The first time we took the directing class, the teacher asked us a question about what movies are good movies, and no one in the class could give a definite answer.
Lately this question has bothered me again because of it
"The North is a Vast Expanse"
In contrast to the 17 days of release, the film won the Best Film and Best Director awards at the 11th FIRST Youth Film Festival, and won the Golden Tiger Award at the Rotterdam International Film Festival in February this year.
Director Cai Chengjie, the introduction on the Internet entry does not exceed 10 sentences, the heroine Tian Tian in addition to being able to find the basic information, graduated from the Beijing Film Academy 2010 performance department, representative works in addition to this part there is also a "sin beauty", there is no more information.
The film festival is 140 minutes, the screening is 113 minutes, and the internet is broadcast for 105 minutes. This movie is recommended by many public names, and the current Douban has 5501 reviews, with a score of 6.8 points, which is only better than 25% of the feature films.
"A Vast North" is also known as "Little Widow Into Immortals", in addition to the female lead is a professional actor, the other is an all-vegetarian lineup, rehearsal for a month, shooting 9 days to end, the whole film black and white tone processing, only in part of the plot is color.
The shots are mostly fixed lenses, and bgm does not appear many times, most of the time dull and somewhat boring. You know, even if it's 103 minutes, some of the time I'm still distracted, and this movie is destined not to be friendly to the public.
The story takes place in the northeast countryside, the two good three husbands have died one after another, the villagers say that she has a Kefu life, I want to stay away from her, afraid of obscurity. The homeless Niyoshi lives in the van with his uncle who can't speak.
The fourth master who has been sick in bed for many years, no one to take care of it, the second good is in good faith to help the fourth master take a bath, who once wanted to heal the legs of the fourth master, overnight the people in the village regarded the second good as a living immortal, and every household had to find two good to calculate a gua, but such a good day, not much long, the second good or towards the end of self-destruction.
The social phenomenon that the film wants to reflect, there are many problems, but also because of too much, it seems too full, every point is mentioned, there is no deeper analysis, the primary and secondary boundaries are blurred, and the highlights seem to be somewhat mediocre.
There are two sides to the effect of ordinary people's acting, on the one hand, it ensures authenticity, on the other hand, because the lines have not been professionally pondered, and the tone of the actor's words is too flat, and it is difficult to grasp the attraction of the audience.
As a debut film, flaws are inevitable, but fortunately, it does not affect the integrity of the plot too much, and the shot of "A Vast North" is cold, and the white snow has not melted for a long time, trying to cover the evil under the ice sheet.
There is a strong sense of "fatalism" throughout the film. The second and third husbands died, they were ostracized by the villagers, the men wanted to get rid of her in order to take advantage of her, and the women wanted to get rid of her in the name of bad customs.
Driving away from this village and starting a new life, in the second good point of view is never thought of, born to be a person from The village of Isba, died as a ghost of the village of Isba, she would rather live a precarious life in the car than take this step and look at the sky outside. Ignorance, ignorance, these ideas have long been ingrained in her mind.
It was accidental that Erhao's path to the godmother was accidental, and the change in the attitude of the villagers towards her was also superficial. To put it bluntly, when you are used, you are a living immortal, when you are not needed, you are worthless, and the second good surface is to solve the difficulties of the villagers, but whether the villagers recognize the two good practices or not depends on the villagers themselves.
Couples who want to have sons, after finding two good practices, really give birth to a son, and then sell their daughter to others;
The village wants to blow up the mountain to open a mine, and the two good ones do not agree, and the villagers spill the "hundred urine" on the two good ones, or blow up the mountain in a mighty way;
Help the fourth master to heal the leg, the fourth master's children do not even have to go home occasionally to take care of it, which directly leads to the death of the fourth master;
No one cared about The departure of the two good ones, and they still wanted to fight for the last amulet. The immortals are gone, please come again, the immortals are useless, then change another one, when to go along with their own wishes, when she is a good immortal, the second good has not been able to change the life of any one person, she was put on a high position by the villagers, and she was also dragged off the altar by the villagers, the gods can't be their own masters, where is god.
Chinese pay attention to feng shui and auspiciousness, and temples and churches in rural areas are very common architecture. Erhao drove past the entrance of the village, saw a small house, she asked the little uncle what it was, the little uncle took the hand and compared it to the confessional room, the first time he saw it, The second good was still a little confused, did not understand what is the use of building such a house in the village.
When Nihao first walked into the confessional, she caught a human trafficker. The trafficker ran all the way and said I'm sorry, the money was also collected, the child was also taken away, it is not clear who took it, you are not a god, you made a contribution, you found it back, the second good who collapsed in the snow, there is no way at all.
The confession of the traffickers, the gods did not hear it seemed to be of no use, standing in the hut at the entrance of the village, like a pillar of shame, dazzling.
Erhao can see what ordinary people can't see, she heard the little girl say help, saw the fox trapped in the trap, the little girl said that it was its mother, after the second good rescue, she couldn't see where the little girl went in the blink of an eye;
The person who owes her husband money said that he fell into a pillow, Erhao saw his dead husband lying on him, a moment of trance, after the mountain was blown up, Erhao said that the mountain god was angry, and then there was an accident when the mine was opened, the coincidence or Erhao really had divine power, the movie did not explain, the imagination was returned to the audience, and the irony filled the whole film.
What kind of movie is a good movie, whether you understand it or not, the cost is more or less, whether the box office is good or bad, put in this "North is a Vast", as if any standard has no effect.
The classification of films with two types of art films and commercial films is naturally reasonable, and the personal viewing experience of watching movies needs to be paid attention to and cannot be ignored, but I still want to appeal to everyone to give the type of film "A Piece of the North" some time.
Yes, its shooting content focuses on marginalized characters, the rhythm is a little scattered, and even sometimes you can't help but want to doze off, but it is such an imperfect work, like a cold knife stuck in people's hearts, the reality of the problem of blindly escaping, will only roll like a snowball, we need to occasionally experience the feeling of pouring cold water on the head in the impetuous life.
Some movies, which are more valuable than the content itself, will become more and more flavorful over time. And I hope that this article can contribute to the attention of more people in literary films, even if it is weak and unremarkable.
Such movies, please more.
(The views expressed in this article are those of the author himself)