The Face of Another is a film based on the Japanese surrealist novel of the same title by Kobo Abe. I've read a few of Abe's novels, but not this particular one, giving me the opportunity to experience the story with fresh eyes. Of course I know Abe's style which often involves taking a character and thrusting them into the unknown, into situations so absurd that their world or their perception of the world is completely changed which ultimately transforms their identity. In this particular story the protagonist suffers an explosion which covers his face with grotesque scarring. In order to live without horrifying the people around him he resigns himself to wearing bandages around his face at all times.
As this man navigates the world he realizes that he has begun to embrace the identity of a man without a face. The people of the bustling city around him interact with him with only cursory gestures. They're not horrified or startled, merely curious and when their curiosity is sated they avert their eyes and carry on with their lives never connecting with him on any emotional level. As he starts to embrace his new life as a permanent outcast he falls into despair which manifests itself as anger, especially toward his wife. She still performs all of her wifely duties but a distance forms between them emotionally and physically.
As the man falls deeper and deeper into loneliness his doctor, who originally treated his injury, informs him of the possibility of a radical procedure which will affix a mask over his face concealing the scarring and allowing him to re-enter society. The doctor is overwhelmed with worry about this procedure because of the psychological implications. When a man has the ability to assume another identity what would stop him from losing all accountability? A man could do great evil under the guise of someone else and then rid himself of the mask and the resulting guilt. And assuming anyone had this power there would no longer be any trust. There's no telling who you'd be interacting with, who you'd be sharing your secrets with, who you'd be in love with.
The doctor reluctantly performs the procedure with one caveat. The man is to be under constant surveillance so that any extreme behavioral changes can be monitored preventing him from doing anything destructive. Of course the man agrees and of course he rebels against this surveillance the first moment he can. He wants to experience his new identity, experience its effect on people without prying eyes. He approaches old friends and is delighted by the fact that they treat him as an attractive stranger. Then he becomes consumed by the unresolved tension with his wife. He decides to attempt to seduce her as a demonstration of how easily she can be swayed away from his previous deformed identity. This is a shameless trap, it's a demonstration of narcissism, exactly what the doctor feared.
The man is successful in seducing his wife, but is surprised to find out that his wife knew all along that this new man was in fact her husband. She agreed to their secret rendezvous to punish him for trying to deceive her. The man is stricken with complex emotions, but at this point his sense of guilt has become polluted. Is he a new person? Or is he his old self turned rotten by the ability of adulterating his past? He takes to the streets in a state of embarrassed disorientation and attacks a pedestrian. The doctor comes to his aid rescuing him from the police telling them that he's an escaped mental patient.
This story is a thought experiment, a meditation on the limits of identity. It attempts to approach the subject in a novel way and I think the audience comes away knowing a little bit more about the fragility of our personalities. It's common for people to embrace their identity as static, to perceive it as their unchanging soul, but our identities are simply collections of our past. Subtle changes in our lives change who we are over time and radical changes have the potential to send us spiraling into the depths of insanity. Death is the only event that brings about the end of our constant transformation.
5/5
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