#Headline Movie Guide #Miracle in the Green is a tragic movie.
There are very few protagonists whose deaths make me feel sad and happy (the other is Pan's Labyrinth) – these are two diametrically opposed emotions.
The analysis of human nature in this American film released in 1999 is also worth exploring today.
From compositional color to intention, it should be more honored than itself - the 72nd Academy Awards Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor nomination, Douban TOP250 ranked 210th.
Director Frank made Miracle in the Green five years after filming The Shawshank Redemption (Douban's no. 1 film), and the real protagonist of this film is Tom Hanks (the first star in Hollywood to announce that he has been infected with new crown).
Hanks's role in the film is not very good, and any actor can have such a performance. On the contrary, the big man with a height of 196cm has become the most brilliant character in the whole film with a full character image, and the limelight has completely overshadowed the protagonist. Therefore, many people will feel that Coffeey is the real protagonist.
The 72nd Academy Awards for Best Picture went to "American Beauty", defeated by this black humor film that reflected the midlife crisis, coupled with the Oscar's usual political correctness, "Miracle in the Green" missed the award is not too unjust. Immortals fight, can only be said to be born at the wrong time.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right">《The Green Mile》</h1>
It's a prison story that takes place during the Great Depression of 1935.
The film begins with a scene from a nursing home, and the real story unfolds through the mouth of a white-haired prison cell.
The opening chapter is the topic, what is the "miracle in the green", the original English name is "The Green Mile".
Death row inmates walk through a corridor covered with green linoleum cloth to soothe the emotions of death row inmates, and in order to soothe the emotions of death row inmates, they will change the terms that look cruel as possible to be as warm as possible.
In the countdown to life, every prisoner is shrouded in an eerie and oppressive atmosphere, and the jailer feels the same way... Until the arrival of the big Man John Coffey.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > several metaphors in the film:</h1>
Green【Hope and Relief】
Green means green, and green also represents life and hope. But after the death row inmates step on that green field, they will go to the electric chair that ends their lives.
Everyone locked up here will eventually die instantly after confessing in the electric chair, a process that sounds hopeless and chilling, and it is not certain that they will do anything in the process of waiting for death.
The jailers told them, through Green's metaphor, that from the time you set foot in this green space until you sit on the electric chair, all your mistakes will be forgiven, which is a complete spiritual explanation.
On the other hand, the jailer also has the additional task of psychological counseling - how to try to make the prisoner spend the last journey of his life in peace.
Even so, no one can really step on this green space to death, and they will still tremble and be afraid after sitting on the electric chair.
Only Coffeey is willing, and he treats it as the final "hope and liberation", completely to the point.
Coffey [Angel of Coffee]
Every time Coffey tells someone his name, he always struggles to explain: My name is Coffeey, and it sounds like Coffee...
"Coffee" in English means coffee alone, and has no other meaning. But the big man's name, combined with his life, is a metaphor for the key words of coffee: brown, bitter.
The film does not deliberately describe the conflict between races, and only spits out words that are inferior to black people from the mouths of defense lawyers and a human scum. But among the very common white actors in the film, Coffey's brown skin creates an extremely strong visual contrast.
Especially this shot:
The white family had lost a pair of daughters, and the bloodstained, and the people with shotguns saw such a scene in the wilderness—a large black man sitting on the ground rubbing the girls' blond hair and howling like a beast, blood and dirt mixed together to make him look dirty.
If you don't look at the second half of the film, this one shot alone will cause people to feel extremely uncomfortable. His complexion, appearance and appearance make it easy to associate him with the "pervert with developed limbs".
He was a big man who was scared even by death row.
Coffey howled hysterically because he could sense the girls' pain when something unexpected happened to them. In the same way, he can feel the pain of others. He cried because he couldn't save them...
He was afraid of the dark, but he was in the dark, and the world was suffering but he was helpless or powerless, and this was the source of his suffering. It was so painful that it felt superfluous to defend itself.
Given his universal mind and innate powers, I prefer to call him a "coffee-colored angel."
<h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > parse the wonderful sensations from repression to relief</h1>
Some people say that "Miracle in the Green" did not get an Oscar because the plot was clichéd, and when you see the title of the film, you can basically guess that this is a story about the redemption of the soul. This is only a translation from Chinese, if you look at the English name, you can only understand that "The Green Mile" is a very abstract title. A mile of green space?
I believe that the Oscar judges have their own considerations, and this article only analyzes this film - "why it can give people a very depressing and relieved wonderful feeling".
This is different from the noisy atmosphere of many American films, the whole film is sinking, like listening to others tell a long-ago story, gradually empathy.
Plot: Narrative style
In most drama films, the story overrides everything else, and the rest takes a back seat — the plot is the most important structure of almost all drama films.
The film "Miracle in the Green" is adapted from the novel of the same name by American writer Stephen King, the original book and "The Shawshank Redemption" are listed as the leaders of prison novels, because the original book itself has an extremely strong magical realism color, the narrative of this film also blends realism and formalism.
The beginning is to evoke memories through the abnormal behavior of an elderly person, which is a common flashback technique in drama films, such as "Edward Scissorhands" starring Depp.
The memories begin with a few guards meeting the big man for the first time, which arouses the curiosity of the audience: What heinous crime did this big man commit? Why were the handcuffs and shackles all on, why did he not even have shoes?
Later, when the jailer flipped through the case, he entered an interlude, but it still left suspense: Why did the big man kill the two little girls? Is it because of mental abnormality?
In today's popular "classical mode" narrative structure films, it is usually the protagonist and the villain who appear at the same time in the opening chapter, and gradually enter the climax - conflict resolution - ending. This approach is a linear and homeopathic way that is not easy for both the director and the actor to make mistakes, as seen in most road movies.
But the flashbacks + interludes of Miracles in the Green reinforce the big man's independent worldview that is completely different from everyone else's.
From the very beginning, the audience felt that this person was unusual, either a madman or an angel. Obviously, people have bet on the madman based on the strong psychological hints in the front. That's the brilliance of directors and writers, and if you don't watch it, you won't know the truth.
Although the process of this narrative has always given people a sense of oppression, the final truth and ending are liberating and relaxing.
Lens: Color and light
Most of the paintings in "Miracle in the Green" use a dull yellow as the base tone, and in the film's color aesthetic, warm colors represent violence, aggression, and stimulation, but saturation and light and shade can change this impression.
The part of the nursing home is bright and cool, the prison section has always been dark yellow, and everyone's face has a very old-age tone.
So after entering the prison, Coffey's brown skin looked closer to black, and half of his face was always hidden in the darkness under the light of the ceiling of the prison corridor.
The same goes for others:
This chiaroscuro accentuates the contrast of human nature, and most people are not as glamorous or dirty as they appear on the surface. Almost everyone has two sides.
Paul, the prison superintendent played by Tom Hanks, is often plagued by urethritis, so that it affects the harmony of husband and wife;
Paycy, the jailer played by Doug Hugheson, as the nephew of the governor's wife, looks weak and white, but is ostracized by colleagues because he likes to provoke prisoners;
Dale, he may have committed an unforgivable sin, but his attitude toward the little mouse is the "good" side of other people's humanity.
……
The only character who did not employ the contrast of light and shade was "William Holt", the real murderer of the two little girls, and who was caught on death row after murder.
Close-ups of his face are either all-bright or all-black.
Most of the shots about him show his face without concealment, he represents extreme evil, and it seems that all the good side is isolated from him.
The kind-hearted Coffeey felt disgusted at the first sight of him and refused to give him even a slice of bread.
The cell where Coffey was closed was exceptionally dark, and the scum's cell was the brightest. I believe this is definitely not a coincidence.
The director wants to use the projection of color and light on different characters to make a potential impact on the audience.
The film also uses a very classic "overlook" shooting method, Pesci looks up at the bottom of the spiral staircase, and the whole person becomes a black silhouette.
The aerial shot has a sense of judgment, usually foreshadowing that the person's fate has been predetermined.
He ended up as he had hoped, leaving prison and entering a mental hospital, only with a slightly worse ending—he became a truly mental patient and would spend the rest of his life there.
The dull, low-saturation colors are also one of the roots of the film's repression to the audience. In "A Beautiful Life", the color of the shot after the protagonist enters the concentration camp is low-saturation, often giving people a cold, impermeable feeling.
Actor: Ideology
As mentioned earlier, the role played by Tom Hanks is not very brilliant in the whole film, and other actors can also take on this role. This, of course, has nothing to do with his own acting skills.
Because the character highlighted in this film is not paul the prison guard, he is just a witness, playing a role in threading the plot trend.
The United States is very good at using celebrity entrainment ideology - that is, the temperament of celebrities themselves. Tom Hanks gives mostly decent screen impressions, and the same is true in this film.
Coffey's character Michael Clark Duncan is the opposite.
Under this ideology, the audience preconceived notions about Coffeey as a perverted beast at heart, ignoring the fear he initially exuded.
When the fog is lifted, the audience's sympathy for the girl is instantly transformed into sympathy for Coffeey, and these emotions are always suppressed. Because the film does not over-render the "miracle", it is more to show Coffeey's pity and kindness.
We expected to see miracles to save good people who seemed to have been transformed, but the screenwriters didn't.
When Dale was executed, Dale used a sponge that was not dipped in water, causing him to be burned alive;
In her cell, Coffey can feel Dale's pain, but can't do anything about it;
Coffey can clearly leave the "green field", but he has had enough of suffering too much, chooses to be misunderstood by people, and calmly goes to death.
Coffey's character is a combination of contradictory traits, the form and personality are completely opposite, on the surface it looks chilling, but in fact it is a pure angel like a baby who is afraid of darkness, which makes the audience have an ideological illusion, so that it aggravates the repressed emotions.
There is no doubt that Michael Clark Duncan is the best actor selected in the whole film.
So that's why Michael Clark Duncan has acted in more than 60 films, but only the role of Coffeey has allowed him to achieve breakthrough achievements.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > written at the end</h1>
When Coffey was executed, all the light bulbs exploded again, and the light he left for the world was extinguished in an instant after the extreme. But the green journey didn't stop, and he passed on a portion of his "divine power" to Ginger and Paul the little mice.
Paul, who tells the story at the beginning of the film, is 108 years old, and in the long years, he has watched his relatives and friends leave him and participate in one sad funeral after another.
Who's to say that this is not a punishment for him?
Death, for Coffeey, is liberation, and so is Paul. Seeing this, we will be truly relieved. At this point, the film has raised the whole idea to several levels, it is not just a story of the fall of an angel, but a proposition of life and death and faith.