Today to give you an Amway spy drama that I think is the most wonderful spy drama I have seen in recent years -
"Female Drummer"
The Female Drummer is based on the 1983 novel of the same name by John Le Carré (the only ever master to win the British Society of Criminal Mystery Writers' "Golden Dagger Award"), starring Alexandre Skarsgaard, Michael Shannon, Florence Pew and other stars.
The story of the "female drummer" begins with martin Kurtz (Michael Shannon), the leader of Israel's Mossad Special Operations Team, who used the "beauty plan" to recruit a radical left-wing British actress, Charlie (Florence Pew), in order to hunt down a Palestinian terrorist organization that has been active in Europe for many years.
Because of love, Charlie is willingly employed by Israel, stealth among the Palestinians to lure the big fish behind the scenes.
However, as she came and went between the two peoples, and the pendulum of emotion and morality also kept swinging, she became a woman who repeated her promises, with double loyalty.
In the chaotic whirlpool of feelings and hunting, in the face of the absurd but incomparably real scenery of life, her originally deep-rooted morality has also been broken into pieces, and her conscience has oscillated between the two peoples.
As a fragile and desperate double spy for love, no matter how you choose, it is a desperate romance.
One
Once "Female Drummer" was broadcast, it was named "British version of "Color, Ring" by many media. However, in addition to the fact that "lust can surpass the political camp", which is very similar, other contents, including the exposition of the core of the text and the adaptation method, must be distinguished and worthy of careful analysis.
At the heart of the most important text, The Female Drummer focuses on the discernment of justice and authenticity, while Color, Ring focuses on the richness and moving of human nature and humanity. "Color, Ring" is eager for the second half of "Female Drummer" to say that there is a rest, while "Female Drummer" considers the deep motives before "Color, Ring".
The two have plots and emotions that overlap, but the pattern of "Female Drummer" is larger, the field of vision is farther, and the direction is clearer, which can also be seen from the length, "Female Drummer" is long, and "Color, Ring" is short and concise.
The American political commentator William H. Lee Jr. F. Buckley's evaluation of "The Female Drummer" has vividly elaborated on the key genre elements of loyalty and betrayal, truth and fiction, justice and injustice in spy novels.
The color, the ring is much less developed in this regard. The moral position of "Color, Commandment" is very clear, although it sympathizes with the encounters and choices of traitors, it stops at "lust transcends everything", and abandons effective judgment and analysis for the two deeper propositions of "justice and injustice" and "truth and fiction", and also abandons the broader social framework and historical process.
Yes, "Color, Ring" also stays in the "pathway to the depths of the female soul is the vagina" in the stage of thinking, the structure and plot are more because of this solidification and can not be effectively extended, especially Zhang Ailing put thousands of boredoms in the self-evident, want to say hugh in the blank, Ang Lee can only use his own will to exert it, simplifying into complexity.
Director Park Chan-wook, on the other hand, simplifies the complexity, abandoning some of the descriptions of the political background and focusing only on two main lines - the problems and solutions encountered by Martin Kurtz, and the problems and insoluble problems encountered by Charlie. What can be resolved is strategy and traps, but what cannot be resolved is emotional and moral struggle, making the story and characters more dignified and emotional.
Two
The success of the miniseries "Night Manager", based on Johann Le Carré's original book, made Park Chan-wook take over the female drummer, also produced by Le Carré's son Stephen Conwell, more stressful.
Park Chan-wook's previous work "Stoke" has only attracted the attention of a few insiders, compared to Bong Joon-ho's continuous large-scale productions, Park Chan-wook can really get Hollywood attention depends on whether "Female Drummer" can be successful, so he uses many of the unique jobs at the bottom of the pressure box.
The first is to use a large number of wide-angle lenses to shoot indoor scene scenes, using the stretching of the picture frame and the distortion of the edge of the picture to integrate the character's heart into the narrative, enhance the drama of the intersection of virtual and real in the original work, while blurring the boundary between reality and virtual, and deeply expanding the character's heart.
This trick has been used in "Bat" and "Robot Love", two films' unique indoor shooting techniques, both of which have won praise from insiders.
Second, Park Chan-wook is good at narrating with color and shadow.
In "Female Drummer", the art creates a huge sense of eye-catching, the costumes and props of big red and green are very prominent, and Park Dao uses discordant color combinations (such as dark purple and bright yellow) to emphasize the tension and appearance between the characters;
The use of shadows is even more fascinating, many one-man shows and close-ups allow the characters to speak in the intersection of shadows and bright lights, and the sense of separation and alienation allows the audience to follow the characters to experience the inner life and death struggle.
But Park Chan-wook's most commendable thing is the actor's tuning.
He has always liked to use heroic actresses with eyebrows, such as Lee Young-ae, Pei Doona, and Mia Huashikowska, and this time he chose Florence Pew, who was "rich and noble".
This girl has just won the best actress at the 20th British Independent Film Awards with "Lady Macbeth", although standing next to Alexander Skarsgaard, she still seems to be a little "not enough to see", but her soft temperament on the outside and inside and the cold indomitable breath between her eyebrows are exactly what Park director wants.
Three
Park Chan-wook also used the "play-in-play" shooting method for the first time in the play, which can be seen as a concentrated embodiment of his rethinking of the performance mode.
This kind of performance is not only a life-like performance of life, but also includes a deeper performance and peeping, the voyeur is anti-peeping, and the personality split after the fusion of real identity and character identity is the easiest mode to make the actor shine, and it is also the most testing acting skill.
The actors did a great job, especially Alexander Skarsgard, who used props and dictations to drive Charlie, played by Pew, into a fictional situation, allowing him to feel the real emotional impact and blur the boundaries between reality and fiction. When Charlie defuses the terrorist interrogation crisis, the audience's emotions burst with the actors.
The key to the series' puzzles falls on one of Shakespeare's four great comedies, "Everybody Rejoices" and George Bernard Shaw's famous historical tragedy "Joan of Arc".
The former is the key to Martin Kurtz's choice of Charlie, Charlie's interpretation of the heroine Rosalind on stage shows her ability to hide many faces under a hat, and Rosalind reflects Charlie's contradictory personality - wisdom and stupidity coexist, anarchism and social responsibility, which perfectly fit the complex interior of the spy character. And "Joan of Arc" reveals the tragic undertone of the play in advance - how ironic it is for a national hero who has been betrayed by his own people!
It can be said that the characters in "Female Drummer", whether political or emotional camps, everyone is a victim and a perpetrator; a winner and a loser. John LeCarret and Park Chan-wook take the wall of war, and through a woman, profoundly depict the potential fears and entanglements of mortals when faced with choices, and also satirize the absurdity and helplessness of war.