蔷薇的葬礼

69年的日本同性恋题材影片居然可以做到如此惊世骇俗：四处游荡的意识流放肆的盛开在啤酒沫中，用快进和异常欢快的配乐将最常见的荒诞演绎成最捧腹的喜剧，像是剥削电影和粉红电影的畸形胎儿，交叉蒙太奇和倒叙的手法将悬疑气氛推向高潮，魔幻和神秘艺术共同营造了最为悲哀的乱伦故事。

品尝现实世界中的存在主义电影是半醉半醒的快感：有时像是穿插着纪录片的真实；有时明白告诉你这是影中影的秘密；有时候将众多的结局糅杂成色彩斑斓的面团先丢向你砸晕你，然后在你面朝天花板背接地气的迷糊时刻认认真真的将每一条色彩的缘由细细讲与你听。

片尾的刀子直直指向围观的群众，沾满了鲜血的刀尖明亮耀过在场任何一个人的眼睛。他们仅仅是围站在一旁，露出或是恐惧或是讥讽的表情，而更多的是什么表情也没有，仿佛只有看着别人的痛苦才能让他们麻木的生活找到一点可怜的存活感。捅瞎了双眼的男妓直直的站在那，就像是堵住了通向圣洁的那条本就是狭窄的小路，不给别人一点救赎的机会。

那些肌肤之亲没有丝毫的猥亵，甚至不带有做爱时那充满占有欲的狂乱和迷离。仅仅是轻吻，吻过另一个人全身的皮肤，用嘴唇去感知对方身体的温度和他的颤动，仿佛所有再熟悉不过的身体部位是一个巨大的漩涡将自己吸进去。黑白镜头下的情欲总是要比彩色的直白来的内敛，仿佛连欲望都来自旧时光，在岁月中学会了慢慢的欣赏和享受。

我是伤口，亦是匕首；我是受害者，亦是刽子手。

影片采访了许多同性恋人的心理活动，但只能让观众从支离破碎的过往中猜测男妓的心路历程。他的父亲不明原因的抛弃妻子，而母亲在寻欢作乐中慰藉人生，对尚且年幼的男妓关注甚少。开始发觉到自身欲望秘密的男妓被母亲所不齿，而羞耻和愤怒让他把尖刀刺向了曾想保护的对象。这成为了他成年后不断的白日噩梦，弑母的痛苦带着迷茫的本能痛觉仅仅揪住了他的心脏，只有荷尔蒙或药物带来的大狂欢才是些许绝望的平静。

写满语言的镜头在黑白色下时而扭曲时而狰狞，人们在虚无中寻找存在的意义，对现实的种种不满都以惩罚自我的方式发泄在了生活中，用带血的热情和坚定的信仰对抗社会的种种荒谬。有时觉得整个社会都像是一锅巨大的温水，慢慢煮掉了自己所有反抗的力量，然后变成这温水中的一份子，去消融下一个带刺的灵魂。

白蔷薇象征着纯洁的爱情，而这一群人既是嫖客与男妓的关系，又夹杂着男同性恋间躲躲藏藏的隐私，复杂程度早已不是简单的爱恋可以满足，而死去的男妓正是绝望的看清了这一点而选择了解脱。周身铺满的白蔷薇是他最终的夙愿，而恶毒的充满了酸味的诅咒让人忍不住发笑，直到它实现了的那刻才惊觉命运之怖。爱情，奇怪又可怕的命题，让人生让人死，让人心甘情愿的用最大的痛苦赎罪。蔷薇没能开出结果，凋零的花瓣撵落成尘，继续酿造下一批悲剧。

这是一部可以闻到的电影，鲜血的腥味、花朵的甜味、旁白的纸味、光影的酒味等等就像一波波海浪，冲刷着观影的人。浪过之后，浑身冰冷。

A masterpiece. Among all Japanese films that I have watched, ATG films always deeply intrigue me. Mastumoto certainly attempts to create a conflict between two poles, such as the avant-garde and the documentary as the reading suggests. Before entering the discussion of his combination of different genres (or even beyond the traditional-defined film medium itself), I want to briefly discuss this dichotomy embedded in this film. The film starts with a poem claiming one person as both wound and knife, both victim and executer. This dichotomy is settled at the very beginning of the film. Later around 4:22, Gonda and Eddie are placed on two opposing side of the screen, showing this dichotomy again. This also indicates the paternity conflict. The imagery of rose is also two-sides. On one side, it is extremely attractive and beautiful. On the other hand, it hurts people who hold it. This reminds me the Marxism theory of synthesis. The conflict between thesis and anti-thesis will create a new synthesis which is higher than the original thesis-antithesis level. This motivates the social progress. The new synthesis will become the new thesis, seeking a conflict with its anti-thesis. As Matsumoto is very aware of the past major film theories, (I really love the quote from Mekas) it is also possible that he learned the writings from Sergei Eisenstein or Dziga Vertov, who highly borrows from Marxism. Therefore, the concept of surrealism and seeking higher truth may also be connected to the concept of “eye” attributed to camera. Vertov’s work “Man with a Movie Camera” definitely demonstrates this idea. Therefore, the foundation of the documentary-side in “Funeral Parade of Roses” may originate from it. However, as the prompt suggests, this film also aggregate so many other genres or even elements beyond cinema to construct a deeper truth. From my perspective, this practice may compensate the innate disadvantage in documentary genre itself.

It is easy to firstly identify the documentary-side elements in this film. This film uses a lot of non-professional actors and actresses, mitigating the illusion of real from the sense of acting. The audiences will be more persuaded by its narration. Also, when the assistant yells out “Cuts,” audiences are aware of the fakeness of this narration, cancelling the illusion as well. The following interviews on either the cast or some random passers-by are also elements of documentaries. They are revealing their personal feelings of the plots, their identities, their dreams and their living conditions. These are not mingled with the narration part (or melodrama part, which will be discussed below) because such information is given purely orally by these people. There are no direct reproductions through images. Furthermore, the response or adaptation from the current events, such as the students’ riots, the wars and even the film posts on display, actively enhance the sense of the newsreels, which could be considered as the early form of the documentary.

However, a significant problem in the documentary-end is the unreachable truthfulness. The editing and the montage inevitably create new meanings instead of faithfully demonstrating the happenings that “once have been there.” Many documentaries, even in early periods, are proved to contain false information or overabundance of propagandistic messages. Robert Flaherty's “Nanook of the North” exaggerates the wilderness of the residences and invents many scenes. The camera perspectives and montages from Leni Riefenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will” certainly glorifies the image of Hitler. Therefore, it is impossible to achieve this superficial level of truthfulness because of the innate cinematic languages. Then, Mastumoto attempts to achieve a deeper sense of truthfulness in the unconscious level. Memories, or sense of memories, may facilitate this practice. The pieced images could become analogies for audiences to recall or recollect, from their daily viewing of different films or even other medias. There are two threads of this adding-up: referring to previous dominating genres that people are familiar with, then exploring the future possibilities of the cinema itself through style of “avant-garde” (manipulating time and borrowing from installation art and television).

For the first thread, Matsumoto clearly refers to melodrama, slapsticks, and some aspects of Jidai-Geki through many devices. The core of the plots still shows the sense of melodrama, even its editing skills are avant-garde. The essence of the scripts for the narrative part demonstrates a clear pattern of Eddie’s whole life, while the audiences need to paste all the parts scattered around together. Several photographs show him as a baby. After his father left, his personalities start to change. He uses make-up. When he uses lipstick, his mother beats him. He witnessed his mother meeting another man. He kills both of them. He then works in a bar, causing a typical triangle between him and Gonda and Leda. Finally, all three are dead. This kind of love affairs and struggle is typical for most melodramas, only the characters are more complicated than the normal examples. This familiar structure from a familiar genre will mitigate the sense of pioneer which may frighten the audiences, making this film more acceptable. The abundance of sex depictions also reminds the audiences the pink films as well, which becomes a powerful advertising device to appeal to the audiences, enlarging the span of its potential targeted viewers. The camera shows all different angles of the naked bodies, with many close-ups. This may clearly recall the pornographical aspects of the pink films. In addition, the reference to slapsticks also create this sense of amusement and entertainment, relaxing the audiences from the more serious and uncanny avant-garde parts of the film. In many fighting scenes, Mastumoto accelerates these shots and uses very simple and delighting background music with quick tempos. This quickly connects to the Hollywood slapsticks such as Keaton’s or Chaplin’s work. This play of time is harmonious with the more avant-garde style of manipulating time. However, it is more familiar to the audiences, replacing this work together to the stream of all the past masterpieces. In one shot, Eddie and Guevara lean on the walls that is full of Pasolini’s film “Edipo re”. They both have the theme of killing fathers. This is also a device of linking this film to previous works in more clearly genres. Finally, from 37:49, the background music for the quarrel between Gonda and Leda are traditional Japanese theatrical music. In this scene, Gonda is dominating the fighting against Leda and kicking him, showing the sense of male chauvinism. Utilizing the traditional instruments for the music here links to the genre of Jidai-geki, which are mostly adaptations from histories or traditional theatres. This genre here seems to ironically criticize the traditional Japanese patricentric culture.

Furthermore, this film also has lots of avant-garde elements. Among those numerous examples, two significant parts are the manipulation of time and the mediums beyond-cinema. Isami’s response has already clearly analyses the relationship between this film and Godard’s jump cuts. Therefore, I will not repeat this argument. There are many repetitively used shots placed in different places of the film. Sometimes they seem to show a continuity in narration, while some of them appear as the hallucinations or dream of Eddie. His memories and dreams contribute this manipulation of time. There are also many moments that the audiences could feel the sense of omens from the objects. After the scene showing dead Leda, there are two dolls on the ground. One of the dolls has a needle pinned on the neck. Another doll’s two eyes are both pinned by the needles. At the end of film, the deaths of Eddie and Gonda clearly revive this pattern. Gonda kills himself by cutting his neck, and Eddie tears his two eyes. This seems to be a De Ja Vu. This manipulation of time is significant for the seek of the deeper truth. One specific aspect of dream is that people do not know the beginning and the ending. The jumps cuts and repetition clearly imitate the similar sense of dreams and deeper memories. Therefore, the memories of Eddie are scattered around the film and freely connected. Finally, as the Mekas’s saying that “all definitions of cinema have been erased, all doors are open now,” this film also aggregates many other art forms. The scenes in the galleries showing the paintings of masks are linked to the gallery-environment. The scene depicting seven naked males’ backs with one rose thrusted in one’s butt clearly creates the sense of action arts or happenings, which is a widely used art form during this period in response to the wars and nuclear horrors, such as Yoko Ono’s “Grapefruit” and “Cut-pieces.” The reference to this new wave of art reforms could intensify this film’s connection with its contemporary political issues. Finally, television dominates many scenes in the film as well. The Eddie’s group gathers around to watch the television. The news of detecting drugs is also delivered through the form of television program. Therefore, this film seems to break the boundaries of instantaneity of cinema, which the audiences merely stay in theatre with darkness for two hours. The television, a familiar medium that represent the audiences’ daily routines, seems to arouse more perpetuating senses for the audiences. This generalization also represent the accumulation of the audiences’ or the characters’ unconsciousness or memories, because people will receive the news and understand the worlds through watching cinemas.