Text/Ziyi
The movie "First Burning Incense" is an emotional love film directed by Xu Anhua, written by Wang Anyi, and starring Ma Sichun, Yu Feihong, Peng Yuyan and so on.
The film tells the story of Ge Weilong, a young girl who came to Hong Kong from Shanghai to study, how she fell step by step in a society of drunken fans.
Just looking at this cast, as well as Zhang Ailing's name, and various trailers, it is enough to attract me to the cinema and find out.
However, I walked out with a little disappointment.
On the day of the movie's release, Douban opened a score of 5.6, and in just a few days, 23,000 people have seen it and 58,000 people want to see it.
This heat, this speed, this rating, presumably needless to say, you know how the audience feels about it.
Is it really that bad?
Please follow the editor, walk into Zhang Ailing, walk into the movie, and find out.
<h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > (1) From the name to the character portrayal, "The First Burning Incense" is not worthy of the name</h1>
Strictly speaking, the names of the films are not strict.
Because it is adapted from Zhang Ailing's novel of the same name, "Agarwood Crumbs • First Burning Incense".
Speaking of this film, I think the first thing to understand is the hidden meaning of the name of the novel, and only by reading it can we better grasp the content of the book.
"Agarwood crumbs" refers to the fine crumb powder scraped off the agarwood.
It should be pointed out that agarwood does not refer to agarwood, but a mixture of resin, gum and wood derived from agarwood.
It has been listed as the first of all incense since ancient times, and it is also a rare medicinal herb of Traditional Chinese medicine.
Because of its unique and elegant aroma, agarwood was generally used as an incense stick in ancient times for dignitaries.
"First incense" refers to the first incense that is formed after being lit in an incense burner with agarwood powder.
The use of agarwood crumbs to burn incense is exquisite.
First of all, the incense ash in the incense burner is turned into a small groove, take some agarwood crumbs and put them inside, let it stir and compact with the middle part of the incense ash.
Then put a little agarwood crumbs and light it, and then slowly cover the ignited agarwood with the surrounding incense ash, so as to form a unique method of burning incense without smoke.
Imagine the situation:
An ashram, where two people sit opposite each other, a pot of incense, two cups of tea.
As the aroma spreads, the woman tells a story to her friends, and the incense burns and the story ends.
This story, either the author's own experience or hearsay, is a story in short.
This is the literal interpretation of the title of the original novel.
That year, Zhang Ailing was twenty-three years old and first appeared in the literary world.
In the following year, she published many excellent works such as "Agarwood Crumbs , Second Incense "Jasmine Pieces", "Love in the Fallen City", "White Roses and Red Roses" and so on.
As for its extension of meaning, it is more interesting.
How could Zhang Ailing, who had a delicate mind, expect that a year later, her love would be as humble as Ge Weilong's, so much so that she was criticized by future generations.
Speaking of which, it is necessary to mention her first man, Hu Lancheng.
This Hu Lancheng had some talent to learn, and should have become a generation of scholars, but he was weak in his wind and bones, bent his knees during the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and became a "Wang pseudo" lackey, carrying the insult of a traitor all his life, hiding in Tibet and dying in Japan.
Hu Lancheng was quite proud of his temperament, and even published a book "This Life and This World" to talk about the story between him and eight women.
Although the article is unworldly, it is difficult to withstand the loss of its own integrity.
During his three-year marriage with Zhang Ailing, not only because of his identity problems, Zhang Ailing won countless scoldings, but also because of his ambiguity with different women, Zhang Ailing was deeply entangled in feelings, so that her later writing style changed dramatically.
From "How Much Hate" to "Half Life" to "Little Reunion", it puts forward a deep whiplash for women's unwilling love, and also makes a deep self-deprecation of their marriage.
Zhang Ailing's marriage was humble and tragic, just like the different heroines in her pen.
From Bai Liusu to Cao Qiqiao, from Ge Weilong to Gu Manzhen, with the shackles and shackles of their respective tragedies, in the midst of reality and ideals, step by step to the abyss of sinking.
After the founding of New China, it was precisely because of her birth, education and experience that she was incompatible with the new cultural and literary circles at that time, and eventually had to leave the mainland, died of quiet illness in the United States, and never returned to the mainland until her death.
This is where she is sensitive and shrewd, as quoted from the autobiographical novel "Little Reunion", "Han rapes his wife, everyone can play".
If Zhang Ailing had stayed on the mainland, with her identity and character, "in the later Cultural Revolution, a hundred Zhang Ailing were also crushed." ”
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > (2) Zhang Ailing's work is good, but it is really difficult to shoot, except for the overhauled "Color Ring", none of which has succeeded</h1>
Zhang Ailing's works are very ambitious, the subject matter is not limited to novels, and her prose and script are equally elegant in language and refined into gold.
The depiction of characters in the novel can be called the ceiling of the literary works of the 1940s.
Similarly, her work is not so easy to adapt, because she has written screenplays and essays.
In Zhang Ailing's novels, many details are mainly psychological monologues.
It is not easy to convert the psychological changes of the protagonist in just a few minutes, but it is not possible to infinitely enlarge the details, which is extremely demanding and challenging for the screenwriter, director and actor.
If the film and television works are copied from the original book, it is basically difficult to succeed.
From the original "Love of the Fallen City" to "The Grudge Girl", there is nothing outstanding, but it is "Color Ring", which is very different from the original work, which shines brightly.
For the adaptation of her works, countless directors have folded here.
Xu Anhua is like this.
Although the box office of "Love in the City" tested in 1984 was a pass, the combined box office with "Half Life" in 1997 was only about 16 million, which was less than the flow of today's movies in a day.
Subsequently, although Ang Lee's "Color Ring" box office was good, it only achieved Liang Chaowei and pit Tang Wei.
Twenty-four years later, Xu Anhua dared to try to shoot such works, which made people have to admire her courage.
You know, the current viewing environment is no longer suitable for playing such films with pure love themes.
Therefore, for the box office of the movie, I dare not hold out too much hope.
What's more, for readers who like Zhang Ailing's works, he (she) does not necessarily like to watch movies, because no matter how well the movies are made, it is difficult to restore the original work.
The original work is the carrier that can best express the author's thoughts.
At least 70% of the audience who want to see such movies are "die-hard fans" of the original work.
Don't underestimate this part of the people, if the director makes the work sparse, they are going to curse people, and the criticism of public opinion is the most terrible.
At that time, the die-hard "Zhang Ailing fans" were estimated to have more than 30+ now, and this group of people is very rational, not good to see is not good to see.
I won't leave you any affection just because I have my favorite idol to participate.
The remaining 30% is directed at Zhang Ailing's name.
If you can't understand the original work, it is difficult to understand the lens expression of the movie, that is, just look at a hilarity.
Moreover, this movie is very different from the original work, and it cannot lift the audience's appetite at all, and the disappointment is quite large.
Because the film is a collection of several people, such as the screenwriter, the director, and the audience, all of them are indispensable.
But now it seems that these parties are doing their own thing and are not well connected to each other.
Southern Weekend once interviewed screenwriter Wang Anyi, meaning: "How did you change the novel to this?" ”
Wang Anyi was aggrieved: "Everything must be subject to the director's will", this pot is also interesting.
The film does not show the plot of the novel in its entirety, and even subverts the author's original intention, just like making a feature film with connotation into a pure love film.
I would like to ask, was there pure love in China in the 1940s?
Many fans of the original really want to ask, please ask the director, do you really understand this novel?
You know, the characters in the novel seem simple, but in fact, they are not good people, and the complex nature of human nature is deliberately ignored, how can it be made into a love film?
The director's motivation is originally a little "impure", and he interprets the original intention of the novel according to his own wishes.
I don't know if Zhang Ailing knows underground, and how she should cry and laugh.
If you have to watch a romance movie, this movie is worth recommending, but hanging up the name of Zhang Ailing is a bit unbearable.
(3) The selection of male and female protagonists has been controversial
Everyone noticed that no, in the trailer, it is basically Yu Feihong's beautiful shot, rendering the feeling of pure love between Ma Sichun and Peng Yuyan.
As a result, as soon as I walked into the movie theater, this persona, this acting, this character image, really did not match.
First of all, let's talk about Qiao Qiqiao (played by Peng Yuyan).
The original book describes Georgie Joe's appearance as follows:
He was even bloodlessr than Zhou Jijie, and even his lips were pale, like plaster casts. Under the black pressed eyebrows and eyelashes, the eyes were like the wind blowing through the waseda field, sometimes revealing the blue light of the water under the rice, flashing and darkening again. Man is tall and well born, but his clothes are so obedient and casual that people forget the existence of his body. ”
From the above information, we can see that Georgie Joe is probably such a man:
A tall man with good facial features, a slender figure but a pale face, coupled with mixed blood reasons, it can be called personable.
If you use the poster picture characters, it is also a perfect match, but the thief's laughter in the play, how to see how uncomfortable.
A prodigal brother, who has been in the love scene for a long time, without some heart and wrist, can survive to this day, how can such a character be so confused.
Moreover, Peng Yuyan's almost "Ma Jingtao" style textbook performance is only playing an amorous male brother, and it is impossible to play a person who is good at cunning and has a thin and cold nature, and has an iron heart, and this acting skill is indeed difficult to compliment.
First of all, I like Peng Yuyan very much.
But I do think that he himself is not suitable for the image of the prodigal brother, because it is too sunny and positive, but it makes people play.
Perhaps, in "Dangerous Relationship", the stupid boy played by Zhang Dongjian is more in line with some.
Let's talk about Ge Weilong (played by Ma Sichun)
The appearance of Ge Weilong in the original work is described as follows:
"Her face is plain and beautiful little convex face, and now, this kind of 'puff face' is outdated. Her eyes were long and beautiful, and the deep marks on her eyelids swept straight into her sideburns. Slender nose, small fat mouth. Perhaps her facial expression is slightly lacking, but only because of this sluggishness, it shows the gentle and thick ancient Chinese atmosphere. ”
If only from this aspect of the picture above, Ma Sichun can still be qualified for any corner, but her image and temperament are inconsistent with the original work.
She gave the impression that she did not come to Hong Kong to make a living, but a rich woman to experience life.
You know, in the novel, Ge Weilong's depravity is not persecuted by anyone, but she herself is willing.
That is to say, Ge Weilong is not a person with a simple mind, but also has his own mind and ideas.
The so-called love is just a momentary impulse and mutual use.
She should eventually become like an aunt.
However, in the play, it becomes a natural forced prostitution, which is one of the biggest misunderstandings of the work.
Moreover, that kind of unchanging eyes and smiles really can't play the hoarseness under despair, but gives people an inexplicable sense of joy that "the more you act, the more you want to laugh".
Excessive performance, there is no deep dissection and purification of the author's characters at the inner level, just for the sake of acting.
On the contrary, a number of supporting roles have shined, and even have a bit of the meaning of playing.
For example: Yu Feihong and Liang Luoshi, which is very confusing.
The novel does not give an explanation of the ending, but even if it is not told, we are very clear: in the face of material and profit temptations, the pair of people will be separated sooner or later, and mo says who gets cheap and who suffers losses.
< h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" > concluding remarks</h1>
The film has a series of discordant things, not in the selection and acting skills of the protagonists, but in the feeling that the script of the film is wrong.
After the first wave of word-of-mouth of "The First Burning Incense" came out, many people attributed the dismal box office to Ma Sichun's acting skills.
But in my opinion, this pot is a bit big, and she alone could not support it.
Did you see it?
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