You, the Living

You, the Living (Du Levande)

Drama/Comedy

Director: Roy Andersson

Run Time: 1 hr 35 min

2007

The title of the film, You, the Living, seems like a purposely juxtaposing title contrary to most of the imagery of the film. The title, grammatically, poses as a statement or a fact confirming the existence of ‘YOU’ (to both the characters of his film and the viewers of the film. It s juxtaposing element arises as the film unfolds through its narration, actions, and sets, which I will be talking about.

Andersson’s film primarily consisted of sets. The sets had a bare feel to them. As Andersson described in his interview with Little White Lies, "My philosophy is to create pictures that are very, very clean, purified and condensed, and easy to see. They are very clear also. Almost close to cartoons... I take away everything that’s not necessary for the picture”. I think the bareness was especially important to the concept of the film. Less visual information allowed us to focus on what was important. Apart from that it almost suggested how the sets were almost as bare and dead as the characters and the storyline, contradicting the title of the film. I felt that the sets were beautifully constructed. Scenes that showed views from one building to another emphasized the idea that everyone is merle in their own lives; it is a day to day process that everyone has to face and no one laughs at the others’ misery because everyone is as hopeless as the next person.

Many scenes from the film stood out for me. I enjoyed the way some of the scenes were shot as well. I particularly like one filming composition that the cinematographer took in various scenes; it was such that the foreground had some kind of minimal activity going on, while the room next door could be visually seen through a doorway where there is another activity taking place. One example of this composition was the scene with the woman in the bathtub, while her husband is getting dressed in the other room. I also liked this scene for the way it was directed; it felt uplifting when the husband joined in and began to sing with the woman in the bathtub; simply suggesting the ray of hope in the hopelessness of their day to day lives.

Another scene that I found important was the dream scene. Particularly the back and forth between reality and the dream. The director was able to emphasize his message by showing how people are as miserable in their dreams as they are in their real lives (shown through the character being stuck in a traffic jam while he is narrating his dream to the audience). The dream also hinted that people often take added weight on their shoulders by stressing over other people’s problems. When the characters begin to narrate his dream, he claims that he is in a room full of strangers and that he feels that it is his responsibility to lighten the mood.

There were many other smaller scenes that I found appealing that reflected the director’s concept. The scene where the old man is hitting his ceiling to stop the noise from the upstairs apartment causes him to break some of his furniture. A few scenes show how people do not want to listen to other people, indicated through the instruments that others (wife, neighbours) don't want to listen to. There is a repeated dialogue ‘What did you say?’ indicating that no one is listening to you. And the scene with the teacher telling the school kids about her problem about her husband, and having them respond in confusion suggests not only the stress-free and purity of the kids but also their naiveness as they listened but did not understand. All these scenes highlight that no one is listening to you, no one wants to hear what you have to say or even try to understand you. It gives the impression that you are living but might as well be dead as there is a lack of human connection with others about things other than misery and hopelessness.

What I found most ironic was that people weren’t able to hear each other as they were lost in their tiresome worlds yet everyone was able to hear the thunder and the rain. The director put a significant amount of emphasis by having the characters constantly repeating that its raining or his concept. The rain was important as it displayed a turning point. Rain makes the soil fertile, initiated growth on the barren land. The rain, for the film, portrayed the idea that there is always hope regardless of all the misery that one faces in their lifetime; showing that there is always scope for growth if you look in the right places and listen carefully.

I found the film very fascinating to watch and with the amount of thought and symbolism put in the film, I would watch it again to rediscover it.

4/5