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Pixar's new animation Dream Quest is related to the Mexican Day of the Dead theme. This less eye-catching theme and the poor translation (formerly known as "COCO") did not stop the explosion of word-of-mouth in this film, and the current Douban score has remained above nine points, which has surpassed "Flying House" and is on par with "Crazy Animal City" and "Robot Wall-E".
It is said that because "Dream Quest" involves the theme of the undead, Disney is not optimistic about the introduction of this film in China, and has been prepared not to review, but did not expect that the reviewers were greatly moved after watching this film, and directly approved the review and global simultaneous release.
According to Mexican legend before the Spaniard invasion, a person must go through a long journey to the "Mirtán" (Mictlán or Mitlán) after death, and one day of the year is allowed to return to the human world to meet with living relatives and friends, which is the Day of the Dead.
Mexicans believe that death is the opposite of life, a complement to life. Different from the sad and quiet of the Yuan Festival and the Qingming Festival in the Eastern world, mexico's Day of the Dead sweeps away the melancholy mood, and people gather in cemeteries or homes, dancing and singing, eating and drinking, like a big carnival.
The movie "Dream Quest" tells the story of a young boy Mig who owns a large family whose great-great-grandfather is a musician who has left his wife and daughter and never returned, and his great-great-grandmother who has taken up the burden of supporting the family, but does not allow her children and grandchildren to touch music again. Because the little boy Mig loves music, he has a conflict with his family, mistakenly breaks into the world of the undead to meet his relatives who have died for many years, and after some efforts, he finally resolves the misunderstanding between the family that spans life and death.
Dreams and family are the main line of this movie, and the discussion of life and death is a hidden line running through it. Compared with the main line, this hidden line is heavy and mysterious, and it is a place that attracts the author more strongly. Because direct depictions of the afterlife may frighten child audiences, there are not many commercial animations that dare to directly depict the afterlife. For this, the director of "Dream Quest" said this: "Death is a part of life, people always ignore its existence, can't believe it." But one thing is clear, that is, we all have to face it and experience it. This is a harsh and powerful reality, and I'm proud we've never hidden it. "Dream Quest" does a very good job of depicting the world of the undead.
From the world of the undead to the world of the living, you also need to go through the "customs", and the world view design of "Dream Quest" is very interesting.
But let us not be deceived by the joyful atmosphere on the surface of "Dream Quest", under the carnival sugar coating wrapped in the song and dance of the Day of the Dead and the brilliant lights of the world of the dead, there is also a rather heavy connotation - what is true death? How do we deal with the regret of having lost the opportunity to make up for it?
There has been a lot of discussion about the definition of "ultimate death" in Dream Quest, and we mainly talk about "how we should deal with regrets that have been lost and have the opportunity to make up for it".
In these animated works that describe life and death, there is nothing more convincing than "regret".
In "Letter to Peach", Peach once said something serious to her father, and his father died unexpectedly, and Peach never had a chance to make up for it.
In "The Day of the Crow", a couple of lovers are opposed by the family because of their marriage and flee to the deep mountains and old forests to live in seclusion, and then their wives die due to difficult childbirth.
In Dream Quest, Mig's great-great-grandfather left home when he was young and never returned, and his great-great-grandmother forbade his family to mention him and even tore his picture out of the family portrait.
People's imagination of the afterlife, the true meaning of the "Day of the Dead", is actually a kind of mourning for the living, and we have no way of knowing whether the world of the dead really exists, nor do we know whether the dead can receive our hearts. Humanity's fear of death and the unknown is everywhere. The distance between life and death cannot be crossed, and many regrets can only be buried in the bottom of the heart forever.
Perhaps it is precisely because of this that people are keen to imagine a world after death, and the depiction of the world of the undead in the animation becomes a safety bag to buffer this fear and sentimentality, and the regret and irreparable regret in real life have a happy ending in the animation.
In Crow's Day, the dead father can finally be reunited with his wife, and their son finds a new life.
At the end of "Letter to Peach", Peach finally receives a reply from her father.
In "Dream Quest", the great-great-grandfather finally cleared up the misunderstanding and was forgiven, and met his daughter who he missed day and night. (No picture, go to the cinema to see it)
If the theme of "Family and Dreams" is aimed at all audience groups, and the theme of "Life and Death" is aimed at adult audiences, Pixar's "Family Fun" animation can be so successful. In the mastery of psychological rhythm, "Dream Quest" crushes the pain points of adult audiences not lightly, and I think this is probably the reason why many people will cry after watching the movie.
Finally, I would like to conclude with a quote from the Hourglass:
"The dead are not as easily lost as the living, they treasure our love until we too are reduced to yellow earth."
Regarding other animation works depicting the world of the undead, we mainly introduce these films.
one
Crow's Day
The boy and his sternly indifferent father lived in an isolated mountain forest, accompanied by not only birds and beasts, but also the ghosts of people who had passed away, the boy was not aware of the existence of the outside world, until a father broke his leg and was in need of medical treatment, the boy took his father to the town, this was his first entry into human society, for him it was completely like "another world". The boy began to gradually unravel the secret of why his father was so cold to him.
In this anime, death seems to be just a form of life, and people will become a more similar animal in life, they live in the jungle, but they can't speak.
two
"Letter to Peach"
After the unexpected death of The father of the 11-year-old girl Momoko, Momoko and her mother moved to live on the island. Peaches has always regretted and regretted her father's death, because the last words she said to her father broke her father's heart, and Peaches has always kept a letter that her father only had at the beginning of "To Peaches". Life on the island makes Peaches feel lonely, and one day she opens a box in the attic and strange things begin to follow.
Instead of directly depicting the world of the undead, the anime connects the worlds of life and death through three yokai guardians. At the end of the film, Peaches receives a reply from her father from Heaven.
three
Zombie Bride
Victor's parents arranged a marriage for him, and his fiancée was Miss Victoria, a fallen nobleman. Timid Victor is afraid of being ugly at the wedding scene, and comes to the woods late at night to practice the wedding oath, putting the ring on the "dead branch", but he does not expect that this dead branch is actually the finger of the zombie bride who was murdered by her fiancé many years ago, and the zombie bride is resurrected to marry Victor.
This animation should be familiar to everyone, compared with other animations depicting the afterlife, Tim Burton's style is relatively infiltrative. Of course, I personally think that the living world in this film looks more terrifying than the undead world, and the undead world is still very "humane".
shop
"Magic Grandma"
The father of the little boy Doudou is unconscious because of a car accident, and his mother has to put him in the house of his aunt (grandmother), who is very terrible in appearance and temperament, and is a very powerful psychic. Bean bean accidentally broke the seal of a ghost during play, this ghost wants to defeat A-ma through Dou-bean, ask Dou-bean to collect A-Ma's three tears, over time, Dou-bean gradually discovered that A-Ma is actually a very knife-mouthed tofu heart person, the feelings for A-Ma have also changed, but the opponent is getting stronger and stronger, can the ghost finally defeat A-Ma?
Perhaps many people do not know this 1998 Taiwanese animation, "Magic Auntie" has a lot of Taiwanese folk elements, the use of Hokkien dubbing is very interesting, and the dialogue between the hot-tempered Aunt and the deceased is also very interesting. Although the production looks relatively rudimentary now, it is quite good-looking!
five
《Xiao Qian》
Ning Caichen fell in love with the female ghost Xiao Qian at first sight in the ghost city of Guobei County, who originally only wanted to absorb Ning Caichen's Yang Qi contribution to her grandmother, but accidentally saved Ning Caichen's life. Subsequently, the famous ghost hunter Yan Chixia came, and Ning Caichen also sacrificed his life to save Xiao Qian, and voluntarily followed Xiao Qian to see her grandmother. When Grandma wanted to absorb Ning Caichen's Yang Qi, Xiao Qian found that she was also in love with Ning Caichen, and ran away with Ning Caichen, one person and one ghost mountain alliance sea oath, meet and reincarnate and continue the good relationship, but there are many obstacles ahead of them.
The 1997 animation "Xiao Qian" chose the famous "Nie Xiao Qian" in "Liaozhai Zhiyi" as the background of the story. This animation may be a childhood memory for many people. Xu Ke has made the movie "Ghost of Qiannu", and it can be noted that the screenwriter and producer of this animation film are also Xu Ke.
(Old rules, Xiao Bao has helped everyone collect the above animation resources, students who want to see it can see Oh ~)