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Usually, the directors attending the film festival will always tell their "artistic life" at the special event held for them, but at the fifth Pingyao International Film Festival that ended not long ago, director Xu Ke, known as "Xu Laowei", "sword out of the side" once, he did not talk about himself, but took "Telephone Murder" as an example to analyze the film master Hitchcock.
In this regard, Xu Ke's reason is that "the Pingyao Film Festival is a very young film exhibition, and it may be easier to talk about Hitchcock, because he is a director who likes to joke and tease people, and his thriller is not a thriller, it is a comedy." He kept joking with the audience about how to deal with a murder, how to scare the audience, and he thought it would have the same effect as a roller coaster ride in a playground."
In order to tell Hitchcock, Xu Ke spent a lot of effort to "prepare lessons", and even released 16 stills of "Telephone Murder" prepared by himself on the WeChat public account of the Pingyao Film Festival in advance, so that the audience could use the lesson as a reference when listening to the lesson, while looking at the pictures and listening to the lesson. Xu Ke suggested that the audience understand the history of film, learn film art from classic works, and called on young filmmakers to grasp the present, "This time is the time for you to absorb nutrition and absorb life experience, and cherish this stage."
"Telephone Murder" and "Spring in a Small Town" are both unexpected classics
Born in 1899, Alfred Hitchcock entered the film industry as a subtitle designer in 1920, directing his first film "Number Thirteen" in 1922, the suspense film "The Lodger" written and directed by himself in 1926 became the work that laid the foundation for his filming style, the thriller "Blackmail" directed in 1929 became the first British sound film, and the suspense film "Thirty-Nine Steps" directed in 1935 laid the foundation for the formation of spy thrillers.
His classic films include "Missing Woman", "Butterfly Dream", "Deep Doubt", "Rear Window", "North by Northwest", "Horrors", etc. Hitchcock has shot more than 50 films in his 60-year directing career, and in 2007, he was selected by the British film magazine Total Film as "the first of 100 great directors in history".
As a path to lead the audience into Hitchcock's creative world, "Telephone Murder", filmed in 1954 based on a stage play, embodies Hitchcock's imagination richly and vividly, and the plot is intertwined and changeable, which is an "unexpected classic" in his creative career.
The reason why it is an "unexpected classic" is because this film is Hitchcock's "unplanned" work, Xu Ke explained that Hitchcock was preparing "Rear Window" at that time, but "Rear Window" could not start shooting immediately, in order not to idle, he added a production, this is "Telephone Murder", did not expect that "Telephone Murder" was a great success after the release, so Xu Ke sighed and said, "I think the realm of 'unintentional' is difficult to get."
In this regard, director Jia Zhangke on the side deeply agreed, "Sometimes the creative state is at its most relaxed, when the baggage is not so large, but it stimulates the innovation and innovation of the film language." Hitchcock was not stressed when filming Murder on the Phone, and he even used stereoscopic film technology for the first time. ”
The whole space of "Telephone Murder" is concentrated in one room, and this film method also reminds Jia Zhangke of Mr. Fei Mu's classic "Spring in a Small Town": "Mr. Fei Mu's filming of "Spring in a Small Town" is also outside his plan, he originally wanted to shoot another work, because his investor Mr. Wu Shengzhi's studio has other directors to use, so the film was temporarily shelved, and the director did not shoot, and it was a great waste if no one used this studio for several months. It just so happened that Wu Sheng planted that they had a script called "Spring in a Small Town", and handed it to Fei Mu. In order to make the studio not idle, Mr. Fei Mu filmed "Spring in a Small Town", the film is also unfolded in a very limited space, the large space is an ancient city, but it is very simple, there are few exterior scenes, mainly in a garden and a story that happens in the southern house. ”
For this "unintentional realm", Xu Ke said that he has also talked to many directors friends, this realm is obviously unattainable, some people in order to "let go", did not predetermine a shooting idea, such as some directors do not separate the camera, to the scene to do. Some directors do not have a script, such as Du Qifeng, who wants to go to the scene to write a script.
Xu Ke said that there will indeed be a flash of inspiration in the shooting, "even if it is not related to this scene, it may be that moment to give you a very strong spark, let you open another door, I have always hoped that I have this moment." 」 On the spot, we will feel the stimulation of the environment, because reading the script is very different from actually shooting on the spot. What you see is something in words, what you imagine is something that you fantasize about in your head, and when you go to the scene, there will be possibilities that you can't imagine. So I'm also in favor of going to the scene, and the atmosphere on the scene makes you think more. ”
Xu Ke also laughed and asked Jia Zhangke if it was a scene like "Telephone Murder", whether he would still go to the scene to find inspiration, Jia Zhangke replied, "That won't", Xu Ke also nodded, "Because the living room you can see is so big, how to use a space to make a movie, I really want to try it, but maybe no one invests, because it is too dangerous, the story is not watched." ”
Admire Hitchcock for shooting a classic thriller in a cramped living room
Interestingly, although inadvertently made into a classic, "Telephone Murder" has no "status" in Hitchcock's heart, and the film master Truffaut once wanted to ask Hitchcock about "Telephone Murder", and Hitchcock directly said that "there is nothing to talk about".
Xu Ke analyzed that the reason why Hitchcock does not value this movie has two very important factors, one is that the film is a film adapted from a stage play, so many plot and thriller factors are limited by the stage play, and the shooting process is not too able to follow Hitchcock's standards and put into his usual methods.
Another reason is that Hitchcock has always been very opposed to using dialogue to explain the plot, "but because 'Telephone Murder' is the form of a play, it must use dialogue to explain the plot, and for Hitchcock, this is a very contrary to his principles." ”
It is precisely because Hitchcock does not talk much about this movie that Xu Ke believes that "Telephone Murder" is more valuable for exploration, which can let everyone understand what Hitchcock pays attention to in terms of film techniques and film language. Why did this work go beyond his imagination to become a classic? How is this film different from his other Hitchcock works in the past? ”
Tsui ke said that Hitchcock's thriller is different from the thriller we usually know, he believes that thriller should not be frightened, all his suspense and tension come from the thriller plot produced by the characters to hide their secrets. Hitchcock has four main ways of showing horror, the first is the layout of the storyline, the second is suspense, the third is tension, and the fourth is the design of the climax.
Taking the layout of the plot as an example, Hitchcock's common method is the secret hidden by the characters, Tsui Ke said: "Similar to the story of the bomb we told." For example, I'm sitting here with Director Jia, there's a bomb behind the screen, and the audience sees someone putting the bomb here, but neither of us knows it, so from the time the bomb appears to the time we start speaking, the audience will be nervous: Why didn't we find the bomb? What would the two of us look like if the bomb exploded? That's suspense. If this suspense has 30 minutes, the process of continuing the suspense requires tension, and this tension is dangerous detail. For example, there may be a cleaning staff who sees something behind the screen, he takes it out, thinks it is garbage, and cleans it up, so that we can solve our crisis, but the cleaners did not take the bomb, and we were still in danger. There can be a lot of detail in the arrangement to allow the suspense to maintain the time it takes. ”
"Telephone Murder" tells that Tony and Margot are a seemingly inseparable couple, and their relationship is red. Margot, who lives a lonely life, and the writer Mark spark love, they date and correspond, but they are found by Tony. Tony didn't say anything, but wrote an anonymous letter to his wife as a warning. However, Mark actually visits the house, and for the sake of shame and the plot to obtain the rich property of his wife Margot, Tony secretly plots to poison him. Tony offered his old classmate Les a thousand pounds to participate in a tight-knit murder plan he had laid out. This set of plans has cleverly designed evidence of the murderer's alibi, telephones, keys, and curtains, all of which become props for this conspiracy. However, the plan could not keep up with the change, and Lees not only did not get the bounty, but also lost his life.
The plot of "Telephone Murder" is divided into four stages, the first stage is that the husband Tony plans to murder his wife Margot, from the beginning of the plan to the completion of the plan. The second stage is that after the plan fails, Tony continues to create traps to frame Margot, who is arrested by the police and sentenced. The third stage is when Margot's lover tries to save Margot, but it doesn't work out. The fourth stage is to solve the case. Xu Ke said: "In such a small living room, Hitchcock has done all four stages. From the perspective of the movie, it is actually very difficult, I don't know how big the living room is, I remember the actor walked seven steps to the end, that is, seven or eight meters, at most ten meters wide of a living room, the whole movie was performed in it, and it was very nervous, when you watched it, I felt breathless, and the plot was linked to a link. ”
Attention is paid to the details of danger, using colors, props, and close-ups to tell stories
In Tsui Ke's view, Hitchcock, as a master of suspense and thriller films, one of the most crucial techniques of his films is to set up suspense points with tension in the plot layout, and this tension is achieved by "shaping dangerous details".
Using 16 hand-picked "Telephone Murder" reference pictures as an example, Xu Ke carefully analyzed hitchcock's personal methods added when adapting stage plays, such as heavy camera scheduling and weakening dialogue, showing the relationship between characters through color transposition, and so on. Hitchcock is a director who "takes great care to design the story told by the picture", so his shots, from angle to composition, from scenery to depth of field, are all at the service of storytelling.
For example, Tsui Ke introduced that Hitchcock had made a color film called "Soul Snatcher" in 1948, "also in an enclosed space to shoot a whole movie, and he was very ambitious, 90 minutes a shot to tell all the stories, but that movie was unsuccessful, because he shot a shot, the rhythm felt a lot of influence." ”
With Murder by Telephone, Hitchcock turned back to coloring again, and he paid a lot of attention to color. "For example, in this picture, three people are wearing gray clothes, one person is wearing dark blue clothes, this person wearing dark blue clothes is Margot's lover Mark, and the three people wearing gray clothes are Tony and Margot and the inspector, and only Mark is wearing dark blue clothes, which is very abrupt and awkward in this group of people, and there is no way to insert into this so-called family, so it is a very obvious color change."
"Later," when we reappeared, we saw that their clothes were the same, and that their lovers and their husbands were dressed the same. So in other words, he has a closer relationship with the matter, he is not outside looking at the state of things. On the contrary, the inspector is very prominent, so it becomes that the lover and the husband are on the same side, and the inspector is on the side. Telling stories with color is one of Hitchcock's favorite ways to use, and we'll see that many of his films often use color to tell stories. ”
In addition, Hitchcock enjoyed close-ups (figure (3)), and he felt that close-ups had a very special power and mystery, which would have a lot of unimaginable effects on the story. Xu Ke said: "Hitchcock's favorite close-up, feet, eyes, hands close-up, this movie has a close-up of the hand, how the hand moves, how to put, represents the character's psychological state, Hitchcock likes to use this technique to express the inner world of the character. ”
In addition to this close-up, Hitchcock also close-ups of props. For example, in the telephone in "Telephone Murder" (figure (4)," Xu Ke said: "You don't emphasize the telephone dial when you call, but Hitchcock emphasizes the turntable very much, and the camera at that time actually couldn't shoot the turntable so close, so you had to put the phone very large." Hitchcock deliberately zoomed in on the phone so that the camera captured a close-up of the circle, and was that finger a real finger or a prop finger? I think it's a prop finger. When Hitchcock filmed "Beauty Count", in order to emphasize the cup of milk, he put a lamp inside the milk, so when the protagonist took the milk upstairs, looking inside the stair light, the milk cup was glowing, and the light was not outside the light, but the inside came out, which would make the audience feel that there was a problem with the milk, there was a very dangerous feeling, on the props, Hitchcock liked to use this method. ”
Xu Ke also took out a picture of a "tug-of-war" lens (figure (5)), "This picture is very interesting, from a photographic point of view, we don't like this kind of composition, we often say that this is a 'tug-of-war' lens, that is, there are people on both sides of the middle, the 'tug-of-war' lens is a lens that is very disliked in photography, but it has been used many times in Hitchcock." What effect is built in this composition? The two characters have a very strong opposite, it does not necessarily need to have a lot of expression of the shot, if you put this shot, it means that the two characters have a lot of dissatisfaction with each other in their hearts, and his intention is here. ”
Hitchcock also experimented with stereoscopic shooting while filming Murder by Telephone, and Tsui said: "At that time, there were very few 3D movies, and all the camera machines were huge. It is difficult to swing the machine at a low angle. But in Murder by Telephone, Hitchcock was shot at a low angle (Figure (6)). This shooting method is no problem for us now, because the machine can be lowered very low, and the machine can be placed on the ground, but the machine at that time was very large and could not be lowered. What are the characteristics of a low-angle perspective? Everything in that scene suppresses the character, brings a kind of psychological pressure to the character, and has such an effect. Another effect is that there is a very important scene in the film where the murderer wants to kill his wife, and when he presses his wife on the table and grabs the scissors with his fingers, the angle is just right to see the hand, the scissors and the murderer. In fact, there is a similar scene in "Chosin Lake", where Duan Yihong is pressed on the desktop by the US military, and when he goes to get a fork, our camera will shake around to explain the overall relationship. But in "Telephone Murder", a low angle allows no cutting of the camera, no need to shake the camera, and one shot can integrate everything that needs to be said. ”
One of the saddest aspects for young directors is to look for opportunities
Telling Hitchcock also allows Xu Ke to recall his youth, once he and Wu Yusen filmed in Kenting, Taiwan, there was no car after finishing work, the two met a tractor willing to take them on the road, sitting in the back of the tractor watching the sunset. Xu Ke told Wu Yusen, "When will we become a special director without having to sit in a tractor and suffer bumps along the way like we do now." Speaking of this, Xu Ke said that the feeling at that time was still quite romantic, "It was a stage that was not restrained and very open, at that time I wanted to do a lot of things, but I didn't know if there was a chance to do it." ”
Xu Ke said that in terms of his own experience, stick to it, and the opportunity will always come. "Everything you go through in your youth is something that will be useful to you in the future, because at a certain age and stage you don't have the opportunity to experience the kind of scene that is very open. Therefore, I think that at this time, when young directors absorb nutrition and life experience, you have to understand what is life, what is growth, what is life, so you must cherish this time. ”
For the current young directors, Xu Ke believes that the saddest level for young directors is to find opportunities. When such an opportunity is not seized, the next opportunity may have to wait longer. Therefore, he hopes that young filmmakers must continue to hone their techniques at this stage of waiting for opportunities, so that when the opportunity to shoot films arrives, they can make films more mature. Xu Ke encouraged young people to create shooting opportunities and hone their techniques, "Constantly find materials in your life, find characters and stories in your life." We filmmakers, combined with the whole environment, can appear living things, if only you hard design, the work is lifeless. ”
Text/Reporter Zhang Jia Courtesy photo/Pingyao