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Text|Henk's loneliness
Editor's | Henk's Loneliness
Miyazaki is one of the few well-known animation creators today who still uses the traditional hand-drawn technique.
It is difficult to express or will try to avoid creating exciting and dynamic scenes, so Miyazaki's storytelling method is relatively gentle.
Miyazaki is good at storytelling, and he can not only unconsciously convey the plot of the work to the viewer accurately, but also has a strong ability to accept the advancement of the story.
It can also be relatively successful in instilling the connotation of the story and the creator's ideas into the viewer, so as to achieve the fundamental purpose of the creation and dissemination of the work.
The reason is that reasonable storyline design and clever and realistic character settings are important foundations for its success.
Miyazaki's characters in "Spirited Away" are all based on real life, not only including a variety of characters and levels in real life, but also making reasonable arrangements for characters at all levels from the story development and psychological level.
Therefore, although the unfolding of the story is completely in a magical space, the viewer will not feel that the appearance of the characters is abrupt when watching the film.
To achieve this good effect of penetration, the reasonable setting of the role is the means that must be taken.
The character design and the logical construction of character relationships that are appropriate and consistent with real life can make the viewer not think too much about the magic space when watching the film, so as to shift their attention to the story itself, and then make their thinking unfold with the creator's ideas, and finally get the best telling effect.
Layered character structure
Text is the basic unit that constitutes a story, and the organizational form and constituent elements of the text are directly related to whether the story can move forward, and whether the content that the creator wants to tell and the ideas conveyed can be completely and accurately communicated.
According to the basic principles of text composition, reasonable hierarchical design and appropriate logical relationships are the key points for characters to establish characteristics and shape full characters.
The reason why the plot can develop forward is nothing more than the three major conflicts between characters and the background of the times, characters and characters, and characters and hearts.
The main driving force comes from the conflicts between characters and characters, with large conflicts often carried out by more important characters, and small conflicts given to less important secondary roles or auxiliary roles.
Only in conflict can the relationship between characters be constructed and developed, and only in conflict can the story unfold smoothly.
In Spirited Away, the main characters are generally composed of Chihiro Ogino, Hakuryu and Granny Yu, and these three are the main conflicts that dominate the entire work.
In the story, Miyazaki sets up the Chihiro family to venture into the situation of the gods, which leads to a fierce conflict between him and Granny Yu.
And this conflict also directly led to the Ogino couple being turned into pigs by magic, and directly triggered the adventure and growth of Chihiro alone.
Miyazaki believes that the separation between traditional civilization and modern life is an irreparable fact, and it is no longer possible to achieve a life like a god.
However, it can be reconciled and revised by characters such as Hakuryu and Chihiro, who have a personal taste for both traditional and modern civilization, so as to achieve stable social and cultural development.
Not only does it not exclude Western modern civilization in modern society, but it also does not lose the fundamental place in traditional civilization in the process of development.
According to the logical relationship of the text setting, it is necessary to set up secondary characters and secondary conflicts to supplement the story, and the character setting of "Spirited Away" also follows this rule.
Compared with the few appearances of Grandpa Boiler, Xiaoling can be said to appear with Chihiro for a long time in the play. Although it does not play a major conflict driving role in the play, its full character image and frank character make the viewer unforgettable.
In addition to Grandpa Boiler and Xiaoling, the faceless man and Mother-in-law Qian also played a role that is difficult to ignore in the play.
The Faceless Man is almost always with Chihiro's adventures, and although he does not play a significant role in the promotion of the storyline, he has been around for a very long time.
Although the faceless man has few lines, it plays an important role in conveying some important ideas of the creator and promoting the development of the story in the play, although it is not as important as Bai Long and Granny Tang, but it has irreplaceable significance for the unfolding of the story.
Compared with the faceless man, although the appearance of Mother-in-law Qian is short, it plays a finishing role in the story. Throughout the film, although these secondary characters do not show the violent conflict like the main characters, they do extend the plot and enter a new level through the connection between each other.
Whether it is Grandpa Boiler, Xiao Ling, Mother-in-law Qian, Faceless Man and other characters, they all show Miyazaki's views on human nature and society in their relationship with Chihiro.
In addition to the main and secondary characters mentioned above, there are also characters such as the frog man, the river god, the little young master, the "big root god" and the father service, which enrich the relationship between the characters, and play a role in enriching the story composition, shaping the realism of the scene, and to a certain extent, playing a role in connecting the conflict of the story and promoting the development of the story.
Although the presence of auxiliary characters is not intended to directly contribute to the storyline.
For example, the "Great Root God" does not appear at any other time, except for the cover of Chihiro at the beginning and the appearance of Chihiro bathing the river god later, and finally when Chihiro saves his parents, and it does not promote the development of the story, but its appearance and Japanese gods such as Kasuga God, Otori God, and Bull Onijin God build a rich and authentic Japanese cultural space.
Independent and warm growing environment
The character settings in animation works, in addition to the logical principles of text composition, also need to be set and arranged according to the needs of the storyline development.
The shaping of any character needs to be coordinated with and serve the overall development of the story.
Since the work uses the topic of Shinhide to tell the conflict and contradiction between traditional culture and modern civilization, it is necessary to use a relatively simple and fair and objective carrier as the leader of the viewer, and Miyazaki chose Chihiro Ogino, a child who is still ten years old.
Subsequently, in order to ensure Chihiro's independence, objectivity and impartiality in storytelling, Miyazaki naturally set the role of the lonely Chihiro, which not only adapted to the topic of independent growth, but also laid the foundation for the unfolding of his subsequent series of stories.
The theme of growth runs through the film "Spirited Away", whether it is Chihiro Ogino who is the main character of the film, growing rapidly.
Among them, characters such as Bai Long and Little Young Master are also growing, and even elderly characters such as Granny Tang, who is considered to have solidified their personality, are also growing, so it can be said that growth accompanies everyone all the time.
For Miyazaki, however, the growing up topics he focuses on are based on the complex of traditional civilization and modern society.
Therefore, the character who leads the viewer to linger in it should be a basically impartial and objective character, and a review of all of Miyazaki's works shows that the age of the main characters belongs to the adolescent stage.
Of the nine works that are clearly Miyazaki-style, the vast majority are under the age of 15, while most are around 10 years old.
This also shows that Miyazaki's thinking that people's views and understanding of the world at this age are heartfelt goodness and justice, and once they exceed this age, their own external influences significantly increase, thus losing the connotation of independent growth.
In the growth topic of "Spirited Away", how to let Chihiro's self-growth, let him have his own judgment and recognition ability, so as to stimulate the power of his most original and innocent state has become the basic premise of Miyazaki's plot.
In order for Chihiro Hagino to grow on his own, it is necessary to make the influence of the Hagino couple on Chihiro decrease or disappear.
This naturally also constitutes the fact that at the beginning of the story, the Ogino couple were turned into pigs by Granny Yu due to offending the gods, thus completely distancing themselves from Chihiro Ogino and embarking them on the path of truly independent growth.
summary
Reasonable character setting and storyline cooperation can make the character quickly accepted by the viewer and leave a deep impression in the viewer's mind.
"Spirited Away" is a work that combines adventure and reflection with the theme of growth.
Miyazaki takes a ten-year-old girl as the protagonist of the story, leading the viewer into a realm of a god that is both completely strange and traceable, so that the viewer can complete the growth process and gain a lot with him.
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