OVERLAY REPORT

The main character in the film *Possession* (1981) is **Mark** (played by Sam Neill), an international spy who returns home to West Berlin to find his marriage in ruins. His central goal, though complex and shifting, is initially to **re-establish normalcy and save his family**—specifically to understand why his wife, Anna, is leaving him, and to prevent the complete disintegration of their life with their young son, Bob. As the plot unfolds, Mark's goal twists into an all-consuming **obsessive quest to uncover the secret truth** behind Anna's increasingly violent and erratic behavior and to stop whatever is possessing her or tearing her away. The specific and often grotesque obstacles Mark faces in achieving his goal are: ### 1. The Breakdown of His Wife, Anna The primary obstacle is his wife, Anna, who instigates the crisis by demanding a divorce and separation. Her behavior is erratic, emotional, and increasingly violent, which Mark cannot rationalize through conventional infidelity. * **Violent Self-Mutilation and Breakdown:** Anna attempts to cut her own neck with an electric knife and experiences a terrifying, convulsive breakdown in a subway tunnel, where she literally seems to "birth" a monstrous entity, which she refers to as "Sister Faith." * **The Rejection of Love:** Anna is explicit in her desire for a complete break, telling Mark that what he sees as love and normalcy is a disease, and that she should never have had a child with him. ### 2. The Grotesque Secret "Affair" Mark initially believes his obstacle is a conventional affair with another man, Heinrich. However, the private detective Mark hires discovers the horrific truth: * **The Creature in the Apartment:** Anna is secretly harboring and nurturing a bizarre, tentacled, Lovecraftian creature in a dilapidated apartment. * **Sexual Relationship:** Anna is not only caring for the being but is also engaged in a sexual relationship with it. She describes the creature as her new lover, and Mark later witnesses her having *coitus* with the monstrous entity. ### 3. Homicidal Violence and Conspiracy Anna actively and violently removes people from her and the creature's life, forcing Mark into a world of criminality and cover-ups. * **Murders of Investigators:** She is responsible for the murder of the private detective and his superior/romantic partner, Zimmermann, after they discover the creature. * **Murder of a Friend:** Anna murders her friend Margie, telling Mark she did it to protect her "faith" (in the creature/her new path). ### 4. The Supernatural Doppelgänger and Loss of Identity As the film progresses, the creature Anna is nurturing evolves, transforming into a **doppelgänger**—an identical, adult replica of Mark himself. * This presents a final, existential obstacle: Mark is faced with an "idealized" version of himself being created by his wife's madness, symbolizing a corruption of his own identity and the final loss of the woman he knew, who would prefer a monstrous copy to the original. * Mark also meets Helen, Anna's doppelgänger (also played by Isabelle Adjani), who is a calm, idealized version of a wife/mother, which Mark briefly uses as a mechanism to cope with the loss of the "real" Anna. ### 5. Mark's Own Descent into Madness Mark's final obstacle is his own mental collapse. He drinks heavily, becomes obsessed, and grows violent, physically fighting with both Heinrich and Anna. His desperation to win Anna back and cover up the murders forces him into a state of "psychotic behavior" matching her own, leading to his self-destruction.