1905 Film Network Special Article "To shoot the grassland where the gods died..."
When the newcomer director who wants to be Hong Shangxiu in "Mustang Mane" quotes Haizi's poem "September" and talks about the shooting concept of a farmhouse advertising film, the tone of the film's rebellious, confused, satirical humor is set.
This youth film released today (November 26) has attracted much attention because director Wei Shujun has successively presented the special honor award for short films in the main competition unit of the 71st Cannes Film Festival, "Yanbian Boy", the 73rd Cannes Film Festival shortlisted for the new feature film director's work "Mustang Mane", and the 74th Cannes Film Festival shortlisted director's biweekly unit work "Yong'an Town Story Collection".
In addition to him, the most concerned is the young actor Zhou You, who won the honor of best actor at the 4th Pingyao International Film Festival, and the jury gave him the award: he accurately grasped the inner movements of the character, and the external display was appropriate. What is valuable is that he erases the traces of performance to the greatest extent possible, completely immersing himself in the role, making people believe that he is the role, and the role is him.
When the character enters the role, when the youth transforms into a "wild horse", the animalism of the character's heart like a wild horse is revealed, trying to break through the cage of the "zoo" made of cement forest with the wild nature of debauchery and face the wilderness in the dream.
After the mane is divided, the distant wild horses gallop
"Off-road off-road, off-road."
When the used car dealer paints a wild and picturesque future for Zuo Kun, a senior, the wild horse-like youth seems to forget the troubles around him, thinking that this second-hand jeep can take him away from the gouge in front of him and run to poetry and far away.
But at this time, the successive blows of reality have just begun, breaking up, being deceived, breaking up, detaining... It turns out that the campus that wants to escape is the best home and umbrella, the cold wind and rain of the outside world make the lonely and naïve horses unable to find a home, and the "wild horses" that have gone from persistence to compromise, from escape to wild running, can only be forced to "divide the mane", play the "tai chi" of the adult world, and forcibly integrate themselves into the "zoo" like a step-by-step life.
Undoubtedly, this is a film about the growth of youth, so that the rules of society terminate the exile of a young man to continue wandering, but also let the animal image of the wild horse into the spiritual world of the character, giving the character a primitive force from nature, completing the integration of human nature and animal nature in a specific situation.
The youth eventually cut off his long horse-maned hair and returned to the campus door with meek eyes. In the mocking internet divine comedy "Earthlings" song, sitting in the taxi, he smiled bitterly and slowly closed his eyes, and saw in his dream that after the mane was split, the distant wild horses galloped.
In the light and shadow, the humanoid animals are fierce
Whether it is Imamura Changping's two-time Cannes Film Festival's "Kaoru Kao" and "Eel", which have won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, which regard people as insects and rats in the mountains and eels in the river; or Ang Lee's Oscar-winning "The Fantasy Drifting of the Young Pi" who sees teenagers isolated from modern society as tigers drifting on the ocean; or Orgus Lancemus's "Lobster" divides different kinds of animals according to human personality, many classic works in the world of light and shadow have added animal metaphors. This is a way to better express the theme of the alienation of human nature when entering a psychological or desperate situation.
In recent years, a number of works using animal metaphors have also emerged in the Chinese film market. Ning Hao's noir crime film "No Man's Land" exposes the evil of human nature to the Gobi desert, and in the no-man's land without legal protection, the eagle falcons and greedy wolves who yearn for freedom launch a bloody and tragic confrontation in the form of human beings, and finally glow the light of humanity in adversity.
Director Guan Hu, who is good at animal imagery, also used the ostrich who broke free from the shackles in "Old Cannon" to show the moment when the sixth master broke free from the worldly cage and lived his own life; in "Eight Hundred", he used a white horse to watch over the dignity and spirit of the Chinese people to defend their homeland to the death, showing the yearning for holy humanity and free hearts.
Director Han Yan also depicted in "Animal World" the competition of people who eat the weak and the strong without any legal and moral constraints, lose their social attributes and degenerate into animals, and stage a naked law of the jungle. While the film whips up the evil nature of the beast, it also shows the beauty of human nature and the light of human nature in the "animal world", which has become the core of the film to touch people's hearts.
In the commercially successful "Manslaughter", the picture of the sheep appears 9 times in the whole film, which expresses the triple meaning of "scapegoat", "kind people" and "rabble", which can be described as a hidden line. Not only that, the theme song of the movie is also called "Dead Sheep", and the English name is also translated as "Sheep Without a Shepherd", which means "rabble".
In a series of art films, animal intentions are more common: the Aries and Black Hawks in Wan Ma Tse-dan's "Crashed into a Sheep", the camels and white horses in Zhou Ziyang's "Old Beast", the dinosaurs and sheep in "Wuhai", the donkeys in Li Ruijun's "Old Donkey's Head", the cranes in "Tell Them I Went with the White Crane", and the camels and horses in "Home in a Place with Lush Water and Grass" all appear on the big screen out of plot needs and artistic expression.
In the film noir "The Party at South Station", director Diao Yinan continued the animal characteristics of the police to the "cat" in "Daytime Fireworks": alert and suspicious and good at tracking; and as the eternal protagonist of the film noir, Zhou Zenong, a "cold-blooded tough guy", no longer showed the characteristics of a fugitive to a "rat", and Liu Aiai, a "snake and scorpion beauty", no longer had a nest with his "snake and mouse", but in the call of the wild, both came to the junction of the city and nature, humans and animals - the wild goose lake.
In this way, when the characters in the film step into the moral dilemma or the limits of human nature, the wild nature of nature returns, and human nature and animal nature merge here. In this "hunting" relationship between people in the food chain, the "law of the jungle" is the only truth before the light of human nature is lit, and the animality of nature acts as a medium for human relations, giving the film characters a more reasonable explanation.
Of course, we don't have to be pessimistic about human nature, after all, we also have morality and law. The philosopher Nietzsche once said, "The beast in us must be deceived, and morality is an emergency lie so that we will not be torn apart by this beast." Without the fallacies in existential and moral assumptions, humans would still be animals. But humans see themselves as more advanced animals and impose tougher laws on themselves. ”
The best way out is undoubtedly to face up to one's animality and return to the embrace of Mother Nature – this does not mean the return of human beings, but as the zoologist Desmond Morris put it: "You are one of the most unparalleled and incomparable species in the world." Please understand your animal nature and accept it. ”