Affected by the world-class spread of the new crown epidemic, on March 24, the Tokyo Olympic Games decided to postpone the holding.
At the same time, Dong Ge can't help but think of an animation masterpiece from more than 30 years ago - "Akira".
This animated film not only bet on the location of the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan, but more importantly, God predicted that the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games could not be held normally.
The ups and downs of the Tokyo Olympics seem to be a brief preview of some small details in the film.
Akira is a production by Toho Corporation. The studio is no stranger to the mainland, and most of its productions can be named:
Crayon Series, Detective Conan Series, Pokémon Series, Doraemon Series...
The above alone accounts for most people's youth.
Directed by Katsuyo Otomo, the film is based on his original manga and is one of his best-known animated films, and he has also directed animated films such as Steam Boy and Memories Trilogy.
The film was released in Japan on July 16, 1988, and a 4K restored version was re-released in Japan on March 14, 2020, with a 4K restoration released in Japan.
It tells the story of the "Akira" project secretly carried out by the Japanese military that led to a huge disaster.
The story is set in Tokyo, the capital of Japan.
In 1988, the Kanto region conducted an explosion test using a new type of bomb, which resulted in a large explosion, causing serious casualties, almost destroying the entire city of Tokyo, and the outbreak of World War III.
In 2019, the people of Japan have rebuilt a neon city from a ruin from 31 years ago.
However, under this false prosperity, the rebuilt Tokyo is almost full of chaos, darkness, ugliness, violence, and decadence:
Economic depression, drug epidemics, daily superstitions of the people listening to doomsday rumors, fights between small gangs, revolutionary riots are poised...
In short, the social situation in Tokyo as a whole is not optimistic.
One night, a group of speeding car rampage teenagers are racing on the highway, and Kaneda is the leading teenager of this rampage.
During the drag racing process, a childlike, elderly-faced man appeared on the street, who had superpowers.
A teenager in the Rampage Clan, Tie Xiong, collided with him due to excessive speed and flew out of the road.
When Kaneda drives to save Tetsuo, the army pilots a helicopter to capture the man along with Tetsuo.
It turns out that the military has been secretly conducting research on the "Akira" superpower project:
Using 40 humans as living experiments, stimulating their heads and triggering different parts of the human brain, eliciting the hidden potential of the human body and making them super powerful.
Originally, it was just to find the strange man, but Tetsuo was also involved in the accident.
At this time, Kaneda knew nothing about the "Akira" project, and after meeting a woman from an anti-government organization, K, they began a plan to rescue Tetsuo.
In contact with Gao Zhi, Kiyoko, Ah Sheng and other super powers, He slowly opened and felt his own supernatural mysterious power, and also learned the key to all the secrets - Akira.
At this point in the story, the development of the film has passed the halfway point, And Brother Dong will not have too many spoilers, and then discuss the two key images of this movie.
First, the classic image of a red-clad teenager and a dazzling red motorcycle
Let's take a look at the main poster for this movie.
Against a white background, one person and one car, the red color is particularly eye-catching.
Red jacket, red cargo pants, red boots, red gloves, Kaneda's red suit, full of style, dazzling in the crowd, born as a leader.
Different shades of red are collaged into a costume, first, to enrich the ornamentation, and second, to instantly brighten the character, and it is difficult for the audience to take their attention away from him.
Then there is the cool motorcycle, in the handsome red paint shape, but also fancy pasted canon, BMW and other popular elements of the times.
Such a car, whether it is reality or animation, is the existence of attracting others, and the products of the times created in the last century are still outdated in the present of 2020, and even a leading trend.
However, the "deceptiveness" of the poster appears at this time.
I believe that many fans will see this main poster and think that it is an animated movie that tells the story of blood racing.
In fact, it is very normal, before watching the film, Dong Ge even thought that the red motorcycle on the poster was the "Akira" mentioned in the title.
They are the most iconic and most likely things in the film to be the ip peripheral.
But the film's quest certainly doesn't stop there.
Red is a distinct symbol: it represents a bloody reality, it represents an out-of-control society.
And the red suit is the core of justice wrapped in the blood of the teenager, and the red car is the courage to move forward,
The "capsule" on the back of the red jacket represents salvation, antidote, and even hope and rebirth.
At the end, Kaneda and Tetsuo are not allowed to fight a big battle: Tetsuo, who is almost heartbroken, puts on a red cloak, while Kaneda fights Tetsuo with only one person, one car, and one shot.
It seems that the power gap is far away, but in fact it implies that every ordinary person will face the attack of this dark generation.
At this time, red is the absolute power to cheer up the end times, and the original red has become a pioneer, a hero, and a fighting force to save the world!
Second, the relevance of Akira
The film's symbolic approach is extremely advanced, conceptualizing the characters and isolating the imagery from the film through a fractured narrative.
This led to most viewers still being vague about the name "Akira" and its symbolism after watching it.
Then, Brother Dong starts with Akira in the movie.
Akira was a boy in 40 kids involved in the Super Power Project in 1988, numbered 28.
The boy was incredibly destructive, triggering the big bang in Tokyo, Japan that year.
After the Tokyo bombings, Akira's organs were broken down and cryopreserved, leaving them in a state of long-term sleep.
Thirty-one years later, Tetsuo, who had attained superpowers, appeared, seeing himself as the supreme power, and decided to liberate and challenge the sleeping Akira.
After Tetsuo loses control, it causes trouble, at this time, under the call of the other three superpowered children Takashi, Kiyoko, and Akatsu, Akira wakes up and takes Tetsuo away.
At this point, Akira's floating virtual body really appeared.
So what is the relevance of Akira?
It is nuclear energy, a power that human beings cannot grasp.
Japan suffers greatly from nuclear energy, and self-righteously sees its energy opportunities and wants to use it to seek a new stage of development, but in the process of pursuing power, it loses control and is fiercely devoured by it.
The creators of this film may have wanted to express a highly avant-garde warning through it:
The rapidly inflating desires of human beings, if applied to unknowable resources, will have the consequence of self-destruction.
This grand practical significance is also directly and completely conveyed:
When Tie Xiong's superpower and out-of-control mind merge into one, he vents the dissatisfaction accumulated by the teenager's long-term mental qi.
At this point, the pure nightmare begins to materialize, and the absurd hope is evaporated in an instant.
The government found that what it studied could not be controlled, and people found that Akira, whom they expected and worshipped, was also a destroyer.
The boy's regurgitation by the power stems from the nothingness and emptiness in his heart, while the blasphemy of the unknown has brought about the destruction of the world.
In addition to the above two distinct images, the visuals of this film are also extremely stylized.
The director tells a story of an era through a delicate picture: the false prosperity era under the bubble economy.
High school students abandon their studies and engage in dangerous activities of violent motorcycles on the highways; liberals are engaged in meaningless demonstrations.
In the crazy and disillusioned animation world, it is full of endless imagination that gives the audience a great impact all the time.
It is worth mentioning that this film work is fully hand-drawn, and the number of hand-drawn paintings of 150,000 pieces is really jaw-dropping.
Overall, it's a near-perfect piece:
Delicate and sophisticated paintings, imaginative designs, vivid characters, rich details, unconventional metaphors...
Through these virtues and a dystopian story about super-power out-of-control, the film presents a post-apocalyptic decadence and an oppressive pessimism in the near future.
This also proves once again that the film has traces to reality.
Although the outbreak of world war III was not in charge, but now because the Tokyo Olympic Games can not be held normally, the majority of netizens once again paid attention to this movie, and were attracted to watch and even brush this film twice.
When cinema and reality merge into one world, the global pandemic spreads at this time, making 2020 like an apocalyptic nightmare in cinema, as if the darkest generation had been rehearsed in movies in the past.
At that time, the various ills of Japanese society made the entire creative community extremely pessimistic, and the terrible unknown must be late.
It can be seen that after 32 years, it is still worthy of the name of "God's work": reflecting on the unknown power and exploring a controllable future.
Brother Dong, | of the Bluestone Film Editorial Department
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