Whenever I think back on this movie, I think of the image of blingbling, even if at the end many people will cry and can't help themselves.
Probably because of the small number of readings, the death of the heroine Matsuko makes me both happy and sad. It is sad because of the passing of matsuko, but fortunately, matsuko is finally liberated and does not have to suffer worldly suffering anymore.
This is a 2006 movie that has been released for more than a decade, but the Japanese trauma literature of "Born to Be Human, I'm Sorry" has always resonated with us, constantly discussing Matsuko's life of abandonment.
From the composition of the film to the intention, to the processing of the picture, the film has won countless honors. In 2006, "The Ten Best Movies" selected by "Film Magazine", "The Life of the Abandoned Pine Nut" ranked sixth;
The following year, in 2007, "The Life of the Abandoned Matsuko" won the Japan Academy Awards. She won three awards for Best Actress, Best Editing, and Best Film Score, and received six nominations, including Best Director, Screenwriter, and Art.
Miki Nakatani, who plays the heroine Matsuko, also won almost all the prestigious awards in Japan with this film.
Because of the similarity of culture, and because this movie is really outstanding, "The Life of the Abandoned Pine Nut" has a score of 8.9 points on Douban. In the douban TOP250 list, this movie ranks 82.
The film was directed by Tetsuya Nakajima. Tetsuya Nakajima, who was born in February 1959, did not become an advertising director until the age of 30. It wasn't until he was 45 years old that he had just finished his big-screen debut, The Tale of the Next Wife, and 2006's The Life of the Rejected Pine Nuts was his second work.
"The Life of the Rejected Matsuko" is Tetsuya Nakajima's second work, and only the second work, but it has become a film and television classic with an astonishing high standard.
Tetsuya Nakajima's third work is "Pagao and the Magic Painting Book", which is slightly inferior to the first two in terms of evaluation and word of mouth, but because of this work, Nakajima Tetsuya's exaggerated visual style has once again been consolidated.
Poster of Paco and the Illustrated Book of Magic
For Chinese audiences, everyone should be more familiar with Tetsu nakajima's film "Confessions", which was also released in 2010. In this film, Tetsuya Nakajima temporarily bids farewell to his trademark visual style and exaggerated character settings, and the picture becomes solemn and gloomy. The heroine Matsu Takako shed the cloak of youth idol and became a vengeful goddess with ice in her blood.
This uneven style of "Confession" also won the award. It became one of the top ten films in 2010' Film Shunbao; won four awards at the 30th Japan Academy Awards for Best Editing and Director; and was the only Asian film to be shortlisted for the 83rd Academy Awards.
Takako Matsu Appeared "Confession"
Talking a lot about Tetsuya Nakajima, the director of "The Life of the Rejected Matsuko", next, let's talk about the film itself.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > What "The Life of an Abandoned Pine Nut" tells</h1>
The beginning of the story begins with an exodus.
In many works, the heroine's departure is nothing more than two endings. One is a return to family, the other is displaced outside. In Alice Monroe's masterpiece Escape, the protagonist Carla's escape ends with a return to her family. But in "The Life of the Rejected Pine Nuts", Pine Nuts, her ending is the latter.
In Matsuko's view, her frail and sick sister has received most of her father's attention and love. Matsuko, who has always lacked love, grew up to become a middle school teacher, and after being sexually assaulted by the principal of her father's generation and being framed and stolen by student Ryu Hiroichi during a school trip, Matsuko was dismissed by the principal with a ghostly fetus. The resentment that Matsuko had been accumulating in his heart for 23 years finally broke out, and finally Matsuko ran away.
Matsuko's first lover was the self-proclaimed reincarnation of Osamu Dazai, the Yaskawa girl Tetsuya
It's a relationship of love and violence, even if you are forced to sell yourself to support your family, even if you are forced to pretend to be injured to borrow money from your family members who have broken off the relationship. In the end, the ashamed che also committed suicide by jumping off the rails on a rainy night. Before Cheya commits suicide, the camera closes up a hole in Cheya's socks and Matsuko's panicked expression.
This shot was later used in the 2014 release of "Longing".
Matsuko's second lover is Tetsuya's rival Okano
After being cared for by Okano, Matsuko naturally developed an extramarital affair with Okano. After the extramarital affair was exposed, Matsuko was also ruthlessly abandoned. Desperate, Matsuko went to the previous custom shop to become a Turkish bath girl, and through her own efforts, Matsuko became the top brand for a while.
Matsuko's third lover is the guest Onodera
After being persuaded by Onodera to move to Yukoto, Matsuko's hard-earned savings were deceived by Onodera, and in a fit of rage, Matsuko killed Onodera and began to flee.
Matsuko's fourth lover was the barber Shimazu
Matsuko, who came to Dazaiji's hometown of Tamagawa Kamamizu and tried to commit suicide, was picked up by barber Shimazu. The two began to live together, and after three months of living together, Matsuko thought she was about to start a new life, and the police came. Matsuko began eight years in prison.
Matsuko's fifth lover is her former student, Ryūyoichi
But Long Yang, who is deeply involved in the underworld and drugs, has been imprisoned again and again, and Matsuko, who has been waiting for Long Yang to get out of prison, has waited for a heavy punch from Long Yangyi.
Since then, Matsuko refuses to associate with anyone, no longer believes in love, no longer believes in anyone. Just like this sloppy and decadent life, becoming the "mentally ill stinky lady" in the mouth of the neighbor. When Matsuko went to the hospital for examination at the age of 53, she once again met her eldest sister, whom she met in prison.
Finally, when Matsuko was struggling to regain hope for life, Matsuko was beaten by a group of bad teenagers and fell by the river and died alone.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > several metaphors in the film</h1>
Matsuko's grimace
In the film, the director designed a signature action for Matsuko - to make a grimace. Because of her sister's illness, her father always had a straight face, and in an accident, Matsuko knew that she could make her father laugh by playing a grimace, so in the days that followed, Matsuko always deliberately put on a grimace to make her father laugh.
Let's understand this small action from another perspective.
In the movie, Osamu Dazai's phrase "Born to be human, I'm sorry" can be said to run through the entire movie. The words left by Cherya before she died, and the words that Matsuko wrote on the blackboard at the end of the film, are all Dazai's sentences: "Born to be human, I am sorry."
The phrase "Born to be human, I am sorry" is not the original idea of Osamu Dazai, but the first verse left by Osamu Dazai's poet friend Shotaro Terauchi before attempting suicide, and Osamu Dazai saw that it was very good and appropriated this verse as a subtitle for his novel "The Standard-Bearer of the Twentieth Century".
The phrase "Born to be human, I'm sorry" is too heavy and complicated after all, and Osamu Dazai deliberately used a copy of "Human Disqualification" to explain it clearly. And Matsuko's life is another "Human Disqualification".
At the beginning of the film, from the way Matsuko handles student theft, it is not difficult to see that Matsuko's personality is very similar to Ye Zang in "Human Disqualification". It is all because of the fear of telling the truth directly, and desperately concealing, hiding, and lying, just to please others.
How hard is it to please someone? The pleasing person cannot understand. Matsuko, who was described by his younger brother Norio as "going to cause trouble to the family when he died" and "never saved in the first place", was a "disliked" person in other people, and he pleased so many people in his lifetime: Taso, Saburō, Tetsuya, Okano, Akagi, Onodera, Shimazu, Ayo, Kio, and Daddy.
Matsuko's act of pleasing makes people seem to have no independent consciousness, and the end of constantly pleasing is the end of obsession and extinction. In this way, the character of Matsuko is unpleasant, even somewhat annoying.
That's why Matsuko needs to grimace, the iconic action.
Matsuko wearing this grimace of this clown mask is not essentially to eliminate the self and seek the recognition of the patriarchal society, but the self that Matsuko hides from everyone who is "different".
When Matsuko's nephew A sheng got a picture of Matsuko, his first reaction was that Matsuko had a strong sense of personality, and he said: "I feel that my personality is very strong, which may make men stay away." "
Pine nuts cocoon
In a small, dark apartment, Matsuko evokes hope and confidence in a fresh start, and desperately runs to the river to find the business card that her inmate's eldest sister has stuffed her head into. Just as Matsuko was hoping to start a new life, a group of bad teenagers came to the riverbank, and Matsuko asked them to go home early.
In this way, the kind pine nuts, the pine nuts with hope, the pine nuts who intend to start a new life, died under the stick of the bad boy.
On the bank of the green river, the pine nuts curled up there, like a cocoon. Pine nuts fell, and a white butterfly flew over her corpse.
This white butterfly is like the embodiment of pine nuts, the pine nuts that turn into butterflies, constantly flying and flying, flying over the cities that pine nuts have walked, flying over the people and things she has experienced in her life.
It is no accident to believe that the shell of pine nuts curled up on the bank of the river, like the cocoon of a butterfly.
<h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > absurd and romantic approach to a sad fairy tale</h1>
In this movie, there is a lot to be said, but in this section, let's analyze how Tetsu Nakajima also used absurd and romantic techniques to set off a sad fairy tale.
Epic techniques
Because Tetsu Nakajima is also an advertising director or MV director, in this "The Life of the Rejected Matsuko", he also continues his consistent artistic style.
When it comes to "The Life of the Rejected Pine Nuts", what comes to mind is the picture of the gorgeous scenes of blingblig such as flowers, but to put it bluntly, this movie has a thick "filter" throughout.
In terms of narrative techniques, Tetsuya Nakajima uses two techniques: flashbacks and interpolations to tell this story.
The interlude technique is expressed in the film, which is completed by Matsuko's memory clips
Tetsuya Nakajima's choice of interpolation of narrative techniques is also combined with his own usual artistic style. Tetsu Nakajima will also give these clips different "filters" and tones according to the distance of the story's time nodes and the differences in the emotions of the characters.
So what we see is that under the colorful images of the film, it tells a fragmented life. Sometimes, memories of Matsuko become out of focus because of their age; sometimes they are questioned because there is no witness confirmation; and sometimes they are obscured by the fact that the subjects are vague.
The thick "filters" and gorgeous pictures in the film are a kind of surreal expression method of the film.
In the processing of the picture, Tetsuya Nakajima also has many tricks. From the grainy feel of the film, to the soft light, to the local overexposure, and even some local plots have been processed into animations.
Whether it is the use of surreal expression techniques or the diversity of picture processing, it is nothing more than to render Matsuko's life into a fantastic fairy tale. But the flowers and starlight that can be seen everywhere in the film lens cannot whitewash the cruel undertone of life.
When you wake up from a dream, because of the brilliance and out-of-focus of the picture, the background or cruelty of life will be diluted, making it difficult for the audience to distinguish whether this is a fairy tale or life.
The flashbacks of the film are expressed at the beginning of the film
Matsuko's nephew Ah Sheng, after getting the picture of his aunt, became curious about the aunt in the photo. Who is she? Is she my aunt? Why had I never met her? Was she a middle school teacher when she was young? How did she become the "annoying" person that her father said "even death would trouble the family"?
As a result, the camera begins to trace back to Ah Sheng's curiosity and abnormal behavior.
The use of two narrative techniques in the film also means that there will be two story lines. One is Ashen's and the other is pine nuts. These two story lines intersect and parallel, which also makes the film itself have a high degree of completion.
What makes me feel great is that in these two parallel story lines, they also show the different worldviews of Matsuko and Ah Sheng.
Matsuko's worldview is that even if she is defeated by fate again and again, she will tremble and stand up again. Even if the next blow given to her by fate made her collapse to the ground again, unable to stand.
It is precisely because matsuko, after experiencing repeated abandonment and heavy blows, still ignites the idea of life, making people feel that this vitality is both tenacious and fragile. Or maybe because at the end of the film, Matsuko rekindles the hope of life and is snuffed out by the small evil of human nature, her attachment to love and home is so easy to make people feel pity and move.
In the film, as a tandem of reality and memory fragments, when he was 18 years old, he also had dreams of pursuing music and trying to become a singer, but after many years, Ah Sheng's dream of being a singer was also stranded, and others advised him to start again, and he refused.
But what does it matter? Matsuko's life had just ended, but his aunt's influence on him had only just begun. Ah Sheng may not regain his dream of being a singer, but in the future life, he will also face the hardships and hardships of life with a more positive attitude.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > the treatment of color and light and shadow</h1>
The treatment of color and light and shadow should be explained in the processing of the picture. But in color and light and shadow, I want to tell a little metaphor. It was matsuko's two waits.
In the movie, Matsuko has two long waits for a long time span.
Matsuko's first wait was to go to jail for murder and spend eight years in prison
Why is she waiting? Because at that time, Matsuko and the barber Shimazu began to live together, and everything made Matsuko yearn for a new life. Just when she thought she could start a new life, the police came to her door.
During his eight-year prison sentence, Shimazu was Matsuko's only belief. She waited until she had been in jail for eight years to be reunited with Shimazu.
Eight years in prison was Matsuko's longest experience. But in the narrative system of the film, time has the fastest passing speed. In order to show Matsuko's prison life, the film uses a lot of fast-paced songs and dances. Matsuko's belief in Shimazu is reflected in her unusual pace.
During her eight years in the women's prison, Matsuko lived for someone she could hardly remember. From this place, it probably laid the groundwork for matsuko's eight-year wait. If Shimadzu likes and cares about Matsuko, why didn't Shimazu visit Matsuko during the eight years she spent in prison?
After Matsuko was released from prison, she went to Shimazu, and the man she could not remember continued to open a barbershop, married his wife, gave birth to his own child, and began a new life without Matsuko.
Here, Tetsuya Nakajima gives Matsuko a background picture of cherry blossoms fluttering in the sky. But it's still a sad story.
The contrast in time feels slightly ironic.
In the movie, Matsuko sings a hymn about life, and still laughs after she finds that her hopes are dashed; in the real world, Matsuko waits for eight years for the illusory thoughts. The cruelest thing is that after a moment's dash of hope, life goes on.
Matsuko's second wait was in exchange for a heavy hammer from Ah Yang
After Matsuko's life progress bar came to Ah Yang, everything became like fate.
Matsuko lost her teaching position because of Ah Yang, and left home in a negative mood, and her life began to change dramatically. But the cause of tragedy does not necessarily end the tragedy itself.
The second time she met Ah Yang, Matsuko lost everything. When beaten by Ah Yang, Matsuko even convinced herself: "It is better to beat me and kill me, and it is better for two people to go to hell than to go to hell alone." "
In the end, because of Ah Yang's incompetence and cowardice, Ah Yang became overwhelmed by the complete love of his former teacher Matsuko, and the only way he could think of was to stay away from Matsuko and cut off contact with Matsuko. As everyone knows, Ah Yang is the last driver of Matsuko's tragic life.
Matsuko is waiting to welcome Ah Yang out of prison, hiding a bouquet of bright roses behind her. She was full of joy, but she ushered in a heavy blow from Ah Yang. After that, the disheartened Matsuko no longer believed in love and no longer trusted anyone.
Perhaps the aged pine nuts have not been able to grasp the last straw in their lives, so there are no longer pink cherry blossoms flying in the sky. Under the flying snow, pine nuts also ushered in the winter of their own lives.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > written at the end</h1>
Nabokov, the author of Lolita, once said: "Fate always shows its true colors when no one pays attention to it." "
This sentence also applies to pine nuts. When looking at any problem and event, there is a common "survivor bias" in us, that is, when we look at an event, we automatically filter out key information in our minds and draw the conclusions we want to get.
But this is biased. That is to say, in the subject of life, we often see the peaceful and joyful side of life and selectively filter out the part of suffering and cruelty.
Pine nuts in "The Life of the Rejected Pine Nuts", her life case may allow us to correct this deviation and let us see another life. But we never dare to call these fragments of tragic lives a lifetime.
No matter how much suffering, cruelty and hardship there is in life and in life, even if we are at the bottom of the valley at this time, please do not forget to look up at the sky - even if we miss the blossoming season, do not miss the posture of the falling flower.
With a line from Ah Sheng at the end of the movie as the ending, no matter what the road ahead, no matter whether life will knock us down again, I hope that everyone can also have the courage to stand up again like Matsuko, and I hope that everyone can really live for themselves once, rather than eliminating themselves to please others.
I don't know God, nor did I think that if there really is a God in this world, like Aunt Matsuko, let people laugh, make people cheer up, love others, even if they become scarred, lonely, not into the stream... Even if I was stupid, I felt that this God was worth believing in.
—END—
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