A delicacy for trauma seekers
The entire story in the film Apathy, directed by Hikmat Rahimov, takes place inside a house. While watching the movie, I was initially captivated by Ahmad’s (Tural Bakhısh) spectacles, followed by the tiny houses sketched by young Akif on the walls, each containing the families he depicted inside. Akif doesn’t attend school because he is demanded money. His parents are unemployed. Though Akif “lives” with his parents, he wishes to live in the house he drew on the walls. Ahmad wears thick-lensed glasses. These provide him to see difficultly his surroundings. Throughout the film, we are unable to see Ahmad’s eyes. Even when he removes his glasses twice, the director deliberately withholds not to reveal his eyes to the viewers. As the phrase goes, the eyes are the windows to the soul. This means that Ahmad’s soul, like his eyes, has already sunk in darkness.
While watching “Apathy”, I remembered the film “The Seventh Continent” directed by Michael Haneke in 1989. Haneke’s film also portrays a family that has become indifferent to everything. This indifference brings with it a sense of mechanization and robotization (the process of turning a human being into a robot). The family lives a routine life: Each morning, they wake up; the husband and wife leave for work, and their daughter heads to school. There is no communication between the family members. They have emotionally estranged and immersed into a state of apathy. Haneke masterfully could express this apathy through movement and the expressionless faces of his characters, without relying on extreme content. Haneke could convey apathy through only actions, the frozen and motionless facial expressions of characters. Unlike Hikmat Rahimov’s Apathy, Haneke avoided using harsh elements—such as explicitness, swearing—to depict apathy. Generally, swearing is to react something. Four out of every five words uttered by Ahmad are swear words. In a sense, he hasn’t yet fallen into a state of apathy. The same can be said about Elnara (Shahla Aligizi). This suggests that he has not yet succumbed to apathy. In this regard, he denies his name. She grumbles whole day, but there is no signs of fatigue. In as much as, we have not been liberated from our destructive instincts. The masturbation scenes involving the characters reflect this truth. In this regard, he denies his name.
In the film “The Seventh Continent”, a sudden vision disorder of the family’s daughter occurs. Mother slaps her daughter for the cause of her daughter. The mother, thinking her daughter pretends to avoid school, slaps her. However, unexpectedly, they figure out that slapping in the child’s face is slapping the entire family.
The moment of realization is expressed through the mother’s weeping. Their lifestyle is wholly meaningless—they are drowning in capitalism, devastating everything they own, from their house to money. They tear up their cash and flush it down the toilet. Ahmad count money. It implies that Ahmad’s state of apathy (I emphasize the second time) has not completely happened; he is just in character.
The critique of capitalism lies on the basis of Haneke’s cinema. In this film, the apathetic state of protagonists is reflected in their parents’ indifference towards Akif and his future. Elnara, remains indifference to Akif. The child’s drawings on the walls fail to grate on her nerves. If Haneke links the state of escaping (or attempt to escape) indifference and apathy to vision, in Apathy this process is expressed through silence but not vision. As a result, we should have seen that Akif had begun to start talking only after witnessing the crime. The child witnesses that his father murdered his uncle. But the child doesn’t cry. While it is understandable for an adult until the last moment, I found the child’s complete control over his emotions unconvincing.
We notice that in Apathy, both Ahmad and his brother (Elshan Asgarov) wear spectacles on (In light of this, Akif’s wearing spectacles was crucial. This is because the director intentionally avoids revealing the reason for the child’s silent behavior.) Ahmad’s brother uses narcotic drug as well. Though Ahmad’s brother-in-law attempts to impart lessons on manhood, in fact he shares no difference with Ahmad. When Ahmad swears at him, he shows no response, remains silent and absorbs the swearing. Despite everything, he sits at the same table with his brother-in-law, sharing bread and drinking vodka side by side.
His uncle speaks about manhood or display a manly demeanor but marries off his school-aged daughter to Agla (Azer Aydamir), a significantly older man who has spent years working in Russia. The woman, thinking her husband has vanished into thin air, arrives at Ahmad’s house with her children and her daughter’s fiancé and notifies the police. The excitement about the vanishment of her husband is not betrayed on the woman’s face, it does not matter to her whether her husband is dead or alive. The husband is needed to make wedding. The fall of patriarchal authority in Apathy is depicted as abovementioned.
Erotic scenes ought to contribute character development. Through these scenes in Apathy, we understand the estrangement of the characters completely. Husband-wife sexual relationship is shown strained. What exactly is audience supposed to take from this scene by showing Ahmad’s brother-in-law defecating in the bathroom? This is an undefined scene. Characters’ act of masturbation emerges from restrainment of their personal zone of freedom. If we pay attention, we notice that the couple does this act after Ahmad’s brother-in-law visits them. Hence, one might interpret the definition of masturbation scene as another approach. These scenes also provoke a sense of disgust. It comes to our mind that the director attempted to show the family immersing into a squalor and filth. He was unable to express this convincingly.
In Apathy, the storyline gaps are filled with the talk shows hosted by Elgiz and Xoshgadam. These broadcasts could have been used to reinforce its core message by making the situation absurd. The sound of the shows should have been audible even when the characters were sitting in the bathroom, sleeping, or committing a crime. In that case, Elgiz and Xoshgadam would have been characters only, but not a part of the film background. For example, if the camera had first shown the TV show and then gradually moved to the wall, where Akif had drawn a house with a family standing in front of it, then cut to Ahmad’s actual face as he opened his mouth to curse at his wife, additionally transitioned into the sound of TV presenters, Elgiz and Xoshgadam’s laughter from the show, the scene-contrast between Akif’s imagined house and what he truly owns with his family would have intensified
One of scenes that truly astonished me was Ahmad, with his weak vision, carrying out of the coffin without any evidence and cleaning the house flawlessly. How could it be realistic for someone with weak vision to sweep every trace away so precisely?
I should also mention that the investigation process is consistently shown flawed. It is obvious that screenwriters, film directors, generally creative team are unaware of how investigations are carried out. It is obvious that the screenwriters, film directors and the creative team are generally unaware of how investigations carry out. The competent professionals also noted that serious mistakes had made in both series “Scorpion Season” and the film “A Blow from Behind”. Police arrives at Ahmad’s house, and then asks obvious questions about the vanished person. He doesn’t want his photo. Questions regarding identifying characteristics, the period he has spent in Baku, previous instances, and other situations are not addressed to the family members. Elnara’s suspicion of Ahmad is not explained at the end of the film.
Elnara’s attention to small detail, which Ahmad missed while cleaning the house, the mother’s sensing her son’s post-incident changes (trembling hands, vertigo, and nausea) and her suspicion about Ahmad’s behaviors would have been more intriguing resolution. Because questions addressed by police fail to raise suspicion against Ahmad. Even the viewers share the same feelings (though we witness he committed crime). The underdevelopment in Elnara’s suspicions regarding her husband, combined with the obvious questions given by the police to Ahmad and his family, contributes to the unsatisfactory finale of the film. After watching the film Apathy 2, I realized: “Hikmat Rahimov promised to inflict the deepest trauma on Azerbaijani audience.” If film has a remarkable message, it would be that “people are despicable.” In addition, it’s conveyed in a rather banal way.
Casting made by Hikmat Rahimov fell short in this film. At initial Tural Bakhish (Ahmad) was able to shoulder a core responsibility of the story in this initial film. Shehla Aligizi, in the role of Elnara, performed the same competence like him as well. However in the film Apathy 2 it was impossible to view the performance of successfully-casted-actor. To some extent, Elshan Asgarov’s performance as Akif’s drug-addicted uncle might come in prominence.
Children run away from a boarding school. We never see this process, how they cope with. However, their escape should have driven the film’s main dynamic. The frequent use of background music in an attempt to make artificial dynamics and excitement felt ineffective. The director apparently had no idea how to capture the kids’ escape in a way that was both credible and meaningful. Instead, the scene shows the escaping boys passing by another child defecating in the bathroom. One cannot make sense why a shot from the first movie that is equally disgusting is repeated here in a slightly different format. For what reason does the director use such repugnant footages?
There is a toilet scene in the film Capernaum shot by Lebanese filmmaker Nadine Labaki. However, this scene was crucial to empathizing the Zain’s character throughout the events. The 10-year-old sister of Zain engages in morning masturbation. Her brother takes her to the bathroom and washes her underwear. Because her sister will be compelled to marry off if her mother finds out about this incident. Zain controls his sister to protect her from their family. He stuffs the bloodied her sister’s underwear into a sack early in the morning and throws it in the garbage. Unfortunately, he is unable to protect her until the end. Sahar is separated from him and married to the boy who worked at the store where she was employed.
Despite being responsible for the film Apathy 2, the child actors are unable to handle their role. The children, like Zeyn, are incapable to arouse any excitement in the audience. Akif finds his house. Actor and actress, the tenants in their house, rehearse opening the street entrance door. This is absolutely an unconvincing scene, even creates a sense of artificiality. Is there anyone in Azerbaijan who leaves the street entrance door partially open while rehearsing inside?
The mother factor is at the forefront. Akif constantly dreams of his mother. It is obviously seen that the prosecutor (Hikmat Rahimov) has problems relating to his severe diseased mother, can’t speak or move. The sequence in Apathy 2 where the prosecutor has his mother bathed is reminiscent of the one in Asgar Farhadi’s film A Separation in which the son bathes his father. Presumably, Hikmat Rahimov was impressed by A Separation.
Prosecutor is gripped by fear of losing his mother. The foregrounding of mother factor in Apathy 2 as in the Part I, implies the lack of a patriarchy (father-centeredness).
Ahmad’s imprisonment, his brother’s breakdown under the influence of narcotic drugs, the impoverishment of the Russian businessman performed by Azer Aydemir, the old rough sleeper‘s (vagrant) muteness, and prosecutor’s incompetency, retardation at solving issues (lack of the prosecutor’s father as well) ratify the fact mentioned above. Regretfully, the director has failed to connect these enumerated nuances in terms of dramaturgy. The prosecutor’s fear of losing his mother is unrelated to Akif’s search for his mother, nor to his eventual finding of her. These elements remain incoherent and illogic. Despite the director’s attempts to emphasize the tragedy of orphanhood, he is unable to find an appropriate manner for expression. Akif’s killing of his mother parallels death of the prosecutor’s mother. The scenes rhyme, but fail coherently to supplement one another.
Apathy 1 starts with the collapse of father-centered system. In the second part of the film, this idea is continued. It culminates with Akif’s murder of his mother at a prostitute house. For one reason or another, matriarchy starts to collapse here. Only the child (and the prosecutor) remains at the centre of the story. However, both cannot be survived. For characters, periodic time begins. I think that if the director had indented to create a healthy, he would not have Akif murder his mother. Instead, he would have stipulate terms to prevent the child from committing a crime.
For instance, if this act had submitted the prosecutor preventing the murder (surely, this is my own film), he would have saved not only himself, but also Akif and Elnara. “Even though the prosecutor had grieved the loss of his mother, he would have had a reason to live, how to say, a meaning in his life.”
The prosecutor’s idea in the last scene of the film—’no one should bring child into this world’—feels groundless, is not meaningfully related with the overall picture of the country and the world described in the film. It is just an expression arisen from the prosecutor’s self-blaming and desire t to clear one’s conscience. For example, in Paul Schrader’s film First Reformed, the idea ‘no one should bring children into this world’ is expressed. We hear it from an activist—and he kills himself. The events happened in the film properly and decently indicate that the idea is derived from ecological imbalance and escalating waste production in the world.
In the film“Capernaum”, Zain regards his parents as worthless. They are the ones who ruined their children’s life and were directly responsible for their daughter’s death. Even after losing her daughter, the mother is overjoyed because of being pregnant again. Both parents are incapacitated and weak-willed people who are unable to show any reaction to Sahar’s death. But Zain does not stay silent. He grabs a knife and runs towards the man who killed his sister. Here we observe how Zain distinguished from his father. Here, we observe how Zain differs from his father (I wondered why information about the child’s similar and different aspects with his family was never profoundly described in Apathy 1. In my opinion, Elnara ought to have remained silent and spoken less throughout the movie if Akif had been identified with his mother. Or there should be a subtle hint that the mother had been gifted artistic ability.) Zain does not wish to be as helpless as his father. After stabbing his sister’s spouse, he is arrested. He files a lawsuit against his family. He strives to explain that the accusations and the severe circumstances they had fallen into are caused by the whole family, not her alone. The judge asks Zain: “What do you request from your family?” In response, Zain “Don’t bring the child into the world”
Zain’s opinions also help us understand how the helplessness reigns in countries such as Syria, Lebanon and Ethiopia. That’s why, as I watched the violation scene, I found myself wondering if we reside in Azerbaijan or Afghanistan. This is because the film Apathy 2 completely makes no attempts to touch upon roots of the crime in social and collective life. Children seek shelter to a rough sleeper’s (vagrant’s) “house”. While coming back his “house”, the rough sleeper doesn’t drive them out. The purpose of the second man appeared in the final scene ends with this. I say “ends” because they help Akif find his mother. It’s so foreseeable that even we could not hear a sound; we understand that there’s something suspicious going on. They may have provided us with a look into the city’s murky side. But obviously, the director had no such an aim.
Ahmad’s smile before the camera in the last scene indicates that the filmmaker intends to expose us to “lovely” tragedies yet again.
Najaf Asgarzade