Since the national theater restart nearly two months ago, the most popular in the theater line is the war theme.
"Eight Hundred" and "1917" have achieved quite good results.
Realistic scenes and special effects design, so that smoke, blood and death as in front of the eyes, to the audience to bring a huge audiovisual impact at the same time, but also from a very intuitive perspective to show the cruelty and danger of war.
At the same time, there are also some films that depict the back of the war with gentle brushstrokes.
What the shop wants to introduce to you today is such a story that happened outside the battlefield -
Summer Country
During the Second World War, in a small town in the south of England, the heroine of the film, Alice, lives alone on a cliff by the sea.
Although the flames of war are raging not far away, she is still immersed in her own world, focusing all day on using scientific research to interpret folklore, write papers, and live a simple and peaceful life.
Although this calm is occasionally broken by the bear children who come to play pranks.
In the English countryside at the time, the Christian faith was considered mainstream.
Alice, an arrogant, indifferent, unmarried atheist, seems out of place among the traditional and "decent" inhabitants of the town.
The children used their imaginations to call her a "witch" and a "Nazi spy", running around her house to make trouble, stuffing branches and dirt into her mailbox.
The forces are mutual. Alice also does not hesitate to release malice towards others.
In the grocery store, a little girl was salivating over a piece of chocolate on the shelf and was reluctant to leave after being told she couldn't buy it because she didn't have enough coupons.
Alice, who came to buy a cigarette, looked into her eyes, showed an understanding smile, playfully took the chocolate that the girl had repeatedly rubbed in her hand, and checked out happily.
Just when the little girl and her mother gratefully thought that the kind aunt was going to give the chocolate to the girl, Alice turned and strode away with a cigarette and chocolate.
Lighting a cigarette outside the store door, like a vicious breath, gracefully spitting out a piece of smoke, leaving only the little girl behind her tore her heart and lungs crying.
If this scene is placed in domestic film and television, it is estimated that it will not be a problem to hang on the hot search for a day.
Such a textbook-level mean heroine was asked to take in an uninvited guest evacuated from London to the countryside on the same day, the boy Frank.
Here the shop will briefly explain the background of the story.
In the early 1940s, the Germans launched a strategic bombing campaign against London, the capital of the United Kingdom, forcing many children to leave their parents and evacuate from the city to relatively safe rural areas to live in foster homes.
Frank was such a boy from London.
Being a guardian for a strange child is certainly not ok for Alice, who loves to live alone.
However, under the persuasion of the woman in charge of resettling the children, she did not seem to have room to refuse, and had to agree to let the boy stay in her house for a week.
As you can imagine, Alice and Frank did not get along well at first.
When a hungry Frank asks "what to eat for dinner," Alice throws him a piece of raw meat, a raw egg, and a raw potato.
Let a teenage schoolboy cook for herself, worthy of her.
But miraculously, Frank seems to have something in him that would distract Alice.
Frank is a strong and optimistic child, even if displaced, and in the face of an extremely difficult guardian, he can still have fun, maintain kindness and humor, and soon become friends with the girl Edie who met at school.
To Alice, he constantly conveyed kindness and showed a rare interest in the subjects she studied.
One day, Alice speculates that the "floating island" she has been working on due to a mirage has appeared in the small town of Ramsgate, not far from the local area.
On the hillside by the Sea in Ramsgate, Frank claimed to have seen a "floating island" refracted by Dover Castle.
Alice is furious when she misunderstands that he is deceiving herself, and it is not until she sees the true face of Dover's Castle that she realizes that she has wrongly blamed Frank.
The contradiction quickly broke out and quickly subsided, and the atmosphere between the two also changed.
Perhaps the relationship between people is like this, and the process of misunderstanding and elimination will become the starting point of intimacy.
They started making wooden airplanes together and walking and chatting together.
This made Alice, who had become accustomed to loneliness, feel a long-lost warmth, and the past that was sealed in her heart quietly opened a soft gap.
Cold-faced and cold-hearted, she had also loved sincerely and passionately.
Several fragmented and emotional flashback shots outline the image of Alice's ex-lover: a charming, smiling black girl.
Writing here, The Shop can't help but say: At first glance, "Summer Country" has gathered anti-war themes, same-sex emotional lines and black actors, which is really a bit of a forced political correctness.
However, in the process of watching the movie, I feel that the film is not a rigid set of these major elements, or it is more natural and reasonable.
Back to the plot.
At that time, Alice had just experienced the pain of losing her father, and it was the encouragement and warmth of her lover that slowly brought her out of the haze, but she did not want this relationship to become the beginning of another hurt.
The other party's desire to form a normal family and become a mother is growing, which eventually breaks the relationship between the two, and also makes Alice wear a selfish and cold protective color from then on.
And frank, who is innocent and kind, is slowly fading this protective color.
After several twists and turns, Alice decided to formally adopt Frank.
With a new home and friends, Frank and Alice's life should have continued peacefully and happily.
However, at this moment, the huge bad news came from the front line, and Frank's true life was about to come out...
Regarding the story, the shop is here.
The next reversal and ending of the movie, interested friends can personally go to the "Summer Country" to explore.
In addition to the plot of the healing system, the fresh painting style and beautiful scenery are also a major attraction of this film.
The film's main filming location, the "Seven Sisters" chalk cliffs, is known as one of the most beautiful coasts in Britain.
The majestic Atlantic Ocean, the cozy and comfortable "dune huts", the colorful cream tones and the sea breeze that seem to penetrate the screen all give people a light and beautiful fairy tale feeling.
But it should be emphasized that "Summer Country" is still an anti-war movie.
In the film, there are also brief scenes of London's devastation: the bombed streets, the fleeing civilians, the cries of babies in the bomb shelters intertwined with the sound of explosions...
It all contrasts sharply with the fairytale environment of a country town.
In a gentle and peaceful tone, softly but forcefully indicted the rough damage of war to beautiful things.
In recent years, films that tell war stories from an alternative perspective have appeared from time to time.
For example, last year's critically acclaimed German film "No Master" introduced by Shop Zi also presents the "evil" of war and totalitarianism in a disfocused way, allowing the protagonist to "confusedly" complete the reconciliation with trauma.
Abandoning the face of the characters and the same brand of the times, paying attention to the experience of each ordinary individual through the chaotic world, and showing a different kind of love and affection during the war and chaos, this may be a more three-dimensional expression.
Admittedly, in terms of completion, "Summer Country" still has some regrets.
At the climax of the film, the setting of the plot conflict is slightly blunt; the arc of character transformation serves the development of the plot, rather than starting from the real logic; the emotional pouring, sometimes very strong but does not seem to be able to penetrate the hearts of the people.
But flaws are not hidden, such a fresh and interesting movie, is still a good choice for watching movies at home.
In the film, Frank asks Alice if the Floating Island is paradise, and if there is no heaven, where the souls of the past will go.
Alice's answer was "Summerland".
"Summer Country" in this film is a paradise for infidels and atheists, a remembrance of the living for the deceased, a meeting of reason and sensibility, reality and romance, and a metaphor for the spiritual home of a niche group.
And in such a season of autumn breeze, perhaps every warm summer that has passed away and has not yet arrived is a beautiful country worthy of admiration.