Vater und Sohn

The expression "spiritual incest" is accurate, but we can go further and ask ourselves - why, when we watch two half-naked men in a tight embrace, when we see their silent loving looks through detailed shots and reverse shots, why, when the whole film is bathed in soft sunlight and toned with warm colors like a Paraguayan soap opera, why, when lyrical music by the famous Russian homosexual Tchaikovsky plays (and Sokurov hits us directly over the head with this information), why are we not willing to imagine what we would automatically imagine in any other relationship? Why do we not perceive the relationship between these two characters as homosexual, even though they exist in a purely masculine world (the very few female characters are always symbolically and physically separated from the male characters - like the son's girlfriend/through a window, balcony/) and, not knowing the film's title or overhearing how they address each other, we would see them as members of a sexual minority? In the film, those who want to can perceive it as an intimate human drama or as a cinematic play with the cultural and social expectations of the audience, which, for civilizational reasons, prevent us from deducing an otherwise logical plot culmination and evoke unpleasant feelings with the return of suppressed psychological forces. (24.02.2015)