Speaking of this year's animated films, in addition to Disney's "Zootopia", DreamWorks' "Trolls", Pixar's "Finding Nemo 2", etc., there is one more that must be mentioned, that is, "Kubo and the Two Strings".
In the competition for the 2017 Academy Award for Best Animated Feature Film, "Kubo and the Two Strings" and "Zootopia", "Finding Nemo 2" and "Ocean's Edge" also had the highest voices.
Today, when special effects blockbusters are flying all over the sky and industrialized and streamlined production, the spirit of doing an original animation is very valuable, and the spirit of doing an original stop-motion animation is even more valuable.
Kubo and the Two Strings is the fourth film by Laika Studios, the first three of which are "Ghost Mother", "Psychic Boy Norman", and "Box Monster", all of which are well evaluated. The film is also the directorial debut of Lycra Studios CEO Taraves Knight, who has been a producer in two films, "Box Monster" and "Psychic Boy Norman".
However, unlike the "Gothic" style of the first three films, Kubo and the Two Strings is set in ancient Japan. The protagonist of the story is a young boy named "Kubo" who lives by the sea with his mentally normal mother. He possesses a magic that seems innate, able to manipulate paper to change into all kinds of little people and small objects, and the wonderful thing is that these little people can jump around alive as if they have life.
During the day, Kubo would take his paper man to the market to perform and go home on time in the evening. One day, however, he disobeyed his mother's warning and stayed in the wilderness when night came, where he was hunted down by mysterious people. His mother appeared in time to save him, and Kubo embarked on an Odyssey-style journey, and what awaited him on the road was not only the secrets buried in the family, but also the heroic struggle to protect the land and the starry sky overhead...
Following Kubo's adventures, Time Bacteria saw an animated movie with super super graphics and a particularly special beauty:
But it's more than that.
"Kubo and the Second String" cost about $60 million to produce, compared with this year's popular superhero movie "Deadpool", which cost just over $50 million.
Tragically, since its release in August, the film has only grossed $69.27 million worldwide, which is difficult to offset the production cost + publicity cost.
Kubo and the Lyre is currently at the box office
In fact, these four films of Laika Studios are basically walking on the blade of break-even.
So the people who do stop-motion animation, blah. And every Laika Studio that doesn't make money, do you think about how sharp the people in it are?
In stark contrast to the box office, the word-of-mouth of Kubo and the Second String. MTC gave the film a high score of 84, while Zootopia was a 78.
MTC-84 points
David Fear, chief film critic of Rolling Stone magazine, said of the film: "Audiences have endured a summer of superheroes, supervillains, disgusting sequels and reboots, and finally can experience the real cinematic charm in 'Kubo and the Lyre.' ”
Perhaps, supporting this group of people to tirelessly go all the way is their common love of stop-motion animation.
Because of their love, they regard animation as a part of their lives, and they are willing to use their real-life time to create a legendary chapter that happens in the void, and use animation to express an essence of the spirit. Taravis Knight once said, "I try to tell the richest, richest, most moving story we can." ”
Making a stop-motion animation can take millions of photos, but the finished product only selects a few hundred thousand of them. In the tedious process, time becomes the most precious resource. Kubo and the Lyre made the longest stop-motion animation film to date, with a total of 101 minutes, surpassing another film from Laika Studio, Ghost Mother (2009).
Taravis Knight is also lamenting this: "I need time. I swallowed something I couldn't chew much. The workload is so much that I dedicate everything to the animation. ”
The time-consuming nature of Kubo and the Second String is that it proposes a completely new creation in technology: physical models + digital special effects + 3D printing.
The faces, eyes, lips, etc. in the movie are designed in advance and then printed out through 3D. In the actual shooting, the characters need to follow the development of the plot and are constantly changed body movements and facial expressions, 24 frames per second, in one second, the staff needs to take at least 24 photos (in fact, more, 24 selected). And in a coherent action of up to 10 seconds, the number of photos that need to be taken is staggering. So while 3D printing has increased efficiency, it has not reduced the workload in the slightest.
For Kubo's role alone, the crew created 23,187 facial models for him, including 11,007 mouth expressions, 4,429 eyebrow expressions, plus hair and other accessories, which can be combined to create more than 48 million facial morphological changes.
The film's main villain, Moon King, is Laika's first fully 3D printed puppet, with up to 881 independent parts: 130 colors and 751 components, which is unprecedented.
In the end, the total number of facial models used in the film exceeded 60,000. Why does the little boss evil sister always wear a mask? The main reason is to reduce the workload on part of the face, and the creation of a cold and stylish villain is a secondary reason.
Snow Mountain Monkey vs Evil Sisters
The technology has been used for a long time, and Coraline, the protagonist in 2009's Ghost Mother, was printed with 6,333 faces that could be combined into 207,000 expressions. 2012's Psychic Boy Norman was first printed in color, and 9,121 Norman's faces were created, which can be derived from 1.5 million facial expressions.
The giant-eyed monster on the bottom of the sea is equally elaborate
The boat in the film is really glued with leaves piece by piece. For the series of shots of the ship, the crew spent 19 months shooting
The most surprising thing in the whole film is that Kubo, The Beetle, and the Snow Mountain Monkey fell into the underground cave while searching for the indestructible sword, and encountered the resurrected giant white bone spirit.
In fact, this white bone spirit image is taken from the Japanese folklore of the Giant Skeleton Monster (Gashadokuro), and is known as the "10 Most Ferocious Japanese Monsters" along with the Snow Girl, the Kata-eared Dolphin, the Yagi Great Snake, and the Sake Swallowing Boy.
Giant Skeletons
The Giant Skeleton possesses a huge skeleton, and according to legend, a Giant Skeleton was born when 100 ghosts wandered over the battlefield where their bodies were rotting in search of revenge. The giant skeleton in Kubo and the Two Strings has a broken sword on its head, symbolizing that it is a combination of dead spirits. The crew built the monster into the largest stop-motion puppet ever built, sixteen feet tall and weighing 400 pounds (4.87 meters, 362.87 pounds).
The production process of the Giant Skeleton
More subtle is the use of engraving printing. The crew drew inspiration from the work of woodblock print master Kiyoshi Saito, and finally achieved the beautiful wood finishes in those film buildings.
Engraving printing
The opening of the film takes place at sea, in fact, there is no real seawater, but the effect of the staff shaking out the waves with fabrics and so on, supplemented by post-production special effects.
Cloth for the sea
This midnight moonlit scene is a beautiful tribute to Katsushika Hokusai, known as the "soul of Japanese painting", who is best known for his work The Great Wave off Kanagawa .)
The Great Waves of Kanagawa
In addition, the film has an ending song based on the Beatles music [While My Guitar Gently Weeps], one of Kubo's friends (actually his father) is also called Beetle, which may be a coincidence or a deliberate tribute
Although the story of Kubo and the Two Strings is very simple, it is also carefully portrayed.
Its entire theme is full of dualistic opposites: the different roles of Kubo's parents, the evil twin sisters, day and night (the moon king represents night, and Kubo's final helmet has a sun motif). The two strings about the theme actually symbolize the way of life and death.
The whole story is constantly sublimated in the binary intersection, and finally a third string is born - love.
It can be said that Kubo and the Two Strings expresses a height of thought in a relatively obscure way. However, in terms of narrative, this film seems to be too peaceful, the rhythm is not moving, and the details of promoting the occurrence of events are not in place, so it also produces many flaws. The veiled expression and obvious narrative problems make the film doomed not to explode in the commercial system.
But it's still worth savoring.
In addition, the movie has many interesting little details:
(1) Although "Kubo and the Lyre" is a story in the eyes of the audience, the word "Story" seems to have become the mantra of the characters in the movie. Including stories, storyteller and other variations, "story" is mentioned 31 times in the film, of which 13 occur in the last 15 minutes.
(2) Kubo's mother's first and last lines are both "Kubo", and they are all said to Kubo.
(3) The snow mountain monkey, like Kubo's mother Sariatu, has a visible scar on the corner of its eye, suggesting its true identity. However, Sariatu's scar is in the left eye, while the snow mountain monkey is in the right eye.
...
Look at it like digging an Easter egg, and the more you look at it, the more interesting things you can find. These details also prove the intentions of Laika Studio.
The crew is more attentive in the search for voice actors:
Two Oscar-winning actresses: Matthew McConaughey and Charlize Theron. Three Oscar nominees: Rooney Mara, Ralph Fiennes, and Brenda Vacaro. There are also many professionals & strength factions.
And the actors deserve it quite well. For example, the Evil Sisters, because of the voice of Rooney Mara, makes people feel chilling.
Time Fungus recommends this anime to everyone, not because of how perfect it is. In terms of narrative, it is obviously not as good as recent word-of-mouth masterpieces such as "Zootopia" and "Ocean's Edge".
It's not that it's a time-consuming and labor-intensive stop-motion animation, so it should be called out to everyone to care.
Doing a business that loses money, one is not a film, or many years. This is the most important quality of filmmakers - intentions.
The blockbuster is cool to watch, but this kind of assembly line work, who knows whether to forget it on the second day or the third day?
What can stay in the audience's heart for a long time must be a movie made with heart.
There is a line in Xingye's "God Of Food": As long as you are careful, everyone is a god of food.
It's not just about cooking, it's about doing anything.
"Kubo and the Second String" remembers. A lot of movies are forgotten.
Laika Studio remembers. A lot of filmmakers forget.
Author: Naruto Kubo
Produced by Time.com
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