Enemy: Doppelgängers and a Spider Fetish

And so the stalker becomes the stalkee...

Last night I saw Enemy since I couldn't bring myself to watch Gemini Man, and it's pretty good, but pretty weird. A lonely and surreal tale of doppelgängers and stalking, Enemy is a film that combines the grounded with the fantastic. It also has some fantastic acting throughout, and some ambiguity notwithstanding, it's a great and relatively brisk (clocking at almost exactly one hour, thirty minutes) film that I think more people should see for its performances and editing.

In terms of plot, Enemy's is pretty out there. It's even stranger the more you think about it, especially since the larger plot only starts from pure chance that an offhand film recommendation would lead to a guy discovering an actor who looks exactly like him. This kicks off an obsession with his double (the title of the book that the film is based on) that leads to the professor stalking his double. He does this not really out of a desire to stalk per say, but more out of curiosity (and his own awkwardness) as to whether or not he has a true doppelgänger. He finds that both live at a glance the same lives, with similar-appearing partners, but the actor's life is marked with more success (living in a nicer building, being acknowledged, and married with a child on the way). Near the end of the film however, the pair's roles are reversed, and the actor stalks the professor with less curiosity and more malice in his intentions. Really, in a nutshell (and stalking aside) the actor is basically the professor's evil twin, and the professor winds up unknowingly doing right by others that his double has wronged. There's also a bizarre Kafka-esque motif of spiders throughout the film, appearing with increasing frequency throughout the film. I'm not entirely sure what the meaning of them are, but they seem to be at least a recurring nightmare for the professor, and at most his fear/awkwardness of/in romantic relationships. It can't be a mistake that spiders frequently are associated with women (in a fear-inducing, not predatory way). I would like to say more, but in all honesty Enemy is a film that's best seen blind, and all you need to know is that Jake Gyllenhaal plays a doppelgänger and there's a strange recurring motif of tarantulas.

It's really a testament to Gyllenhaal's acting chops that in a single character he's able to swing from amicable, standoffish, anxious, to even magnetic within the span of several minutes. Great stuff.

Enemy is a great example of editing and ambiguity, and its sharp cuts and repetitive sequences do a good job at giving Enemy a distinct feel. If you're looking to see some great uses of sharp cuts, this film has that in spades, as the majority of the scenes end with a cut. One of the first sequences, which is used to establish the professor's humdrum life and his numbness, is a great example of repetition done well. On top of that, the 'humdrum sequence' serves double duty for illustrating and immersing the audience in the professor's life. The music in the film isn't particularly notable, but it does do a great job at amping up the tense and nervous atmosphere of the film. I do think that Enemy would have been more visually enjoyable if the picture weren't so yellowed. It does help establish the ugliness and banality of the setting, but at the same time I wouldn't be surprised if by the end I saw things in a greenish hue. Besides that it's shot pretty well, with a lot of lonely shots mirroring the professor's lonely circumstances, but there's no single shot that really stood out to me.

Probably the highlight of the film's editing/sfx is that you clearly have two Gyllenhaal's on screen at the same time. The best part is that it looks perfectly natural, hat's off.

I very much enjoyed Enemy, and while it's perhaps not the easiest watch, it's a film that will reward the discerning viewer. Enemy is also wonderfully bizarre, and if you want to see something far removed from the usual psychological thriller, it's a good choice. Jake Gyllenhaal does a fantastic job portraying two very different characters, and he's quickly becoming one of my favorite actors. There's also a book, The Double, that the film is based on. I haven't read it, but it's on my list now. Weird (but not crazy), yet really good and tense.