Any film with numbers in the title will cause great repercussions, numbers, not only record the process of human society, but also regulate the development of human society, it may only be a recorded symbol, may be some kind of hint, a symbol, the number has infinite charm, of course, the number will also produce great panic, perhaps it is for these reasons, those with numbers as the title of the film will achieve unprecedented success. This seems to be beyond the scope of the film's explanation, so what kind of implication does the number have to the audience?
The writer Toh Carlisle said that numbers speak for themselves. When everything in the world is quantified and regulated by numbers, we have every reason to believe in the correctness of this famous saying. But Cha Grosvenor also said that numbers don't fool people, but scammers play the numbers game. So, in the world we live in, what do the numbers really represent, are they the standards that regulate the world or the tools that scammers use to regulate the world? In any case, numbers are closely related to our lives, and it is an indisputable fact that I cannot do without numbers, which is also included in movies, and this entertainment industry often uses numbers to regulate our thinking, numbers, a kind of preconceived hint.
In the titles of many films, the number is first and foremost a definite number, and when we watch these films, we tend to look for the corresponding person or thing in the film according to the number in the title. For example, "The Thirteen Taibao of Shanghai Beach", which is the representative work of the martial arts master director Zhang Che in his later years, the thirteen Taibao represents the thirteen good and evil characters in the old society of Shanghai, and the audience will gradually look for the traces of these thirteen people as the plot develops. Although each person's appearance time is extremely limited, it is undeniable that the director has made a film from a male perspective through these thirteen people, which makes people look very enjoyable. In this film, the director obviously borrows from classical Chinese novels such as the one hundred and eight generals in "Water Margin" who summarizes a group in numbers, which makes the audience extremely impressed.
The thirteen characters in "Shanghai Beach Thirteen Taibao" appear one by one, although they are all distinct, but the connection between them is very lacking, "Eleven Arhats" and "Eight Beautiful Pictures" are completely different, the characters in the play are almost simultaneous, the connection between them is also extremely close, their cooperation and their relationship with each other has become a great attraction in the story, similar to Akira Kurosawa's "Seven Samurai", although the seven samurai have different personalities, But the sense of responsibility they have shown is extremely admirable. This kind of film saves the audience the opportunity to look for because the characters appear almost at the same time, so the concept of numbers is not so strong, in other words, the theme of the reaction of the seven samurai and the eight samurai can be the same, but why must the number "seven" be chosen? I am afraid that this is not unrelated to the connotation of culture.
Whether in the East or the West, the fascination with numbers can be expressed in a few works. In the East, almost every singular number has its own inherent cultural heritage, throughout any work, the things that are given to these numbers are also extremely diverse, so it is not difficult for us to understand the origin of the names of books such as "Three Heroes and Five Righteousnesses" and "Little Five Righteousness", and this traditional digital power has also affected modern film works, so rather than saying that the number in some titles is a definite number, it is better to say that these numbers carry a cultural connotation. For the West, one of the most impressive numbers is "13".
Westerners' taboo against the number "13" is universally recognizable, probably because of the Christian crucifixion of Jesus or some ancient Greek legend, and it is precisely because of this problem that any film with the number "13" in the title is inseparable from words such as "thriller". For example, the most famous series of films in the West, "Friday on the 13th", this set of films obviously gives the audience a hint from the title, and it is this hint that has always influenced the audience's mood when watching the movie, which is a psychological process of both fear and expectation, so the series has achieved unprecedented success. Similar films, such as "Blood Spatter 13" and "Thirteen Steps", and even Hitchcock's "Thirty-Nine Steps", etc., have a psychological connection with "13". Such figures as 666, the day of the birth of the devil, and so on, and the corresponding films are too numerous to mention.
In fact, some numbers will receive great attention in both the East and the West, such as "five". In the West, the fear of "five" is mainly reflected in time, such as the above-mentioned "Friday on the 13th", which is also called "Black Friday" in the West, so the number "five" in the title of Western films is generally accompanied by "week". In the East, especially in China, there is a sense of supreme worship for the "five", such as "Five Tiger Generals", "Five Kui" and other films. With the increasing and deepening of the exchange between the East and the West in modern society, this understanding of the concept of numbers will become global, so we as Orientals will naturally know that "Friday on the 13th" will naturally know that this is a horror film, so the hints of numbers have also reached a global situation. In this regard, a small number of Japanese films have tried to directly use Western digital concepts, such as the film "Neighbor 13" and other films.
Although most of the numbers mentioned in the above title have a deep cultural content in it, they are ultimately some definite numbers, at least in the process of telling the film, you will find the origin of these numbers, or refer to the number of people and things, or refer to a specific time, number and so on. But in some films, these numbers are completely false, and you can't understand the origin of this number from the screening of the film, such as the French film "400 Strikes", which does not have any topic related to the number of 400, so the use of this number is confusing. But if you know French folklore, you will know that the so-called "400 blows" actually means that the child will be punished 400 times, which is a measure of punishment. Therefore, the number 400 has absolutely no definite meaning in this film, but only borrows a common saying.
There are many cases in which numbers appear in the title with a kind of uncertainty, most of which do not actually have a certain cultural connotation, but are just a quantitative accumulation. Titles such as "Hundred" and "Thousand" only indicate the accumulation of quantity. For example, "House of a Thousand Corpses", "Girl Hundred Cuts" and so on. Of course, some films contain a definite number in the title, but when the audience watches the film, that definite number becomes an imaginary number, and maybe you can only see all the imaginary numbers converge into a real number. For example, "First Love 50 Times" and so on, the specific numbers in the title of the film are actually false, and they are not reflected in the film, or only a few shots are taken, and the rest is the specific plot of one or two times presented in front of the audience.
In summary, when a film contains certain numbers in the title, these numbers are either certain numbers, or with a certain cultural connotation, or with a certain folklore background, or just a simple hint of quantity, but in either case, the number is extremely tempting for the person watching the movie, perhaps human beings are born with a sensitivity to numbers, so this kind of film has a certain opportunity with the unpredictability of numbers. But it is undeniable that the so-called implication is that the film relies on the influence of the number itself in people's minds, but in fact there is a type of film that has caused the impact of the number on the human psyche due to the success of the film, such as the British film "28 Days of Shock".
The number 28 is far less mysterious in Western countries than 13, but when the film "28 Days of Shock" was released, this number had a new horror hint, and the concept of time emphasized everywhere in the film was frightening, so people unconsciously included the number 28 in their own inner taboos. In the film "The Eighth Day", people who watch the film cannot help but think about another world of thinking that exists seven days a week. Also causing thinking is the film "21 grams", people are going to die, so what does the missing 21 grams mean? And can the mind be carried by the actual weight? Numbers, here no longer have a concept of quantification, but instead a kind of metaphysical thinking.
When the numbers hint at the audience's film content, when the film imposes numbers on the audience's heart, when the numbers transcend the film and become a metaphysical problem, we find that the world in our eyes, including ourselves, has been standardized, or is being regulated, or trying to regulate, it is difficult to say whether such a thing is good or bad, but in any case, the use of numbers in the title of the film reflects the most real side of the world, so, The audience watched various films under the guidance of the numbers, felt various norms that had or will exist, and enjoyed such ways of thinking, and fell into the director's hints. As Cha Grosvenor said, numbers don't fool people, but scammers play numbers, so we play numbers with the director.