Poster for the movie Elf Hostel 3: Crazy Vacation
Reference News Network reported on August 22 that the summer file needs family movies, which is a clichéd topic and does not need to be deliberately explained. The 2018 summer season produced by Sony Animation,3 The Wizard Inn: Crazy Vacation is the latest fun work, maintaining the moderation and novelty of the first two works, and successfully topped the North American box office list, which is a standard Hollywood industrial product.
However, the wisdom article contained in this "standard" is still intriguing, and it not only refers to a popular, secular and mass-produced film industry development mechanism, but also contains aesthetic considerations that constantly renew itself with the progress of the times.
Cute the dark image
The Elf Hostel family boarded a luxury cruise ship and embarked on an adventure
"Elf Hostel" treats the classic vampire image originated from the european medieval Grand Duke into a warm family running an elf hostel, constantly experiencing adventure and experiencing the life and emotions of real human beings.
Thirty years ago, the British animation classic "The Adventures of strange ducks" changed "Dracula" to "Duckula", which is a model of cute dark image. "Elf Hostel" is produced in the third part, and Dracula's desire to rebuild a complete family is also stronger than ever. This is the setting of the characters themselves in the film, and it is also very obvious that it represents the typical position of the Hollywood film industry in which the film is located, that is, it also reflects the affirmation of family value in American society as always.
Therefore, how to innovate in the existing role setting and value orientation will directly determine the success or failure of "Elf Hostel 3".
In terms of the traditional method of playwriting, it is obvious that as an animation film with general significance, it is difficult for the film to jump out of the clichés too much in the play, or conversely, it is basically impossible to get rid of the format of "pursuit-adventure-reunion".
In fact, from the perspective of the finished film, it is true, the emotional main line throughout the film is Dracula's love process with the cruise ship captain Erica, supplemented by Dracula's long-entangled grudge with the Van Helsing family, to evolve the interweaving of romance and love, this main line will eventually end in a successful end, the audience is familiar with this schedule, and has also watched almost all family movies, and this fact can be judged subconsciously. On this basis, how to make the adventure process full of ups and downs becomes the narrative focus, which is reflected in "Elf Hostel 3", not only the ups and downs of the attraction level of the play, because this ups and downs are already difficult to make new ideas.
Reconstruct dreams with anomalies
Show off all kinds of tricks and cute moves
On top of this, the film quite boldly reorganizes the narrative thread, pushes the various monsters of the elf hostel to the forefront in turn, and shows the various monsters with different body shapes and cute actions in the main line, and the almost non-existent jokes effectively make up for the tiredness that may be brought to the audience during the promotion of the old story.
As a descendant of Dracula's nemesis Van Helsing, the heroine Erica's change of heart from revenge to true love seems far-fetched, and the relationship between the two is also more urgent from the search for the ultimate weapon.
"Elf Hostel 3" does not spend the main ink on the routine of traditional genre films, but creates entertainment effects with the construction of "ugly" reverse aesthetic scenes. The display of their special morphological characteristics by the above-mentioned monsters is part of it, such as the flight with extremely poor service experience, Erica's unsuccessful assassination of several yin and yang errors, the misinterpretation of the intrigue of her friends on the exposed plot, and the various "paradoxical" sections that are plausible to the traditional misunderstanding, showing the film's comedic idea of reversing the normalcy of life.
Therefore, if you simply look at the main theme of the film as another "evil does not suppress the right" without suspense, it seems that it is not possible to summarize the intentions of the creator very well.
Erica's rash handling, like the final reversal and the transformation of the black hand himself behind the scenes, is both abrupt and in line with the essence of "judging ugliness", and is an attempt to reconstruct the dream with abnormalities. Audiences who are the interpreters, or who can be inspired by the song that sparked the final victory, have the most straightforward tactile logic that makes up the film's greatest strength: simplicity.
At the same time, it is also a part of Hollywood animation that is increasingly emphasizing the need to enhance the visual experience and challenge the complex emotional function of the play' connotation, and it is becoming a myth of the old era, but it is by no means out of reach.
Cold humor packs hot skin sacs
The "body difference" of the shape is more flattering to the comedic effect
The fish-headed waiter adds tea and pours water without expression, and the wolf-dog couple lowers the group of cubs without defense, representing a rhythm and posture that is not agitated, and the film bases the joyful atmosphere on the aesthetic mechanism of anti-regulation (the character images appear in the film are various, there is no standard handsome man and woman, reminiscent of "Monster University", "Monster Shrek"), wrapping hot skin bags with cold humor, quoting inappropriate comparison examples, the clown play in Peking Opera, which undertakes a similar function, the "body difference" of the appearance, It also flatters the multi-faceted personality of the character's comedic face, which is a similar effect in "Elf Hostel 3".
But is Sony Animation still fundamentally different from Disney's productions?
Compared with the many works dominated by the latter that are full of extreme crazy big screen experience, "Elf Hostel 3" seriously neutralizes the weird experience, while rejecting the crazy rhythm and image, "dancing with the demons", and finally returning to the family body, in this sense, it is the same as the high-profile competitors.
In fact, this is the mainstream value of American society that has not changed for decades, not shaken by the vicissitudes of politics, race, gender and other issues, the film successfully reached the North American box office champion, it is too natural, no matter how heartless, the final happiness is still gratifying, even if it should not seem so smooth. (Text/Lonely Island Lord)