🌹The Rose & Skull ☠️

Response 1B

Topics: ❧ How does Fowler start to change as a result of his experiences in the canal in Phat Diem? ❧ Compare the opening scene (or scenes) in the novel and film.

This week’s responses aren’t in any particular order, except that I tend to start them with a response that sets the scene or covers the general situation in an overall way. I’ve tried to post the better responses and to avoid repetition. If you see something you disagree with, you might use it as a counter-argument to strengthen your own argument.

Fowler in Phat Diem

In the canal Fowler learned how the war raging in Vietnam consumes lives. Human beings have their characteristics and personalities reduced to nothing once their life leaves them. Fowler even compares them to clay, an amorphous mass which they must wade through, their distinguishing features nullified by their sheer volume and mass. Witnessing the scores of dead, Fowler developed a distaste for war, not only for what it does to him, but also to the soldier and civilians caught in its path.

Fowler had experienced many disturbing and scary instances through the journey of the canal causing him to change his emotions toward the deaths caused by the war. As Fowler and the group were passing through the canal, multiple lifeless bodies covered the water and Fowler “took [his] eyes away,” and seemed to feel uneasy. However, after, he is faced with a disturbing visual of a mother who had blood running down her forehead and accompanied by her lifeless son next to her. Fowler thought, “I hate war,” and his feeling toward the war changed from fear to anger.

The moment Thomas Fowler witnessed firsthand the effects of war in the canal in Phat Diem, his emotions became distraught. A man who planned on remaining neutral on the situation now produced a strong emotional revelation on the war. He witnessed the people flocking for protection, and the gory and gruesome numbers of casualties. His viewpoint on the war changed and his empathy for the number of scared and fallen civilians skyrocketed. The idea of war finally became a reality right in front of his eyes.

After directly experiencing the aftermath of the war in the canal, Fowler starts to change from being indifferent to the war to being concerned about the innocent people who had to suffer from consequences of the war. Though Fowler constantly states that he “is not involved,” he repeatedly takes the innocent people’s side whenever he debates with Pyle, which shows that he has already formed his own opinion regarding the war. Fowler’s experiences in the canal and other similar experiences causes him to act against his own rules of being in a neutral position, and therefore influences Fowler to make a drastic decision, which leads to Pyle’s present situation.

The sound of mortars whizzing through the air and exploding in the distance haunts Fowler most of the time he stays in Phat Diem. As Fowler learns, in wartime one can pass through emotional extremes from one moment to the next. Moments of shock and horror erupt suddenly, eliciting strong emotional responses, such as Fowler’s hatred of war. Fowler is emotionally unprepared and therefore, romanticizes the concept. He even compares his disgust upon seeing the canal full of bodies with the way that Pyle (who is likely a virgin) reacts to the sexually charged performance at the Chalet. (98 words)

In the canal at Phat Diem, Fowler dehumanizes the “grey drained cadavers” before him, to a pot of “Irish Stew” that has too much meat.  He averts his eyes and thinks of “buoys” bobbing in the canal as the punt gets stuck up on the “shoal” of bodies, pushing through them like “human clay”.  Fowler processes the human element of the carnage surrounding him, feeling vulnerable like a “virgin” -- terrified of anonymous death; reminded that in war, everyone is expendable and devalued for political gain. Civilians getting stuck in the crossfire is simply “Mal Chance”. (97) 

After Fowler's experience in the canals at Phat Diem, he begins to feel the psychological torture that is war, after seeing numbers of corpses too high to count, dead mothers and their children, and the sounds of mortars exploding Fowler begins to look to the future, and thinks only death, pain and suffering will be in store for him and his friends. After his time at Phat Diem Fowler begins to see his future differently than he did before, he sees love as a game of chance, and does not want to play that game anymore.

The Opening Scene: Novel vs. Film

“It begins with a body…” . The Quiet American begins with a dead body, or rather: the discovery of the death of Aiden Pyle. The opening scene of the film stuns the audience as we see Aiden Pyle’s corpse (including a scene where Fowler sees Pyle’s dead body at the morgue, and we listen to his conversations with the morgue worker and later his mistress), before we begin to learn about their connections....  Meanwhile in the first few pages of the novel, The Quiet American, the focus is on Thomas Fowler and his mistress, Phuong (Phoenix) as they discuss Pyle’s upcoming return to Vietnam, before they learn of Pyle’s untimely demise. Here, the novel flashes back to Pyle and Fowler’s first meeting, juxtaposing the past and present. Although the source material appear similar on the surface, the moments of beginning differ in these two works.

The opening scenes of the movie and the novel are surprisingly distinct. The movie’s opening, filled with uncertainty, has striking dramatic flashes – an opium pipe, explosions, a woman’s face, a voice in the background, and a dead body. But what is really happening is unclear. On the contrary, the novel’s beginning provides names of the characters, description of a regular day on a Vietnamese street, and a girl. There is some ambiguity but, the subsequent conversation provides clarity about the relationships between these characters. The story is set straight for the readers before moving into the flashback.

The film opening describes Fowlers escapist mentality through Vietnam, saying “[y]ou could be forgiven for thinking . . . that only pleasure matters”, whereas the book does so through Phuong, calling her “the promise of rest.” Both however, draw the parallel between Phuong and Vietnam. In the book, Fowler likens her to native tea when he thinks, “She was indigenous like a herb, and I never wanted to go home.” In the film, the comparison comes when he talks about Pyle, saying “saving a country and saving a woman would be the same thing to someone like Pyle.” (98)

The Quiet American begins differently between the novel and the film. Due to the arrangement of the film, the beginning shows Pyle dead in the morgue, while Fowler is identifying the body. The scenes leading up to Pyle’s death become flashbacks in the film. The novel, on the other hand, does not have as much of a dramatic beginning, Fowler waiting to meet up with Pyle in his room, describing a hot February night. The movie depicts an eye-catching visual to draw the audience in, whereas the novel provides a detailed description of the setting while waiting for Pyle.

In both the novel and movie The Quiet American, beauty and war are used as imagery to depict love and political disagreement: the two main driving factors in the story. In the novel, Fowler describes “the lamps burning” from where the planes had disembarked. In the movie, a peaceful evening by the river is interrupted with what at first glance appears to be fireworks; adding to the beauty of the scenery. It then becomes apparent that these are not fireworks, but rather gunshots and war planes. This sets the scene for the struggles of love and hate that will take place.

The 2002 film The Quiet American, and the 1955 novel upon which it is based, both open with a distinctive look at a central component of the story. In the movie it is the setting, Vietnam itself, while in the novel it is the characters who are given the focus. The movie begins with a narration that paints an idealist picture of Vietnam, talking about its scenery and scents to promote a romantic view of the setting, while the novel opens with two of the main characters engaged in conversation, where we learn insights into their characters that will prove critical later on.

The Difference between a Car Exhaust and a Grenade. When comparing the opening scenes of “The Quiet American” between the book and the movie adaptation, there is an evident amount of foreshadowing in the movie. In the introduction of the movie, we are shown Phuong with explosions behind her followed by Pyle’s dead body in the water, while Fowler is discussing his love for Vietnam. This is foreshadowing the lengths he will go to help the places and people he loves from coming in harm’s way. This is in comparison to the book, where we are slowly introduced to Fowler's affection for Vietnam, and his need to protect it and Phuong. 

The book "The Quiet American" utilize opium during the intro as an idea and as a material thing more complexly than in the film. The film has a single shot at the beginning which shows opium in a pipe, and another small narrative line, "A pipe of opium, or the touch of a girl". These two small references contrast heavily with the book, as it has a much stronger focus on opium. For example, when fowler thinks, "Aren't we all better dead? The opium reasoned with me" the opium has a greater meaning than simply a drug, as it has influence on the way Fowler operates and takes in the world. During the introduction, opium as a concept has much more narrative purpose and relevance in the book opposed to the film.

The opening scene of The Quiet American speaks not only to the darkness of the war but also the beauty of Vietnam. The scene starts off dark at nightfall with the boats lit up magically floating on the water. As Fowler narrates, he speaks of all the senses surrounding him with “taste, sound and smell” of Vietnam being majestic comparing it to “nasty London.” As he smokes the pipe of opium, which symbolizes the escape from the world of darkness the “touch of a girl that may tell you she loves you” makes the beauty in Saigon all worth it. (100 words)

The film’s opening scene divulges truths that Greene takes the length of the book to reveal. “I can’t say what made me fall in love with Vietnam…,” Fowler ponders, verbalizing a reality that the literary Fowler never articulates. Similarly, the film immediately connects Fowler to Pyle’s death, though the novel reveals this connection near its end. As the camera pans to Pyle’s bloodied body in the canal, Fowler says “Something happens, as you knew it would…,” while literary Fowler’s thoughts imply that Pyle’s death is unexpected: “Of course, I told myself, he might have been detained for some reason...” (99 words)

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