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(The author is Yunzi, special commentator of Litchi News, film critic, executive producer, director of Jiangsu Film and Television Critics Society; this article is an exclusive manuscript of Litchi News mobile phone client and Litchi Network, please indicate the source when reprinting.) ）
"Lyceum Theatre" is a film that Lou Ye once again focused on the spy battles of old Shanghai after "Purple Butterfly" 18 years ago. Compared with the chaos and pathology of "Purple Butterfly", the loss of control index of "Lyceum Theatre" seems to have decreased, and it has begun to work hard in the direction of genre films: the structure of the play within the play, the overlap of time and space, the violent gunfight and so on. Before the debut of the film, we can even build a rather gorgeous imagination space - from the early Hollywood film noir to the current "saga girl" action movie, "Lyceum Theatre" seems to be rounded up.
Stop! Lou Ye, who was keen on self-congratulation in the past, would never easily make a movie look so "simple", testing the audience almost his eternal artistic pursuit. The Lyceum Theatre, which has been anticipated for more than two years, is a bold experiment in form like a mad demon, surpassing any previous film.
In the current world film world, except for a few works that have reached the peak of art, such as "Roma" and "Caesar Must Die", few directors dare to use black and white images to narrate, but "Lyceum Theatre" completes this terrible challenge. From the perspective of image effects, the coldness and lingering hazyness throughout the film create a completely different old Shanghai from the conventional impression, and each character is like a ghost through the dangerous era. However, this atmosphere accumulated with strong ambition did not make the whole story erupt into the tension it should have, and the wayward editing once again revealed Lou Ye's entanglement and division of "longing for business and difficult to give up art". It's hard to figure out whether Lou Ye wants the audience to seek a thrill of sorting out the logic of the plot, or whether people indulge in an atmosphere of "unclear consciousness" and marvel at his artistic challenges.
The film has extremely high expectations for the heroine Yu Yan (Gong Li), and hates that she cannot load the most character meaning for her in a limited time. As an actress, she fell into a state of exhaustion. Not only to disguise himself as another person on stage, but also to take on countless roles in life — wife, lover, adopted daughter, and a spy on the blade of a knife. In addition, she resembles the late wife of a Japanese intelligence officer and has a strange affair with a young female agent who disguises herself as a fan.
However, this seemingly mysterious and complex female character is not supported by clear story details in the film, and the male characters who are related to it are also point-to-point, and a large number of blank spaces can only make up for the situation in each plot line. The result is that even if the huge amount of space is aimed at the heroine, it is still difficult for you to enter the heart of the character. It's hard to completely negate the actors' acting efforts, but the sense of wandering never goes away.
Another reason for this sense of dissociation is that Lou Ye once again used handheld photography to the extreme, but the effect was not ideal. Photographer Zeng Jian showed a convincing photographic talent in "Tuina", but in "Lyceum Theatre", the combination of photographic style and plot is not precise, excessive handheld tracking shooting and complex environmental elements are piled up, so that the already bleak black and white shots are always in a shaky state, and the sense of vertigo has never disappeared. The showmanship transition shots are not as smooth as in "Birdman", and they also greatly detract from the actor's performance charm.
"Lyceum Theatre" wasted a group of powerful actors, and no amount of "texture obsession" could save this result. The most unfortunate thing is of course Gong Li, just like Lou Ye used to blind Zhang Ziyi in "Purple Butterfly", although he also gave this super capable actress a considerable number of close-up shots, but neither captured Gong Li's charm release point, nor did he have a strong script to empower the role.
The old Shanghai female star played by Gong Li, from clothing to makeup, is far from the actress of that era, all relying on Gong Li's aura to support it bitterly, but the effect is like the middle-aged Hollywood actress Joan Crawford, you believe that she was once radiant and charming, but do not believe that she can still call the wind and rain at this moment. Under the limitations of black and white light and shadow, Gong Li's performance is seriously suppressed, and you always suspect that the film is to pursue a sense of form, which leads to insufficient performance materials. If the performance material is sufficient, then there must be an unforgivable mistake in editing.
"Lyceum Theatre" is not like a rigorous artistic exploration, more like Lou Ye, who has been "normal" for several years, a feeding to the so-called art film fans, fiercely releasing his play heart that has been held for too long, but it is not naughty. The film is so flustered, sloppy and abrupt that Lou Ye doesn't know what is left after he has been hi.