Facts are presented to us by people, and people have opinions, bias, and feelings. This plain truth itself blurs the lines between fact and opinion. To discern whether something is based on truth, or instead based on someone’s viewpoint, proves to be a near impossible task. The three films in question, aim to explore and illustrate to the audience how stories, and by extension, events in history, always have more than one side to it. In each film, there is more than one account of the same story. Due to this, there tends to be some overlap of events, creating a non-linear, and sometimes fractured, narrative structure. Apart from the ambiguity of truth, these films clearly show how history has been written over time, by naturally flawed and
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Having taken place in the 12th century, Rashomon also has an added element of rich, traditional cultural views that govern its characters. The very Asian culture of ‘saving face’ is still prominent today, and I feel it is one of the reasons that made some characters bend the truth. For example, in the wife’s retelling of the story, she completely voided the horrible truth about her getting ruined by Tajōmaru, which was consistent in every other recount. At the same time, the husband’s side of the story, told by the medium, he presented himself as a powerless figure and showed his wife as ruthless. Here, it is important to add that the film presented the medium’s retelling with such conviction that it would be difficult to dismiss it as fraudulent. In Rashomon, the main takeaway is to show that every person has a hidden agenda, and perhaps there might not be a whole, untainted truth in any of the accounts. At the end, even the woodcutter, who is but an onlooker of the story, also bends the truth, for his own gain, albeit it being somewhat altruistic (to take care of the baby). But the plain truth is that he too had lied. In that way, Rashomon shows clearly how humans will always have some form of …show more content…
Delving deeper, the idea is that there is no objective truth when the event is filtered through the human heart. The woodcutter’s narrative rings through, and the only derivation from truth was pertaining the dagger. In Gone Girl, both Amy and Nick were motivated to come on top as the good person because they each felt betrayed by their lover. In Memento, was a man whose memory has failed him, but is still riddled with guilt because he is unable to come to terms with the fact that he himself might have killed his own wife. But it would be callous to say that the audience would not have at least a gist of the real story. Likewise, we cannot hold these characters fully accountable for their version of the story, because that is what makes them human. It is up to individuals to find what they seek. If they seek the whole, untainted truth, all they have to do is exercise caution in extracting the fidelity from the fluff, and separate fact from feelings, and therein, indefinitely, will lie the real
Having taken place in the 12th century, Rashomon also has an added element of rich, traditional cultural views that govern its characters. The very Asian culture of ‘saving face’ is still prominent today, and I feel it is one of the reasons that made some characters bend the truth. For example, in the wife’s retelling of the story, she completely voided the horrible truth about her getting ruined by Tajōmaru, which was consistent in every other recount. At the same time, the husband’s side of the story, told by the medium, he presented himself as a powerless figure and showed his wife as ruthless. Here, it is important to add that the film presented the medium’s retelling with such conviction that it would be difficult to dismiss it as fraudulent. In Rashomon, the main takeaway is to show that every person has a hidden agenda, and perhaps there might not be a whole, untainted truth in any of the accounts. At the end, even the woodcutter, who is but an onlooker of the story, also bends the truth, for his own gain, albeit it being somewhat altruistic (to take care of the baby). But the plain truth is that he too had lied. In that way, Rashomon shows clearly how humans will always have some form of …show more content…
Delving deeper, the idea is that there is no objective truth when the event is filtered through the human heart. The woodcutter’s narrative rings through, and the only derivation from truth was pertaining the dagger. In Gone Girl, both Amy and Nick were motivated to come on top as the good person because they each felt betrayed by their lover. In Memento, was a man whose memory has failed him, but is still riddled with guilt because he is unable to come to terms with the fact that he himself might have killed his own wife. But it would be callous to say that the audience would not have at least a gist of the real story. Likewise, we cannot hold these characters fully accountable for their version of the story, because that is what makes them human. It is up to individuals to find what they seek. If they seek the whole, untainted truth, all they have to do is exercise caution in extracting the fidelity from the fluff, and separate fact from feelings, and therein, indefinitely, will lie the real