In the Czechslovakian film “Shark in the Head”, the overly artistic nature can be overwhelming at first. The director Procházková’s heavy use of special effects can be confusing and make the plot of the movie hard to find. One reason the plot is elusive results from our inability to determine what is real from what is imaginary. Strange things happen around the protagonist, a schizophrenic old man named Mr. Seman, and at times it is unclear whether anyone else is aware of the things he sees or if they are even real. One scene towards the middle of the film served as a sort of pivot point in the narrative to me, helping to answer this central enigma: Mr. Seman is watching the street absentmindedly out of his window. As night falls, we see him continue to stare outside, unmoving. We see the outside of his apartment building, the street empty and silent. Suddenly we hear music start, and a spotlight illuminates Mr. Seman’s window from outside. Confetti begins falling from the sky, and people appear on the street, dancing and dressed up in party clothes. Everyone is celebrating and laughing, almost as if it’s a New Year’s Eve party. The gaiety of the dancers and their over-the-top costumes also contributes to the theme of childhood and innocence seen in Mr. Seman’s visions. We see him watching them dance with silent amusement. As we look at the partygoers again, the music and dancing stop, everyone turns towards Mr. Seman, and they all throw out their hands towards him, breaking the 4th wall in the process. We see Mr. Seman again, looking outside, where it is once again silent and empty. The kind woman’s daughter is seen walking down the street in Mr. Seman’s direction. As she passes his window, she stops at his window to spruce up her appearance. The camera assumes a point-of-view shot, showing what Mr. Seman is seeing. We see the daughter as she calmly fixes her hair while the party in the street has once again resumed around her. Strangely she does not seem to notice the partygoers, music, or the confetti flying around her and landing in her hair as she fixes it. The shot continues to flip between the daughter’s and Mr. Seman’s point of view. Whenever we are seeing through the daughter’s eyes, the street is silent and normal. Mr. Seman however, sees a vibrant party going on in the background. The scene ends with a shot from the street of the daughter still primping while Mr. Seman stands watching her in the shadows, only visible to the audience. The director’s inclusion of both characters in the same shot is symbolic of the daughter’s inability to see him in the regular world also. Although her mother’s coercion eventually convinces the daughter to be cordial towards Mr. Seman, she originally resists with irritation. She, nor any of the other characters, can ever truly understand what Mr. Seman sees and feels. At the same time, Mr. Seman is able to use his imagination to see more of the world and people around him than anyone else.
The juxtaposition of these two points of view is crucial to the narrative of “Shark in the Head”, and gives it style. It solidifies the fact that Mr. Seman is indeed hallucinating all of the strange things that happen around him. Up until this point in the film, the fanciful imaginings of Mr. Seman could be interpreted as just that: things he’s simply imagining in his head. It is never told to us in the film that Mr. Seman has schizophrenia; this is told to us by Procházková herself. Without this knowledge, the audience could interpret his child-like imaginations as a simple, harmless way for an old man to fill his days. As soon as we see that his hallucinations actually encompass the world around him by including the daughter, the verity of everything that ever happens around Mr. Seman is suddenly thrown into question. While it might be easy to pick out some things as imaginary, it is impossible to know whether the people themselves are there also, or simply part of a larger delusion. The reason this scene helps the film achieve style is because it establishes Mr. Seman as someone who must have some kind of mental disability or disease. By watching this movie, the audience better understand of how different life would be living with schizophrenia. Rather than including bizarre special effects simply to be strange and “artistic”, the director skillfully employs these effects as a means to personify schizophrenia itself. We are eventually led to question whether his diagnosed “madness” even needs to be corrected, especially after we learn he’s scheduled to go to a mental institution, where he will surely be less happy. Procházková’s ability to raise these deep ethical questions is proof in my mind that this film’s excessive use of manner was an effective tool towards achieving the unique style needed to conjure these thoughts.
