This hellish story forged by Roger Water’s and Pink Floyd's 1979 album of the same name is delivered to us in this 1982 film. The Wall is a brutal journey of trauma, internalisation and insanity, throwing the viewer into the maddening descent of protagonist ‘Pink’ (Bob Geldof), as he builds a wall around his feelings, keeping the pain of his past away. As Pink withdraws further within himself, he withdraws from any semblance of reality and loses himself to the confines of the Wall, and the destruction it brings. As Pink confronts each of his traumas, another brick in the wall is built, until he is lost altogether.
Robert Scarfe’s beautifully nightmarish psychedelic animation is interjected at points, inflicting a distinct feeling of visceral lunacy on the viewer, and creating a mirror into the mind of Pink, a mirror that makes us become him. This along with the cinematography is overlaid with the Pink Floyd album music to cutting effect, screaming this story of terror through lyrics as well as visually. The album was originally inspired by the same subject of self-imposed isolation and madness. Bassist Roger Waters models the character of Pink after elements of himself and former band-mate Syd Barrett, who had his own brush with psychedelic insanity.
We begin with Pink, withdrawn in his apartment and devoid of basic social interactions, failing to even acknowledge the existence of a house maid and his own girlfriend. From here, the descent begins and we are thrust into the feelings of isolation and loneliness Pink first felt as a young boy with the loss of his military father, who would never return home from the trenches. Exploring this loss leads Pink to an asylum, figuratively and literally, as he looks upon himself isolated as an adult, the hopeful curiosity in Pink as a boy interestingly juxtaposed with the hopeless insanity of Pink as a man.
The flashbacks of Pink’s childhood are some of the most saddening and emotionally charged moments of the film, made all the more cutting by the agony heard in the chosen overlaid songs. Here, Pink Floyd’s music steps away from being music altogether and it becomes a cry of pain. We are also exposed to Pink’s struggles during school at young age. In his feelings of helplessness he imagines a day of revolt against the headmaster and school, determined not to yield to the system that would think for him, and crush him down to another brick in the wall. We learn loosely about the fear and detachment he felt for his mother and an early experience with death, all which would breed an apathy that would later build into complete human disregard.
These feelings of detachment and disassociation would come to a pinnacle with a loss of consciousness after a series of manic rages, marking the climax of the film in my opinion as Pink devolves and mutates into a deformed faceless monster as he is rushed to a hospital. Parker and Scarfe magnificently illustrate Pink’s transition into the very entity he has long feared he would become as a boy. Pink, betrayed by the false security of the wall looses himself to his apathetic suffering and transforms once more into a Nazi figure, a servant of the wall ready to inflict the totality of his hopelessness on others. The parallel the creators of the film draw between Pink’s apathy and totalitarian suffering with an externalised vision for a totalitarian Britain, serving the wall and himself illustrates something just as horrifying as it is masterful. In becoming what he hated, Pink as we knew him has melted away through his internal fixations, and disregard for himself and reality.
With Pink’s insanity realised and his imagination for the command of his faceless army complete, we see his repressed pain externalised as he commands the elimination of all those who are weak, different and not of his master race. The pillaging begins to the Pink Floyd track Run Like Hell. Following this, Pink goes to trial for his crimes with a depiction of his mother as the judge. For me this is the high point of Robert Scarfe’s animation throughout the movie as we see his demons and those Pink has wronged get the better of him mentally and the wall becomes a prison, trapping him as opposed to keeping him safe.
I wouldn’t consider The Wall a movie, rather I think it’s best summarised as a piece of visual and auditory art; the cinematography, animation and music, all capable of leaving a resonating impression on the audience as stand alone works. It is definitely the kind of experimental approach we could benefit from more as viewers. I highly, highly recommend watching The Wall.
