Game is never over

     Game over is a superb movie, widely appreciated, Tapasee Pannu has thrown up brilliant performance in it. I really liked the raw courage the director has shown in working on a not so common subject. Won’t be wrong if I say it is the topic that would make many extremely uncomfortable discussing openly. One thing that struck me most was the idea of faceless killers. I would rather refer them as demons since they belong to the realm of imagination. The demons haunting her had origins in her traumatic past. Her battle against them is open to interpretation and possibly most of us can rediscover them in the depths of our own psyche. Though the trauma she had been through in the past was not as vividly shown as haunting demons the connect is never missed. The demons were bent upon destroying her physically and exhausting her mentally. She fights and fights hard. The fight has three main characters coming to her rescue police, maid and herself. When she wins the last fight she is alone. The last demon runs through all the defenses put up by police and maid and attacks her. The fight ends when she kills the last demon.

         If we interpret police as an external help, maid as a close friend then conclusion is, on the final frontier you have to fight on your own for at least one demon is going to run through all the defenses and catch you. The external help may be a councilor. He has a role to play. His role is to make her aware of their presence. It has an intellectual existence. It prepares her mind for the battle through understanding the origins of demons. The maid is a close friend she has confidence in. A helping hand always a call away. An essential support when dealing with traumatic past. But the bottom-line is at least one demon is definitely going to out power external help and a close friend. There you are alone. You cannot bank on their support as they are already run over. With all the external lifelines exhausted you have no other option but to engage yourself with the demon. She wins the fight when she destroys the last demon.

         The demons within aren’t unique only to the central character of the movie owing to tragedies in her life. A closer look within our own reveals the demons we are carrying. We all have them may be weaker, may not be deadly, may be stronger but we cannot claim their absence. These demons are always faceless. They pick up the faces from our surroundings. We have our own insecurities originating from variety of reasons. From financial constraints to career growth, from turmoil at home to toxic atmosphere at work place, from trouble with children to health issues, from deprived opportunities to failures and many more, all contribute to the germination of demons within us. They are always faceless but take the face from the reality. Our own insecurities visit us taking masks of familiar faces. Our own fears meet us in people around us when we move. In general we never understand the true nature of demons within and tend to know them with the faces they pick. Obviously we never are able to overpower them. The faceless demons have unlimited capacity to multiply and change faces, even change shape. With no understanding of them we make mistake of identifying them with faces. And we find ourselves completely surrounded by demons.

         The protagonist in the movie shows us that to win the battle, and that we must, we must not depend on others. The final frontier starts when the influence of external help ends. It is a battle within and we have to put up fight there itself. When we understand that we are real and the demon is unreal, a creation of our own, we start walking on a path of victory. The demons come from our own creativity. In fact they are faceless, shapeless, in reality without a body. They are intangible. We provide them body, give shape and select a face and start fearing them. It is just a thought, faceless, shapeless and rest is all imagination. When imagination comes to kill, the only way is to know the real.

      I firmly believe that but for few exceptions all lesser mortals like me come face to face with these demons at least once in lifetime, the intensity may vary but it is inescapable. Some easily conquer others fight hard and win, the most unfortunate lose and slide into depression. That these demons are faceless is the key to know them. Only then we start looking what is behind the faces. The inner journey to explore the origins begins. As we go deeper they lose all the faces, all the shapes but a thread remains. A thread that takes us in the abyss to find a fortified thought. We have to dig it out. Even if we are able put firm grip on it the demons lose power, making its intense resurgence difficult.         

         I think these demons can never be permanently eliminated because they are created by our imagination using impressions of our past and uncertainty of future. Since it is a shapeless thought residing deep within us nobody can come close to it except us. It is the final frontier that we have to win. Have to win on our own as it is beyond the reach of others. Nobody can win it for you. Fight is easier when we know that the demons are of our own imagination. Since we never stop imagining the game is never over. It is always played on inner field. The demons never stop coming at us. But we can always cripple them by strong dose of reality. A destructive imagination can always be killed by constructive reality.