A few days ago, a friend said that he wanted to lose weight between the teenager Peng Yuyan as a model. She also sent me photos of Peng Yuyan when he was in high school, and to be honest, I didn't dare to believe it. Here's a picture she sent.
But she texted today and said she gave up. The reason is that just after watching Peng Yuyan's new film "Tropical Past", Peng Shuai lost 32 pounds. In her words, she finally understood what it meant to be thin into a bolt of lightning, and she could only do ball lightning.
When this friend messaged me, I was also watching Once Upon a Time in the Tropics. Unlike the entry point of her face, I went with the possibility of this movie. After all, this "Tropical Past" produced by Ning Hao and directed by Wen Shipei has already taken the lead, winning the VFF Venture Capital Award, the market unit of the talent project of the Berlin Film Festival, and was shortlisted for the special screening unit of the 74th Cannes Film Festival.
In September 2016, Bad Monkey Pictures announced the "Bad Monkey 72 Change Movie Plan", except for Lu Yang for "Embroidered Spring Knife", others are newcomers, including Wen Shipei, the director of this "Tropical Past". Ning Hao's evaluation of the film industry Shinjuku is: "I think director Wen Shipei has a very special aesthetic tone, his own set of aesthetics is very complete, and very charming, what he writes is good, comprehensive ability." ”
Before Wen Shipei, the directorial debut "Beneficiary" successfully took the "Bad Monkey 72 Change Film Project" to the throne, and this feature film starring Dapeng, Liu Yan and Zhang Zixian not only gained word of mouth, but also won the "Best Director Debut" at the Changchun Film Festival and the Golden Rooster Award. The box office of 219 million is also a good performance for a newcomer's new work.
As another masterpiece of the "Bad Monkey 72 Change Movie Project", Ning Hao chose to be Wen Shipei's lift-off rocket booster this time. And Wen Shipei also lived up to Ning Hao's love, "Tropical Past" earlier in Cannes and Berlin Film Festival, especially the Berlin Film Festival genius project market unit - VFF Venture Award, is the previous Chinese failed to dabble in the virgin land, showing the infinite possibilities of Wen Shipei under the international vision.
Once Upon a Time in the Tropics is a story of accident and redemption. Wang Xueming, played by Peng Yuyan, is guilty of an accidental car accident and approaches the victim's wife again and again, and he wants to tell the truth again and again, but he wants to say it again and again. What surprised Wang Xueming even more was that the case had another hidden plot, and he was caught in it and could not extricate himself, and was caught in another dangerous vortex.
Personally, I think that the Berlin Film Festival VFF Venture Awards have a special love for "Once Upon a Time in the Tropics" for two main reasons. First, the story advances layer by layer, it is a nesting doll-like case-in-case, and the characters rise step by step in the double helix structure of reversal and progression, and the concept is very exquisite. The second is its microscopic human perspective, which crushes the characters and then re-kneads them, almost microscopic human dissection, so that the story's creativity wins at the starting line.
The film adopts a fragmented narrative. The two non-linear scenes of prison and car accident are shaken up, making people mistakenly think that there is a causal relationship. As the plot deepens, the jumping timeline becomes more and more imaginative, and also gives the story characters more possibilities. The characters return to the origin of time again and again, or return to the same place at different times again and again, and each time they shake out more information, and finally outline another unexpected direction of the story.
This is typical of immersive movies. The director adopts a rare suspect perspective narrative in Chinese crime genre films, which not only benefits the portrayal of characters, but also is not afraid of spoilers. Wang Xueming's first perspective is synchronized with the audience's psychology, the audience does not know what Wang Xueming is doing, why he is doing it, and he does not know the consequences of the behavior, and Wang Xueming is the same. In other words, the audience enters the story with the protagonist's synchronized questions and follows his emotions with subtle changes.
The film is quite successful in terms of imagery and style. The director's brain was wide open, and he came up with a strange trick of using stockings as a filter, creating a kind of retro and virtual and indistinguishable effect. People who have experienced major accidents know that people will be in some kind of restless fluctuations, everything around them will be magnified, time will be stretched, space will become deep, and everything will be perceived deeply and unreally. Wen Shipei cleverly used a stocking to implement literary and sensory synaesthesia into the visual system, so that the vision was directly imported into the body.
Another major image synaesthesia of the film is the dry heat and stickiness it creates. Titled "Once Upon a Time in the Tropics", the story takes place in the south, Wang Xueming set off from that unexpected summer night, his face and body have never been dry, sweat, blood and other greasy secretions mixed in, until he ran from the shadow of the prison into the free sun. After the air conditioner was broken, Liang Mama, while fanning the fan while blowing the fan is still hot, she grabbed the fan to prevent the movement of shaking her head, highlighting her inner uneasiness and restlessness.
The film is full of heat, panic, mystery and exhaustion. Throughout, it is like a sweat sauna, every pore of the actor is opened, and the emotions of the characters cannot stop gushing out of the pores. Each progression and reversal of the plot is like pouring hot stones, steaming up the heat, and giving the characters a new round of steaming. There is only one outlet for the character, that is, to discharge all the toxins accumulated in the heart, and the spirit and flesh can be released.
From the actor configuration, it can be seen that Ning Hao loves Wen Shipei and his "Tropical Past". The starring lineup of Peng Yuyan, Zhang Aijia, Wang Yanhui, Zhang Yu and Jiang Peiyao is placed in the film project of mature directors, and it is also a powerful lineup of leverage.
In "Tropical Past", Peng Yuyan and Jiang Peiyao are a pair, but most of the time, it is Peng Yuyan and Zhang Aijia's group of "forgetful years" that modulate the chemical effect of the story. Wang Xueming initially entered the house in the name of air conditioning maintenance, which seemed to be a patron relationship, but it was actually a relationship between the perpetrator and the victim's family. The return of the perpetrator to the crime scene is a high probability event in criminal psychology, and similar plots often appear in film and television works, such as the Korean movie "Memories of Killing". However, it is still relatively rare for the perpetrator to approach the victim's family with the idea of redemption. As Wang Xueming himself said, he did not know why he did it, and the later plot made it clear that he hoped to tell the truth and seek forgiveness in his heart.
This involves a theme of the film, that is, how a person can face the past and embrace the sun. Wang Xueming's accident is an inadvertent fault, but the disappearance of the body is another layer of legal relationship. People inevitably make mistakes in a young or high-pressure state, sometimes dare not face the door, sometimes choose to escape, and the result is more serious consequences. But to be born as a human being, you should have the courage to bear the consequences of your actions and work hard to make up for and redeem. This is similar to some doctrinal confessions and redemptions.
But the director didn't stop there. Between Wang Xueming and Liang Mama, the director takes into account the complex side of human nature, and under the theme of redemption, he rubs in the instincts of voyeurism and curiosity, as well as some unclear ambiguity. This is not the first time that Zhang Aijia and "small fresh meat" are ambiguous, in Jia Zhangke's "Mountains and Rivers Of the Past", Zhang Aijia and Dong Zijian once had a period of electric light and flint. Of course, Wen Shipei still knows the measure, he pursues a certain kind of "return to sweetness" of knowledge, and did not step into the thunder pool. Director Wen Shipei calls this kind of personal expression or appeal "aftertaste", which is quite different in genre films.
Zhang Aijia is a two-time Golden Statue and two-time Golden Horse Film Queen, and the performance of each work spares no effort. This time, her grasp of the character was thunderous in the silent place. There is no emotional rendering of big openings and closures, and nothing but an emotional action of grabbing the electric fan. But in front of the opponent's play, every micro-expression has a subtext. His kindness, ambiguity and vigilance toward Wang Xueming all seem to flow naturally and inadvertently, and the rhythm and expression of the action are just right.
Mama Liang is not a simple and flat victim. Her search for her husband's disappearance and her death are two completely different attitudes. My guess is that because of the quarrel before leaving, I feel guilty about my husband's disappearance, and when I learned the reason for my husband's death, I seemed to have some kind of unexpected determination and relief. Taking the scene where she confesses the body as an example, she kept her distance and glanced at it, simply gave the police a "it's him" and turned away, without giving more than half a second. Sleeping in bed with a person whose relationship is not harmonious and chaotic is a very complex and delicate emotion, and the director and actor stop at this point.
The director uses the contrast between the two scenes to outline the inner waves of the characters. One is not grieving in front of everyone, and the other is crying and despair when alone. Liang Ma's lack of grief surprised Wang Xueming, especially in front of visiting her sisters, who openly expressed that they did not want to cry, and the condolences of the crowd seemed superfluous and embarrassing, which was probably one of the reasons why Wang Xueming continued to follow her. As for her despair, it only took one scene, if it were not for Wang Xueming secretly throwing stones to interrupt, she would have sunk into the river.
Speaking of returning to the weight loss inspirational model teenager Peng Yuyan mentioned at the beginning, it is said that he lost 32 pounds this time. The largest one meter and eighty-two, from 157 pounds to 124 pounds, reached the lowest value after he exercised and lost weight in college. This time, he no longer aims to shape and become handsome, but pursues the tearing feeling of the characters who have been mentally tortured. To this end, he lost weight in vegetarian science for half a year in advance, and then strengthened fat loss before opening the lens, and finally tortured himself to the point of withering.
In the history of world cinema, there have been many skinny labor models. For example, Christian Bell, who lost 60 pounds for "The Mechanic"; matthew McConaughey, who lost 30 pounds for "Dallas Buyers Club"; for example, Little Plum, who once lost 61 pounds for "The Revenant"; such as Adrian Brody, who lost 61 kilograms for "The Pianist"... In addition to being skinny, they also have one thing in common - they all won Oscars for their roles.
Peng Yuyan, as one of the few bodybuilding men in Chinese movies, has previously cultivated an enviable and hateful tendon meat, and captured the love of thousands of fans. With this tendon meat, he became the royal actor of Lin Chaoxian's series of action films. However, he is not satisfied with action movies, in Zhang Yibai's youth films, Xu Anhua's literary and artistic films, Jiang Wen's films, Han Han's cross-border works, cross-strait and three places, directors of all levels, and various types of films he can pass the level.
Peng Yuyan can also be said to be a model actor of the young generation. Ten years ago, he starred in "Roll Over! At the time of Ashin, he practiced for gymnastics characters in a closed period of three months, and performed twelve hours of physical training and gymnastics exercises every day. In order to shape the physique of the athletes, he insisted on eating according to the dietitian's recipes every day, not taking up a little oil or salt, and relying on boiled vegetables to fill his hunger. His athlete figure stems from this.
This time, in order to play the air conditioner repairman, Peng Yuyan specially found a technician who has been engaged in air conditioning maintenance for most of his life to learn from the teacher, look at the drawings, measurement size, and carry the gas cylinder, all of which have been carefully learned. After mastering sign language, gymnastics, surfing, Muay Thai, locking skills, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, dolphin training, tiger crane double fist, professional bicycle, etc., Peng Yuyan trained himself into an air conditioning maintenance worker.
Acting becomes what you want, and there used to be a name called experientialism. Want to be the fourth generation of director Wu Tianming filmed "Old Well", first threw Zhang Yimou into the deep mountains to carry more than a hundred pounds of large stone slabs for several months, filmed "River Without Navigation Markers" more fiercely, first let a group of actors go to the river to train for three months, dry into a pop-up loach, a few sunburned, more than others, until the sun is full of blisters. There is only one purpose for this, and that is to fit in with the character. Before many people lamented that the trick of the experience school was "lost" in the film and television circle, they did not expect to be passed on to the young generation of Peng Yuyan.
In the past ten years, young labor model Peng Yuyan has been nominated for awards such as Golden Statue, Golden Horse and Volkswagen Hundred Flowers many times, but has not been crowned by the Performance Award. This time, the director's creation of Peng Yuyan can be said to go straight to the major awards. Massive close-up shots, micro-expression mining without dead ends, the scheduling of inner dramas, the laying out of subtexts, the outbreak of emotions, and the final relief are all scheduled delicately and realistically, which raises Peng Yuyan's performance dimension to another level of ceiling.
For Peng Yuyan, this is an emotional film, immersed in a certain emotion throughout. From the sudden car accident in the narrative, the confusion, panic and overwhelm at the beginning, to the guilt and difficulty in opening the heart when sneaking into the victim's home as a maintenance worker, to the complexity of learning the cause of death of the victim and seeing the money, to the escape of guns and bullets and the outbreak of nowhere to escape, Wang Xueming's heart rate and emotions are beating at a high peak, thus bringing an immersive emotional experience to the audience.
At the end of the film, a long shot of Wang Xueming walking out of prison, through the crowd of hugging people, wu zi walking into the sun. He laughed and ran, and in the background was a mosaic tile of the image taboo and the "climbing lattice effect", which resulted in the effect of running through the two-dimensional world. This shot reminds me of Trevor's autobiographical debut, Four Hundred Blows, where we don't know where the teenager is going, only that he finally runs to the sea. We also don't know where Wang Xueming's future lies, but we know that he runs in the sun.
This time, his face was dry, no longer hot, flustered, mysterious and tired. He walked out of the sauna, relieved, and redeemed.
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