Anthony The Enemy Conflict

Enemy introduces us to Jake Gyllenhaal who portrays the character Adam as well Anthony. Adam, is a professor who lives alone. He has a girlfriend named Mary. He watches a film and then he sees an actor which looks exactly like him. He start to stalk the actor and his whereabouts. This is the first encounter we have with the inner conflict of Anthony. Eventually he meets the actor who’s named Anthony, this character is also portrayed by Jake Gyllenhaal, and Anthony shares an apartment with his pregnant wife, Helen. The film show us a reality where Adam and Anthony cannot understand how they are identical and this creates conflict and more tension.

The character Adam is a figment of Anthony’s imagination. So we know that Adam does not really exists. Adam is created by Anthony and this is his way to escape his own reality and to deal with his fear of commitment. Adam is the dark and disturbed subconscious of Anthony. . Sometimes we see Anthony as himself spending time with his pregnant wife, Helen or riding his motorbike. But sometimes Anthony takes on the figment of Adam. Here we see that he struggles to be himself as Anthony. He has a lot of inner conflict through this. To make matters more complicated, sometimes he sees himself as Adam, and imagines Anthony.

Anthony feels trapped in his marriage and the fact that his wife is pregnant as well.

The dialogue between Mary and Adam actually overlaps into a shot of Anthony waking up in distress. Helen wakes up and comforts Anthony. For Anthony this represents a breakthrough as he accepts his reality and destroys the fantasy he has created. Meanwhile, in his head, Mary freaks out when she notices the tan line where Anthony’s wedding ring should be. The rules of their world are coming apart and they drive home and they argue and die in a car