There are many domestic films to look forward to in December.
But "The Party at South Station" is undoubtedly the hottest new film in December right now.
This is also normal, after all, the entire cast from the director to the actor, reveals two words: strength.
Director Diao Yinan, one of the representatives of domestic avant-garde drama.
In 2014, he won the Golden Bear Award at the Berlin Film Festival with "Daytime Fireworks", becoming the dark horse of domestic films in the World Film Festival in recent years.
Starring Hu Ge, Gui Lunmeng and Liao Fan.
Needless to say, they are all famous characters that everyone knows.
A Golden Bear Shadow Emperor (Liao Fan) and a Golden Horse Shadow Queen (Gui Lun Magnesium).
And Hu Ge, I believe many people are rushing to see "The Party at South Station" for him.
Hu Ge, who starred on the big screen for the first time,
He faded the image of the handsome and dashing little student of the past and became Zhou Zenong, the small leader of the theft gang from the muddy bottom.
The story begins with a shot from Zhou Zenong:
In a gang internal firefight, Zhou Zenong counterattacked with a gun, but unexpectedly killed a policeman by mistake and could only run.
Kill the police, Zhou Zenong's rotten life was marked with the price, who can provide effective clues to the arrest, you can get 300,000
Bounty.
Zhou Zenong has a wife and children, but he has not returned home for many years, and he thinks that he is a dead man anyway, so it is better to let his wife report himself.
But his wife and children are under surveillance, and enemies are also looking for him, and if they want to take his life, they will exchange him for money.
Zhou Zenong had to ask for help from fellow villager Hua Ge, and Hua Ge asked his subordinate Liu Ai'ai to go to a station in the suburbs to meet Zhou Zenong, which is the origin of the title of the film.
Liu Ai'ai is a swimmer, what is the identity of the swimmer?
Take a look at the lines:
"You can do anything you want me to do, and you are satisfied."
The scale is self-evident, and it also clearly indicates the position of the swimmer.
To put it bluntly, the swimmer is half a prostitute who is attached to others to live.
In the film, the role of Liu Ai'ai is played by Gui Lunmeng, which makes people feel a sense of violation.
Because of the kind of cold literary and artistic temperament that GuiLun Magnesium itself carries, there is an indescribable sense of alienation from the role of the escort swimmer in the lower society.
Objectively speaking,
The story of "The Party at South Station" is not very exciting, and it can be summed up in one sentence:
A long escape.
After the Cannes premiere of "The Party at the South Station", Quentin admitted that when he first watched it, he felt a little dissatisfied, because the plot was predictable, even mediocre, and trivial.
Its narrative purpose is not to climax with the audience, but to go around and turn to a dead end.
But by the next day, the movie's momentum struck:
"You'll love its bloody and cruel smell, and you'll love the beauty of its filthy wrapping around it." "I liked it even more the day after watching the movie."
Why is that?
Because of the visual light and atmosphere of this film, it can be called an extremely rare masterpiece in domestic films in these years.
As netizens commented:
"Diao Yinan used an almost obstinate visual light and shadow to create a bloody spectacle for this adventure with a dreamlike footnote."
Diao Yinan's light and shadow art is similar to Lou Ye to some extent.
Both are very good at using changes in light and shadow to bring out the psychological changes of the characters, or the sense of identity.
In "The Mystery of the Floating City",
Wife Hao Lei found the old house downstairs, and the sound of husband and second mother making love echoed in the stairwell.
Lou Ye did not let the actor have a seizure, but slowly and slowly engulfed her with darkness, like all the air drained, like the sea water all gushing in. The chiaroscuro contrast is used just right, and the feeling of suffocation and despair of the wife is accurately transmitted, so faintly, slowly, and firmly choking the throat of the audience.
And in "The Party at South Station",
There is a scene where Hu Ge and Gui Lunmeng meet under the bridge, you can't see anyone, you can only see two figures on the wall talking.
Suddenly a car passed by, the light of the headlights hit the wall, the figure disappeared, and the conversation stopped. The message came out all at once— it was two invisible people, it was a conversation that could not be heard.
Both like to use a lot of neon lights to light up, especially red.
In "Tuina", Lou Ye uses "red" to represent lust.
Hair salon, red light bulb; sister-in-law body, red halo; Sha Boss lost love, spitting red blood.
In "The Party at South Station", Zhou Zenong, played by Hu Ge, was shot and fled for his life on a motorcycle in the heavy rain, heavy rain, night, the motorcycle has completely lost its shape, only a bright red neon light in the rain wind film is particularly dazzling.
Red means danger.
Sure enough, the danger came.
Like Lou Ye, Diao Yinan's shot is also very jumpy.
There are several places in the movie that are even more impressive.
What impressed the reader the most was one of the montages:
When the police are chasing the fugitives, they mistakenly enter the zoo, the arrestees flee in terror, the pursuers are terrified, and the panicked eyes of the characters and animals alternate, and the backs of the people are chilled.
But Diao Yinan also has the same problem as Lou Ye:
It can also be said that it is a typical problem in domestic film noir - the compositional tension of the film takes precedence over the complete smoothness of the narrative.
Therefore, it is also doomed that the box office of this type of film will not be too good.
Although film is the art of light and shadow, it is not worth the loss to overemphasize the aesthetics of form and ignore the heavy social issues behind the film.