When I was young, I was an unmarried person, and I was afraid of the trivial mediocrity of married life and the daily consumption of love.
At that time, I must not have understood "Gentle Mercy".
Only by walking through the years of water and mountains will you understand what a moving story "Gentle Mercy" is.
The screenwriter of this story, for which the film won an Oscar for Best Screenplay. And I was able to salvage this film in the ocean of movies precisely because of the strong recommendation of Robert McKee, the famous screenwriting coach in Hollywood.
It is also about marriage, and I prefer this "Gentle Mercy" to the "Marriage Story" of the widowed sister who was sought after at the Venice Film Festival recently. Probably because I prefer transcendence and redemption to being trapped in a married life.
1、
The protagonist of the story is Mike Sletch, a once very famous singer who writes his own songs and is an idol of many young people.
Mike is played by Robert Duvall, the adopted son of the old godfather in "The Godfather"
Before becoming famous, he and his wife were constantly moving from town to town, looking for opportunities to sing at every bar. His wife, Louise, slowly felt unbearable and returned home first. When Mike returns home, he finds that his wife has betrayed him.
Deeply hurt by his feelings, Mike can no longer believe in love and vows never to marry again. But he met Daisy. Daisy has a moving voice, and she sings songs written by Mike, which are popular with the public.
Time flowed through the shallow chants of countless love songs, and Mike and Daisy fell into a crazy love.
They got married, and Daisy was only 18 years old.
Young and beautiful singers and mature and talented musicians, achieve each other, infatuate with each other, stand at the top of the red and green entertainment circle together, full of light.
Such a love story is as beautiful as a fairy tale. But fairy tales will always be disillusioned in real life.
In the long life, they found that the two people are actually completely different people.
Mike is an indifferent person who simply likes music but thinks the music industry is dirty. As a musician, what I like about him is a niche circle that truly loves music.
The public is sought after Daisy standing on the stage, but she is keen on fame and fortune and enjoys a flashy life.
Mike is depressed because she is not understood by Daisy, and the two have a conflict, but Daisy thinks that Mike is jealous of her because she is red, and he is not.
In mutual incomprehension, the contradictions between the two escalated and the swords were raging. Mike begins to drink heavily, and when he gets drunk, he beats Daisy, but he doesn't know it. Daisy curses Mike and forbids him from having contact with her daughter.
Both were bruised and finally divorced.
How beautiful the once legendary love story is, how deep the hatred for each other later is.
This time the emotional wound completely overwhelmed Mike, who had no intention of a career, and became more seriously drunk, wandering from town to town.
He wrote songs to heal himself, "Romance is gone", "God can forgive me, why can't you do it", "I will learn to love again, no matter what, I can even learn to be a fool again, but I will never learn, say goodbye, to a woman I have known for a long time..."
Love is still there, but the wound is too deep and can never go back.
Mike can't accept such an ending, can't release the feelings in his heart, love and hate, all unforgettable.
He wandered for 7 years until his last friend gave up on him and he was penniless.
2、
All of the above plots are just the background to the story that the movie really wants to tell. The film only intersperses a few shots and short character dialogues in the middle, outlining the entire story above.
I have never seen such a powerful screenwriter, and in just a few strokes, I have explained the whole life of the main characters before.
The real beginning of the story in the film begins when a penniless Mike, abandoned by his last friend, wakes up in a motel.
He also owes motel owner Rosa Lee lodging fees.
Rosa Lee, a young widow with her son who runs a small gas station and a motel, works hard every day, and she agrees to Mike's labor to pay for her stay.
After paying off the accommodation bill, Mike, who had nowhere to go, asked Rosa Lee if he could continue to work for her, and she agreed, with room and board, and a little bit of pay.
After every day, Mike hides in his room and plays the guitar and sings the love songs he wrote to heal his wounds, which is very beautiful. Rosa Lee would listen quietly in the other room, and she read Mike in these songs.
Rosa Lee married at 16, her husband went to war at 17 and then died, she gave birth to her widow at 18, and now the child is 10 years old. The town she lived in had been inhabited for generations, and it wouldn't be difficult for her to remarry if she wanted to, but she was a woman who had requirements for her life, and she shouldn't like the men of the town very much.
After the death of both parents, Rosa Lee lived alone and with her son, toiling hard every day. Mike was 15 years older than she was and still destitute, but Rosa Lee was impressed by his songs and married him.
Rosa Lee has a calm temperament, she can make Mike quiet, Mike took the initiative to quit drinking, became a gentle and family-oriented man, willing to live an ordinary life, and work with Rosa Lee every day.
Until one day, Daisy came to the place where they lived to hold a concert.
Mike goes to a concert, and he gives Daisy his new song and wants to meet his daughter, only to be hysterically cursed and expelled.
Because Mike was in a bad mood, because Rosa Lee was jealous of Daisy and Mike's past, they had their first argument.
Daisy's agent then told Mike that his new song was badly written and that he was outdated. Mike just wanted to write songs well, and he couldn't accept Daisy's cursing and such derogations.
He drove away angrily, he went to the bar, he bought wine, he didn't come back late in the evening.
Rosa Lee was upset, and her son asked her if Mike would ever come back, and she said she didn't know. The foundations of this marriage are far weaker than the previous one, and she feels that Mike still loves Daisy, and she does not know if Mike will leave her and return to a life of wandering and drinking again.
3、
Late at night, Mike finally returned. He offered to say to Rosa Lee, "I didn't drink, I bought a bottle of wine, but I poured it all out... I walked around town all night, driving twice toward Anthony, and then turning back, toward Austin, toward Dallas, and turning back. He told Rosa Lee that what he was giving Daisy was a new song that had just been written last week. It turned out to be a song written to Rosa Lee.
At this moment, the audience and Rosa Lee confirmed Mike's seriousness and concern for this marriage, and suddenly understood that Mike's marriage proposal to Rosa Lee was not a compromise of life after desperation, but that he had read Rosa Lee in the common labor, they had similar souls, so Mike wanted to start a new life, took the initiative to quit drinking and then proposed, so he would still resist the temptation of alcohol in a manic state and take the initiative to come back.
Daisy is just a big part of his life, not to be forgotten, but it is over.
The writers also used the story of Mike and Daisy's daughter Sue Anne in the film.
Anne and her boyfriend Harry are another Mike and Daisy, Anne wants to be a singer, Harry is much older, has musical talent, loves to drink, they have a car accident like Mike, but Anne is killed in the car accident. This both tells the audience that Mike and Daisy's last connection is gone, and also implies that Daisy will completely disappear into Mike's life in the future.
When Annie last saw Mike, she asked him about a song that Mike used to hum to him as a child, and Mike said that he didn't remember it at all, but after Annie left, Mike looked at Annie's distant back in front of the window and hummed the song softly. This is another way to tell the audience that Mike remembers the past and misses the beauty of the past, but that's all, he has decided to move forward.
The exquisite structure makes the film rich in content and vivid in detail, and the 92-minute film appears to have a huge capacity and endless afterglow.
Mike's new song is welcomed by the townspeople, who can feel the warmth inside and the affection contained in the bland lyrics. Mike's career has come back to life.
At the end of the film, the director, who is like a golden shot, spends almost 3 minutes repeatedly showing Rosa Lee watching Mike and her son playing rugby in front of the house through the window. They were all smiling, the sun was shining, the sky was high, quiet and serene. The camera slowly zooms out, suggesting that this is Mike's future life.
I have always felt that love in marriage is the best love. When we are young, the heartbeat is actually very simple, we think it is love, but in fact, it is just imagination or hormones at work. People are easily moved by the love between Daisy and Mike, but what is really profound and precious is the love between Rosa Lee and Mike. I prefer the warm bland flow of years to the legend.
When you walk through the thousands of mountains and rivers of life, there are still people around you, you can treat each other with sincerity, and give to each other, it is fate that gently pities.