It has been almost a year since the death of Tibetan director Wanma Tseden, and many people mourn him by saying that "the story is only half told".
Recently, his posthumous work "Snow Leopard" was finally released, but the theater schedule was not optimistic, and on the third day of release, the box office was only 1.1 million.
Earlier, when "Snow Leopard" was shortlisted for the Venice Film Festival, many people were brushing the real "cheese snow leopard" stalk everywhere. This is a disrespect to Wanma Tseden and film creation.
"Snow Leopard" is Wanma Tseden's eighth Tibetan-language film, inspired by a true event. On the Tibetan plateau, a snow leopard bites a herdsman's sheep to death, and everyone has a fierce disagreement over whether to "punish" or "release".
This matter has always lingered in Wanma Tseden's mind, and in the film he hopes to explore a story about human nature and spirituality, life and faith, survival and rules.
From the small to the big, man and nature, herdsmen and snow leopards, who has broken into whose world? This question is worth entering the theater to find the answer.
When it comes to the new wave of Tibetan cinema, Wanma Tseden is definitely an inevitable name.
After graduating from Beijing Film Academy that year, Wanma Tseden took a maverick national perspective and worked silently on the front line of Chinese films for many years, making pure Tibetan films, breaking the public's stereotype of the Tibetan people.
2019's "Balloon" is unpopular and amazing, and it is also a movie I like very much, it has been shortlisted for dozens of international film festivals such as the Venice International Film Festival and the Toronto Film Festival, so let's talk about it today.
Before Balloon, Wanma Tseden was better known for his 2015 Talo and 2018's Killed a Sheep.
His novels and film works use affectionate brushstrokes to delicately describe the customs and customs of his hometown.
Because of these beautiful words and images, the mystery of life in Tibet has been slowly revealed.
The famous Tibetan writer Tashi Dawa once commented: "Wanma Tseden has created the peak of Tibetan films and novels in Gemini. ”
【1】
"Balloon" is set in Tibet, where Zhuoga is an ordinary woman who is raising three sons with her husband Dajie. The family lived a poor but warm life with their son's grandfather.
One day, Zhuo Ga timidly took a car to the town's health center. The doctor she was looking for came to see her, but Zhuo Ga refused the male doctor's kindness to see him and insisted on waiting for the female doctor to come back:
It turned out that Zhuo Ga wanted to find Zhou Cuo to help her with the ligation operation: "The ligation saves trouble, and you don't have to worry about it anymore." ”
The female doctor was suspicious: "Didn't I send you a condom?"
Zhuo Ga blushed and smiled sweetly: "It's all used up." ”
The female doctor then couldn't help but tease her: "Is your family a breeding sheep? ”
Unfortunately, the condoms in the clinic were all distributed, and the female doctor took out the last private collection from the drawer and handed it to Zhuoga.
When Zhuo Ga returned home, he pressed this important condom under his pillow. Unexpectedly, it was turned out by two naughty little sons and played with it as a balloon.
They used "balloons" to exchange whistles with their neighbors, and when the younger sons were stubborn on the grassland, Dajie took the eldest son out and returned the borrowed rams to his friends.
The phone rang, and suddenly came the bad news that my father had passed away. The family was so grief-stricken that they organized the funeral for their grandfather.
After the funeral, Dajie took his eldest son to visit the most respected local guru, who told him that his father's soul would be reincarnated and reincarnated into their home.
At this time, Zhuo Ga became pregnant.
In the 90s of the last century, the family planning policy was vigorously implemented in Tibet, and they were fined money for rebirth, and raising three children at home has made it very difficult for them.
But Dajie, who is pious and superstitious, believes that this child is the reincarnation of his father, and resolutely refuses to allow his wife to induce labor.
Zhuo Ga is very contradictory: the implementation of policies, economic pressure, the pain of childbirth, the lack of educational resources...
The weight of all this made her really not want to have a fourth child, and the originally loving and harmonious husband and wife had irreconcilable contradictions.
The core ink point of "Balloon" lies in the social tragedy of Tibetan women who are unable to control their own destiny, and the director is very restrained in his expression, using "the slaughtered ewe at home" as a metaphor for the dilemma faced by Zhuoga.
In order to provide for the eldest son in the family to study, Dajie rushed into the sheepfold and dragged a ewe fiercely, ready to sell it.
Zhuo Ga was puzzled: "This ewe usually looks quite honest, what are you pulling it for?"
The husband frowned: "What's the use of not producing lambs, being honest." ”
【2】
After discovering that she was unexpectedly pregnant, Zhuo Ga did not want the child, but her decision was unanimously opposed by her family.
Except for Dr. Zhou Cuo, no one understands the pain of female birth, including her own sister.
Her sister, who had escaped into the void, advised her: "Since the undead have chosen your body, how painful it is for him to refuse his birth." ”
Her husband Dajie accused her: "How good the old man was to you when he was alive, how can you be so conscienceless." You witch, you will be punished. ”
The eldest son also pleaded with her: "Mom, grandpa was the best to me when he was alive, please give birth to this child." ”
It's her womb, but she can't say it herself.
Luckily, we ended up seeing the rise of Tibetan women's sense of independence in the film.
Dr. Zhou Cuo persuaded Zhuo Ga to take away the fourth child: "We women did not come to the world to give birth to children, women in the past gave birth to five or six, so hard, why do you want to? Look at me, just one child, in addition to being easy for themselves, the child can also enjoy a good education." ”
And that "balloon" is one of the most important clues in the movie.
It has strung together family planning, educational resources, women's awakening, the concept of reincarnation, and other grand issues in Tibet.
In the film, the people in Tibetan areas struggle to live in the concept of division, and the director accurately captures this contradiction with the language of the lens, and the shock and thinking caused by it are long and eternal.
Dajie sold the ewes that did not produce lambs to the butcher, and only barely made up the tuition fees of his eldest son Jiang Yang, and after learning that his mother was pregnant again, at the school gate, the eldest son said sensibly: "Abba, I don't want to continue studying." ”
Dajie was a little helpless, but he also understood his son's sensibility and asked him to stop worrying about family affairs.
The lack of material and educational resources has forced many Tibetan families to make similar decisions, while at the same time, they are struggling to live in the divisive ideas between tradition and modernity, religion and self.
At the beginning of "Balloon", the old father saw Dajie riding a motorcycle, and he thought it was strange: "Why don't you ride a horse? Can this car be faster than a horse?"
The family sat around the house to eat and watch TV, and the program was introducing IVF, and the grandfather scolded his grandson to turn off the TV and not watch it.
Because "IVF" is the "end of the world", the grandson had to patiently explain to him: "That's science".
Grandpa then said: "Science science, people nowadays don't know what they're thinking." ”
【3】
The movie is a very unexpected thing for Wanma Tseden, and many of the stories are also based on his own upbringing.
In 2006, Wanma Tsedan's debut work "Quiet Mani Stone" was released. The film was the first local film directed by a Tibetan director for the first time in China's century-old film history, and was called the purest work of Chinese cinema at the time, and also won the Golden Rooster Award for Best Director's First Film.
The little lama full of curiosity is attracted by the TV program, between secular life and religious life, between local culture and foreign civilization, the little lama is novel but confused, compared to the religious spirit that adults are highly concerned about, the most curious thing for children is actually the Monkey King in "Journey to the West", "Wealth is like the dew on the tip of the grass, and life is like a candle in the wind." ”
And 2015's "Talo" won the Golden Horse Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, the first black-and-white film in Tibetan, and the epitome of the inner confusion of Tibetan youth.
The story depicts Talo, a shepherd who wants to serve the people, and later changes his environment and mentality after coming to the city. As an honest and single shepherd, Tharlo can memorize Chairman Mao's "Serving the People" in Chinese, he remembers everything, but no one remembers him, and he has always been called "pigtails".
In the process of going to the county to apply for an ID card, Talo met the barber girl, the barber girl awakened the silent love in his heart, the two lingered all night after singing and entertaining in KTV, and then the barber girl instigated Talo to sell the sheep and go to other big cities with the money, when Talo took the 160,000 yuan from the sale of sheep and handed it to the barber girl, the barber girl shaved off Talo's pigtails and disappeared.
In the end, Talo, who kept to himself, was empty of people and money, and not only could not get a new ID card, but also lost his original identity and beliefs, and at this time, he naturally could no longer religiously recite "Serving the People".
In the above-mentioned "Balloon", Wanma Tseden uses the joys and sorrows of a family to reflect the life of the entire Tibetan area in the 90s.
Seeing the big from the small, in fact, it is a bit similar to Wang Xiaoshuai's "Long Time and Long Days".
Everyone in the movie is not living an easy life, a heavy burden is pressed on their hearts, and the joy is just a flash in the pan, leaving a long struggle of 30 years. Everyone is depressed, but they live with tenacity and always have kindness to life.
Wang Xiaoshuai is always most concerned about the people themselves, he said: "I think good creations have the element of humanistic care, some people pay attention to the poor life of the bottom, some people pay attention to the extravagant upper class, for me, the camera should be aimed at ordinary people, they are the fabric of this society." ”
In the past few decades, China has changed so much that many things are gone, many things are disappearing, memories are disappearing, and even the inheritance between each generation has been severed. But in this process, the recording of changes and the expression of people's emotions are always lacking.
What Wanma Tseden does is record and express.
What is very precious is that the audience will not see a sense of curiosity in his expression, and Wanma Tseden has always been a calm observer, expressing the most authentic, pure and profound Tibetan stories and culture from the perspective of Tibetans.