With the bells ringing in 2021, we finally have a seemingly new beginning.
However, for the movie, the time of January is a bit awkward.
After experiencing a large number of months in December, I have not yet seen the shadow of the Spring Festival stalls
However, today, seeing a domestic crime suspense film that has been scheduled for January 15, Tomato Jun suddenly raised his interest - "Soul Hunting".
The title of the movie is mainly in the word "soul".
It is not a general suspect crime genre, but a soft science fiction innovation.
The film is adapted from Jiang Bo's science fiction novel "Soul Transference", set in the near future of human brain replication technology.
The story goes that the head of the Wang clique and a local tycoon was killed in his home.
Prosecutor Liang Wenchao (Zhang Zhen) and his criminal police wife Ah Bang (Zhang Junning) investigate the case and find many suspicious points.
The rich man's son Wang Tianyou (Lin Huimin) is suspected of committing a major crime.
His new wife, Li Yan (Sun Anke), also seems to have hidden secrets.
Strange murder weapons and bloody coats were found at the scene.
Even his dead ex-wife Tang Suzhen (Zhang Baijia) was implicated.
With the in-depth investigation of the case, the earth-shattering secrets behind it are slowly revealed.
You may have seen many Hollywood movies with the theme of "consciousness reproduction" before, such as "Clone"; but "Soul Hunting" is different, director Cheng Weihao added his own special thinking about this subject when he made a dramatic adaptation of literary works.
The West pays attention to the natural sciences, so we have seen films with similar themes before, and they are all based on technology.
But the East focuses on philosophical thoughts, and our concept of "soul" is completely different from that of the West.
The reason why "Soul Hunting" is a good story is because under the director's understanding, the West and the East have completed a unique mixture and unity on the issue of soul.
The story of Soul Hunt is based on the fact that humans make powder from brain RNA (a genetic material) and then transfer the soul.
To tell the truth, this process of RNA making powder to transfer the soul, Tomato Jun is very hopeful that the movie will give a hard-core explanation.
Because the West believes that the human brain and cognition can be left behind in the form of RNA.
But Cheng Weihao did not want the discussion of the film to stop here, and in the process of adaptation, it added the views and speculations of oriental culture.
Genre mixing is risky, but it's not necessarily a bad thing for a young director to dare to try — what he wants to do is an "oriental sci-fi crime movie."
This is not a "riot operation", the suspense crime type, in the hands of Cheng Weihao once wiped out a dazzling spark.
Nowadays, Douban still maintains a high score of 8.2 in "The Pursuit of witnesses", which is his work. Below there is soybean oil that has willingly sacrificed its knees for this "light of crime suspense".
In "Soul Hunting", the director also studied some theories of human origin, and even the content of the "Classic of Mountains and Seas".
Just from the styling of the movie villain, you can see that this is not a simple Western story about science fiction and the soul.
Tomato Jun can responsibly say that with Cheng Weihao, "Soul Hunting" has won the basic disk of film quality.
Zhang Zhen commented: Very attractive.
Zhang Junning said bluntly: It will give people a lot of thinking, very plump.
I believe the words of these two major casters, not only because they starred in the film, but also because of the sacrifices they made for the film.
When evaluating an actor, we often say the word "will pick the script". In fact, the script is also the actor's choice.
Looking at Zhang Zhen first, I believe that seeing the stills of the movie "Soul Hunting", no one can associate this man with a terrible face with Zhang Zhen, and Zhang Zhen's sacrifice for this film is not small.
The last time I saw an actor lose weight in order to act, it was Deng Chao in "Shadow".
Because the prosecutor Liang Wenchao in "Soul Hunting" himself is suffering from cancer, and his hair begins to fall out later.
So Zhang Zhen had to take on the challenge for the role and lose weight like crazy.
He went to the gym 3 times a week for 1.5 to 2 hours at a time, and by the time he was filming, he had lost a total of 24 pounds.
In order to achieve the best state of playing Liang Wenchao, Zhang Zhen directly shaved his hair, and the knife was still his own daughter-in-law.
It's a tiger dad.
It was not only Zhang Zhen who made sacrifices, but also Zhang Junning.
For so many years, Zhang Junning has shown her long hair and left behind the nickname of "Long Hair Goddess".
From high school to now, she has never had short hair. Director Cheng Weihao revealed that when he first met Zhang Junning and proposed the idea of cutting short hair, the staff strongly opposed it, but Zhang Junning did not expect Zhang Junning to agree.
So in "Soul Hunting", we see Zhang Junning with short hair.
Capable and ethereal, A and sassy.
The first scissors for cutting hair were personally ordered by the director.
At the same time, in order to adapt to the role of the criminal police, she also did a lot of physical training.
What I admired even more was this interview after she cut her hair: it is very basic for actors to change their appearance for the sake of the role.
For her, it wasn't even a "sacrifice." A sentence can see Zhang Junning's professionalism as an actor.
In turn, of course, we can also understand that in the view of Zhang Zhen and Zhang Junning, this "Soul Hunting" is worth sacrificing like this.
The quality of the film is prompting the actor to change himself closer to the role. The change of actors can also make useful feedback on the quality of the play, which is a virtuous circle of a good film.
In addition to science fiction and the understanding and interpretation of the "soul" in the East and the West, what is more attractive about "Soul Hunting" is probably its suspense texture.
After all, Cheng Weihao is famous for making suspense films, and "Soul Hunting" itself is a story that is biased towards suspense.
The dead rich, the transfer of souls, and the futuristic scenes are actually in the service of the "suspense" of the story.
The place where the murder occurred, the "Wang's Mansion", was built by the director's entity.
The tattoos on the light villains take 10 hours to make every day.
We don't know the specific information of the current story, but we can see it from the poster.
This poster is the best embodiment of the title of the film "Soul Hunting". Next to each character is a broken statue that represents the incomplete truth about each person.
And the statue is broken precisely the brain, echoing the title "soul transfer".
Each character has a serious look, showing a half-body, indicating that everyone has something to hide.
This episode of "Soul Hunting", which gathers a lot of drama bones, what kind of story will it be, and what kind of reversal will there be, everyone can only go to the cinema with doubts to dig for clues and find the real culprit.
On January 15, "Soul Hunting" is definitely worth a movie ticket.
(Rotten Tomatoes Editorial Board: Yang Yang)