Reconstruction:Angst (1983)
Angst starts with the camera the main character as he roams around before finding and shooting his next victim:
He is then captured and imprisoned for several years. His first stop after release is at a diner, where he catches people
him:The
coincides with extreme close-ups of him :After the scene, he finds a cab but the suspicious driver makes him flee. He finds an isolated house. He
it before breaking in: the house, the camera resumes him as he scouts:
He kills the occupants, while entertaining fantasies of making them
:He then loads the bodies into the trunk of a car:
He goes out in the car, bringing the now friendly family dog with him. He gets into an accident, causing many bystanders to
the car and , sending him into a panic frenzy. Note that the scene is shot from inside the car:He manages to start the car and flees. We later find him back at the diner, with the same people
:The dog
barks, making him go outside. He makes the dog his food.Policemen arrive at the scene and check on the car,
it.They order the killer to open the trunk, while the people that were at the diner, the policemen, and even the killer, all check on the car.
As they
the car, with the dog hypostatizing the killer being (by the people at the diner during the eating scenes, and then by the bystanders following the car accident), and the bodies in the trunk reminiscent of what he did the house, they hypostatize the movie viewers when they were the killer as the camera was him since the beginning of the movie. In fact, since the killer himself is among the watchers, the scene plays out like an out-of-body experience where the killer moves out of the car (and out of the subjective view from inside the car) and takes the viewers’ place, the car-dog-bodies as himself, and giving a very particular meaning to the word “everybody” in the following quote: