Enemy In-Depth Analysis (Fully Explained Theory)

I like nearly all theories and this theory too. You do write her instead of him a few times :-) I have a theory that none have mentioned so far - the brand new theory (I think):

What I noticed first was that the movies storyline is not a line but a circle, it repeats over and over again. But it is not just a circle, it actually has other storylines in it - just like a spiders web - it is a circle but with (story)lines in it. It illustrates something more boring/bad than a boring linear life - a boring life that repeats itself - and what's even more boring than that? - a boring life that repeats itself/goes in a circle but then has small boring storylines in it so that the "line" becomes even bigger. This is the spiders! He is caught in a web/life made by spiders. These spiders are women - I think his wive creates the outer ring but his girlfriend creates the smaller rings and the lines, or the mother creates the lines? This is why his girlfriend repeats the same day - she is creating rings in the web, and only she can finish the web by creating the middle of it - car crash.

All this is created by the fact that he used to have big dreams of becoming a superstar actor and be popular. This is why the guy at the office likes him - he used to be alive but then gave up acting to become a father. The guy at the university does not like him as much as he has lost his spark. This is also what creates the split personality - he has to grow up but is stuck in his former self at the same time.

And a final big reveal! When does he become his boring self? When does he become the history teacher? At the very end! He sees his wife/spider and knows that he is stuck in the circle and at the same time has to lie to her. So he does not give up anything, he stays with her but loses control of his mind as he has to hide things from her. This story is his hell.

The car accident is the end/start. Then the final scene is the end/start. But also the hotel meeting scene is the end/start. When his wife meets him at the university is the end/start. This is a non linear storyline. So it is impossible to say when it begins. As you can see he is both married and not married. Faithful and not faithful. This is a few storylines mixed together. But the real story is that it has no beginning or end. Both his personalities are real and not real at the same time. It all depends on what storyline you are currently looking at.

Okay... I made a TL:DR version of the movie:

Anthony quits his 3. rate acting career as his girlfriend gets pregnant and then marries her becoming a history teacher to support her. But he still keeps his mistress.

His mistress finds out he is now married and refuses to sleep with him. He tries to defend his acts by saying his needs make it okay (right before the car crash).

In the car crash he sees a spider web on the front window and in his unstable emotional state he now associates having needs to cheat with spiders and spider web and something bad because of the shock - he now has PTSD and amnesia because of his PTSD.

The emotional shock he splits his personality into his real self with sex appeal and his new faithful self, Adam. He only remembers his former self by dreaming of spiders.

His wife discovers he has a split personality. And before he goes to the stripclub she finds out that only Adam is faithful and therefore divorces him.
Anthony now changes his name to Adam and even removes all photos of his wife to fully become Adam.

His mistress returns.

When he one day watches a videotape of Anthony he becomes a little sexually aggressive again and she leaves him too.

Now he tries to remember his former life as Anthony by visiting the hotel he was unfaithful at and visiting his old job. He now remembers everything clearly but his emotional choch from the car crash still makes him unable to remember the most emotional things in his marriage and he therefore still see spiders.

Beautiful theory and analysis! As you said great movies are the ones you can watch many times and find different meanings every time. I understood that they were the same person the fiirst time I watched it, but couldn't in any way see anything you mentioned in your review. What a movie!

I've enjoyed his movies since Maelstrom and Polytechnique, and while I always find them a little challenging, I have to admit that this one was just beyond my intelligence to understand, so I really appreciated your analysis, spot on, thank you!

Thanks for your theory, I'm not a stupid person but OMG this film took a lot of brain power. Thats all, thanks again.

I seem to be the only person who saw this slightly differently, accept I was wrong lol, but it was as follows.

The entire film to me was the main character in a coma, in a coma due to the car crash he was involved in with is mistress after the argument when she found out.
The web in the glass is what imprints the whole spider theme in his mind.
In his coma state his mind separates his double life as two completely separate lives leading to the plotline.

His reaction to his wife being a spider to me was his slow realisation that it was still "all a dream".


Was very interesting to read up on the expanded explanation of the spider symbol, but feel my version gives weight as to why both characters have the post crash scar. Though how he knows he has a scar while still in a coma......great film has kept me thinking for days.

Regardless of how others may have thought of the movie, I am quite content with your interpretation. All I wanted was for someone to bring SOME sense into what I just saw.

I guess it's fiendishly good story telling when people come to their own, different conclusions regarding the events of a movie, even if it's not necessarily the kind of movie that caters to my taste :)

Thank you so much!!!