Repulsion (1965)

Director: Roman Polanski Stars: Catherine Deneuve, Ian Hendry, John Fraser

Review:

There are very few directors that have been into movies since the 1960s who are still delivering to this very day. Roman Polanski is one of them and from all directors I could think of, he is the only one. Repulsion (1965) is his earlier work that bought him into international notification. 

In 1960s, when the terms like schizophrenia and OCD were lesser known to the general public, people fear of what those mentally disordered people perceive. Repulsion sets the formula for the psychedelic film about mentally disordered to come. Psycho (1960) was also about the mentally ill, but it never see things in the perspective of the insane, but Repulsion follows the mind of the disordered almost like a conscience stream.

So the flows goes like this: first it shows the audiences all the elements that haunted the lunatic, and then gradually the protagonist witness surreal things happening around him/her. The happenings grows stronger and stronger, and more unrealistic. Finally some normal people invaded and discovered that most of the surreal hauntings were only happened in the protagonist's mind.

In Repulsion the protagonist is a girl who is very depending and attached to his elder sister. She works in a grooming house, in which her workmate is female, and her clients are females. Male invaded her world when her elder sister had a boyfriend, which occasionally stayed overnight. She could not handled it, and when her sister were away for vacation, she really gets into her mind.

The films shows she both repels and fantasied of being abused. She dreamt of being raped, in which we could tell it was her nightmare. But later we see her put on her lipstick and lied on the bed, almost being prepared of the imaginery rapist. She is also a mysophobia, in which she would gag over an unwashed cloth, but could do nothing about a dead rabbit taken out of the fridge because she was so traumatized by her fantasies.

What is so scary or thrilling about the scenes? Well Repulsion does lost her charm due to age. As we were mostly understand about mental disorder, we could tell right from the start that the protagonist is having a psychotic episode. You know fairly well that what is real and what is not, which kills some of the thrills about wondering whether it is truely happening or just inside her head.

However, in the 1960s, it is truly an inspirational and influencial film, that the whole theme became a cliche nowadays. Dont get me wrong I absolutely love the genre of surrealism and illusions, and to get to the root, watching Repulsion is compulsory.