Look at the cover picture, you should know, what is the movie that Pocket Cat wants to talk about today, I believe you have seen a lot of film critics analyze it. The first time the resources were obtained, the pocket cat read it, and it took several days to type this paragraph in front of the computer.
Because until now, Pocket Cat is not very clear about how to say this movie. This is the first time, after watching it for several days, the more I think about it, the more complicated the mood, this movie, is a mysterious existence.
"Burning"
South Korean director Lee Cangdong competed at the Cannes Film Festival again after eight years, and received the highest score of 3.8 points in the history of Cannes, with a full score of 4 points. Word of mouth exploded, but unfortunately, the Palme d'Or lost to Kore-eda's "Thief Family", and Liu Yaren did not have the opportunity to be the emperor, but this situation is not the first time.
High voice does not mean that the award will be won, the work of the award does not mean that the public must like this movie, the evaluation of a movie is very subjective in itself, just like this "Burning", before everyone did not see, the Douban score is still 8.6, and in recent days, the score has slipped to 8.0, many people said that they do not understand, pocket cats also have similar feelings.
Roughly speaking about the plot content is convenient for the understanding of the article. Delivery man Lee Jong-so (played by Liu Yaren) and hourly friend Hae-mi (Kim Jong-sook), Hae-mi before going to Africa to tell Jong-soo to take care of her cat, who knows that when Hae-mi returns, she has a mysterious man Ben (played by Stephen Yuan).
Ben's profession is not very clear, but he is a rich upper-class person like Gatsby, and Zhong Xiu hides his love for Haemi in his heart. On the evening of a three-person party, Ben reveals a secret to Zhong Xiu, who likes to burn discarded plastic greenhouses once every two months. Not long after, Hae-mei's whereabouts are unknown, and Zhong Xiu is magically searching for plastic greenhouses, approaching the terrible truth step by step...
"Burning" seems to tell you something, but it doesn't seem to say anything. It alludes to the unfairness of modern life, the loneliness of young people, and so on, but it is not as thorough as other social theme films, naked, alive and open to make you miserable, sad, and crying.
As director Li Cangdong said, he wants to express the mystery of the film medium itself through this movie, "Burning" is a mystery, the world is a mystery, everyone is a mystery, you can't laugh, you can't cry, you only have one feeling, helpless.
The sense of helplessness will increase with time, like director Li Cangdong carefully concocted a cocktail, just drank it and could not say where the taste was good, stayed for a few hours, the wine was on the head, and suddenly found that this wine was really wonderful.
The magic is in the adaptation
The film is adapted from Haruki Murakami's short story "Burning Barn" and included in the 1984 book "Firefly, Burning Barn and Others".
People familiar with Haruki Murakami's writing style know that most of Haruki Murakami's writings are only unspeakable, and the earlier films adapting his old man's works were almost completely destroyed. For example, "Listen to the Wind" and "Tony Takiya" make people inexhaustible "Norwegian Forest", word of mouth box office double flutter street.
Shooting completely according to the character situation in the book, the director's lens language will be weakened, and some things will be deleted according to his own understanding, and the unique charm of Haruki Murakami's literary works will be lost.
The process of turning text into images is bound to face contradictions and conflict points, how to find a balance between the text expression of the old man's "stream of consciousness" and the director's own style, Li Cangdong gave an answer. "Burning" can't be said to be perfect, but it is indeed one of the more successful remakes.
Director Li Cangdong's own few films focus on the fate of the characters under the cruel reality. The three protagonists in "Burning The Barn" are undoubtedly lonely individuals in the big era, and Li Cangdong is very good at expressing this lonely emotion, and he himself deepens this loneliness on the basis of the original work.
In the original work, the story is told in the first person "I", the girl usually relies on relationships with men to maintain her life, and the male protagonist is also one of her sources of life.
After the girl disappeared, the male protagonist, like the mysterious man, did not inquire about the whereabouts of the girl, mentioning that the girl was still occasionally mentioned when the two met many years later. Li Cangdong changed this relationship between the three in the movie.
The understatement in the article has a heavier flavor in the movie, and Lee Jong-so wants to find Hae-mi, ostensibly mad at love, but on a deeper level, it is better to say that he is looking for himself. Before meeting Haimei, he was in a state of turmoil, the uncertainty of work, his mother left when he was young, and his father was sentenced for negligence, he was like a small boat adrift in the vast sea, Andi was the harbor where he temporarily inhabited.
(Lee Jong-so in the shot gradually blurs)
It was a tsunami that suddenly came to break the calm, destroy the port, and Zhong Xiu survived, and this experience of gaining and losing was even more desperate than ever.
Haemi loves Zhong Xiu, does she love Ben, she has lost the ability to love someone, perhaps since the family ignored her, she has been in a state of "hunger". Haemi's loneliness is filled in through desire, but the result is repulsed by this power.
As the only representative of the upper class among the three people in the play, the material level is enriched, and the spiritual world seeks comfort by burning plastic greenhouses. The woman stays briefly in the trajectory of his life, disappears, new people appear, stays again, disappears, and so on, and he is always alone.
Based on Haruki Murakami's "Burning Barn", the story is a fusion of the short story "Burning Horse Shed" by American writer William Faulkner. "Burning Horse Shed" should more directly reflect the inner dissatisfaction of the characters, and this transformation is embodied in the last part of the film.
The accumulation of loneliness finally broke out in the burning, and the self-created plot of director Li Cangdong will not make people feel abrupt, but will just let the audience follow the protagonist's long-suppressed emotions to be cathartic. Condensed into a new story in the process of adaptation, "Burning" did it.
The magic is in the actors
How many people came to see this movie with Liu Yaren, and the pocket cat counts as one. We have previously introduced Liu Yaren's film "Old Hand", the image of the clumsy boy and the arrogant is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, and the outstanding performance in "Si Mourning" has made him win the Qinglong Award for Best Actor in one fell swoop.
Liu Yaren in "Burning" perfectly integrates Li Jongxiu's ordinary and ordinary character fate and is not willing to accept the fate of the real characters, with the uneasy shaking of the director's lens, which is perfectly integrated into his performance.
Li Zhongxiu often bows his head, rarely looks at people, facing Haemei he will subconsciously look elsewhere, his sense of insecurity is also reflected in the first time to Ben's home as a guest, dare not ask where Ben toilet is, eyes full of nervous emotions.
He often half-opened his mouth, spoke slowly, and looked up at the sky with confusion all around him. He was stimulated to sensitive nerves by Ben again and again, from tracking Ben to facing Ben directly, to completely erupting, Liu Yaren subtly infiltrated Zhong Xiu's psychological fluctuations along the way into the viewer's thoughts. Cannes Film Emperor, sooner or later there will be his name.
Steven Yuan, who first met him wasn't Glenn in The Walking Dead, I remember an episode in The Big Bang Theory where he played Shear's former roommate, a few shots, and said a line or two. When he received the play "Burning", he flew to South Korea to meet director Li Cangdong at the first time, and was ready to refuse this role at that time, because he was afraid that he would not be able to play it well.
Although he is Korean, grew up in the United States, Korean has some strange feelings for him, during the shooting, he learned Korean, wanted to use his native language to complete this work in his homeland, the director did not choose the wrong person, And Stephen Won is not worthy of the role of Ben.
He has his own arrogant aura, his appearance is not offensive, he can be approachable, he can also pretend to be a posture, and behind the smile hides a cold intention that you can't understand.
In the face of Zhong Xiu's confession to Hae-mi, he sneered, and Hae-mi danced in front of everyone, he yawned and smiled politely at Zhong Xiu. You are transparent to Him, and He is invulnerable to you.
Playing Haemi's Kim Jong-sook, can you imagine this is the debut work of a 24-year-old girl? In that nude scene, which is called the most beautiful of the year, you don't feel any distractions. Against the backdrop of the setting sun, Haemi broke free and danced as if she were going to follow the wind to an unknown place in the next second.
In the second half of the film, Haimei does not appear, she lives in the minds of two men, hidden in the film, and from time to time you will begin to recall what Haimei said, the tears in her eyes, and the painful back. In front of the two predecessors of Liu Yaren and Stephen Yuan, Kim Jong-sook is not inferior. The beauty is metaphor
The common technique of "leaving blank" in works of art is to leave enough room for the reader's imagination. "Burning Barn" is like this, and "Burning" also continues this treatment. The controversy of this film lies in the two extremes of understanding and not understanding.
Film critics interpret the details, language, and various meanings contained in the film in detail, but some people think that a movie covers too much and loses the ease of watching the movie. The whole network is interpreting which one is correct, whether Li Cangdong is really expressing these emotions, as if no one can give an accurate answer.
The role of metaphors in the film is everywhere, and the criterion for judging the quality of a movie is not only between understanding and not understanding. The pocket cat remembered a clip from Xu Zhiyuan's conversation with Director Jiang Wen some time ago.
Teacher Xu Zhiyuan asked Director Jiang Wen what they thought of his work. Director Jiang Wen said: "When any work faces the admirer, it is they who express themselves. Life is based on misreading. ”
Good or bad, whether to win the award or not, perhaps for director Li Cangdong is not particularly concerned. The director expresses himself in the work, and the viewer fully expresses his own concepts outside the play, and the two do not conflict.
Returning to what was said at the beginning of the article, this work is obviously not suitable for everyone to watch, the director has to express the "mystery", and the whole story attracts people to solve the puzzle process, which is where this film is worth playing.
I can't give this film an actual score, and in my mind, it can't be measured by scores. More than once in the past few days, I have thought about what ben said, what kind of feeling it is to have a bass at the mouth of the heart, and more than once to think about whether the people and things in this movie are real.
Is it possible that all this is Zhong Xiu's fantasy, Haemi does not exist, Ben does not exist, cats, dry wells, dispensable oranges, are all the materials in Zhong Xiu's novels.
Even if there is an answer, does it matter? All I know is that the raging fire that ignites the plastic greenhouse will burn in your hearts for a long time.
(This article represents personal views only)