd and the Virginia, which is about to sink to the bottom of the sea, playing out of thin air with both hands, and the delicate fingers follow. Finally, in the whole life of "Boom", the soaring flame rose, and 19 disappeared with "Virginia" in the blue and clear sea that swallowed everything. He walked into heaven like an idealist with his illusory utopia, and calmness and calmness were his last emotions. Joy and pain, sadness and despair, these feelings that plague human beings have nothing to do with it since then. In the sea, 19 completed his mission and ideal. Since 19, only the mysterious record template that Max hid in the piano and was put together by the owner of the musical instrument store has been circulated in the world.
In fact, hope still exists. As 19 said, "As long as you have a good story and someone listens to you, there is still hope." At the end of the film, Max's figure is drifting away. He still has his trumpet, his story and his hope. I believe that at this time, 19 is playing the piano in heaven, remembering this romantic and sad legend!