ABSTRACT

On an airplane, a middle-aged American salesperson, Joe, is attracted by Anna Maria, a beautiful but naïve Italian airhostess. During a stopover in Bangkok, he fi lms her with a movie camera and keeps after her everywhere like a child begging maternal affection. While he never stops pestering her, a psychiatrist gives her fi ancé advice that she should act more sluttishly because Joe is a psychopath fi xated on her purity. Anna Maria’s sudden promiscuous manner and attire at a bar, then, disappoints Joe so much so that he laments the loss of his ‘dream girl’ by projecting her virginal image onto the wall of his room. He kisses and hugs the mirage, which also glimmers on his own body, comically yet pathetically ( fi gs. 2.1 – 2.2 ).