Matthias is an perfect worker of the hiring company to pretend to be household members, partners, friends. Depending on the need, he can change his behaviour in specified a way as to suit the client. Unfortunately, at any point he starts pretending not only at work but besides in private life. He can't be honest anymore, and he pretends all time he cries erstwhile he breaks up with a girl.
Bernhard Wenger, an Austrian director, mostly known as the creator of short productions balancing between absurdity and intellectual observation, tells Matthias' communicative in his full-length debut.
‘Common peacock“ is simply a movie that, under the cloak of absurd comedy, tells about 1 of the biggest problems of modernity – the failure of authenticity.
The production was shown at many festivals, including the Venice global movie Festival, where it won the “Person, Lavoro, Ambiente” Foundation Award.
Wenger creates a cool, orderly planet where people are artificial and emotions are only illusion. The main character Matthias, played by Albrecht Schuch, has the ambition of being the best employee. In the name of this – for the needs of customers – he takes on various social roles – the perfect partner, colleague, coworker, father. In this way she loses her own character and adapts to company. His life is dynamic and volatile – he repeatedly participates in cultural events, complimenting art, even erstwhile he does not like it.
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Privately, he struggles to regain his just-completed relationship, which has just broken up due to Matthias' constant appearance. erstwhile a fresh friend of Sophia appears in his life (played by Julia Franz Richter), for a minute he manages to abandon the function of the perfect person, but erstwhile she rejects him, he starts to fishy her of being hired by the company where he works. His struggles oscillate around the dilemma or conform to society or stay himself?
The trick is to play the individual who plays himself, but Albrecht Schuch manages it by saving his emotions. The actor handled this task well, creating a hero simultaneously restrained and torn internally.
Hard and without anesthesia
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All for... rent
In popular consumerism, it is popular not only to rent items, but besides animals and humans, as reflected in the ‘Common peacock’.
The main character himself being loaned out, rents a dog he doesn't even care about. erstwhile the pet drowned in the pool, the worker of the animal rental company offers... another one, as much as possible akin to the erstwhile one.
Nobody cares why the dog died, no 1 checks whether Matthias was liable for it – just as no 1 had always checked if he had a swimming pool and if a rented dog could swim. There's no punishment, no responsibility, just another product. Their grotesque attitude shows the influence of consumerism not only on the way they buy objects, but besides on the approach to relationships: with animals and people.
In the planet created by Wenger for hire is everything: objects, time, relationship, life. Man ceases to be a service provider, and becomes a service whose actions and emotions are to take place according to the wishes of the client.
Just like artificial intelligence. It can besides be rented, programmed to match a man, pretend to be emotional, be the best friend or online partner. Everywhere I look – there is simply a discussion about its usage everywhere, and after beginning social media I will always find bots. Many countries are working on machines that are to be as human as possible. They are given not only voice and shape, but besides warm and soft skin and human face. It is no longer fiction, but the reality in which reality is being undermined, and the man from the robot is becoming increasingly hard to distinguish.
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In visual selection
The visual layer is simply a large asset of “Frog”. Ordered, symmetrical, static frames resonate with the planet presented, emphasizing its artificiality. Albin Wildner's photographs are not a wonderful discovery of creativity, but in their simplicity they give well what is needed.
Heroes are frequently separated in the movie by glass windows, which can be interpreted as an emotional distance between people or, let's say, longing to see another reality waiting somewhere. It's close, but it's far away. To scope it, you gotta break the symbolic glass and yet become part of the planet you have been looking at for so long.
Many times the staff is divided into 2 or 3 parts, which emphasizes the interior teardrop of the main character.
Rebellion Against Perfection
Wenger besides criticizes the social request to fit in with others.
Matthias takes care to be fashionable and to delight guests. He compliments me, buys unusual sculptures. All to be fashionable, to show the status.
Although it seems that the minute of his breakup with a girl will be drastic and groundbreaking for him, even then he pretends to be emotional and crying. It shows how profoundly he's pissed off with his fake identity.
The same is besides actual of the play, which Matthias frequently watches during work in the “Fresh Peacock”. Everything that is incomprehensible, unusual and unsuited to the environment gains its status. Nobody will admit that they do not realize – everyone interprets. Differentiation cannot be an expression of rebellion or showing authenticity – it is just an art to be admired and applauded.
In the final scene, Matthias cannot withstand the force of continuous pretending and decides to break – he sneaks out during a solemn dinner, after which, to the surprise of the client of the company and another guests of the event, returns bare and entirely covered in mud. For Matthias it is an expression of rebellion against perfectionism, for participants of the event – art! They start clapping and enjoying the author's idea. This emphasizes not only the absurdity of the situation, but is besides satire to treat everything as art.
When showing up in a naked, muddy form has no intended result, Matthias decides to jump in the pond. Only this becomes a symbol of his purification.
(No) All lost?
"The Common Paw" is an highly up-to-date and disturbingly accurate film. Bernhard Wenger created a satire that at times laughs, sometimes scares, but above all leaves the viewer with a sense of discomfort. Everything is for sale – emotions, relationships, the presence of another man, and even his own personality.
The title peacock becomes a symbol of something beautiful and well presented, which, however, remains common and... ordinary. It is an allusion to the image of the society presented in the film, which needs to brush the feathers – to be fashionable, nice, acquainted with art, and in fact everyone is average people.
The movie remains in memory precisely due to the fact that it shows a planet dangerously akin to ours and asks very crucial questions:
How can we not lose humanity in reality based on consumerism? Does the constant adjustment to society truly lead to happiness?
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