猎鹿人

The film can be perceived in different ways. First, it is a nostalgia toward those happy old time when those steel factory workers, maily Russian imigrants, forges their brotherhood and communities, and when they are close to the nature, the crude and unbound pursuit of their natural instinct, including happy night life and deer hunting. This is a never returnable place that they all have lost.

Second, the deer hunting and fraternity among those Russian imigrants represents the masculinity which dominates their female, while the war stands for the unspeakable dark power that makes and displaced and disoriented. This is the moment when the man meets the Thing, which is out of nowhere and untouchable. Nick, who has a unofficial fiancee left behind in America, donot want to return home after the encounter with this Thing. Steve, after losing his two legs and becomes invalid in the war, donot want to regain his normal life. This traumatic power of war has left an unfillable hole in their life. The last trio brother also cannot stay at home where Nick and he used to live together. Home is not at the usual place as it used to be.

Third, the film is a jouney to return home, whose barrier is that game. the game, Russian routlette, becomes the game that initiates the emergence of the trauma and also ends the chaotic situation after the war, that is, killed Nick. It is similar to those happy old life when they stays close to natural instinct. It, however, produces different result for Nick and Steve, the former of whom gets addicted to this game of death, the latter draws back. This is something that will make you addicted when you faces it or that will frighten you away when you are outside of it. In a sense, it also represent those dark outsideer which will threnten you away when untouched, but which will becomes part of you when experienced.

That is why the film is contrasted with two sides: the harmonious Russian immigrant society where people dances, drinks and celebrates, and another side has two contrasting but essentially similar scenes. One scene is when those russian masculine steel workers are with the moutians, trees and deers. Those night life when they spend their time drinking, hanging around, and playing manly. On the other scene, the chaotic war when refugees crowds and fight for the space to get away. The vietnam jungle where there is swarting poeple, rats, floods and unseen animals. These two contrasting sides constitue the same natural and chaotic situation where people are close to their instincts.