First Essay: ET 2

An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

When the film began with showing a wild woods, I kept wondering where the place was. I frowned a lot, I stayed still and calm. There’s a lot of questions in my head, honestly (since i had never heard of this film before), like what was this film all about, what would happen next these sort of questions. After that i saw some soldiers walking around and preparing. I was a little confused. When there was a man showed up, I thought he was just a small character, irrelevant, I was still focussing on the captain, or soldiers. But suddenly one of the soldier place him on the long board, and put a rope around his neck. At that moment, I was frighten, I thought i just shivered in my mind. I still concentrate on the movie, realizing the whole thing was an execution of that man, that poor man. I really felt sorry for him, I was thinking how sad for a person to die so young.

When the soldier tighten the rope on that man’s neck, i assumed that the man was a tough guy, since i didn’t see any facial expression on the man’s face, but when his body and legs were being tied up, obviously the man closed his eyes miserably and showed a crying expression on his face, till then i knew the man was afraid, scared, he wasn’t the tough guy I first thought he was. My mind wandered, was anyone rescuing him? Because most of the movies i watched previously there must be some rescuer appears in this situation. But there wasn’t. The man stood there lonely, waiting for his time. There was a moment the film was showing what the man saw around him before being hanged, the sunrise. That was a lovely sunrise, even it was in black and white, i could still feel the message brought out by it. That man gazed at the sunrise, like this would be the last sunrise in his life, that scene was sad and sorrow. I couldn’t imagine how it feels if I were him earlier, but through this scene, i felt it. He thought of his wife, his two sons, I felt even sadder when I saw his sons, they were too young to lose their father. What that man could have possibly done to deserve this, the separation with his family, the despairing look. This question came into my mind, i felt life was unfair, for the first time in my life, through this movie.

It was the time, the soldier left the board where he was standing to keep it balance, opposite was the man to be hang. The man fell in the river, watching him struggled untying the rope around his legs and arms, i urged to know if he got out of it. But at the same time, i was questioning myself that would it be that easy to survived from an execution. The man finally untied all the ropes and came to the surface of the river, gasping crazily for air. When the film showed the beauty of nature through the man’s eyes, we could tell how the man felt when he knew he was alive, feeling happy and incredible.I know at that moment i was supposed to be thrilled because the man was saved, but I seriously doubted that. Those ropes were too easy to untied, why weren’t those soldiers shooting at him once he stretched his head out of the river, I wondered. But the coming scene answered my question, there was a bunch of soldiers started shooting at him, fortunately, the man escaped.

He reached the river bank, he was so happy that he got a second chance of being alive. He played with the sands, rolling himself over the river bank. I were so anxious for him, I was thinking was he out of his mind? If I were him i wouldn’t do that, I would run as fast as I can away from the soldiers and find a place to hide, immediately, instead of playing. Later he ran and ran and ran, I couldn’t even breath when watching him ran for his life, it was so exciting and joyful and sunny. I felt like more appreciate my life! Life is good. But this joyful moment just lasted about 3 minutes, because after happily hugging his wife and rejoicing for their reunion, all of a sudden the man struggled vigorously, his eyes were wide opened, I almost jumped up from my chair when I saw this. Then he was showed hanging in the middle of the river, cold, dead, and I was TOTALLY shocked! What happened? Don’t tell me that the whole escaping was just an imagination of the man, an illusion of the audience. Yes it was. The great escape was just a delusion of the man before the soldier stepped out of the board in the beginning of the film, and the man finally hanged when he had a vision of reunion with his wife. That was really really sad. I felt like my heart just broken. A man’s life just ended, within a blink of an eye. I sincerely believed he got escaped, I was about ready to accept the happy ending, but in reality, the man just dead. In the meantime, what a AMAZING twist ending. I’m not happy for the man’s death, but it did surprise me. That was exactly what we need in films, surprises. While shocking for the lead’s death, I was more amazed by the talent of the author for writing it, and the making of the film. Epic.