Text/Summer Fall
Hello, it's Friday again. Welcome to the weekly movie recommendations, this is summer and autumn.
The movie I want to talk about this week is the horror film "Black Telephone", based on Joe Hill's short story of the same name. You may not have heard much of Joe Hill, but his father's name must have been heard of, that is, horror master Stephen King, who has created and published several best-selling novels, as well as many novels that have been adapted into film and television works. For example, "The Shining", "The Shawshank Redemption", "The End Is Near", "Dead Light", "Miracle in the Green", "No Stars in the Night", and so on.
Well, under the aura of Daddy's bright blindness, how does his son behave? Many people naturally compare this "Black Phone" with "The Return of the Joker", based on his father Stephen King's 1986 best-selling novel "Dead Light", after all, in terms of plot content, it is all about the case of mysterious missing children.
But there are always some differences, as to whether it surpasses Daddy's "Joker Returns", emmmmm... And listen to the breakdown.
"Black Phone" tells the story of a small town in the United States, one after another children disappeared, until a boy named Finney was also kidnapped, and then he was in the basement where he was imprisoned, through the help of a "psychic" black phone, actively launched self-help, and finally killed the kidnapper and successfully escaped.
Thematically, the film should focus on the personal growth of the boy Finney. The film meticulously and comprehensively portrays the whole process of Finney from being timid and cowardly to being alone to bravely killing the "Grabber" child prisoners, and the young actor who plays Finney can be expected to complete this transformation well.
This is one of the strengths of the film, but how to say it, in order to show this advantage, other shortcomings will follow.
First of all, in the advancement of the plot, in order to strengthen the contrast between the boy Finney before and after, the film spent a lot of time to depict Finney's living environment and family background, which is understandable, but it is too flat and straightforward, the general life trajectory of the flow account is introduced, making people look sleepy - you think oh, a horror film is boring, how much...
Even if it is the final Finney's anti-killing climax, the people watching it are not excited, because the front rhythm is not well controlled, the end of the counter-killing has made people lose patience, and the fear of the protagonist's fate has long been exhausted, after all, it can be guessed that the ending must be that the boy can escape smoothly!
As an audience, under the premise of "knowingly watching", what you actually want is those twists and turns, but unfortunately, the film did not do it.
Secondly, in the name of horror films, in terms of creating a sense of atmosphere, the production team can't find elements that make people feel scary in addition to covering the film with a layer of gloomy filters to highlight the atmosphere. Black cars, black balloons, clown masks for child abductors, and basements where children are being held, etc., these props that could have created a horror atmosphere, in the end, only played a simple "decorative tool" value.
The scary highlight that can be said to be a few mouthfuls may be that when the children who were killed before communicated with Finney through the black phone, they were only voice transmission at the beginning, and then the physical image flashed out! When the dead child suddenly appears in the picture, it really frightens people, but it is limited to this rare "jump", and there is nothing else to be afraid of.
Moreover, there is a big problem in the film, which causes the overall plot to be weak and cannot withstand scrutiny. That's the depiction of the "Grabber" child abductor, and to be honest, if it weren't for the ending, I would have looked up the cast and wouldn't have known that the child abductor was played by Ethan Hawke! You can imagine how low the sense of existence of this character is!
It feels like all of his appearances are just to advance the plot, so as to set off the boy Finney's calm and composed response. Every time he went to the basement, he didn't do anything except deliver food and say a few words that didn't hurt or itch, nor did he check the window railing that Wasnell had pulled down, he couldn't see the pit That Finney had dug, and he couldn't detect the wall that Finney had pierced...
Heck, you say, where to find such a kidnapper who doesn't beat people and just comes to see you every day!
But in fact, this villain can portray a lot of points!
For example, the rivalry between him and Finney – why not create some more intense conflict? Isn't the confrontation between the characters, especially the confrontation between the positive and negative sides, the most eye-catching, but also the most able to show the crisis dilemma that Finney is in and the side to foil the growth of the character?
There is also an unfolding depiction of his background/family environment – which not only explains why he became a child captive, but also reinforces his perverted image.
You know, a villain role is well shaped and deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, but it can highlight the "horror" temperament the most...
Well, speaking of which, think of the male protagonist in the "Shining" written by Joe Hill Daddy - look, the same is with an axe to cut people, one is so terrifying that people still have palpitations after watching it, and the other is... Just... How to say it? An axe down, not to mention the taste of horror, blood spatter on the spot to see people calm.
Hey, how can the gap be so big!
Ethan Hawke, why on earth are you trying to take on this film? Such a villain, what is the figure?
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The image comes from the Internet