Yesterday, the movie "Keep You Safe" directed by Dapeng was released, which swiped a wave of heat in the circle. March has always been the off-season of the film market, and the film side is well aware of this, but they still choose to go on when the market is relatively cold, which shows that they are still very confident in the film, and hope to make a big splash in the off-season.
"Keep You Safe" is the fourth feature film directed by Dapeng as a director. His first three works are "Pancake Man", "Sewing Machine Band" and "Auspicious Ruyi".
"Pancake Man" allowed him to enter the domestic 1 billion box office directors' club at the age of 33, and although the film achieved great success at the box office, it failed in word of mouth. Some people say that the word-of-mouth reputation of "Pancake Man" has eaten up Dapeng's second work "Sewing Machine Band", but to be honest, although the quality of this work is better than "Pancake Man", it is still not good-looking, and the box office failure is reasonable.
After "Sewing Machine Band", Dapeng's director identity was silent for several years, until the launch of "Auspicious Ruyi" in 2020, which made everyone feel reborn. This time, Dapeng completely abandoned the previous commercial film path, but turned to the literary film track, pointed the camera at his family, and explored the ethics and emotions of the Chinese family in the form of pseudo-documentaries.
If "Auspicious Ruyi" saved Dapeng's previous face in directing bad comedies, then this time "Keep You Safe", Dapeng returned to the commercial comedy track, allowing people to see his obvious progress in directorial expression and technique. The film combines Dapeng's authorial expression and commercial comedy on social issues such as rumors, online violence, and school bullying, and makes it both beautiful and values.
In the film, Dapeng also plays a down-and-out little person - Wei Ping'an, just like his performance in previous works. Wei Ping'an once squatted in prison for lecture qi, and now he is unmarried in middle age, and he makes a living by broadcasting goods and selling cemeteries on the Internet. Such a person, if viewed according to general logic, must be an out-and-out failure, but he is a good person, and he is an idealist who regards "the true feelings of the world" as his life creed.
So, when his client Han Lu passed away and was fabricated with yellow rumors, saying that she was a lady sitting on the platform, causing the cemetery owner to ask Han Lu to move the grave, Wei Ping'an saw that the road was uneven and pulled out his knife to help. The whole film is about how Wei Pingan traces the origin of the rumor of "Miss Sitting on the Platform", and also Han Lu has a clean slate.
Spread rumors with one mouth, refute rumors and run off legs. Wei Pingan's process of debunking rumors shows in detail how rumors are generated and spread. Wei Pingan tried to find the person who first said that Han Lu was the lady sitting on the platform, so he went through and down to find this person, this person said that he listened to that person, and then the person said that it was said by another person... In the end, even Wei Pingan himself fell into new rumors and online violence.
From Wei Pingan's experience of debunking rumors all the way, we can discover many truths about rumors.
Whoever they are can become rumor-makers and spreaders. Wei Pingan checked all the way and found that the spreaders of this rumor were almost all hearsay, involving all ages, occupations, and social classes. And their motive for spreading rumors, in fact, has no motive, may be a casual talk during the chat, not distracted at all, as the lines in the film say, "just eat a melon, we can't commit it." But the terrible thing is that they "unintentionally" participated in the spread of this rumor, which brought great harm to the parties. This is where the horror of rumors lies, the person who says it may not care at all, but countless times it spreads, and the rumor becomes a deep-rooted truth and prejudice in the minds of many people.
Moreover, in the process of spreading, rumors will be distorted and deformed, becoming more exaggerated and serious. This makes up a laugh point that appears several times in the movie. Wei Ping'an was obviously harassed by his ex-husband because his brother's daughter-in-law was harassed, he couldn't look past it, stood up for his brother, and finally led to imprisonment, but it was passed on, and it became "he slept with his brother's daughter-in-law and beat his brother", and then passed it on, and it became even more outrageous "he slept with his brother and beat his brother and daughter-in-law".
When Wei Pingan finally found the starting point of the rumor, he caught the earliest rumor-maker, the netizen "Perfect Display 421". His rumor-mongering motive is also so ridiculous: he actually wants to read online novels for free and accumulate points through comments collections, so he made up a rumor about a lady sitting on the stage to attract attention. Of course, this person is not a big adulterer, but it is this "mediocre evil" that will bring many bad effects to others and society. The so-called do not do evil for the small, this is exactly the truth.
Of course, "Keep You Safe" also has places for laziness and chicken thieves. For example, at the beginning of the film, Han Lu was rumored to be a lady sitting on the platform, so she was asked to move her grave. So what if Han Lu is really a lady sitting on the platform? Can the grave be moved? Although the film also uses the protagonist's mouth to say clearly, even if she is a lady sitting on the stage, the plot development later in the movie still revolves around Wei Pingan returning Han Lu's innocence.
And Han Lu, played by Song Qian, can be said to be full of "beautiful and miserable" skills, young and beautiful, kind and gentle, with a miserable life, poignant love, and died young - where to find such a perfect victim?! Dapeng cleverly bypassed the topic of whether the lady sitting on the platform should be treated differently, and focused on refuting rumors and spreading rumors, which was downgraded by one level in terms of intention and depth.
Of course, for commercial genre films, such expressions are already valuable at present, at least Dapeng still dares to say that he is willing to touch some serious social issues, and it is in a very light and popular style such as comedy.
In addition to Wei Pingan's line, the film also sets a line of Wei Pingan's daughter Wei Mo, which contrasts and echoes between father and daughter. A girl at Wei Motong's school is identified as a thief, and only Wei Motong witnesses the process of the girl being planted, and she wants to tell the truth to her teachers and classmates, but is afraid that the planter will tell the secret that she has a serious birthmark on her calf.
Wang Shengdi, the young actor who played Wei Motong, used to be Pupu in "Hidden Corner", but now he has actually grown so big, and his acting skills are quite good. She accurately interprets the mentality of ordinary people who want to stand up in the face of injustice, but are afraid of getting hurt. Finally, under the influence of her father's debunking behavior, she overcame her inner timidity and cowardice and chose to stand up and tell the truth. She was bullied by the planters after telling the truth, but her coping was very admirable. She did not doubt her behavior in the slightest, but was soberly aware that she had done what she "thought was right", and even if she paid for it, she would not regret it, because she knew that she was right and the other party was wrong.
I even feel that the daughter line is more touching because it is more explicit and pure. Sometimes we don't need a utilitarian motive to do things, but because it's the right thing to do and what should be done. When some viewers questioned Wei Pingan's motives for refuting rumors, did they ever think that maybe he didn't want anything, just a truth and morality?
"Keep You Safe" was very successful in terms of comedy effects, and the laughter in the screening scene that Yi Bloomjun watched was one after another, and everyone watched it very happily. What is especially rare is that Dapeng's comedy effect this time is closely related to the Internet environment we are in today, and the baggage is not a bad terrier, but a fresh meme that keeps pace with the times. For example, the part of the film that enters the horror room to find someone is scary and funny, and it is full of the atmosphere of the times. For the chaos such as the current online UP main letter, Internet celebrities rubbing traffic by unscrupulous means, pink and black wars, etc., the film also made a very humorous display and slight ridicule, which is a little ironic in it, but not so offensive.
There are many familiar faces in comedy in this movie, basically every actor with a name and surname is a well-known actor, and Dapeng has also reconciled them well, and some Yi Jun feels that people who are slightly greasy in other comedies are a lot more sincere and pleasing this time. Especially Li Xueqin, who made her film acting debut, acted naturally and cordially, which was very surprising.
The big and small characters in the film are relatively cute, there are no obvious villains and bad people, like Wei Pingan's ex-wife, the current ex-wife, and Wei Pingan's brother and boss, can be said to be good people with feelings and righteousness, which makes people feel very solid and warm. Therefore, the reason why Wei Pingan can do this righteous act may be because "there is true love in the world."
I hope that such a warm little character comedy can be more and the box office will be better.