"Luo Xiao Black War" movie poster The picture comes from Douban
When we watch "Luo Xiaohei" (hereinafter referred to as "Luo Xiaohei"), we will see many classic shadows, such as the depiction of the vitality of the forest at the beginning, much like Miyazaki's "Princess Mononoke" filmed in 1997, and the whole story of "Luo Xiaohei" is actually closely related to it; at the same time, we will also see the shadow of the famous Japanese manga "Naruto", whether it is the characters in the movie, or their use of spells, etc...
The story told by "Luo Xiaohei" is actually very old, but it is always anxious and uneasy for modern people, that is, with the rapid development and progress of modern science and technology, the earth's ecology has been almost irreparably damaged, thus directly threatening the lives of other animals and plants living in it. Since the beginning of the First Industrial Revolution, many art movements in Western countries such as the United Kingdom – such as the Arts and Crafts movement led by Raskin, William Morris and others in the UNITED Kingdom, or the Art Nouveau movement that swept Europe – have begun to reflect on the damage that large-scale machine production can cause to nature and the human mind and society. This line of thinking became more urgent and important in the 20th century, when the rapid development and war continued, and became the focus of criticism and reflection.
Stills from "Luo Xiao Black War".
One. Towards the world of "people"
In "Luo Xiaohei", the goblin wind that has always occupied its homeland and destroyed it gives the cat demon Xiaohei a brief history of human development: primitive human dependence on nature, to slash-and-burn formation of villages, reverence for natural forces and worship of gods, human beings and natural society form a certain symbiosis; but with the machine age opened by the Industrial Revolution, human beings began to cut down forests, split mountains and reclaim seas, break ground and dig mines, and eventually led to nature becoming the object of exploitation and seizure, which on the one hand promoted the development of human society. On the other hand, it destroys the natural ecology... The history of human development carries a strong Marxist perspective.
We see in the cinema that there are symbols of the early industrial movement that are typical of the early industrial movement, such as trains, large smoke pipes in factories, and high-rise buildings. In the eighth episode of the multi-episode science fiction short film "Love, Death and Robots" filmed by Netflix in early 2019, "Good Harvest" - adapted from the short story of Chinese science fiction writer Liu Yukun - it also tells the story of a china that accompanies the entry of modern (Western) industrial science and technology, which leads to the traditional magic of China being completely de-charmed, so that the fox spirit in the play loses its magic and is difficult to change at will. To a large extent, there is a very similar connection between Luo Xiaohei and Good Harvest, except that the latter discusses more about the emergence of the "West" as a powerful other in modern Chinese society, which has led to the influence, destruction and transformation of a whole set of self-consistent traditions. But in Luo Xiaohei, for those goblins who have been driven out of their homes, the "other" is an increasingly powerful human being.
In Luo Xiaohei, many goblins hide in modern cities of humanity, hidden and fused together, and live together, but goblins like Feng Shi are very resistant to this, and believe that the balance between goblins and humans maintained by the goblin guild is itself fragile. In the eyes of the wind, humans and goblins should live separately and return to their former appearance. If we put the wind in the spectrum of modern social ideology, we will naturally feel that he is a stubborn conservative, clinging to the old dreams that have disappeared. When modern China encountered the West, these people were named "old ghosts" or diehards, criticized and ridiculed by the new intellectuals, and abandoned by the whole mighty historical current. So in the movie, The Wind Breath finally chooses death. And with the death of these people, in fact, along with them disappeared one ideology and another life and view of another life.
Therefore, in Luo Xiaohei, Fengshi is not a typical bad person, and many guild goblins also express sympathetic understanding of his ideas, because to a large extent, Fengshi longs for the life they once had and are now plundered. The difference is that they accept the change, accept living with human beings, but the wind still clings to the old dream. In the end, the director did not portray Kaze as an evil person, just like Miyazaki's description of the Kirin Beast and the "Princess Mononoke" Sang in "Princess Mononoke", they are actually weak in the face of humans with muskets and various machines. The director of "Luo Xiaohei" did not unabashedly show the abuse, bloodshed and struggle caused by the development of modern human society as Miyazaki in "Princess Mononoke", but the reality after it is exactly that.
With the development of the modern Enlightenment in the West and the spread of the ideas and ideas it preached, the traditional world of God was completely expelled and the world of human reason began. Horkheimer and Adorno called the program of enlightenment "to awaken the world, to dispel myths, and to replace fantasies with knowledge," thus creating a world of binary opposites, namely reason/myth, knowledge/fantasy. It was on this basis that the Enlightenment began to prepare both hands, on the one hand, to criticize the world of myth and fantasy, which was full of ignorance, darkness and disorder, and on the other hand, to construct itself, that is, the future world was human, rational and orderly.
It is in this self-confidence that human beings believe that heaven is not on the other side of the reach, but in this world where human rational knowledge and technology can design and realize. But in "Luo Xiaohei", "Princess Mononoke" or "Good Harvest", the world full of myths and fantasies, while shrouded in a layer of ambiguous light, is always harmonious — especially compared to the modern technological society shown in the film — and leaves enough room for other animals and plants on the planet to survive.
When Benjamin discussed classical art and the art of the modern mechanical reproduction era, he introduced a concept called "aura", pointing out that it is an atmosphere that surrounds classical art, a certain atmosphere with sacredness. It is mysterious, ambiguous, and unique and authentic, so that with the advent of modern reproduction art, they disappeared. To some extent, the disappearance of "spiritual rhyme" is what Weber called "de-charm", that is, the light of reason dispels the hazy atmosphere that once hung over people's hearts, lives, society and the world, so that everything becomes clearly visible.
But just as the so-called "water is clear, there is no fish", for the goblins in "Luo Xiaohei", once they are expelled from the ancient wood and the shadowy nature into the sun, they will inevitably be looked at by humans, and even hunted. In "Good Harvest", the protagonist's father is a generation of demon hunters, but their hunting of goblins is often a limited personal behavior, but with the development of instrumental rationality and systematic management models began to appear, and when they acted on these dissidents, there was often a large-scale and very orderly massacre. And isn't that exactly what Baumann pointed out in his Book Of Modernity and the Holocaust?
II. If you are not of my race, your heart will be different" trap
In "Luo Xiaohei", the vast number of human beings are not aware of the existence of goblins, to a large extent, this is the universal state of "other" in modern society, and it has become a topic of discussion in many film and television dramas. For example, in the X-Men series, the difference between Magneto and Professor X is actually very similar to the conflict between Wind and Infinity in "Luo Xiaohei", that is, the former wants his group not to hide and hide, and the latter hopes that the two sides can coexist peacefully, even if the price is to hide the special place of the self. This is actually the dualism of traditional Western metaphysics, which emphasizes more contradictions, conflicts and struggles between the two, but in traditional Chinese thought, it emphasizes the integration of the two more.
Whether it is the Confucian appreciation of harmony and difference, the elaboration of yin and yang harmony and complementarity, or the elimination of conflict in Taoist thought, etc., all aim more at "harmony" than struggle. In "Luo Xiaohei", the coexistence of humans and goblins may be helpless on the one hand, but on the other hand, it is also the refraction of the concept of harmony under "harmony and difference", of course, according to the show in the movie whether it really achieves harmony, it is another matter, at least the goblin hall is working in this direction.
Whether in the concept of Magneto or wind, there is an attachment to "purity", that is, a certain dislike of "impurities", and a stubbornness to "non-my race, its heart must be different". In Mary. In Douglas's Clean and Dangerous, she argues through her analysis of cleanliness and filth in the Bible and in people's daily lives that "cleanliness" and "filth" are actually a classification of human symbolic social systems and orders. For example, "filth" symbolizes the violation of social norms and order, and implies danger, and danger is the fear caused by crossing boundaries that should not be crossed. The removal of filth (danger) – i.e., through the creation of taboos, the observance of rituals, the punishment of crimes – is a means of re-establishing the original order and maintaining social norms. Thus, for Magneto and The Wind, only by removing the "filth"—humans—mutants and goblins—can they return to/or create their own, pure, orderly societies and worlds.
It is under this concept that Magneto and the Wind Breath will break through the existing social norms, legal constraints and morals, thus causing the destruction of the normal social order, so as to achieve the possibility of transformation and reconstruction. But the problem is also here, that is, when Magneto and The Wind Define "Non-Self" as others, they simultaneously rob the latter of a series of essential rights that they have as human beings or individuals, making them filthy or things that can be erased. In Luo Xiaohei, Feng Shi violently plunders the abilities of other goblins, which in itself has destroyed his original good purpose—allowing the goblins to live in a world that does not have to be hidden and free from fear—which is exactly what Infinity repeatedly reminds that in order to achieve good ends, evil means cannot be used, because these sporadic means will eventually produce a result that Feng Si cannot control himself. Especially when he knew that XiaoHei would die after seizing XiaoHei's ability, he still chose to continue, which had already led to another bad result that he could not control.
Wind Breath finally chooses to plunder Xiao Hei's ability, and in the face of infinite questioning, he says that he has "nothing to say" because he knows that it is wrong, but why should he do it? In fact, behind this lies the most clichéd but very tempting notion that for the happiness of a larger or more people, the happiness of one person or a small number of people, even life, can be sacrificed. This ideology is rife with secular utilitarianism, and the shadow of modern instrumental rationality and capitalist business logic also floats in it. In the face of these ideologies, man becomes a calculable thing and commodity, and by measuring the pros and cons, he makes corresponding choices, which leads to universal harm and even massacre. And this idea completely subverts Kant's ethical law that people cannot be used as means. But in Luo Xiaohei, Feng Xi uses many goblins as a means to achieve his own ends, thus directly destroying his own good purposes.
In the film, when the eroding "realm" begins to spread in the center of the city, the "realm" is quiet without any sound inside, becoming a blank piece of paper for the wind to redesign on it. The film's representation of the city within the "realm" is interesting, it is very similar to the 3D drawing software sketch up (aka "sketch master"), so it is very standardized and lifeless. In the modernist design movement that emerged in the West at the beginning of the 20th century, mainly the Bauhaus in Weimar, Germany, modern urban planning had several very central concepts, such as standardization, functionalization, blocking, and ordering. To a large extent, it is the product of instrumental rationality, that is, the standardization of urban functions, regions and lives through rational planning. Stills from "Luo Xiao Black War". In "Luo Xiaohei", Feng Xi also adheres to this concept, hoping to create a new world for the goblins in the "field" he has built. But as Infinite Zeng and Xiao Hei said, in his own "realm", he is God, so in the "realm" of the wind, he actually becomes a new God. When the American scholar Jane Jacobs criticized the concept of modern Western urban planning in his "Life and Death of American Great Cities", he pointed out that these designers came with God's power to discipline people's urban life.
In fact, the wind and breath also fell into the modern instrumental rational ideology that he hated and opposed, and through it caused even more damage. In the film, although the windy utopia is not realized, another utopia exists, that is, the guild hall that appears repeatedly in the film. In the end, we failed to see how the interior of the guild hall was and how the goblins organized and lived in it. According to Infinity and other goblins, the guild hall is probably also a gathering place for goblins, so infinity did not enter in the end (because some goblins were dissatisfied with humans). So, how is it different from the world that Wind Breath wants to create? We cannot answer this question for the time being. But if you can guess a little, it may also be what Feng Xi calls "a corner", that is, what Xiao Hei said, to find a place to live, not necessarily in the homeland that has been occupied by humans. The guild hall may be such a existence, that is, a goblin place in the vast human world, which is what the guild director calls "delicate balance".
In the end, Feng Shi did not want to go to the guild hall, saying that "one day we will have nowhere to hide." According to the history of human development summarized by the wind, this does not seem to be alarmist, that is, with the depletion of the limited resources that have been developed by human beings, a new round of exploitation and plunder of nature will inevitably begin. In Hayao Miyazaki's Castle in the Sky, a high-tech sky city can eventually live in the sky, and at that time, it will be difficult for the guild hall to continue to hide, and the fear of wind and breath may come true.
In Miyazaki's films, discussions of technological development and the destruction of nature are repeated. He uses the traditional Japanese culture of natural ghosts and spirits to express the life, society and world that once had human beings, as well as their relationship with nature. Whether it's the unicorn beasts and white wolves in Princess Mononoke, the robots in Castle in the Sky or the garbage-covered river gods in Spirited Away, they are actually symbols, just like these goblins in Luo Xiaohei. They are silent images of nature, another mode of thought and life that is different from the industrial revolution and the logic of capitalist development. In Good Harvest, they are all described by the invading West as backward, ignorant, and feudal, knocked over with a stick, thus beginning a long and painful modernization — indeed, Westernization — transformation. The ancients called "taking its essence and removing its dross", but in practice, it is often a half-understanding of the essence, but the dross are completely absorbed, coupled with the thorough criticism and abandonment of their own traditions, resulting in a mixed and even hollowed out state.
Three. epilogue
With the two world wars and the Nazi Holocaust, Western intellectuals began to reflect on the materialization of man under the tide of capitalist commerce and the alienation of man in instrumental rationality. But with the globalization of capitalist ideology and the strength of consumerism, a fine web seems to have formed, tying everyone within.
In Luo Xiaohei, the wind of failure finally chooses to die, transforming into a huge tree and appearing in the middle of the city in a lush manner. But the other goblins laughed at it blackly— Nezha said, "Why bother?" In the end, it wasn't chopped into firewood! Another goblin said, "It could also be to build a park and then collect the entrance fees"—once again exposing the powerlessness of resistance like the wind. The dregs ideology of modern society has penetrated into all aspects of life and society, and business logic has become the core concept of modern people, becoming an internalized "unconscious" that manipulates us. This is the symptom that Lukács already saw in the early 20th century, and it is also the modern "glass house" that the French philosopher Baudrillard pointed out at the end of the 20th century.
In the "Biography of Shang Shu Kong", a story of the separation of gods and gods of the ancients was recorded, that is, "The emperor ordered Xi and He, the officials of the world to control the heavens, the earth, and the four hours, so that people and gods did not disturb, and each had its own order, which is called 'Jedi Heavenly Communication'". Before the Jedi Heavenly Passage, the human gods lived together, which led to disorder, so the final separation was carried out. Mr. Yu Yingshi pointed out in his "On the Occasion of Heaven and Man" that the old unity of heaven and man after the Jedi Heavenly Passage was created by the wizarding group, mainly referring to the fact that the human world and the ghost world were integrated under the manipulation of the witch, showing a special way and a universal way. The so-called special way is that the earthly human king obtains the "mandate of heaven" of dynastic rule from the "emperor" of the "heaven" through the wizard's divine magic; the so-called ordinary way is that ordinary people often rely on witches to beg for help from ghosts and gods in order to avoid evil and prosperity. This may be the life that Feng Xi misses in "Luo Xiaohei", but it has long passed away with the wind.
In Princess Mononoke, Sonny eventually chooses to return to the forest instead of entering the human world. The antagonism between man and nature seems to be difficult to truly resolve in the modern capitalist world. Man was once called the "Primate of All Things" and, under the light of reason and science, has become the god of the world. But for other plants and animals, humans dominated by profit and machines may be nothing more than viruses. The story of "Luo Xiaohei" also fails to give any answers, but shows such a situation that has lasted for a long time and may continue to exist or even further deteriorate, and behind the story it can show, the current situation we are facing is already very serious.