Several box office predators in this year's Spring Festival file are basically dominated by sequels:
"To Catch a Demon 2", "Journey to the West Daughter Country", "Bear Haunting", etc. are all series of works, and Lin Chaoxian's "Red Sea Action" can be counted as a companion to "Mekong Action" (as for the "Nineteenth Generation of the Ancestors", please ignore it automatically)...
"Detective Chinatown 2", which is also a sequel movie, after watching the bitch's first feeling is——
The sequel has been upgraded in all aspects compared to the previous game; Chen Sicheng did not disappoint.
Detective Chinatown 2
detective chinatown vol 2
Up to now, the total box office of the film in the mainland has counterattacked, and exceeded 1.7 billion, and while the box office has exploded, the film has also received a rating of 7.2 on Douban.
You should know that this score is really at the upper middle level in Chinese films, especially as a sequel movie.
Recalling the "Detective Chinatown" in 2015, it has already given a lot of surprises to domestic audiences.
With its unique "comedy + reasoning" genre elements, the film ensures the high density of funny bridges while ensuring the compactness and suspense of the story, and has become the dark horse of the domestic film of that year.
Chen Sicheng, the director and screenwriter of the film, has only directed a hit drama "Beijing Love Story" before this, and the subsequent film version, and the director is still a newcomer, but "Tang Detective" is definitely a mid-level work in the field of domestic commercial comedy.
Its excellence lies in its skillful control of genre filmmaking, coupled with the borrowing of classic mystery novels, which are handled exactly according to the methods of Hollywood commercial comedy.
The film creates a pair of contrasting "detectives":
The first is Wang Baoqiang's cousin Tang Ren.
The character of Tang Ren is probably one of the best characters Wang Baoqiang has portrayed in recent years.
From the first appearance, he brought a greasy middle-aged obscene uncle temperament, changing the grassroots comedian temperament that Wang Baoqiang had previously shaped in the "囧" series.
He was superstitious about the theory of feng shui yin and yang, always spoke a slightly earthy Nanyang dialect, and often boasted that he was aware of astronomy and geography.
"The First Detective of Chinatown".
But in fact, it is just a down-and-out private detective who has been living in a foreign country and achieving nothing, and he has also taken over the work of catching Xiao San, finding cats and dogs, and delivering couriers.
The shape of the Thunder Man, the tone of the ghost animal, and all kinds of pompous and contrived styles make people feel that this self-proclaimed "detective" is unreliable no matter how you look at it.
But it doesn't matter, he also has a real detective partner, which is—
Qin Feng, a talented teenager played by Liu Haoran.
Qin Feng is a talented teenager with a strong talent for reasoning.
Because of the failure of the police academy, he was sent to Thailand by his grandmother to find his distant cousin Tang Ren to relax.
A fanatical fan of speculative fiction full of expectations, thinking that what he wanted to meet was originally a detective with wisdom and courage, but he did not expect to be a sloppy and obscene uncle.
The two looked down on each other at first:
Qin Feng stuttered a little, but Tang Ren was an inconspicuous nagging; Qin Feng believed in science and logic, but Tang Ren was superstitious about feng shui yin and yang theory.
The pair of unreliable nephews must cooperate because of a mysterious murder in the secret room and the theft of gold.
In just "seven days", they must complete the task of finding the "lost gold", identifying the "real culprit", and finally "clearing the charges" for themselves.
The plot of the entire film moves forward extremely quickly, changing scenes every once in a while, and at the same time, almost every scene creates a small climax.
Whether it's that panning slow motion inside the hospital —
Or Pan Yueming's cameo appearance as the murderer staged the "elevator horror", which created a strong dramatic tension.
Especially the reversal at the end of the film, Zhang Zifeng's evil and crazy smile, still makes the sister remember it vividly.
With the successful experience of the previous work and a larger investment, the director Chen Sicheng, who is not bad for money, has comprehensively upgraded from many aspects such as story, scene, and production in the sequel.
The sequel is set in a move from Bangkok, Thailand to New York, the "sin city" of the United States, but the story still takes place in a foreign chinese street.
It has both an international metropolis and a strange exotic atmosphere, but also has the classical mystery of oriental culture, which is very suitable for shooting on crime themes.
In the film, New York landmarks such as Times Square, Madison Avenue, Central Terminal, and Fifth Avenue are all haunted by the combination of Wang Baoqiang and Liu Haoran.
Not only that, "Detective Chinatown 2", whether it is the intensity of the film's laugh point design, or the complexity of the bridge section and the case, is more than the previous work.
In particular, the concept of the "World Famous Detective Competition" was also introduced in the film.
At the beginning of the movie, Liu Haoran's character introduced the detective list of the crime master (crime master) app, and let all the masters gather together to appear and speak.
In addition to the three Chinatown detectives played by Wang Baoqiang, Liu Haoran and Xiao Yang, there are also famous detectives from all over the world such as Shang Yuxian and Mu Cong, who have joined in the sequel.
According to director Chen Sicheng, this series will constitute a complete -
Tang Exploration Space.
This is also the first time that Chinese films have truly introduced the concept of Hollywood's "symbiotic universe".
The story of the film continues the Easter egg at the end of the previous part, when the talented teenager Qin Feng suddenly receives an invitation from his uncle Tang Ren to come to New York to attend his wedding.
Sure enough, Tang Ren, who had focused on his nephew for twenty years, this time encouraged Qin Feng to participate in the "World Famous Detective Competition" for the sake of a huge prize.
It turned out that a few days ago, the grandson of the seventh uncle of the godfather of Chinatown was mysteriously killed, the cause of death was bizarre, and the murderer left a mysterious Taoist symbol at the scene.
So Uncle Seven ordered a reward to find the murderer, and a time limit of one week.
The huge prize money of $5 million attracted all kinds of detectives to New York's Chinatown to participate in the pursuit of the murderer.
However, while the crowd was investigating, another case occurred, and the modus operandi was very similar.
All the clues point to a low-level "black household" Song Yi who is mixed up in New York. The role is played by Xiao Yang, a member of the Chopstick Brothers, who played a Thai policeman in the previous game, and this time the character setting became a suspect.
However, after Qin Feng and Tang Ren's investigation, it was found that there was another hidden plot behind this serial murder case-
The real culprit behind the scenes is more like completing a criminal ritual of a terrible crime...
After the release of the last Detective Chinatown, sister remembered that some media had a very sharp evaluation of Chen Sicheng's directing level:
Smart people make smart movies.
Indeed, leaving aside others, the "Detective Chinatown" series undoubtedly proves the creative talent of director Chen Sicheng, who knows too well the needs of the audience in a movie, and then constantly amplifies the advantages -
The dark and complex attributes of the film are dissolved with extremely crazy comedic jokes, and the audience's attention is always aroused with a compact and rigorous reasoning plot.
As a suspenseful reasoning movie, although "Detective Chinatown 2" is cloaked in comedy, its core has not been discarded in the slightest, and as the plot advances, the case unfolds, and the truth is revealed in front of the audience.
The most novel setting of the "Tang Detective" series is-
Metaphysical detectives collide with scientific reasoning.
In the previous work, feng shui theory only appeared as a setting for Tang Ren, but in this sequel, this setting is deepened, and there are oriental metaphysical cases such as planning murder cases according to the five elements feng shui theory.
If in terms of typological division, the first part is more inclined to intrinsic reasoning, and this sequel is closer to social reasoning.
The previous game focused on the deduction and restoration of the case, while the sequel paid more attention to digging deep into human nature and the social criticism behind the case.
The opening scene of "Tang Detective 1" comes from a sentence from "Zhou Yi":
One yin and one yang are called the Tao, followed by good karma, and the nature of the person who becomes.
And to the "Tang Detective 2" is introduced in the "Tao Te Ching" quotes:
The Tao gives birth to one, one to two, two to three, and three to all things.
These two sentences run through the theme of the "Tang Detective" series, and the director intends to blur the boundary between good and evil in the film, just like the paper that Liu Haoran stood up at the end of the first part, symbolizing the coexistence of good and evil, but always opposing.
However, it must be acknowledged that:
Compared with the previous work, the story of "Tang Detective 2" is slightly weaker than that of the previous work. Because it has more comedy plots, it is more like a comedy movie specially customized for the Spring Festival.
From the local tycoon aura in which Wang Baoqiang appeared in the opening scene, to the police chief who spoofed Trump, to the strange detectives from all over the world, all the characters in the movie appeared with a kind of charming aura.
The crowd played tricks all the way and launched a case investigation under the arrest of the police.
What impressed sister the most was probably the reverse string of steel straight man Liu Haoran.
In the movie, The trio of Liu Haoran, Wang Baoqiang, and Xiao Yang flees to a hospital.
In order to avoid the pursuit, I had no choice but to change into women's clothes, and that scene was really quite stinging (la) exciting (yan)!
And my wuli Haoran brother is definitely free of himself——
One will incarnate as a women's clothing gangster, one will run naked in the downtown of New York, and there will be several sweet cries for solving the case in the play, which can be said to be very idol baggage!
Such comedies are certainly very lively, but in many cases they also invisibly disrupt the rhythm of the film, and sometimes even sacrifice the rationality of the film's plot.
For example, there is a scene in the movie where a strange famous detective joins forces to escape from prison.
This scene seems to be hilarious, but even the plot of superpowers appears more like a farce, and the setting of superpower detectives is actually contrary to the theme of scientific reasoning pursued by the film.
In addition, the film also has many plot flaws.
For example, at the end of the film, when the truth is found, the murderer suddenly commits suicide, and the ending of such a story is really too hasty.
Overall.
Detective Chinatown 2 is a more entertaining work.
It has a more clear genre positioning and creative ambitions, although it has slight flaws in the story, it is still a relatively mature work in the domestic suspense comedy genre.
Final Advance Spoiler:
It is said that the next "Tokyo Chapter" will have a cameo by Mr. Pan Yueming, think about it, there is still a little expectation!