Recently, I saw a version of the most complete animated film so far on the Internet, "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", which is about 114 minutes long, which is spontaneously organized by the fans of "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", referring to various versions, including French, Swedish and other versions of the restoration and sorting of the works after the subtitles.
I looked at it again with great interest, and found some details that I hadn't noticed before, such as the various ingenious designs in the transformation battle between Sun Wukong and Erlang God:
Sun Wukong turned into a bird and did not forget to look around with a pergola in his hand.
Sun Wukong turned into a small fish, and his ancestral craft was still not forgotten.
When Sun Wukong turned into a crane and pressed the wolf that Erlang Shen turned into, how could the swing of his fist be a bit like Wu Song fighting a tiger.
Of course, the author also saw a BUG that I had not noticed before, King Tota, they shouted Long live the Jade Emperor? You are a bully, and who can only live for ten thousand years.
Although there are already a large number of articles discussing the animated movie "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", the author still wants to write another one, if the system does not give recommendations because of too many articles on the same subject, then keep it for yourself.
First, the background of the creation of "The Great Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", Wan Liming's long-cherished wish in life
The ancestor-level figure of China's animation industry is the Wan brothers, of which the boss Wan Liming is the core of this family. They created a series of firsts in the history of Chinese animation, and Journey to the West and Sun Wukong have always been targets of the Wan brothers.
In the 1930s, under the influence of the Western movie "Snow White", the Wan brothers spent a year and a half to produce the journey to the West-themed animated film "The Iron Fan Princess", which was successfully released in 1941 and caused a sensation, and even directly prompted the Japanese animation industry to give birth to their anime grandfather.
Wan Liming's favorite Sun Monkey is not here, but the one in "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", there were also merchants willing to invest in him, after the Wan brothers painted for more than half a year, the merchants thought that they did not make money and did not shoot, which became a pain in Wan Liming's heart.
In the 1950s, Wan Liming returned to Shanghai, he directed a series of animation films and achieved remarkable achievements, and by 1961, the conditions for the production of "The Great Haunting of Tiangong" were finally ripe, and with the support of Te Wei, the director of Shangmei Film Studio, the production cycle of more than two years of "Daxiao Tiangong" drew the first stroke. There is a saying that Te Wei originally wanted to leave "The Haunting of heavenly palace" to his director, but he still supported Wan Liming, who had been preparing for this for decades.
Interestingly, the end of "The Great Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" and "Journey to the West" are very different, Sun Wukong broke the Lingxiao Treasure Hall and returned to Huaguo Mountain to live a carefree life, without the Buddha and the Five Elements Mountain.
It is said that this ending is what Wan Liming has considered since he was a child, and he cannot allow Sun Monkey to be defeated, which is also the real idea of many children.
This statement may be true, but the choice of this ending in "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" is of course also related to the intention of the whole movie.
Second, the characteristics of the times have created the classic image of the Monkey King
There is a saying that there is a difference between the image of the Monkey King in "Journey to the West" and Sun Wukong and "The Great Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", relatively speaking, the image of the Fighting Victory Buddha is more plump, while the Monkey King is more simple, he is jealous and hateful and frank, dares to fight and fight to see everything, so Sun Wukong in "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" is obviously more able to win the love of most audiences, because his life is addictive.
At the same time, the intention of "The Great Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" is also in line with the characteristics of the times of that year, and Sun Wukong, who is not afraid of power to resist feudal rule, represents the spirit of that era, and pictures of experiencing these ideas in this cartoon abound.
For example, when Sun Wukong first went to the Heavenly Court, the Jade Emperor was high above.
By the time Sun Wukong made a big fuss in the Heavenly Palace, the image of the Jade Emperor had shrunk to Sun Wukong's crotch.
When Sun Wukong went to the Imperial Horse Prison to take office, his subordinates knelt on the ground to greet him, and Sun Wukong's sentence "What are you doing here" showed his personality of pursuing equality.
It is reasonable to say that such a cartoon with the characteristics of the times should only be national, and it is difficult to be the world.
On the contrary, some of our anime works that study the West cannot go abroad, and the "Haunting heavenly palace" that adheres to the national culture and contains the characteristics of the times is very popular abroad. It's "Stand and earn the money!" ”
Speaking of which, it is necessary to talk about Osamu Tezuka, the father of Japanese anime.
3. Osamu Tezuka's Dream of Sun Wukong
To put it bluntly, when it comes to animation, we used to be the masters of the Japanese animation industry and their leaders.
In 1943, Osamu Tezuka saw the Man Brothers' cartoon Princess Iron Fan and decided to pursue an animation career in the future.
Osamu Tezuka has always had the same goal as Wan Liming in his heart, that is, Sun Wukong.
When Osamu Tezuka saw "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", he was very excited, and after coming to China, he met with Wan Liming and Yan Dingxian, the chief animation designer of "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", and established a deep friendship.
From these two paintings, we can see his love for "The Great Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" and Sun Wukong, as well as his respect for his peers such as Wan Liming Yan Dingxian.
In the last autobiographical anime Osamu Tezuka made before his death, Osamu Tezuka: My Monkey King, we see him and Man Akira discussing Monkey King together.
Before Osamu Tezuka died, he told Takashi Matsutani, president of Tezuka Animation Company, that Osamu Mansuka was the person he most respected and admired, saying that Osamu Tezuka was influenced by Disney, but in fact, he was influenced by Osamu Mansaki earlier and more profoundly.
When Osamu Tezuka died, "My Monkey Goku" was not completed, and Takasei Matsutani took over the final production, saying that Osamu Tezuka's purpose in making this animation was also to say hello to Man Liming and tell Mr. Wan that I had gone.
In 1997, Wan Liming died, and he seemed to have taken away an era that belonged to Chinese animation, and many people lamented that "The Great Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" would not be able to be copied.
Fourth, where is the difficulty of "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" that cannot be copied
Of course, we have to admit that there is indeed a nostalgic factor in the middle of the inability to copy "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", such as the voice actors of "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace", Qiu Yuefeng (Sun Wukong, Taishang Laojun), Bi Ke (East Sea Dragon King), Fu Runsheng (Jade Emperor), Shang Hua (Taibai Venus), Yu Ding (Tota Tianwang, Ma Tianjun), Li Zi, Liu Guangning (Fairy) and others are all master voice actors, and it is difficult to have them in the future.
Technically speaking, "The Haunting of heavenly palaces" can be copied, but its cost is extremely high.
According to Yan Dingxian's recollection, when making "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" in the 1960s, they had to produce 7,000-10,000 original paintings every ten minutes of animation, and there were 70,000 original paintings in the previous episode alone, plus more than 100,000 original paintings in the next episode, which was the painstaking effort of the crew of 20 or 30 people for two years, and this workload and cost were now unbearable for commercial film companies.
Even if the use of computers to make cartoons can greatly improve efficiency, the huge amount of details involved in cartoons is also something that many animation practitioners cannot sink into.
To sum up, "The Haunting of the Heavenly Palace" is a pure work of art under specific historical conditions, while in a commercial society, the living space of pure art works is very small, and economic interests are considered in the first place, which is a pain point that is difficult to solve.
The death of the master, of course, is also an important reason, there are dreams in the heart, and it is necessary to realize them with his life.
In front of Mr. Wan Liming's tombstone is the Sun Wukong who made him think about it all his life.
END