I'd like to say that the fragmented nature of my entry is a response to our discussion of wholeness, but alas it's not. Chris and Margaret have raised some ideas I want to play with and it would take more time than I have to weave my thoughts together into an essay or even continue far enough along on the paths that the ideas take me.

First off, what forum can be more appropriate for discussing the need for stranger intimacy as a way to define oneself than a blog? In last Sunday's New York Times a reporter cited a study which indicated that Americans' circle of confidants had shrunk and that the internet could be used to help people remain connected to friends and family. He went on to write that a long life requires a strong coterie of friends. Isolation leads to an early grave (our serial killers would agree to this, i think). I wonder what that same reporter would have thought of blogging. Why is sharing your pain with strangers less healthy as sharing it with close friends?

In Epitafios Bruno's quest for wholeness, his need to return to an Eden where he had found love with one of the young students killed in the fire(i just discovered this yesterday in an espisode. btw, following the path of a serial killer in a blog through a serial is very, very fun. you end up seeing whether your assumptions about the text prove true or not.) sets him apart from all others. His art, his quest prevents him from cultivating relationships with others. Because he is human, he is terrified of being alone. It is only through his art, the staging of his murders, that he can enjoy stranger intimacy. The trace of humanity within him, the need to be understood, I suspect will prove to be his undoing.

As the police investigation leads Renzo and Laura closer to Bruno, they also reignite the flame of passion previously set by the fiery deaths of the high school students. Laura has given up her son and allowed him to leave the country with her. It was the boy who had made her feel whole after Renzo. Renzo, in turn, has given up the drugs which allowed him to feel complete as well. Whether their reawakened love will lead to redemption or destruction remains to be seen because Bruno has worked to position them in this way. He wants them to experience the pain of loss that he has.

One of my least favorite scenes in Munich was the heavy-handed cross cutting between Eros and Thanatos at the end of the film. I felt as if the ol' directorial sledgehammer were being used to drive home how fraught the quest for vengeance. One of the reasons the contrast works in Epitafios is because it's allowed to be drawn out along the course of multiple episodes. The wholeness imagined by those in the throes of passionate, erotic love triggered the series of events which led to Bruno's murderous and it is that wholeness which will end the killings one way or another.

Epitafios uses cross-cutting to do more than generate suspense. The technique also serves to further shake up our understanding of its fictional world. In one episode, the camera alternates between shots of Bruno opening up bathroom stalls in search of his next victim at the same time as Renzo is searching a bathroom for Bruno. Our assumption is that one is in the men's room and the other in the women's room (another aside: Bruno as a tranvestite was Renzo's supplier of illegal anti-depressants). That assumption like so many others is shown to be false.

I still haven't stopped thinking of the soundtrack of serial killers. My next step is to come up with a playlist using the music genome project: www.pandora.com. More to follow.