Text: Overnight flowers
"Film noir" is one of the genre films that have had the greatest influence on later generations during the Hollywood blockbuster era (probably from the 1930s to the early 1960s, the "classic Hollywood" period). It is not a strict single genre, many times, it refers to a film tone and temperament, often combined with other genres such as crime films, suspense films, the story usually tells the crisis of the ups and downs of the urban streets, the degenerate urban civilization and the complex and multi-faceted human nature.
Although many contemporary audiences have not seen these classic Hollywood models, the aesthetic characteristics of "film noir" have been homed and continuously developed by contemporary directors such as Martin Scorsese, and have been implanted into modern local stories by directors of different languages and cultures. For example, Diao Yinan's "Daytime Fireworks" and Dong Yue's "Blizzard Is Coming", so that these contemporary literary and art films that use genre elements such as criminal investigation films to tell realistic stories can be seen as the shadow of "film noir".
Director William Wheeler, who has been nominated for 12 Oscars for best director and won three awards, although he is not known for "film noir", but this "Tears of Incense" has received considerable praise, and the film has been nominated for 7 awards including best picture at the 13th Academy Awards. Although the sociological significance of the textual level is slightly weaker from a modern perspective, the unique style of the confused atmosphere, the multiple reflections on human nature, and the expressive light and shadow pictures are still fully ornamental.
<h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > the unique charm of Hollywood's classic "film noir."</h1>
01. Reflection and questioning of true human nature
The main reason for the wide influence of "film noir" on later generations is that it is different from the main theme of the same period of war films (such as "York's Cobia", "House of Loyalty", etc.) excessively whitewashed and carved to create false beauty, but is committed to exposing the dark evil and ugliness in real society, trying to show the ambiguity and complexity of real human nature.
Therefore, the thoroughness and refinement of that insight into the world make "film noir" have a lasting charm. Although the emphases of these films are different in individual cases, they have a similar overall tone: a slightly pessimistic and somber tone, a lonely protagonist who sees all the world's variety and cynicism, and criticizes and reflects on reality while harboring a sense of confusion and nothingness about the future. The self-torture of the protagonist's inner world, the moral struggle under the conflict between personal interests and interests in the real world, are vividly presented in "Tears of Incense Sticks".
The film's name "Xiangzhi Tears" pays attention to the beauty of Chinese characters and has been specially modified, while the original English name "The Letter" is more crisp and neat to the point. The narrative function of "letter" in the film and the dominance of plot orientation are obvious, and the storyline itself is extremely simplified: a woman who loves and hates because of love and hate, kills her lover and tries to evade legal punishment through a series of disguises, her powerful disguise deceives others, but fails because of a "letter" exposing her behavior with her lover; when she buys the evidence and deceives successfully, but because of the disclosure of the content, she leads to the breakdown between the husband and wife, and in the end she is assassinated by the mysterious lady of the other party. Eventually killed.
At that time, the female consciousness had not yet fully awakened, and she was often in the environment of being oppressed, and the heroine's behavior was for the purpose of defending the dignity of love and personal rights. Therefore, the heroine's defense lawyer Howard in the film, in the professional ethics (exposing the heroine's sins), ideal morality (loyal to the equality of love), private feelings (to defend the dignity of friends) struggle is quite meaningful, when the dignity of the friend's life, the moral code of the times, the ideal of the heart and love form a collision, what is the most important thing to adhere to?
02. Reflect the value appeal of women's roles
Phyllis Dickinson, played by Barbara Steinwick in the classic "film noir" Double Reparations, is a model of Femme Fatale on the screen, she is scheming, shrewd and strong, and good at using beauty for money and profits; if this role still has a certain stereotype pattern, as a narrative carrier is prop and functional, then the role of Betty Davis in "Tears of Incense" plays Leslie, who focuses on women's gender rights. Position in a love relationship.
The film's script is relatively thin in its explanation of the character's motivation and psychological logic, but Betty Davis enriches the role with her own image characteristics and performances. Whether it is the early "The Shackles of Human Nature" or the later "Lan Boudoir", Betty Davis's role has never been different from the traditional feminine weakness and delicacy, showing obedience and submission to the traditional patriarchal husband; on the contrary, she is independent and strong, rebellious and arbitrary, always playing some strong and aggressive roles, this "modern female consciousness" emanates from the inside out.
Because of this, behind Betty's wonderful performance, a basic contradiction behind the theme of the "film noir" story is introduced: women's growth and personality independence and traditional patriarchal family ethics. Of course, limited by the overall cognitive level and conservative concept of an era, the film does not make a deeper exploration, when Rice uses a gun to kill the man who tramples on her love, the final result is to "fight violence with violence" and eventually sink in his own crime.
<H1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > William Wheeler's interpretation of the essence of cinema: the audiovisual arts – storytelling in the language of the lens</h1>
From the romantic romantic comedy "Roman Holiday", which won Audrey Hepburn an Oscar, to the 11-time record-winning war film blockbuster "Binxu", William Wheeler has been unanimously praised by filmmakers, audience fans and critics in the industry. The reason why William Wheeler can wander through various genres and be both commercial and artistic is inseparable from his mastery of film language. The clever use of scene scheduling and depth of field composition inside the space makes all kinds of subjects become "popular" models that are easy for mainstream audiences to accept.
As a "film noir" that pays attention to suspense and crime elements, the thinness and lack of depth at the text level naturally become an important factor restricting the overall quality of the film. In this case, how to create a richer audiovisual experience for the audience through the lens language is a major problem that the director needs to face. There is no doubt that the audiovisual language is the biggest highlight of the film, and under the skillful control of the director, the actor's performance, camera scheduling, scene design and soundtrack are perfectly combined to complement each other.
01. Exquisite audiovisual rhythm: create suspense with clips
In many realist films oriented by documentary aesthetics, the use of a large number of long shots creates a sense of realism in a continuous period of time. In contrast, one of the film's great successes was the use of a large number of clips to create suspense. Because the scene of the story is not complicated, the main location is limited to the enclosed space such as home and office, so many times the dialogue and interaction between the two people adopts the specific scene with recognizable positioning lens, and then determines the axis of the character's activity, using the classic "line of sight" and "positive and negative shot". For example, Leslie and lawyer Howard explore and communicate on the couch and at the dinner table.
In the occasion of multi-person interaction, the film strengthens the sense of suspense through the switching of different scenes in the middle and close-ups, the visual conflict brought about by the combination of overlooking and looking down at different perspectives, and the partial cover and selective presentation of information. For example, after Leslie committed the crime, when her husband, detective, and lawyer interrogated together, the viewpoint was changed back and forth between the four people, and the audience could not see the full interaction and psychological transformation process between the four people.
The subtlety of this is obvious, that is, it mobilizes the audience's curiosity, nervousness and anxiety. On the one hand, the incompleteness of information and the incompleteness of the picture emphasize the limitations of the field of vision, eliminating the audience's sense of ease as a bystander brought about by the omniscient perspective, the audience learns the psychological dynamics of a certain character through local expression close-ups, but cannot know the current reaction of all the characters in this continuous time, which will inevitably produce a curiosity and doubt; on the other hand, a large number of simulated subjective viewpoints make all characters in a "peeping" situation while peeping at others, "seeing" and "being watched" The clever use of relationships is an important means for Hitchcock to create horror.
02. Expressive light and shadow composition
In addition to the exquisite editing method, the unique "black temperament" of "Xiangzhi Tears" lies in the fact that the story takes place in Malaysia. The natural characteristics and humanistic features of Southeast Asia are "exotic" produced by the perspective of Hollywood subjects, which is a mysterious color in itself, and the director strengthens this sense of mystery through visual modeling.
The first is the control of the overall image. Presented with a large number of empty lenses, the bright moon shadow, mottled rubber, and the ceiling fan that rotates all the time create a unique tropical humidity and eerie dove, which undoubtedly gives people a sense of anxiety and boredom. And the emphasis on imagery is also a metaphor for the development of the plot: from the dark clouds at the beginning to the floating clouds at the end, the bright moon shines, and the dynamic process of echoing from the beginning and the end is coping with the case from confusion to the truth.
The use of light and shadow and composition design, there are strong expressionist characteristics, highlight ratio of lighting, pay attention to the contrast between light and shade and shadow highlighting, the heroine's face is often in the shadow. The blinds have become natural props, and the light through the blinds has become a "stripe" intertwined with light and shade, and the ambiguity, confusion, and weirdness arise spontaneously. When the light is projected on the heroine Betty Davis, the light and dark are naturally divided, and the meaning of this human judgment is naturally self-evident. Perfectly supported by photographic scheduling, Betty Davis's eyes take on more complex meanings.
In addition, the design of the position of the characters in the overall composition is even more carefully modified. The heroine Leslie cheated her husband and the jury into a strong position in the network of relationships, but has always been in a weak position in the confrontation with the local Malaysian lady of her lover. For example, Leslie always lives in the light and low, and the other party lives in the dark and high; when Rice uses money to buy important evidence keepsakes, the other party scorns her with disdain and disdain and throws the money on the ground; the actor's image temperament or eyes are undoubtedly more cold and fierce than the heroine Betty Davis.
When analyzing the audio-visual of "film noir", it will be found that these means are not unique to the genre, but also a common means to express the emotions of the characters, create an artistic mood, and mobilize the psychology of the audience. It is precisely for this reason that although this kind of typical "film noir" cannot be seen in today's film industry, that kind of "black temperament" is not uncommon in the mainstream literary and art films of many languages at present. The modern and localized paradigm of Hollywood classic genres formed by combining different languages, cultures and characteristics of the times has become a model for contemporary genre films, which is also the charm of classics.