Signs

As we finished Signs today, the second time I've seen it, but only the first time that I was actually conscious. I think that we can all agree that our brains hardly functioned at age 12, if they did at all. I enjoyed the movie more this time because I found more substance to it, but it was still not my favorite film.

Personally, I felt that the a main issue that I had with this film was that the film pretty much slammed ideology and ideas into the audiences' mind instead of doing it with subtlety and different techniques rather than through straightforward and direct dialogue on the subject. Overall, though, it was a good film, but I did not find it to be outstanding, or quite on the level of The Seventh Seal or the others we have seen in this class.

A couple of scenes that I did like involved the juxtaposition of two scenes. The first one is where Graham first comes out of the shower with only a bathrobe and walks into his children's room. Clearly, there could be seen as his washing himself clean of religion and faith. However, at the end of the film, he walks out of the bathroom, in his priest's outfit, with his faith restored, clearly symbolizing his second awakening and second baptism in a sense. This scene, although not subtle, was one that I liked the repetition of because of its powerful imagery.

Another repeated concept that I noticed was that in nearly every scene involving the aliens, outside, the wind chimes are tinkling and you can constantly hear that normally calming sound symbolizing something scary and unpleasant. It was very interesting in at least 7 different instances, I took note of the sound of wind chimes inside, and each time it signaled to the characters that they need to take some sort of action, but I am not sure if they serve as having some deeper meaning.

A third thing that I noticed when I was looking through my notes on the film, was something that Mr. Bennett brought to our attention about the Middle-Eastern "primitive method" that defeated the aliens. Earlier on in the film, the reporter on the television stated that "people flocked to their local temples, synagogues, and churches," again reaffirming the idea of the three different religions that empowered the people and allowed them to defeat the aliens.

Also, there may have been said already, so I apologize if it is repetitive, but it is clear that in religion, a person is baptized with water to cleanse them and give them a new innocence and purify them. In this film, the "water" or the "baptism" and strength of religion is what eventually killed the aliens. Therefore, the purifying, cleansing power of religion will overcome any outside force, stating that God truly is watching out for us.

It was also interesting that although Graham had lost his faith and no longer believed in God, and stated that no one was watching out for us and that we were truly alone constantly spoke to God in anger, so he had lost his faith in God's ability to help him but not in the concept. These are shown through the lines:

"I'm not ready."
"I hate you."
"Don't let this happen again. Not AGAIN!"

Clearly he has some faith in God but just no longer trusts God's decision making but still believes that there is something there, but in fact this God, happens to be evil and spiteful and not looking out for his goodness.