Everyone has a dream. No matter how poor life is, no matter whether this dream is clear and strong in your heart.
In Russia, in a small seaside town, there lived three 18-year-old boys who lived in poverty and occasionally did petty and evil deeds. Poverty makes their lives monotonous, and they share a common desire: to leave the humble town and find a better life.
They went to a large coastal city, saw in the window an expensive GUCCI suit, this set of noble and mature suits, and suddenly grabbed them and made them decide: buy it at any cost.
The reason why they can't afford this suit is that they think it is a symbol of maturity and success, which allows them to fulfill the dreams of the adult world - when we don't know what the dream is, don't we all have such imaginations and desires?
Later, after all the efforts, they finally got this suit.
The first child, because he loved his mother, put on a suit to find the father who had been evading responsibility, but when he woke up, his father left him on the ship that did not know where he would take him - the suit full of dreams could not give him the temperature of his dreams;
The second child is dissatisfied with his father's attitude towards the young stepmother and with what his stepmother has done. But when he put on his suit and tried to prove his strength, his debauched stepmother put him in a state of embarrassment. The suit is worn on his body, but he still can't find his emotional landing point between his father and young stepmother;
The most silly and straight third young man fell in love with a fish girl, but in the suit, he just felt a smile of life, and was taken away by his love enemy.
In the end, the two remaining children left the town by boat. The suit that once held their dreams was worn on a madman who led a goat all day.
Looking at the ship that slowly left, we don't know where the two children will go, nor do we know where their dreams are in the heavy fence of reality?
This is the Russian film "Suit", which was released in 2003.
In 2003, Russia had not yet woken up from the pain and chaos of the split. The mood of not knowing where the future lies pervades the entire nation. Where will this country go and where is the hope of this nation?
No one says it clearly, and neither does this movie.
Not being clear doesn't mean there is no moving power.
The first thing that impresses this movie is its story structure, the dreams and lives of the three young men, whether it is the dependence and sincerity of their mother, or the wandering confusion between their own inner morality and innocent lust, and the fiery and straight for pure love, are all presented in a simple and natural narrative. They are naïve, happy and lively, but under the happiness, the faint sadness in their hearts, the deep restlessness, and the desire to get rid of poverty and monotonous small town life are as bright and dazzling as the red roofs of the town.
The smooth editing technique connects the stories of several young people with the fate of a very natural connection, just the right music makes the film full of warm sentimentality, although there is not much public expression and conflicting plot, but three young ordinary and stirring hearts, the struggle and desire for the dream of youth, but bloom a kind of burning power.
At the end of the film, the boat carrying two young people who finally left the town slowly left, and the film uses a long lens of several minutes to watch the departure of the ship, in those few minutes, the old ship carrying the dream of youth gradually drifts away in the textured picture, but the confusion of youth and the innocent sadness are swept in the moving music, making people unable to calm down for a long time.
Another attraction of the film is its mirror style, which will make you involuntarily stay for it at the moment of opening - the pale and somewhat barren town, under the bright sun, is filmed like an oil painting, the white gray architectural tone exudes a russian poetry, and the occasional red roof that jumps out brightly reveals a faint sadness.
It should be said that it is a very strange visual feeling: sadness flows under the bright sun. And this sadness is soaked in a kind of quiet gaze. The small town buildings, the blue rivers, the colorful costumes, the real family environment, all in this quiet gaze, with a faint tone to show a life, a somewhat depressed, not poetic, and a shallow longing and somewhat overwhelmed life.
This kind of gaze reminds me of the kind of gaze of the famous director Sugunov on the ancient city of St. Petersburg in another Russian film "Father and Son Obsession", which has been interpreted in many ways, and my understanding is that in the quiet gaze, the quiet and deep beauty expresses the director's deep attachment and reluctance to the land of the motherland. The ambiguous and inexplicable relationship between father and son in the film is actually the relationship between the director himself and the land.
If we still follow this thread to reflect on the movie "Suit", perhaps we will ask: What does that suit represent? Why is the dream of three children an imported product from the West?
Also, why does the first child have to find his father? In "Father and Son Obsession", the father is his own root and a symbolic symbol of the motherland. Can it still be interpreted in "Suits" in this way that the search for a father is actually the nation's search for its roots after ten years of dissolution?
And the stepmother, can it be seen as a symbolic symbol of the national system before the dissolution? She didn't belong to the family in the first place, and eventually left them.
Therefore, this nation can only find its hope like the third child looking for its own love, but this love is ultimately an illusion.
Therefore, those two children can only leave their roots and find their dreams. Where is the dream? Looking, there is always hope.
This is just a personal interpretation. In today's busy and tense day of replacing dreams with wealth and success, we who are accustomed to using the stimulation of American blockbusters to meet visual needs, many of us have forgotten that Russia was also a film power before the dissolution, and the innate artistic tradition and romantic temperament make their films always have a romantic and melancholy atmosphere, which is always infiltrated with a kind of thinking about reality and society.
Even without discussing the film's objective reflection and realistic concern for the mental state of Russian society. The confusion and confusion in the hearts of those three young people, as well as the hot and confused dreams of youth, will still emit a dazzling light against the background of the town under their own feet.
And the director's attention to the dreams of youth and the focus of this attention are also particularly moving. It is a bit like the domestic movie "Kidnapping Karajan" that I watched a long time ago, in addition to the technique, the director's eyes are more attractive.
Douban gave the film a high score of 8 points, which is enough to prove its excellence and weight.
At the end of "Suit", the young man who can't find his dream goes to a distant place by boat, what is in the distance? Even though we are accustomed to using "poetry and far away" to express the yearning for life in our hearts, we can rarely say what kind of dream is far away?
And we just need to remember, look, there is always hope. Like the famous saying: ideals always have to be. What if it happens?
The more important significance of this film is to let us see a tradition of Russian cinema: film, should be a wait-and-see view of life and the heart.