Reading some of the reviews of "A Pigeon Sat On A Branch Reflecting Upon Existence" on this site made me despair for the state of humanity almost as much as watching the film. Several reviewers accuse Andersson of "racism" in response to the scene where the slaves have to enter into the infernal machine. In fact what this scene is presenting is a metaphor for the fact that the wealth of western nations is based upon the colonial and imperial exploitation and cruelty towards ethnic peoples across the globe, which continues to this day in sweat shops in Asia and in American owned fruit plantations in Central and South America. Andersson is encapsulating in a graphic and chilling way how black slaves were used to fuel the engine of capitalism. A couple of the "reviewers" operate so far down the IQ scale that they clearly do not even understand that films are "fictional" and so they accuse Andersson of showing actual animal cruelty. One of the intentions of the film is to show how far removed from nature we have become. Nature is shown imprisoned in glass cases as stuffed museum exhibits or when being subjected to the indifferent, cruel and pointless animal testing on what was quite clearly a model monkey. Then we also see the small glimpses of light amongst the gloom when people respond to the beauty of nature such as when the characters look skyward to the off screen cooing of the pigeon. We also see a couple on a beach with the oppressive city scape in the background quietly being intimate with each other and in this scene the dog is shown to be able to behave in a relaxed and natural way. Roy Andersson is a humanist and he is showing with sympathy, but also with much disappointment and sadness, the state of humanity. The two central characters are the salesmen Jonathan and Sam selling junk supposedly designed to bring fun into people's lives. As people have remarked a Vladimir and Estragon for our times, wandering within a desolate world with only the vaguest of purpose and the faintest glimmer of hope. Their "trade" and the products they sell a commentary of our times. So we have the vampire teeth, representing the superstition that is forcing the major religions to retreat to medieval attitudes and behaviours, the laughter bag representing the forced mechanical fun of our age, the dumb formulaic comedies with their never ending sequels and the "fun" of Springbreak and 18-30 holidays where the "highlights" are being drunk, producing lots of vomit and the opportunity to sexually abuse a semi comatose drunken girl. This is a reflection of a world where the success of Governments is measured by GDP, which is really a measure of how much pointless crap people buy, as opposed to a society where we measure happiness. When Jonathan attempts to discuss his true feelings or to discuss anything in philosophical terms he is told to shut up because "people need to get up for work", people reduced to mindless automatons. The mask of "one tooth uncle" is I think representing our disdain and mocking of the old and the different. Our duo are engaged in low paid work often amongst people who are in an even worse financial state than they are, trapped in the debt culture that fuels consumerism. The historical reference Sweden's chequered past and links with Nazism and demonstrate the lessons that history can still provide to us. Thus we have a scene set in 1943, just at the point when Sweden was turning from tacit support for Germany and starting to allow Jews from Norway to cross over into it's borders. I think that the scenes featuring Charles X11 are designed to show that the arrogance of empire is temporary. Charles was a brilliant military leader with at one stage the most powerful army in Northern Europe but like Napoleon and Hitler he was destroyed by a military campaign against Russia. Thus I think Andersson reflects that the great European empires gave way to the USA and now North America is in hock to China. Charles X11 the heroic, masculine leader of legend but what he really craves as a human is the quiet warmth and intimacy of holding the hand of a boy in a bar. Several commentators have remarked upon the bizarre almost Python-esque humour in the film but in a World where a government can bail out the banks, the institutions that created the financial crisis in the first place with their greed and incompetence, to the tune of 23 trillion dollars, or a sum that would have enabled us to develop cheap sustainable energy sources across the Globe, the only reaction can be to reflect on the surreal and nonsensical values of the world in which we now live. Homo sapiens have become a race of empty zombies reduced to mouthing platitudes about everything being" fine", a recurring motif throughout the film, where for ordinary people trying to make a living the daily reality is one of struggle and despair compared with the luxury and indolence of the wealthy. But are the pale vacant expressionless faces to be studied or are they really mirrors that our own faces will inhabit as we look into them? There are tears in Andersson's eyes from the sadness he feels and from the bitter laughter of recognition at the ridiculousness of the state of homo sapiens and what we have allowed ourselves to become. A species reduced to behaviour that enables it to steal from a dying mother or to a society that can ignore the dignity of a dead man and instead concentrate on consumer exchange. Yet as a humanist Andersson still needs to show that we are capable of retaining some vestige of humanity encapsulated in the innocent play of the children with the bubbles, another small glimpse of sunshine amongst the gloom. Some hope where very little remains.
