Monday, February 17, 2014
Mirror, Mirror
Watching Last Laugh this time around, I was struck by some imaginative uses of mirrors. Let me describe two. The first is about twelve minutes into the film during the morning of the doorman's niece's wedding. He is brushing his hair, looking at himself in the mirror and in the background (in the mirror) we see his niece preparing the cake. The second is the scene in the bathroom the morning after the wedding. He is cleaning the sinks and he looks into his image reflected on the gargantuan mirror which lines the bathroom wall. Is there any symbolic meaning to the use of these mirrors in these scenes or other scenes in the movie? How do they help tell the doorman's story? Do they have a similar purpose in scenes in The Rules of the Game?
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I believe that there is a distinct meaning to the use of mirrors and reflections in Murnau’s film, “The Last Laugh”. For the doorman, the initial shock of losing his beloved post has more of a physical effect on him than he can bear. His posture, composure, and appearance collapse as he receives the news of the demotion. But without looking in a mirror, there is no way that the doorman can understand the visual effect of his aging and frailty. In the scene where the doorman is cleaning the bathroom sinks, he looks at himself, almost surprised at how he has changed and at his lack of dignity. The contrast between his looking at the mirrors and at the windows is also evident. He looks out the window as an escape and as a view of the ideal world, while the mirror is the reality he is stuck with. In self-reflection, literally looking at his reflection, he comes to terms with himself without the uniform on and downgraded to a bathroom attendant. Murnau’s use of mirrors could also be interpreted as a German Expressionist method. Focusing on the reflection as what we see in the middle of the frame, as opposed to the live, dimensional man, we see a distorted and angled perspective of his actual movement. It is a known fact that what you see of yourself in the mirror is not what you actually look like, and there is practically no way to see your true self in physical form. A mirror reflects and distorts the image in a way that is a minimal version of German Expressionist distortion and exaggeration. Mirrors have been known to symbolize vanity, loneliness, relationships, narcissism, and illusions in other films, according to a blog post on “The Fade Out” (a WordPress blog). In “The Last Laugh”, the use of mirrors generally helps the doorman to understand his existence and both literally and figuratively reflect on his new role, though in a less-than-realistic way.
ReplyDeleteMurnau uses the reflection of the mirrors to help show the doorman's thoughts and emotions in his movie the " Last Laugh". About eight minutes into the film we see a scene of the doorman walking upstairs to his apartment. If you pay attention to the doormen's facial expression while he is walking up the stairs, it is very noticeable that he is exhausted while the emotion of agony covers his face. A few minutes after that the doormen is in his bathroom getting ready for work. While he is in there, he is staring into his bathroom mirror watching his wife prepare a cake for their nieces wedding. While she is doing this she moves quickly without any hesitation. If you pay attention closely to the doorman's eyes, he has a look of jealousy or a look that tells the audience that he wishes that his age did not effect him and what he loves to do. It is obvious that there is some sense of envy since he turns his back around when he sees his wife working on the cakes through the mirror, in order for him to focus only on her. His wife loves to bake cakes; the doorman loves to his job at and position at the hotel. One thing that made this scene even more powerful is how Murnau uses a medium shot because allows the audience to see the emotions on the doormans face while showing his wife working in the background on the cakes. The mirror in the movie does not just only serve as self-reflection literally but symbolically too.
ReplyDeleteThe use of mirrors truly enhances the aspect of individuality and defining who you are. Throughout the last laugh when I see the doorman look into the mirror I get the perception that he’s understanding who he is and what he’s become. This also makes the movie easier to understand because the mirror shots and close ups of his face allows viewers to see his emotion. There is no dialogue so we never truly get to understand who he is and his personality, therefore his emotions are vital because we need a standpoint of what he’s like. Mirrors and reflections are the only way we truly get to see what we look like, and who we are. Mirrors give people confidence, when we see who we are in our own perception we can judge ourselves and admire what we truly look like. When we see the doorman early on in the movie looking in the mirror with his uniform, we see the pride he has and the confidence he has about who he is. Although mirrors bring confidence they can also dishearten a person. Later on in the movie when we see the doorman in the bathroom seen we see the pain in his emotion and the embarrassment that he has of himself. His pride is gone, he doesn’t have confidence because he knows that in his opinion he reached rock bottom. Mirrors show the reality, no matter how bad you want specific things to look or be, mirrors don’t lie to you, they show you the truth.
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