FIRST WATCH THE MOVIE BEFORE READING THIS ARTICLE OR BOTH WILL BE A WASTE OF YOUR TIME.
I am not interested in elaborating on the meaning of the storyline in Vivarium because it will not make sense after watching it for the first time. This movie needs time and space to let individuals absorb the story and self-introspect. Its surreal storyline and visuals make you feel vomited, anxious, and claustrophobic because it hits you deep inside until you don’t know what is happening to you. With a time of progress, when you start understanding common sense around the movie, you may not like that feeling or your present state of existence. If I talk about the basic storyline, it is about a couple stuck in some strange and ideal city where only they exist. They were forced to raise a child if they needed freedom. They started raising children by providing food delivered by unknown entities around them. The couple hopes to return to the real world of their imagination. If we consider visual representation, it is an ideal that we all have this perfect desire for home, furniture, nature, trees, clouds, etc. As the movie progressed with the hidden meanings of culture, consumerism, and societal rules to follow. Even after getting all these ideal homes and luxuries, this movie questions the emptiness in our life after having these facilities around us. While trying to escape from this place, they return to the same number, 9 of each house. It signifies the completion of the end of individual identity and starting a new beginning. After getting this beautiful home of their dreams, the couple is forced to raise a child, giving them food and good habits. As he grows up, time becomes so fast that they do not realize it. The task given or taken by the male is to do labor work for the survival of the family while the mother has to take care of the food, love, and emotional support. The child, on the other side, starts growing up and starts being more rebellious and meeting new people he doesn’t wish to tell and stopped learning from assigned parents that he used to learn behavior from the couple. The mother tried to convince the boy and understand him so they would get the idea of escaping from this place. During that time, Man dies in the hope of getting out of this ideal home and life. While the female is stuck in the same loop of depression and suffering her entire life, when she finds a. way to get out. But she gets stuck in the same loop and never emerges out of it. Vivarium asks a deep-down question of family life or home that we consider and desire for living constructed by society.
