Pusher II Parent child relationship under the veneer of gangster film: from boy to man, from son to father

Although the surface is a gangster film, in fact, to explore the relationship between father and son, or how to get rid of the patriarchal power of the boy and grow into a real man. At the beginning of the film, the main character Tony, who is still in prison, and his cellmate chatting, the cellmate wants Tony to pay back the money, Tony said he will find a job after he gets out of prison, the cellmate said he can pay back the money later for the sake of your father; after he gets out of prison, Tony has nothing to do and is penniless but can only go to his father, wants to work in his father’s auto repair store, and asks him for some money; then the camera turns, it is Tony is eating chicken shots, facing the bed scratching two But he was unable to salute the sexy women, wilted, and repeatedly let the women do not shout each other mother; from the brothel, he stole a Ferrari sports car, all the way back to the repair store, want to please his father, but his father saw the car was very angry, and even to take an iron bar to beat him, he could only drive away; then he and his father and his party to steal a car, his father’s car was hit, Tony in the car to watch his father limping From the car down, but he did not stop, watching the team behind his father picked up the car; friends told Tony a woman gave birth to his child, Tony said not my, friends gave him money to persuade him to do paternity test, he has been dragging refused to go.

These plot paragraphs, Tony’s various actions, all around the “father” to start, in fact, all in front of his father, Tony is still a child. Tony asked his father for money, like a schoolboy asking for pocket money; like a child eager to show his ability to please his parents in front of his parents to steal a car in an attempt to prove himself; including his father was hit and did not stop to pick him up, because in front of his father he is still a child, self-admittedly unable to take responsibility for taking care of adults; even including his withering, is also implying that he is still a child, so can not do what adults do. There is also the fact that the woman is not allowed to call her mother, which also makes him think of the child; he refuses to go for the paternity test because he is afraid that the child is really his own, that he himself is a child, and that he cannot take the responsibility of being a father.

Yet how does the father treat Tony, who is his son? The father, because he has a young son, obviously love the young son more, he thinks Tony is a loser, look down on him, only trouble, nothing to do. The rigid relationship between father and son makes Tony very distressed, he is careful in front of his father, but always botched, the back of his head “respect” tattoo has become a great irony of his own. In the middle of the film, in the car repair store colleagues about the wedding, the father made a speech, which mentioned that about as a son to see such words. At this point the camera to Tony, we see him silently sitting on the side, with a forlorn expression on his face, and the people around the laughter is out of place, can only drink to cover up. Drunk, he pinched the woman who claimed to have given birth to his child, but also worried that his father did not know about it, afraid of his father and dislike himself, and wanted to go to explain to his father.

The only time Tony is not like a child is when he is faced with the little baby who may be his illegitimate son, he will take the initiative to hug him and take the initiative to ask to change his diaper. In other words, in front of the child, he really is a bit like a man. But not enough, the reason for saying a little like, because in the heart, he did not accept the child is his own son, do not accept that he is the father of the child. There is a detail in the film, at first Tony thought the child was a girl, the friend said he was a boy. There are actually two pairs of father-son relationship in the film, Tony as the key character in the middle, he is both the son and the father. This all laid the groundwork for the end of the film.

At the end of the film, under the father’s humiliation, Tony kills him. This is Freud’s “spiritual patricide” under the growth. Tony finally got rid of his father and his mother, and finally ceased to be a child, but grew up to be an adult. So he finally accepted the child who had refused to accept, picked him up and left in the car, shouldering the responsibilities of a father. Now, he is both a man and a father.