Two faces of Thanatos: Broken Flowers (2005) and Ai no corrida (1976)¹

1. Students wrote this final paper on two films used as subject matter in the class ‘Death instinct and its interpretations’, taught during the first semester of 2006 at the Sociedade Brasileira de Psicanálise de São Paulo. Translated by Arthur Brakel.

Abstract

Since Freud formulated the death instinct concept, it has received widely diverse interpretations. Even Freud advanced two versions. The concomitant analyses of two films, Ai no corrida (1976) [ In the realm of the senses (1977)] and Broken flowers (2005) evince Thanatos's two faces: the cold death of decathexis of an object, in the case of Don (in Broken flowers) and the hot death of the subject‐object fusion in Sada's case ( Ai no corrida). In our analysis, we elaborate two possible vicissitudes of the death instinct: in Broken flowers, the main character finds an ‘analyst’ and is cured. In Ai no corrida, the protagonist meets a complementary object and goes mad.

Key words:

• death drive
• death instinct
• object divestment
• psychopathology
• addiction
• tedium

1. Students wrote this final paper on two films used as subject matter in the class ‘Death instinct and its interpretations’, taught during the first semester of 2006 at the Sociedade Brasileira de Psicanálise de São Paulo. Translated by Arthur Brakel.

1. Students wrote this final paper on two films used as subject matter in the class ‘Death instinct and its interpretations’, taught during the first semester of 2006 at the Sociedade Brasileira de Psicanálise de São Paulo. Translated by Arthur Brakel.

Notes

1. Students wrote this final paper on two films used as subject matter in the class ‘Death instinct and its interpretations’, taught during the first semester of 2006 at the Sociedade Brasileira de Psicanálise de São Paulo. Translated by Arthur Brakel.