Firstly, I would just like to point out how brilliant an actor Jake Gyllenhaal actually is. Most people probably know him as the kid from Donnie Darko - the one who has a giant, talking, prophecy-spouting rabbit friend named Frank -, but since then Gyllenhaal has been in a number of movies and has proved that as an adult he is just as much of a skilled actor as he was when he first slipped onto our radars in Donnie Darko.
Everything about this movie screams "ambiguous" and "enigmatic". Right from the start we are left wondering what the hell is going on, on the screen in front of us...
To put the movie into its most simple description; History teacher, Adam (Jake Gyllenhaal), goes on a search for his exact look-a-like, after noticing him in a movie.
The movie begins with Gyllenhaal's character in an apparent strip/sex club, where young ladies are parading themselves naked, and one lady proceeds to reveal a spider, just to then crush it with her high heeled shoes.
(Possible spoiler warning!!! Skip next paragraph if you don't want to know anything about the movie!!!)
It then continues to depict the character with his apparent girlfriend, Mary. From the looks of it, he seems to use her mainly for sex and treats her with little respect or interest. It then becomes clear that Gyllenhaal's character, Adam, is a history lecturer/teacher at some kind of university. After discovering that he has a look-a-like somewhere in the world, Adam goes on a short, yet confusing, search for this unknown man. Eventually they find each other, and it is at this point that the movie really heats up. The look-a-like turns out to be a married man named Anthony, who also happens to be a small-role actor. At once, when the two meet, it is clear that Adam is outmatched and his anxiousness quickly takes over as he runs off. Towards the end of the movie, when the two eventually do meet again, Anthony takes Adam's girlfriend for a "romantic weekend away" whilst Adam proceeds to sneak his way in to Anthony's apartment, where his pregnant wife, Helen, soon returns to, and assumes that Adam IS Anthony. After a huge argument, Anthony and the girlfriend, Mary, are in the car heading back, when another heated discussion ensues and the car rears off path and into a concrete pillar, throwing the car into the air and crashing down onto the ground with the two characters still inside. It is clear, right away, that they are both dead. The screen then snaps back to Adam, who is in the apartment with the wife and is clearly very distressed for some reason. The next morning, Adam opens Anthony's mail, to find a small key inside. He then proceeds to the bedroom, where Helen is waiting for him, to find that she has transformed into a giant, hairy, room-sized spider.
Now if anyone tells you they expected THAT ending....they are bullshitting. Pregnant wives, transforming into giant, hairy spiders, definitely aren't the most common of endings, to say the least.
Now, personally, I watch a lot, and I mean a hell of a LOT, of psychological movies, so ambiguity is rarely something I fully experience anymore. Most films, even the most intelligently woven stories and twists, have become all too predictable to me, due to the fact that I've experienced so many "unpredictable" storylines or "twists" in movies over and over again.
My mind is now, almost, accustomed to interpreting a movie in the most unpredictable and psychologically twisted way. So, as you can expect, my mind was whirling throughout the film, trying to work out what was going on; trying to find the best explanation possible, in places where others (who are not so accustomed to this genre of movie) may not look.
At first, I suspected the other man was merely Adam's twin. I was disappointed by this prospect, as it seemed the most predictable, and least exciting outcome, but in all honesty it was what I was expecting.
Later in the movie, when it was revealed that Adam - and his apparent look-a-like, Anthony - had even the same scars, it became obvious that they were not twins, and that the movie was, thankfully, going to be a lot more unpredictable than I had first expected.
I then began to predict that, perhaps, Adam had multiple personality disorder, and that Anthony was merely his other personality, whom he had never before been aware of. This would have made sense, as Adam would have gone about his day to day life as a teacher, whilst at other times Anthony may have taken over and formed a relationship of his own with Helen and made his own career as an actor (whilst all the while Adam was unaware of his existence). However, it then came to be that Adam is seen on screen with the wife, Helen, whilst Anthony is simultaneously seen in a completely difference place with Adam's girlfriend, Mary. If they had been multiple personalities, then it would have been impossible for Adam and Anthony to be in two difference places at once. So, once again, that poked a massive hole in my expectations.
Once the film had finished, I was impressed but confused, to say the least. There were so many different explanations flying round my head as to what have happened, and I had no idea which of the interpretations could possibly be the correct one. After sorting through my thoughts, and having a sneaky look at some reviews on google, everything became clear, and I am now 100% certain as to what the film was meant to portray and how it was intended to be interpreted. I am also, as it turns out, 100% certain that this movie is completely and utterly brilliant in every possible way.
(Definite SPOILER warning!!!! Skip next 14 paragraphs to avoid big spoilers!!!)
To me, the character of "Anthony" represents all Adam-the-history-teacher's subconscious struggles and desires. At the start of the movie, when Adam is in the strip club and then again when he is home in his small flat with Mary, it is important to realise that Adam is having an affair with the woman, and that, clearly, he is more of a seedy character than his anxious appearance may let on. The wife, Helen, from later in the movie, is actually Adam's wife, who he is cheating on with this new woman, Mary. This affair is referenced later in the movie by Helen, as she yells at the look-a-like "You're seeing her again, aren't you?!".Anthony is not a person, in himself, he merely represents the part of Gyllenhaal's character that feels trapped, oppressed, and restricted by his marriage and his unborn child, and deeply feels the need to escape. He fears having to settle down into a normal, boring, mundane, predictable lifestyle. The fact that the security guard at the acting agency states that he hasn't seen Gyllenhaal for around 6 months, and the fact that his wife is six months pregnant, hint that the character was forced to give up his dream and his acting career in order to focus on a real job and provide for his wife and child. This, of course, further demonstrates why the character may feel restricted, and extremely resentful towards the wife, hence the affair.
By going to a strip club and having an affair, the character feels he is fighting back against the oppression and freeing himself from the trap and control of his boring, family life. When Gyllenhaal is at the strip club, at the start of the film, one of the naked ladies places a platter on the stage floor, and when she removes the lid a hand sized, hairy brown spider is crouched upon the surface. She then proceeds to lift her leg up, and bring her high heel down right on top of the spider, crushing it into a tiny splat on the floor. Throughout the film spiders appear, often, to represent the oppression and restriction the character feels he is subject to. It is also clear that, to the character at least, women are central in creating this oppression.
So, when the stripper kills the spider, this is extremely important as it symbolises what the strip club represents to the character, in that, to him, he is rebelling against the constraints and commitments of his life.
On the other side of things is Adam. Adam represents the side of Gyllenhaal's character that is scared of the commitment and scared of being repressed and is just, in general, very scared. He is a highly neurotic and anxious side of the overall character, who is merely terrified of what commitment could mean for him. In my opinion, he does not know what he wants and does not understand his desires. He is just confused, which is shown clearly through his permanently dishevelled appearance.
Now, just to make it clear, Gyllenhaal's character in NO WAY has split/multiple personalities. All the above things are different emotions and desires felt by one man; it is merely the film that portrays them as two different people, whilst in reality this is just an internal battle of two parts of one man's mind.
Later in the movie, when Adam finally meets "Anthony's" wife, what is really happening is that he is properly seeing/hearing her for the first time since his affair. It is at this point that Adam realises what he really wants. This glimpse of his old life with his wife is what causes him to realise that he so desperately wants his old, mundane, committed, lifestyle back. He no longer wants the escape, or the excitement, or the thrills; he finally understands that what he really needs in his life is his wife and child.
Towards the end of the movie, when Anthony and the mistress are having a heated argument in the car, Adam is simultaneously in the apartment with Helen, acting extremely distressed and almost in tears. This is important, as it is the part of the movie where Gyllenhaal's character starts to accept what he has done and take responsibility for it. It is where Adam realises the mistake he has made and no longer wants to escape or be held back by his past mistakes.
As the argument comes to blows, the car rears off path and into a concrete pillar, flipping onto the windshield and killing both the passengers instantly. This is important as, you must remember, all these things are happening subconsciously in Gyllenhaal's character's mind. These deaths signify that Adam has now completely let go of his past and accepted the mistake he had made. He has let go of his old self - all the sleeziness, the unfaithfulness, the lack of respect for women (all of which are personified in Anthony), and has also let go of any remaining desires or feelings he may have had left for the mistress.
It is also at this point that Adam ceases to act in a highly strung, neurotic, anxious fashion. The reason for this, it can be assumed, is that his thoughts are now one. There is no longer an internal, subconscious battle going on between his thoughts, feelings, and unwanted desires, so he is no longer trapped in his neuroticism or anxiety. When the crash is mentioned on the radio, Adam turns it off before any names are mentioned, which indicates that this news report was merely an unrelated coincidence, further supporting the idea that this event took place within Adam's subconsciousness.
The last, final, important moment of the movie comes when the character opens the letter addressed to "Anthony" and inside finds a key. From the beginning, the audience - or at least, the close observers in the audience - are aware that this key is the one used for unlocking the strip/sex club at the start of the movie.
Now, I have read a few different opinions on what this last part of the movie symbolises, but in all honesty I do not know what my own personal interpretation of the ending is.
When the character is looking at the key and says to his wife he "might need to go out later", this may show that already, in part, he is slipping back into old habits, as it appears he is most likely going to visit the club. So when he sees the giant spider in the bedroom, rather than his wife, this could represent that the oppression and restrictions the character previously battled with had returned.
Alternatively - and I think I prefer this interpretation since it's a much nicer way to end the film -, the key may not mean that the character has regressed back to his old ways. It may, in fact, hint towards the idea that Adam has now overcome his need for the key, and therefore for the strip club or for the escape from the commitment and mundaneness of regular life, so the key is merely just a key to him now. In this scenario, when he returns to the bedroom and his wife is no longer there and the giant spider is in there staring at him, this shows that the character has accepted his normal life with his wife and unborn baby and is content with it, so he can now look the spider (aka the oppression and restriction caused by his relationship with his wife) in the face (without having to escape from it or kill it, as "Anthony" had previously done, and without having to avoid it, as he had previously done) and fully accept his life as it is.
This movie has been woven together in such a complex, detailed fashion that, in all honesty, it's no wonder that once it's over you're left as confused and dumbstruck as a cat on meth.
One of the things I love about the film itself, aside from the depth and complexity of the storyline, is the way the overall thing is portrayed. The costume designs, the acting, the background images and symbolism.
When watching Adam and "Anthony" together, it is almost as if you are watching two completely different characters, not two identical characters played by the same actor, and to me this really is a credit to Gyllenhaal's immense acting abilities. Adam was clearly displayed to be highly neurotic and anxious, and Gyllenhaal demonstrated this clearly though his use of stuttering during the dialogue, as well as the use of volume, as, throughout the movie, it seemed Adam was communicating in very soft, low tone and volume of voice. This anxiousness and neuroticism was then also further shown through the use of body language throughout the film, as Gyllenhaal was almost always slightly hunched over himself whilst playing Adam, which, as well as displaying Adam's anxiousness, also made it seem as if he was almost trying to feebly protect himself from any threats. In fact, in the scene with Adam and Anthony in the hotel room together, this difference in body language can be seen clearly, as Anthony almost appears to be much taller and larger looking, despite both characters being played by the same actor. When all these factors were combined, it allowed us - the audience - to get a clear glimpse of this nervous side of the character, and to see the effects that his affair has had on his mentality.On the other side of the spectrum, Anthony was portrayed as self confident and self assured. He did not appear to be afraid at any point within the film, almost the complete opposite of Adam. The way he was portrayed was almost provocative and confrontational, towards Adam and then later on Mary too. Gyllenhaal conveyed these traits clearly through his use of body language, as well as his use of voice. Whilst Adam's voice was mostly soft and quiet, Anthony's voice was shown to have almost passive-aggressive overtones, and was much stronger and less shaky. Where the previous traits relating to Adam made me feel sympathy for him and for his remorse and anxiety, these traits displayed in Anthony made me, as the audience, feel a certain amount of disdain and dislike towards his character. He was almost too self assured, too volatile, and I believe this was another well thought out design of the director of the movie. Whilst he intended for us to like Adam, we are not meant to particularly like the character of Anthony, which is why, when he is killed, we are not left with a feeling of sadness, but almost of relief.
Probably the last, and most impressive, part of the film that I am going to mention is the symbolism displayed through the use of the spiders and spiders webs. If you are watching closely, spider web designs appear often in the background of the scenes, for instance when the car crashes with Anthony and Mary inside, a huge web-shaped smash is left on the screen. If this were the only use of imagery within the movie then, perhaps, I would have ignored it, or even overlooked it, however there is also, at some point in the movie, a shot of the skyline with telephone wires spreading across into a large spider web shape all across the city. I'm almost certain there must be other points in the movie where these designs are integrated into the scenery and background, but these are the ones that were most noticeable to me. Then, there was the random naked girl with the head of a spider, and the giant spider that, at times, towered over the city and walked it's way through. And then finally, of course, the giant spider in the bedroom in the last and final scene of the film.
Overall, Enemy was an extremely well put-together movie, with a deep, complex meaning that at first confused the shit out of me, and then left me gob smacked with the brilliance of it.Great acting by Gyllenhaal.
Great scene shots and background designs.
Great costume choices and lighting techniques.
Overall just a very, very good movie.
My rating: 9 out of 10
