Preface▻▻▻
Starting from "Crazy Stone", director Ning Hao has been the only ruthless character in the Chinese film industry for nearly 20 years: he is a golden boy and a ghost, every film is the choice of the year, he is good at black humor, and he can always accurately capture the ironic side of contemporary China.
As a result, every new work directed by Ning Hao is a blockbuster topic that the industry and fans are looking forward to.
"Mr. Red Carpet" is another comedy that he and his Bole Andy Lau have promised us for more than ten years, but it is late to this day. Undoubtedly, this is not a movie that tries to please people, it is spicy, narrow-minded, satirical, and "even beats yourself when you are crazy". But it goes without saying that this is an honest work that practices the principle that "the true meaning of comedy is to offend".
How to interpret such a "meta movie", China's chief film critic Sairen, who has been absent for a long time, has something to say.
——Editor-in-chief Xu Yuan
What exactly do we want?
Text/Sairen
About the author: Film critic. I started watching movies at the age of five, and I still don't stop watching them, but I still remember the lights and shadows I have seen.
Whether you admit it or not, since the end of the eighties, we can all say that we grew up watching Andy Lau's movies.
Andy Lau has won the actor many times, but in "Mr. Red Carpet", he is still haunted by the lack of blessing in the acting awards. We can't equate Stephen Lau in the film (that is, the combination of Andy Lau, Tony Leung and Stephen Chow) to the actual Andy Lau. If you don't make a comparison, it seems that there is a cheap and not taking advantage, and it seems to be another itchy and unbearable.
Most of the people only talk about Andy Lau's dedication, and rarely talk about what substantive additions or contributions he has made to Chinese film performances in the film industry for more than 40 years.
(Note: As early as 2006, Andy Lau, the producer of "Crazy Stone", made an appointment with director Ning Hao to star in the latter's new movie, but this agreement was fulfilled after 17 years of going around)
Wong Kar-wai worked with Andy Lau twice, but soon broke off. Andy Lau's attitude in this regard is that he can't afford the too casual and long production process of the king of sunglasses. Wong Kar-wai's statement is more intriguing, in his opinion, Andy Lau is a very sunny person. The subtext of this sentence, I speculate on it, means that Andy Lau is a little simple, at least in terms of performance methods.
Personally, I think the most comfortable time for him to perform is still in Johnny To's movies (Lao Du let him win the Hong Kong Film Awards twice). He plays the urban little love saint, full of childishness, which is what Wong Kar-wai called "sunshine". It does not fully provide a sense of dependence, but it can stimulate the potential of women. And his style of not refusing to come, in fact, allows his naughty energy to have a wider range of freedom.
Andy Lau probably has also heard the discussion of his performance in front of people. The most poignant statement is that it would be much better if he put more of his life skills on performance. In fact, this can only be heard. Whether Andy Lau really has introspection, we have no way of knowing. But an indisputable fact is that his acting skills are getting better and better - especially in "Blind Detective" and "Sister Peach".
In "Mr. Red Carpet", Andy Lau plays Lau Weichi, who is not only the combination of Andy Lau, Tony Leung, and Stephen Chow, but also another person
An interesting phenomenon is that Andy Lau has played a filmmaker many times in various forms. Such as "Forever", "Rescue Mr. Wu", "A Sea of People" and "Sister Peach", this time it is "Mr. Red Carpet".
Sister Tao in "Sister Peach" is actually a background, and what Xu Anhua really wants to say is the filmmaker Li Enlin played by Andy Lau. It is extremely rare that in the face of this real person, the creator is more free than cautious. Andy Lau uses light and even simple performance strategies to interpret the loneliness implicated in the arrogance of the characters with subconscious reactions. As a result, we see that the slightly restrained sitting and enjoying the success echoes in the distance, and the indifference of habit and the warmth of necessity complement each other.
The Hong Kong star Lau Wai-chi, who does not speak Chinese well and has a lot of assistants, is determined to experience life in the mainland and try to be a farmer
Liu Weichi in "Mr. Red Carpet" is like this again, he is cautious, greedy and afraid of burning his mouth. I have enough limelight in my body, but I still feel that my excitement is not big enough. The major turning point in the drama of the whole film is the series of turmoil caused by his release of the video of his fall from a horse.
But Liu Weichi is soft-hearted and kind, he is very easy to talk and very cooperative, he doesn't seem to have much ego. So the question is, as a very important public figure, he is so happy to be seen by people, what kind of self does he want to show? He sees himself on the poster on the side of the road, and thinks that the man who can almost become an image is too fake.
"Viewing oneself" is a recurring plot in "Mr. Red Carpet", which alludes to self-reflection and narcissism and is intended to show that "there is always something wrong with things"
Generally speaking, an actor is willing to stay in the spotlight and receive applause and flowers. It's as if the hot hearts under the screen are waiting for you to heat up. The desire to perform, to put it bluntly, is a desire to control, which is understandable, people eat grains, how can they avoid vulgarity.
The top light of this line is the dual nobility of material and spiritual. They also have the desire to perform and control, whether it is a pre-modern butcher or a post-modern UP master, they are a bit of an old-time magnatal to the show. Seeing this, I really don't know who is raising whom. According to the film, who will be the pig and then come up from a tall building in an unexpected free fall?
(Note: In 2006, "Crazy Stone" was born, and the Chinese film industry gained a ghost horse director, but before "Stone", Ning Hao had already made two slow-paced good works)
The above are some of my thoughts about the producer and star Andy Lau of this film. As for the director of this film, I believe many people have seen a different Ning Hao from "Mr. Red Carpet". The former Ning Hao, in his movies, the amount of information is criss-crossed, and can be used to catch and kill at any time, those people from all walks of life who have firm beliefs but immediately disperse birds and beasts, etc., are only chasing the majesty, and only death is following after the appearance.
And this "Mr. Red Carpet" is completely slowed down, and it waits patiently for the extension of the reflex arc. Ning Hao seems to have left his good place, but if you have watched his early works "Incense" and "Green Meadow", that is, two movies closer to his hometown, you will know that Ning Hao's clumsy coincidence this time is actually a benign return.
This meta-movie is like a teenager who has been away for many years, returning to his former residence in a daze. At the same time, there are more multiple thoughts on the two-way proposition of film and life. The Celestial superstar that he wants and wants is also a projection of Ning Hao himself. To come and go, the final question is: who am I and what do I want.
Ning Hao in "Mr. Red Carpet" plays an art film director who is bent on going to France to participate in the film festival, and his self-deprecation is 100%.
Previously, Ning Hao also had a movie about filmmakers, that is, "Heart Flower Road", which I admired. The van full of movie props made the two men have constant encounters, and Xu Zheng's peach blossom luck started from watching the props. In the climactic paragraph, Xu Zheng and Huang Bo's important means of avoiding danger are to make the prop gun in his hand come in handy. And buying a joy is a very narrow combination of the performance in life and the performance in the drama.
In that movie, everyone is an actor, and real acting is to make us addicted to the virtual. And the best part about it is that all kinds of people are jumping in and out of the dramatic situation. But Ning Hao also told us in his humorous way that there will always be times when we can't act.
And the performance in "Mr. Red Carpet" seems to be about communication as the ultimate goal, but in the end, the communication is all talking to itself. Countless people watch movies in search of their hearts. This is a disguised confession, and to put it mildly, it is a disguised obscenity. There are only other moviegoers, who are listening, who are entering a strange world – if there is a threshold for watching a movie, it is here.
The core expression of "Mr. Red Carpet" is the dilemma of communication between people
In most of today's Chinese films, we seem to have only preconceived ideas to go, and we don't have any mood to watch the after-effects. Performer, I will play whatever you want to see, without having to realize what I am. Viewer, you have to know what I'm thinking, otherwise it's ignoring or even offending. The actor becomes the waiter, and the film becomes a kind of draft that is constantly revised as the mood of others changes.
Because our own lives are not independent enough, we also require that movies that reflect the trajectory of life do not need to be so unconventional. As a result, the film and the audience form a kind of complicity, both eager to be discovered.
"Mr. Red Carpet" is extremely difficult to break through this closed-loop system, but the whole film is still about the story of a grasshopper shaking a tree, in vain.
At the beginning of the film, the empty red carpet is moving expressionlessly, waiting for people to step on, stand, and wait for all eyes to gather. The red carpet before and after this has no scenery at all. Director Ning Hao is like a tour guide, leading us to see scenes that are not beautiful, as if they have nothing to do with our life experience, which also reminds us that the most important moment for those people is outside the red carpet, after they are about to become machines, they can only communicate with those sweeping machines, delivery machines, and robots, but this communication is still fruitless.
In "Mr. Red Carpet", no one is a bad person, but there are no more contradictions and conflicts
Is it fair to say that this is a glamorous movie? Let us stop looking up at the glamorous people who wander in the galaxy. It's also ourselves who it really enchants. None of us really watched the clouds and see the sunrise for a screen illusion as we imagined.
If we say, Stephen Chow's Spring Festival masterpiece "The King of New Comedy" allows us to see what kind of chaotic and blind obedience, restless and cruel, arrogant and empty-eyed, humble and shameful existence is. This is the place where countless people yearn for dreams, there is only the law of the jungle, but there is no true love in the world. If your ideal can only blossom and bear fruit in such a primitive zone, then this ideal, don't do it. "Mr. Red Carpet", which also entered the Spring Festival file, let us see where those lively dreams are, but the dreams are absent, but they rely on this bleakness to continue the pseudo-carnival.
This not only refers to the current film itself, but also covers our increasingly barren spiritual life. The movie is like a magic trick here, someone is performing, and someone will debunk it.
In general, movies will stimulate part of our attention and dissipate our more comprehensive perception. The secret of magic is here, and so is the movie. There are also movies like "Mr. Red Carpet" that correct our illusions and let us know that the water has always flowed like this, and the reality has always been so solid.
Editor/Xu Yuan
Typesetting/Hachiko
THE END