Wen Shu Sairen
Overall, the Chinese films in 2011-2020 do not have essential or real scale expansion, looking at the world, the world is cool and hot, and those past film powers are often just too thick a foundation, and there are old things to eat. Judging from my experience in watching movies, every year there are still one or more films that are related to the film itself and people themselves, some are unique, some are both, which prompts me to watch Chinese films, not only in my profession itself, but also in love.
It is quite gratifying that the boundaries of Chinese films have been broadened to a certain extent in the past decade. In the past, we saw films from inland and Hong Kong and Taiwan, and if we extended a bit, there would be Chinese productions in the United States, such as the familiar Chen Chong and Ang Lee (referring to the fact that Ang Lee had not yet won the Oscars), as well as Wang Zhengfang and Wang Ying, who may not be familiar to everyone, and also Including Song Haowei and Wang Ziyi, who have emerged in the past two years. Now we can also see some Chinese productions from Malaysia and Singapore. Such as Zhou Qingyuan, He Yuheng, Chen Cuimei, Chen Shengji, Wu Junfeng, Chen Ziqian, Chen Zheyi, etc.
In my ten-year top ten choices, I did not list their films, for various reasons, and I will not repeat them. What I want to say is that it is their appearance that allows us to freeze the square words, under the spread of local accents, so that we can appreciate a more fluid East, not only connected to our bloodline, outside of geopolitics, echoing with our unshakable foundations, but also allowing the whole world to enter our different vocal positions through the universal language system of image. This is a gratifying thing in any case.
But here, it is important to admit that, for knowable or unknowable reasons, our humanities are not so lush, not only in film, but also in literature and music. We all want to stop talking, ashamed to express our simplest wishes, untested ideas can always run ahead of unreliable techniques, and overcrowded personalities have become commonalities. To be dishonest because you are not quiet, to learn to be lost because of dishonesty, is really "to lose yourself before you see immortality as you wish."
Fortunately, there are still some movies, which are not the case. They have real thoughts, temperatures that we often overlook, and a reminder that there is a vision that looks at us day after day, year after year.
Lost Souls
Zhong Menghong is the most important Chinese director in this decade, and his important point is that the Chinese-style family drama not only connects the inherent traditional model, but also has a very modern consciousness of the family as a rather dangerous and quite accurate analysis.
Family dramas are the soul of Chinese movies, and the movie "Lost Soul", from the title, already implies that our blood is thicker than water and is slowly draining from the body and wandering from our spirit. The son kills the daughter and the father kills the son-in-law. From the plot point of view, the father loves his daughter more than his son-in-law, and loves his son more than his daughter. Such an emotional progression, in the eyes of ordinary people, is a sharp decrease in "morality", and those exquisite images convey a very peculiar closed-loop effect, because in the name of love, we all lose the energy of love.
That muddy, difficult-to-walk cabin in the forest symbolized, at least, the territorial consciousness in Zhong Menghong's heart. It tries to hold on in a destructive way, and Wang Yuyu, who is born as a hero, stands here, and he is in a husband and wife, and everything is impossible to open. He wants to meet God and kill God, meet Buddha to kill Buddha, and finally kill himself.
Many people can't stand Wang Yu's cold body language and thin facial expressions, but I saw from this role the heartbreaking style of Klaus Kinsky in "Akyr, The Wrath of God", and what Klaus Kinsky strives to open up is a territory that is uninhabited, and it is also a soulless person.
Blind Detective
At first, I thought that the appearance of Zheng Xiuwen would provide Andy Lau with visual assistance, and the continuous heating of their emotions, or when they speculated, were described to each other things that they had never seen. Zheng Xiuwen is a memory, Andy Lau is a reasoning, this is naturally not entirely in the distance between their ability to act, this story of beauty to save the hero, the final discussion is that the blindness of the heart is far better than the blindness of the eyes, and the pair of detectives with no heart and no lungs in the film, what they want to explore is the red dust of the heart. The good news is that they are in the mud without staining, and they are muddy and not sinking. Andy Lau often ignores the feelings of Zheng Xiuwen, Zheng Xiuwen cares where Andy Lau will belong, but he is not attached to it, giving a little sunshine a brilliant cuteness, making her invincible.
This is a movie about feelings, and it's also a movie about not having to feel. Du Qifeng did not seem to talk about current politics this time, but it seemed that he was talking about paying attention to current politics, just a unrequited unrequited love. Like "Lost Souls", they are all talking about the loss of the soul, and they are also talking about going to this kind of search notice, which is ultimately futile.
"Van Bode"
In the past decade, Taiwan's most historical film, it starts from the point and the surface, starting from the smallest incision, but it ripples out of the white cloud dog for decades. Cancer is a metaphor, and Luo Dayou's "To the Future Protagonist" is also a metaphor, which can make people think of the time code that Taiwan has passed. But what charms it is another layer of man's relationship with history, walking in the narrative jungle of two-way search for a father, is an uncertain, heavy body with a heavy body, but there is a soul that is lighter than life can bear.
Father and son did not get a dramatic recognition, but from the sound of water droplets slipping, there was a more spiritual recognition of ancestors. Man is a hostage of history, but as long as you travel through it, you can be saved from the kidnapping of the universal ends and thus enter into what Nietzsche called "eternal reincarnation."
Johnny Keck
Moving but not seductive, meticulous but not easily input affection, no attempt to turn triviality into dust, it is the parrot that does not learn the tongue, and what is more pleasant is that no one domesticates those cute birds. Like Xiao Yaquan, the director of "Fan Baode", the director of this film, Huang Xi, also studied under Hou Xiaoxian, and also inherited the open-minded aesthetic that Hou Dao repeatedly practiced, light ups and downs, heavy flow; knowing cold and warm, refusing sorrow and joy, but after all, it is not as conscious as Hou Dao, so that the situation is moving, so that he can glimpse another miracle outside the true nature of life from doing nothing.
Let's say that Hou Xiaoxian's film is not willing to give up day and night, and Huang Xi is more emphasizing that flowing water is not corrupt. He often oscillates between refinement and simplicity, but fortunately, he believes that everything will have a moment of suspension, and the better place is that he does not hold the expectation of a woman looking forward to her fate, but rather calmly waits for the natural rhythm of fate. Affection, friendship and love are more often not used to warm up and quench thirst. This is also very good. It is only quietly proving that you will not be numb, and of course, you will not be blind and try to use the next emotion to complete the ritual of cutting flesh and filling sores.
"Sister Peach"
I have a preference for Xu Anhua, which means that I do not think that she is one of the best directors in Chinese, and I am even more reluctant to add a female character in front of this, her films always bring me some simple worries, some returns after wandering, and some people who know that they cannot do anything. The same is true of "Sister Peach".
The first time I watched "Sister Tao" was the Cantonese version, when the Cantonese "Untitled" echoed in the ears, I lamented that the river of years would eventually dry up. After watching it, I soon met Xu Anhua, and I told her that when I watched this film, the boys cried harder than the girls. Xu Anhua smiled shyly.
I have always thought that Roger is the protagonist, and Sister Tao is a background in his life. The process of sending Sister Tao on the road was not to let him understand what he could do, but to know more deeply what he could not do. Life is finite and can be measured by time, and so is man.
Xu Anhua shot a pulse of warmth, just the right distance. The closest thing between Tao Jie and Roger is the rejection of marriage, which must be hidden in Xu Anhua's own voice. The funny passage between the master and the servant is the brightest place in the whole film.
Andy Lau acted well, he heard Tao Jie's ridicule, his expression seemed to be reflecting, even if he opened his mouth, he fought a beautiful mouth fight. Naturally, a man of such a background and culture as he could not win no matter how quickly he spoke. Both people are a little afraid of loneliness, and there is no way to take loneliness, in the face of loneliness, the class barrier is relaxed, and the illusion of equality of all living beings will quietly come.
"Lang sings a mountain song to the door"
Every film of Zhang Ming puts love in the air, you can breathe, but you can't store it. But as long as it really grows in the heart, it is not afraid of any form, and the form itself becomes the content. Like "Wushan Clouds and Rain", they are all across the river, and there is a rape case that cannot be answered.
I suddenly realized that Zhang Ming's films were often accompanied by alcohol. This time, the drink was the fiercest, and when he drank until he lay on the ground, he did not feel cold, and as soon as his consciousness eased, he continued to drink, the man drank, the woman drank, so the fragment was broken, so the memory could not skim through the most acute senses, and even the humiliation was ambiguous. With the help of the contents of the cup, one hallucination fell down, and another hallucination climbed up again. The essence of love is to flow from one illusion to another.
The most important prop in the film is the piano, by which the two people have a love affair, which was once painted on the table and sold by the father with ulterior motives. In this film about music, it doesn't try to expand our sense of hearing, but rather hovers over how we should listen to our inner voices.
The girl said: There is a song on the other side. Like her lovely father, we actually couldn't hear anything. Her father said he heard it, and he didn't seem to be simply responding to his own daughter, did he really hear it? The desire to be an official, the desire to be with one's sweetheart, and the desire to prepare to leave one's partner are all in the song of nothingness, coming and going.
Roadside Picnic
I don't want to discuss the mysterious and mysterious meanings of "Roadside Picnic" extending from the Diamond Sutra, nor do I want to criticize the crudeness of the hard technology brought about by low cost, or the director's own rush to mobilize language, let alone the clock on the wall, the retrograde train, and the long shot that has to be mentioned. Of course, there are still many fans who are quite concerned about which passages in the film are realistic, which are dreams, and where are their dividing points?
What attracted me most to "Roadside Picnic" was the role of Chen Sheng played by Chen Yongzhong, specifically, his identity. This is a poet of unknown name, a rogue who does not want to show off his might. If these two identities are expanded, I think too many people will flash this belief, that is, if I become a poet or a hooligan, how good it would be. And these two wishes come and go and connect all your fantasies about life. I have seen such poets and hooligans in my life, but in Chinese movies, it is really the first time to see it, and I hope it will not be the last.
"Ara ginger color"
Matsutaga's masterpiece of Daiyin Xisheng caters to my claims for something that may be big or inappropriate about the story itself. That is to say, when the wife's secret is all revealed, the narrative is not framed by this, but there are many more signs of being ready to turn. In a word, such stories are alive and capable of movement.
The wife told her husband about her ex-husband's past and confided in her determination to inherit her long-cherished wish. When the husband heard this, he lay down unusually slowly and unusually tenderly beside the woman whose heart might have been torn in half. The next day, the woman died. In "Assassin Nie Yinniang", Zhang Zhen told her concubine about his longing for Nie Yinniang, and "Ara Ginger Color" is also like this, but the gender is exchanged.
Here, after the secret dissipates, jealousy and the consequent duhmin gradually fade away in the hazy night, and all that remains is endless regret and deep admiration. This is the high-level manner of life that I aspire to, to put it bluntly, it is a person who does not shy away from stating to the person I love most: Who I love more. Too many people's lives are circled and set. And the two partners of "Arajan Color", the love between them is clear, but they are not in a hurry to see the bottom.
"Fanghua"
The dispersal of youth, the double flow of individual and collective, and the mourning of the era drama style are all the paths to "Fanghua", but they still cannot reach its final destination. The end of the film is the same disease, but also more magnificent no regrets. Since we are all in social life, drivers will be passengers, doctors will be patients, and children will one day become parents. You are thus circulating in multiple identities and being replaced, and blindly removing the attributes of the crowd will fall into the cage of pseudo-reality and cannot move, or you will not be able to pull your hair and leave the earth.
It must be admitted that its literary nature is not good enough, the human body is better than the human face, the scheduling of the image is sometimes stiff, or it lacks a sense of flow with time. In consciousness, when it is necessary to speculate, there is often congestion. But it has the most precious thing about this kind of film, and it emphasizes the disillusionment that comes with the performance itself.
There are three most important dances in the film, the first is the best, and the bodies that make our eyes climb are shining. Their bodies are not wrapped in any slogans, directives, they are jumping for themselves to see, but maybe they are imagining that if there is an audience present, they will be infected by them, but at the moment, they are their own audience.
In the last one, they had to perform for a group of people who had been traumatized mentally or physically. They are about to disband, and the grief they bring because of this is really a small witch compared to the audience below. Who is the audience? What if there is no audience? What if you don't give your audience? Fortunately, life is broad enough, or how to live, it is a lifetime. And for the past, just like that photo, someone will tear it up, and someone will collage it for you. In any case, this is a record of the times that never needs to be remembered and will never be forgotten.
The King of New Comedy
Stephen Chow paid tribute to many movies here, the most important of which are two, one is "Soul Break Blue Bridge". This film, which has a very good reputation in China, is mainly responsible for theatrical tasks. "Swan Lake" is the title music of "Soul Breaking Orchid Bridge", in this film, it appears twice, once in the bumpy group performance car, Ru Meng is eating a bowl of rice that is not suitable for her to eat.
The second time, after all dreams were gray, he closed his eyes and rode a motorcycle on a rainy night. This situation is even more a cool portrait of Mara's suicide in "Soul Break Lan Bridge".
If the film only stays here, in my opinion, this is still a warm movie, but Zhou Xingchi, with his characteristic heart, is fierce, and he also pretends to be cloaked in a veil of warm pulse. At the end of the film, It is a dream encouraging a woman who can't get into the industry no matter how she looks, so we can expect another vicious circle to unfold.
Another film is a connotation of meaning, that is, Hitchcock's "Psychopath", and Stephen Chow also parodies the classic bathroom killing. Ru Meng was the most physically derogatory of women here, with a rotten body, loose skin, and the key is that the ass has not been washed. The male director called Tian Tian's spirit, saying that instead of finding such a masterpiece, it is better to personally fight.
Zhou Xingchi's meanness, like that incomplete body, is unobstructed. In the eyes of dreams at home, friends, and peers, they are probably mentally unhealthy. But what is interesting is that her salted fish turned over, and it was only by her schizophrenic acting that she finally reached the ideal boundary. Of course, it also tells the true meaning of some performance, and you can only learn to observe others if you look at yourself squarely.
Zhou Xingchi is a suspicious person, and his doubts in the end are even hollowed out by the doubt itself and the object of suspicion. His film ostensibly says: You can do it. But what he really wants to ask is: Are you okay? When Zhou Xingchi was not proud, he must have often heard such greetings. Now, turning around, he gave this greeting to good men and women who tried to worship as a religion.