In the past two years, mainland audiences have become more and more discerning.
Hollywood blockbusters such as "Fantastic Beasts 2", "Thunder Shazam", "Captain Marvel" and "Captain Marvel" were released at the same time as North America, and "Reunion 4" is the earliest in the world;
"Green Book", "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Roma" and other Oscar hits, the front foot awards ceremony just ended, the back foot mainland announced the introduction.
But in addition to the joy, it is also a little uncomfortable. Because the introduction of the release is the "optimized version", at this time, Uncle Yu is somewhat fortunate, the following good film has not been introduced -
"The Masterless Work"
Work without author
At this year's Oscars, the film competed with Roma for Best Foreign Language Film.
It is also a competitor to the Venice Golden Lion Award.
Although it failed, it did not prevent it from becoming one of the most noteworthy films of the year.
The reason is simple, as it is a new work by German director Florian Heinkel von Donas mark.
Although the director's name is very difficult to remember, you must know that his "Eavesdropping Storm" that has touched countless people.
This suspense film about the former East German secret police ranked 43rd in the "Douban Movie Top250", with 300,000 people scoring a high score of 9.1.
So if you haven't seen it yet, please make up for it.
After 12 years, the new work "Masterless" once again placed the background in the period of the division between East and West Germany, and this time, the director challenged the grander narrative background.
The story spans three decades before and after World War II and is 188 minutes long.
To be honest, a three-hour World War II film is really easy to dissuade many viewers.
But don't panic, director Florian's great point is that he can make a three-hour movie "eye-catching".
Douban scored as high as 8.5, better than 88% of the feature films, is the best in the near future.
The grip of this work lies in one word:
beauty
So beautiful.
First of all, the protagonist's appearance is as if he came out of the painting -
The male protagonist, Tom Shirin, is a handsome teenager in "Hitler's Boy" and "Ah, Boy" (both films are "boys").
The heroine, Paula Bell, is a brave woman who has silently pursued love in "Franz".
Earlier, there was also a glimpse in the unpopular film "Pol's Diary", which was full of girlishness.
The two protagonists are pleasing enough to look at their faces, and the director does not hesitate to show their beautiful flesh in various nude shots.
This graceful curve of the human body is full of raw power in the context of brutal war.
But if you go to the theater, I am afraid that it will be deleted completely.
So when he thought of the appearance of "Green Book" and "Bohemian Rhapsody" after the trial, Uncle Yu was somewhat glad that this piece was not introduced.
Also, another layer of beauty lies in the story itself.
This film tells the story of people who have suffered from the trauma of war and healed themselves with the beauty of art.
The male protagonist, Kurt Barnert, is a teenager with an extraordinary talent for painting.
Unfortunately, the era in which he was born was doomed to a life of twists and turns.
He grew up in Nazi Germany.
At that time, the Nazi government imposed a high-pressure control on art, and all art that did not conform to political ideas was banned.
In 1937, the Nazis held an "exhibition of decadent art", and world-renowned masters such as Van Gogh, Schiller, Picasso, and Mondrian were listed as objects of criticism.
However, the young Kurt was lucky, he had an enlightened and beautiful aunt Elizabeth, who often encouraged him to create and would take him to "critical learning" at decadent art exhibitions.
It's just a pity that the good times are not long.
Under the call of crazy "Aryan racial optimization", the Nazis not only slaughtered Jews who were considered inferior, but also targeted their own people.
The infamous "euthanasia plan" was put into effect.
It was a blatant murder in the name of genetic eugenics.
People with disabilities (including any physical or psychological deficits) are considered worthless lives, they are forcibly sterilized and more than 200,000 people are sent to gas chambers.
Elizabeth, who was convicted of mental illness, died as a result.
After the end of World War II, it was not peace, but the Cold War in East and West Germany.
Kurt's hometown was divided under the Soviet-ruled GDR (commonly known as East Germany).
Here he began to receive art education under the socialist system;
He also met the love of his life, Ellie Sibbonde, at the Art Academy.
Ellie is a simple and lovely rich girl, And Kurt is a talented poor boy, and the two have a passionate underground love affair.
The fire of love burned with the momentum of the fire, and soon gave birth to the crystallization of love.
However, in front of this couple is the opposition of the family.
Ellie's father, Carl Sibond, a well-known local obstetrician, had long since seen his daughter pregnant and had secretly hatched plans for an abortion.
He lied that Ellie's womb function was wrong and that pregnancy would kill her, so he personally removed her grandson who was still in the mother's womb.
An ordinary person, no matter how much he does not like his son-in-law, may not be able to do such a thing.
But Karl is no ordinary person.
In fact, he was one of the executors of the "euthanasia plan" of the year and an absolute fan of Nazi eugenics.
Curt's aunt, Elizabeth, was one of the countless undead who died under his command.
The cunning Karl managed to hide his nazi identity and became a well-known "humanitarian doctor" after the war.
But he was clearly not reconciled.
When the opportunity came, he quickly defected and fled to West Germany, continuing to mix with the wind and water, leaving his indisputable daughter and son-in-law to fend for themselves in East Germany.
After Carl leaves, Kurt and Ellie finally have a good life.
They married, inheriting Karl's "legacy" in East Germany, and Kurt became less famous for his excellent painting skills.
However, he longed to be able to paint freely, rather than painting the walls uniformly every day.
But in East Germany, the "eyes of Big Brother" are always on the artists who try to cross the line.
With Ellie's support, he resolutely gave up all his wealth and fled to West Germany together...
However, just when Kurt thought he would finally be able to show his skills freely, he discovered that traditional arts such as painting had long since become obsolete here.
The creators play with avant-garde art that people can't understand.
Out of love, Kurt decided to return to school at the age of thirty.
He applied to the Düsseldorf Academy of Arts (which is still an authority in avant-garde art circles today) and followed the trend.
But his efforts were not recognized, and the principal considered Kurt's work to be "without self".
Creation is stuck in a bottleneck, and there is no serious work.
Unable to make ends meet, Kurt had to bow his head to his father-in-law, Carl, for help, but was repeatedly humiliated.
When Mozart was 30 years old
They're all dead
At this low point in his life, a piece of news accidentally triggered Kurt's inspiration.
When the main culprit of the "Euthanasia Project" was arrested, The Cotter Ghost made a divine copy of the photo of the war criminal.
While copying the photo, he suddenly felt a sense of realism that had never been seen before.
Decide to put the direction of creation and invest in your own life.
Old photos of his childhood and aunt, photos of his wife, and even his father-in-law's ID photos were all depicted by him.
Enough to copy the fake truth, it is artistically added a hazy effect, blurring the boundary between reality and creation.
At that time, it was generally believed that the emergence of photographic art made painting lose its meaning of existence.
Cotter's work, on the other hand, uses painting techniques to present the characteristics of photography, breaking the "painting is dead" thesis in one fell swoop, and finally achieving great success...
Masterless is not entirely fictional.
The artistic experience of the male protagonist Kurt is derived from the famous German pop artist Gerhard Richter.
The work that made Kurt famous in one fell swoop was the series of "Photographic Realism" created by Richter in the 1960s.
However, although the film is based on him, it is not a biopic in the traditional sense.
The film incorporates a lot of fictional dramatic plots, and the final theme expressed is not Richter's history of artistic struggle.
It's just borrowing the shell of Richter's story to convey another level of truth.
What is the truth? This is the key issue around the heart of the film.
For so many years, Kurt seems to have been stuck in a dilemma, with emotions and strength in his heart that cannot find the ideal way to vent and express.
The traditional art of East Germany, the modern art of West Germany, could not touch his heart.
At first, Uncle Fish thought that this film would be like "Eavesdropping Storm", and what Kurt was pursuing was a specific truth, a definite ending:
That is, the Nazi identity of his father-in-law, Karl, was exposed and eventually brought to justice.
But the director is obviously not satisfied with making the film into a simple suspense film.
Because Carl's identity is not revealed until the end of the film, and even Kurt himself does not realize this.
This secret, like his vague paintings, has been hidden in the long river of history.
So what is the truth that Cotter is seeking?
The answer, in fact, is in himself.
The principal criticized Cotter's work as "selfless" because he saw through his work that he was only creating for the sake of creation.
Hidden beneath the bells and whistles are empty souls and powerless expressions.
Great art is supposed to touch the heart, but Kurt is escaping from himself, escaping from pain—
His beloved aunt died in the gas chambers; two older brothers died on the battlefield; his underage sister died in bombing; his kind father fell victim to his time and committed suicide in despair.
As a child, Kurt would put his hands in front of his eyes and block his sight.
The truth of the war was too harsh for him to face.
In fact, many people after World War II chose to live in lies.
When it comes to genocide, people habitually blame the Nazis entirely.
But in fact, many ordinary people in Germany at that time were not completely kept in the dark.
Behind the euthanasia plan, more than half of the parents have agreed that the hospital unconditionally "shortens" the life of their children who have no hope of curing.
The truth is too heavy, so most people choose to turn a blind eye.
Continue to live in self-paralysis, allowing the soul to curl up in the shadows.
So instead of saying that Kurt is seeking the truth, it may be said that the truth has always been there, and he just needs to summon up the courage to face it.
And the way he used it was by copying the war criminals, so that he could look directly at the picture that he had blocked with his hands.
As Curt's principal said, after a disaster, the only thing that sets the soul free is art.
It is precisely because of this mission that art cannot tolerate a little fraud.
People don't dare to look at it, and the artist has to look at it for them.
Even if it is so painful to look directly at the truth, "you must not look away."