October 18 coincided with the 13th anniversary of Xie Jin's death.
November 21, 1923 - October 18, 2008
Thirteen years have passed, and today we see the current situation of Chinese films with both joy and sorrow.
The box office has ranked first in the world, although there is an impact of the external epidemic environment, it is undeniable that domestic films have indeed moved towards the era of blockbusters, but on the other hand, there are fewer and fewer domestic film films, especially in these two years, it has encountered a cold ice period.
In 2021, it is particularly obvious that there is almost no one who can really be called a masterpiece, and for the entire film market, it is only supported by two slots, and the main theme has become dominant.
Today's domestic films are technically close to the world standard, but there is still a long way to go in terms of ideology and art.
That's why we miss those film masters, and Xie Jin is one of them.
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Xie Jin, who has been fascinated by opera since childhood, gradually became interested in this art form.
Born in the Shuxiang Mendi family, it is obvious that his parents' expectation for him is to be able to inherit his father's business and make a difference, but for Xie Jin, he did not want to do so, until he met the movie, completely opened the inner world of the teenager, from opera to movie, but this is contrary to his parents' expectations, so there are often conflicts.
At the time of graduating from high school, facing the first major choice in his life, Xie Jinyi chose to apply for drama school without hesitation.
Since then, he has begun the road of drama learning, and he has been taught and cultivated by drama masters such as Cao Yu, Jiao Juyin, Ma Yanxiang and other teachers, and received the best drama education at that time.
He dropped out of school and continued to work with his mentor in the drama club, and also began to hold some positions in some important plays, from which he also established the direction of directing.
After eight years of study and work, he finally got his wish and began his career as a director.
In that war-torn era, it was not easy to adhere to a certain artistic pursuit, but for Xie Jin to get what he wanted with love and hard work. Starting from the assistant director, to independently directing the Huai opera short film "Blue Bridge Society", he began to move towards independence.
Three years later, he became famous with the sports film "Women's Basketball Five", which won many international awards.
He was just 34 years old.
Xie Jin has been influenced by zhang shichuan and Zheng Zhengqiu's films since he was a child, so at first his films had a strong creative paradigm of the 30s and were always different.
Just like the famous work "Women's Basketball No. 5", the humanized expression method and the traditional family ethics narrative model are very different from the environment of the times at that time.
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In Xie Jin's films, we can feel his humanistic care, the expression of humanitarian thoughts, and tell the public what is true, good, and beautiful.
The expression in "Red Detachment of Women" is still implicit, but in "Ah! "Cradle" is completely let go.
The beginning of the praise of the beauty of human feelings and human nature marks the beginning of Chinese war films moving in the direction of human feelings, humanity and humanitarianism.
For Xie Jin, the real peak is naturally in the 1980s, when he created his own glory, which is also a rare period in the history of Chinese cinema to "make a statement" for the times.
The representative film of nature is the reflection trilogy: "Legend of Tianyun Mountain", "Wrangler", "Furong Town".
In the midst of controversy, the three films have also created a lot of achievements, caused a huge sensation, and become an insurmountable peak.
Under historical politics, the beauty of human nature is infinitely magnified, and moral criticism and historical reflection are truly achieved.
Its "Wrangler" is popular again among the public more than thirty years later, because of the scarcity of the innocent and beautiful love depicted in the film, people are calling, people are longing.
As a special war film, "Legend of Tianyun Mountain" has become an insurmountable peak.
"Furong Town" from history, let us see a certain insistence on human nature.
The three films completely bottomed the status of Xie Jin's film master and were praised as the national soul of Chinese films.
Later films such as "The Last Nobleman", "The Bell of Qingliang Temple", "Daystar", "The Old Man and the Dog" still have similar shadows, but they can no longer surpass the trilogy, but we will find that Xie Jin can always focus on human nature and human feelings through a grand historical narrative, and tell people's historical stories in history.
Xie Jin and Zhang Xianliang have a special emotion, and have adapted two of his works into movies, one is the famous "Wrangler", the other is "The Old Man and the Dog", of course, the shooting reality story of "The Old Man and the Dog" is even more absurd and bizarre.
Zhang Xianliang's contribution to Chinese cinema is also huge, not only providing excellent film materials, but also creating the famous Zhenbeibao Western Cinema, although his life is bumpy, but filmmakers should not forget him.
At the end of the century, although "Daughter Valley" was the graduation work of the first batch of students in his school, Xie Jin taught this group of students to look like they really experienced prison life, and everyone made great sacrifices, although the acting skills were still slightly immature, but the themes and stories involved in the film were novel.
Although Xie Jin has always described the tenacious and flexible beauty of oriental women, in this film, it focuses on a group of women, and it is guilty, and it reflects Xie Jin's humanitarian pursuit, which still has the meaning of reflection, but it is from the times to the individual.
Tribute films are a more important category in the 90s, especially various war blockbusters, and for Xie Jin, he brought "Opium War", although he is not as good as the trilogy, but now it seems that he can still kill most of the main theme works, because it is more objective and real, but also get rid of the characteristics of Facebook, and not excessive sensationalism.
The film has created an investment record in the history of film, with an investment of up to 100 million, which was simply amazing at the time, and of course, it also set a record for the domestic box office of domestic films.
The significance of this film in the history of Chinese film is not only this, but also directly promotes the establishment of today's Hengdian Film and Television City.
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From the study of film in the 1930s and 1940s to the beginning of filming and production in the 1950s and 1960s, to the peak of the 1980s, Xie Jin's life has been dedicated to film, more than 50 years of film life, telling the story of his home country, creating a new genre of Chinese cinema, and becoming a unique film master.
However, it was unfortunate for his family life, the two sons suffered from intellectual disabilities, and the eldest son died of cancer before himself.
Of course, looking back, no one's life can be perfect, even as a director Xie Jin, his works have also gone through various controversies and tests, but standing at this node today, just looking at domestic films, we will still miss this master.
The times created Xie Jin, but at the same time Xie Jin also created the film era.
Such a film master should not belong to a certain era, but should always be remembered and learned.