Time Contributor | County Howe
Older youth in a cinema.
Domestic rating 9.2, IMDb 8.5, Japanese net score 4.6 (out of 5.0).
Finally, the memory of a generation's youth is on the big screen today.
Slam Dunk
At present, the film's domestic box office in Japan is as high as 13 billion yen, and the total domestic pre-sale box office has reached 115 million yuan, surpassing "Lingbud Journey" to become the pre-sale box office champion of imported animation in Chinese film history.
The national zero point field box office exceeded 21 million yuan, and won the box office championship of Chinese film history animation film zero point field.
In the Japan Academy Awards presented last month, this film beat "Suzuya Journey", "Dog King" and "Sea King: Red-Haired Singer" and other films to win the Best Animation Award.
Japanese audiences praised the film for exceeding imagination and not losing to the TV version.
Some female audiences even described their daughters in the theater: We are now at the entrance of youth!
All because this is Slam Dunk.
Want to feel that way
On April 15, the film team of "Slam Dunk" held a Chinese premiere at Peking University.
4,000 people gathered to watch the movie, and the formation made Japanese and South Korean netizens shout surprise.
Such a scale, hidden in it, is a sense of ritual to recall the blood of youth, and in the years when "Slam Dunk" accompanied everyone, the sense of ritual has never been lacking.
In December 2004, the total sales of the Slam Dunk manga exceeded 100 million copies, and the author Inoue Yuhiko spent two days in an abandoned middle school classroom drawing "Ten Days Later" on 23 blackboards in chalk to complete the ending of the manga.
Three days later, Inoue erased the blackboard painting.
When Jordan Brand co-branded with "Slam Dunk", the sneakers also drew the scene of Sakuragi Hanamichi's rehabilitation after the ending.
These cool linkage ceremonies prove that Inoue Yuhiko hopes to convey the youthful and enthusiastic manga spirit of "Slam Dunk" in more dimensions.
Nowadays, movies have become a completely new channel (or way of playing).
The "Slam Dunk" movie is the directorial debut of Yuhiko Inoue, and he is to movies, just as Sakuragi Hanamichi is to basketball, although they are humbly called "laymen", but they show great talent in them.
The film began planning more than 10 years ago.
Initially, Inoue Yuhiko wanted to participate in the production of the film just to make manga fans feel familiar, but later he decided to become a director from the perspective of both readers and audiences.
During the production process, he realized that comics can be the solitary creation of one person, but the film must be the collaboration of a group of people.
Inoue Yuhiko, who joined the basketball team in high school, promoted the details of the film based on experience (such as the way the feet step on the ground, the instantaneous reaction of the body, etc.), and because of the huge difference between the screen and the book format, a large number of jokes and monologues presented in the box form of the original work were deleted.
At the same time, he abandoned the TV version style and completed the film animation with "three shades two" (presenting 2D hand-drawn texture with 3D modeling, such as "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse"), CG technology, etc., which is visually subversive for comics and TV fans.
In the choice of voice actors, theme songs, and background music, compared with the TV version, this movie version is also a big change, so it has also caused a lot of controversy.
But in Inoue's view, he is also based on the imagination of the voice of the comic characters, from the thick and thin voice, high and low, husky, thick and other texture levels, to find the right person, which will not erase the memory left by the manga.
In terms of all parts of the production, the "Slam Dunk" movie is both in line with the comics and subverts the stereotypical impression of fans on the audiovisual side.
This is what Inoue wants.
As "a brand new life", the movie is the same as the comic book from its roots, but he hopes that the audience will have such an exclamation after watching the movie -
I know "Slam Dunk", but this is the first time I have seen such "Slam Dunk".
From Sakuragi to Miyagi
"Slam Dunk" comic has a total of 31 volumes, and volumes 1-22 are animated, and this movie version is the first time that the national competition is presented after nearly 30 years of TV version.
That is, the fierce battle between Xiangbei VS Mountain King in the comics.
More importantly, the protagonist this time was changed from Sakuragi Hanamichi to Miyagi Ryota.
In the manga and TV version, Sakuragi has a flamboyant personality and amazing skills, and is a well-deserved protagonist, Kaede Rukawa, Takeshi Akagi, and Mitsui Shou are also impressive, only Miyagi, as a second-year student, is sandwiched in the middle and has a relatively weak sense of existence.
For example, in the drill match between Xiangbei and Green Wind High School, Green Wind's team members mentioned Akagi, Sakuragi, and Rukawa all over again, but Miyagi was not mentioned, which shows that in the eyes of opponents, Miyagi is often ignored.
However, Miyagi, who is only 168cm tall, is known as "Kanagawa's chief guard", and its speed is known as "electric stone fire".
In the TV version of the ending of Xiangbei VS Sho Ling, Miyagi also raised the question of "how can everyone forget my existence", and contributed a very wonderful blocking action, and there was also a near-perfect cooperation with Rukawa Kaede.
Promoting the most neglected member of the Five Tigers of Xiangbei to the current protagonist position of the "Slam Dunk" movie, this is also the adventure of Yuhiko Inoue, and it also represents a change in his creative mood.
Inoue was 23 to 29 years old and serialized the "Slam Dunk" manga in "Weekly Shonen Jump", and he admired pure, genius characters at a young age.
But now, Inoue is 55 years old, his vision has widened, his thoughts are heavier, and the background of life he wants to dig into is more complicated.
Miyagi's dedication to the art of "Little Transparency" is more in line with the growth process of an ordinary person than Sakuragi and Rukawa.
This time, Inoue also spoke very deeply about Miyagi's native family.
Miyagi lost his father at a young age and later lost more relatives, which caused him to be unable to be as wanton as Sakuragi or as calm as Rukawa, and he could only carefully guard the only basketball dream in his life in the indulgence and self-soothing of his pain.
When such a backstory penetrates every minute of the court, we see that Inoue's depiction of basketball teenagers no longer stops at youth and blood, but extends to the precipitation of life and destiny.
It just so happens that the first fans of "Slam Dunk" are now middle-aged, and entering the national competition of Miyagi as the protagonist from their perspective is both to make up for the regrets of the TV version of that year and to re-gaze at this enduring basketball story.
For fans of Sakuragi and Rukawa, the film is equally fascinating.
Because in addition to the change and re-creation of the literary drama, the film did not destroy the overall structure and details of the comic to the national competition.
Every movement of the five tigers of Xiangbei in the arena did not disappear, but was amplified and inscribed with the help of audio-visual and white space.
Only heartbeat drums remain
Speaking about the film, Inoue said that as he gets older, his perspective on capturing characters increases.
Talking about the characters in the film, Inoue told the audience that they are ordinary high school students, which is the most important thing.
Therefore, the film uses a lot of space to shape how basketball teenagers walk from life to the court, so as to add thickness to the field.
And that doesn't stop Inoue from showing his limits on the field.
"Slam Dunk" presents basketball games no less immersive than "Wrestle! Presented by events of classic sports films such as "Daddy" and "The Killing of Munich" (Russia, 2017).
In sports movies, like musical films (such as Bohemian Rhapsody), the best thing to do is to unreservedly bring the audience into the "real scene".
Slam Dunk even builds on this to create a completely different and top-notch approach.
What this refers to is that at the last moment of the game, the score of Xiangbei and the mountain king is glued and entangled, the film suddenly pulls off the background music, the picture rotates in the attack and defense of both sides and the rapid overlap of countless faces, and there is only the sound of time racing against time on the scene, and-
Heartbeat drumbeat!
At the back, it is completely stationary.
In the last few seconds, Kaede Rukawa unexpectedly completed a surprising match with Sakuragi Hanamichi, and the high-fives of the century between the two followed!
It has to be said that this treatment of director Inoue and manga artist contains more power than any previous two creations on the Internet.
We will also be shocked by the shock of holding our breath, and sighing that after more than twenty years, they and we have finally come to this moment.
So, for "Slam Dunk" fans, the emotional power created by this movie through the field and inside the arena is quite huge.
For newcomers who have never touched Slam Dunk, the world of "The First Slam Dunk" created by Inoue is enough to make it easy to enter and immerse yourself in it.
Whether it is "Gorilla" Akagi re-understanding his desire to dominate the country, or Sakuragi's phrase "My most glorious moment is now", or the protagonist of this film, Ryota Miyagi, finally relies on the competition to get out of the shadow of life.
In the world of "Slam Dunk", it means the end of one period of youth and the beginning of another.
And we are the witnesses and participants of the alternation of youth.