Life of Pi: summary, analysis and interpretation of the film
The movie The life of Pi (Life of Pi in English), also known as An extraordinary adventure, tells the story of how young Pi experiences the presence of God after surviving a shipwreck and sharing the lifeboat with his only companion: a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.
Directed by Ang Lee, this film addresses faith as a fundamental theme. Its main character is the young Pi Patel, who spends his life searching for answers through religion to learn to deal with life's adversities.
Summary of the movie
The story begins when Pi Patel receives a visit from a writer interested in knowing in depth his history as a shipwreck survivor who, despite having lost everything, did not lose faith in God.
Curious to know if he can believe in God again through this testimony, the writer begins an interview, but Pi does not limit himself to telling what happened, but tells the story of his life in an attempt to show the designs of God.
Pi's childhood
Pi Patel is a young man from India, whose father owns a zoo in that country. This is an atheist man of science, while his mother is a woman of Hindu faith and introduces him to religion, which awakens spiritual curiosity in him.
Meanwhile, in the zoo the legend of Richard Parker has grown, a Bengal tiger that awakens the fascination of all. Pi is convinced that he can see in the tiger's eyes a gesture of correspondence, of humanity. Therefore, one day he approaches to feed her, as if it were an elusive cat.
His father surprises him in time, and to make him understand that Richard Parker is a wild animal, he forces him to watch him devour a goat. Since then, Pi will be afraid of him.
In the home of the Patel family there are great debates, although respectful, about science and religion as vehicles of human salvation. Everyone is aware that Pi has begun to explore other religions in search of God.
Thus, Hinduism has taught him the connection with nature and the universe; Islam has given him the notion of submission to the divine will and, finally, Christianity has given him taught that humanity is a divine gift and that love of neighbor is a mobilizing power and healer. His mother supports him in his search for him. His father is not opposed to his seeking God, but exhorts him to choose only one path.
An unexpected change
When Pi becomes a young adult, he falls in love with Anandi, a girl he meets in Hindu dance classes where he plays percussion.
Meanwhile, a political event forces Pi's father to sell the animals to another zoo in the United States of America and move to Canada. The trip must be done by boat to transfer the animals. Pi resists, but he has no choice but to leave and promise Anandi that they will be together again.
When they are on the ship they attend the dining room, where they only serve beef and white rice. Pi's mother asks the cook to serve her a vegetarian alternative. This, an irascible, racist and intolerant European, gets angry with her and insults her, which generates an altercation with Pi's father.
A young oriental Buddhist, also a vegetarian, intercedes to calm everyone. He invites the woman to be more flexible when need compels. He suggests eating the rice and adding some flavor to the meat sauce on top. Thus, he would not compromise her faith.
During the long journey, Pi cannot sleep and goes out on deck to see a heavy rain on the open sea. But the rain becomes a storm and causes the shipwreck of the ship, from which apparently no one can save himself, except him.
The shipwreck
Suddenly other occupants appear on the boat. They are his father's zoo animals: a zebra with a wounded leg, an oragutan, and a hyena. The painting already shows us a conflict at the doors: a man and two meek and vegetarian animals together with a carnivorous and scavenger animal.
Paralyzed with fear and despite his disapproval, Pi watches as the hyena attacks the wounded zebra to eat it. In response to her maternal instinct, the outraged orangutan struggles with the hyena, but the fierce scavenger kills both. An unexpected crewman appears: Richard Parker (the tiger), who suddenly comes out of a hiding place and kills the hyena.
From then on, Pi must share the boat with his only companion: the fearsome wild beast Richard Parker, whom he must tame. The question is: who will prevail: the beast or the human being?
The rescue
Pi lives six months of adrift adventures in the company of the tiger. When it calms him down, he thinks of Anandi and talks to God. Finally finding the shore, Pi is separated from Richard Parker, who turns his back on her and doesn't bother to look at him one last time.
Pi is rescued and taken to the hospital where he receives primary care. Once there, two officials from the ship's insurance agency ask the young man to report the facts in order to prepare a damage and liability report. Patel tells this story, but they don't believe him.
To his disbelief, Pi unmasks the symbols of the story in the conversation in less than 5 minutes (details will be revealed in the next section of this article, but attention! Contains spoilers).
The film ends when the initial narrative thread is resumed. This is how it shows the final dialogue between Pi and the writer: "Which of the two versions do you prefer?" Asks Pi Patel. The writer will make the choice for him. While he thinks and watches, the current wife of Pi, his beloved Anandi, arrives at the house.
Interpretation: a spiritual fable
In this film, the same story is told in two versions: one is in the form of a fable with animals, filled of spiritual symbols and learning everywhere, and the other is just a straight-language summary of what happened. This flat story is dispatched in five minutes and takes away from the events all the learning and adventure character it contains. In other words, the second version turns an extraordinary spiritual adventure into a simple event note.
The fable, on the other hand, represents the people who survived the shipwreck alongside him. The orangutan was his own mother; the zebra was the young Buddhist and the hyena the cook of the ship with whom both had had the altercation. The lack of values and spirituality of this "man" makes him have an animal behavior in adversity and murder the Buddhist and the mother of Pi.
The tiger, of course, represents the repressed animal instinct in Pi itself. Attending the murder of his mother unleashed fury in him and also led him to commit an inhuman act: murder. Horrified at himself and frightened by uncertainty, Pi, who was characterized as a spiritual man and peaceful, he must figure out how to tame the wild instinct he carries within him, but he can't get rid of it either. he. His animal instinct is also the force that allows him to survive.
In reality, the principle of this fable is anchored in the symbolic use of common language, which distinguishes between the human as a biological fact and the human as the quality of being a "person". This can be explained through its opposite principle: in common language the word "animal" is used to refer to those people who have lost the ability to behave as such, that is, those who have become "inhumane." From this logic, the film shows how survival conditions remove human beings from their center.
The extreme experience of survival tenses the interior of people and makes them reveal all the instincts previously domesticated. But one thing stands out in this movie: Not all animal instincts are murderous or creeping: some are fear, self-defense, pack protection, cunning, camouflage, etc.
In the case of the film, the instinctive reactions of each character vary according to the values from which they have learned to observe the world. Therefore, while the hyena kills by wanton violence, the tiger only acts as a reaction.
However, what keeps Pi human essence in the midst of the entire experience is Anandi's memory and faith in God, his ability to connect with transcendence, even from the challenge. Faith, seen as awareness and acceptance of the Other, becomes a resource for humanization. For this reason, Pi maintains his ability to perceive beauty, to dream, to imagine, but above all, Pi maintains hope.
The final dialogue between Pi and the writer gives the viewer a fundamental key: each one chooses how to view the experiences he faces and how that can influence his own lifetime. Pi has three keys that he learned as a child: openness to the universe and nature, acceptance of God's will and love as a mobilizing force.
From this argument the film addresses issues such as prejudice, xenophobia, religious intolerance, intercultural dialogue, the eternal discussion between modern scientific thought and religious thought, the meaning of life and, the one that links them all, faith as a humanizing phenomenon.
Fun Facts About The life of Pi
1. In the solo scenes, up to four tigers were used to make Richard Parker. But in the scenes with actor Suraj Sharma, the tiger was animated by computer and included in post-production.
2. The film is based on a homonymous novel written by the Hispanic-Canadian Yann Martel.
3. Ang Lee won the Oscar for best director with this film, while Claudio Miranda received the award for best cinematography.
4. Ang Lee had to be advised by the castaway Steven Callahan to achieve good documentation.
5. Tobey Maguire was going to play the writer who interviews Pi, but after filming a few scenes Ang Lee decided to hire someone else. The reason was not in any conflict with the actor or with his professional level, but Lee preferred to keep a lesser known cast.
6. Many believed that the story told in Yann Martel's book was impossible to film. However, Ang Lee along with his special effects team made it happen.
