I have seen many excellent movies, each of which will make people move and moved, but once you leave the atmosphere of the scene and return to real life, the huge touch when watching the movie will also fade, and then I only know that it is a good movie. So this time, I want to record the viewing experience of Director Guan Hu's new work "Eight Hundred" with words, so that the shock, thinking and emotion brought by the film have always been traceable.
On July 7, 1937, the Lugou Bridge Incident, Japan launched a full-scale invasion of China, and on August 13, the Japanese army attacked Shanghai.
China and Japan fought a battle in and around Shanghai for more than three months.
The film begins with the fall of the great field, which marks the beginning of the rout of the Songhu Warring States Army.
The Battle of Songhu was by no means a glorious battle, seven times the enemy's strength, but with huge casualties; a ragtag group of civil warmen, gangster-like soldiers, smokers, factions that conspired with each other, officials who fled for their lives first, and finally the great rout.
There are always deserters in war, and there are bound to be heroes.
"Eight Hundred" mainly focuses on the most tragic battle of the Four Elements Warehouse in the "Battle of Songhu".
The Sihang Warehouse was once the headquarters of the 88th Division and was stockpiled with a large amount of ammunition and food.
The west and north sides of the warehouse are Chinese territories, occupied by the Japanese army, the east is the public concession, the south is the Suzhou Creek, and the south bank of the river is also the public concession.
Therefore, the location of the sihang warehouse has become an "island".
On October 26, the Japanese army captured the areas of Dachang, Jiangwan, Zhabei, and Miaoxing.
The Chinese defenders were attacked by the enemy on their backs, and the battle situation was critical, so in order to avoid the total annihilation of the army, the Nationalist government decided to withdraw the main force to the position south of the Suzhou Creek.
In order to cover the retreat of the large army, the 88th Division was ordered to leave 1 regiment and hold Zhabei, that is, to use the Sihang Warehouse as a base to contain the Japanese army.
The film is called "Eight Hundred", which refers to eight hundred heroes, but after historical research, there are actually only 452 people, one battalion. Led by Xie Jinyuan (Du Chun), deputy of the 524th Regiment.
According to the situation at that time, the Japanese army had occupied the area north of the Suzhou Creek, and the Nationalist army only left 1 battalion to hold on, but it did not have much military value.
But in Chiang Kai-shek's eyes, the significance of leaving this lone army is to let foreigners see that we still have troops in China that are sticking to downtown Shanghai.
The situation in the battle was becoming more and more unfavorable, but Chiang Kai-shek's choice was to insist on letting the lone army fight with Japan, even if it was a symbolic fight, until the League of Nations congress was convened, and the League of Nations intervened and mediated.
Often the tragedy of a weak country is to fantasize that when it is in danger, the strong country will "do its duty" to help.
Unfortunately, war is not a fairy tale, and the law of survival of the weak and the strong has remained unchanged.
The Nationalist government asked the soldiers on the north bank of the Suzhou River to fight a battle for the foreigners on the south bank, and the people in the south bank concession seemed to be watching how the nationalist army on the north bank was going to end the play.
And the whole world is watching the drama on both sides of the Suzhou Creek, and at the same time, we are restoring the recurrence of that tragic scene off the screen.
"Across a river, hell and heaven", people in heaven have become the "live audience" of hell torture.
Most of the anti-war films we have seen often praise the great deeds and heroic indomitable heroes of the war of resistance, and show the great image of our Chinese soldiers who are brave and good at war and are not afraid of sacrifice with an indomitable spirit!
In fact, the so-called "brave and perseverance" is just a stereotype whitewashed by posterity.
In this film, we see the transformation of soldiers from cowardice to fearlessness.
The Battle of Songhu has been fought for nearly three months, the Chinese army has been defeated and retreated, the army is already scattered, has no intention of fighting, and there are constantly "deserters" who have been brought to justice on the spot, and we all know that it is only a matter of time before Shanghai is lost.
The characters with the most ink and the easiest sense of substitution in the film are a group of "scattered soldiers" who have temporarily joined in, and they truly show the faces of all beings in war.
The two brothers of the Hubei Security Corps, the "Dragon Boat Festival" played by Ou Hao, came to fight the war, but they just wanted to see the bustling Shanghai, and the younger brother "Little Hubei" was still a stinking little hairy child. The "Dragon Boat Festival" began by hiding in the corner of the warehouse and not daring to show his face, not even daring to take a gun, to giving up his life and forgetting death, shooting at enemy planes and being shot and killed.
Younger brother Xiao Hubei has always had the picture of Zhao Zilong riding the savior alone in his mind, and the famous general who rides on a white horse close to the picture is his brother Dragon Boat Festival. In his heart, his brother should be brave and good at fighting, heroic and fearless, facing the large number of enemy troops that rushed forward without any hesitation, and killed alone into the siege.
Wang Qianyuan played by the "sheep abduction" is a veteran oil, when the soldier fights is just to earn military pay to support the mother, he does not want to make a career, only want to go home to beg for his wife, but this has finally become the wish of the next life.
The northeast soldier Lao Tie, played by Jiang Wu, once followed "Zhang Dashuai", and it is reasonable to say that he should be fearless, experienced in hundreds of battles, but he has become an out-and-out "melon instigation" in the mouth of the sheep. He was not a wicked man or a warrior, but a cowardly soldier who had been frightened and stolen in the days of war.
The "old abacus" of the Zhejiang security regiment played by Zhang Yi is even more obsessed with the intention of fleeing for his life, and he does not want to go into battle to kill the enemy at all, and sacrifice his life for righteousness. He is cowardly by nature, wants to escape, is not willing to face war and disaster, and only wants to settle down in the chaotic world.
There is also the "knife" played by Li Jiuxiao, who was originally a thug in the casino of "Sister Rong" (Played by Liu Xiaoqing) in the public concession, cold-blooded and ruthless. When the refugees cross the concession, he uses a knife to prevent the "old gourd" (Huang Zhizhong) from entering the concession by hiding his identity as a soldier. Yang Huimin (Tang Yixin) leads people to avoid stray bullets, but he refuses to open the door and let his compatriots enter. But when he saw that in order to connect the telephone lines to the soldiers in the Sihang warehouse, ordinary citizens were sacrificed, he took the initiative to ask for help. Whether at that moment he was really touched by people's patriotic enthusiasm or wanted to show his ability to run fast, he finally made his own contribution to the war and sacrificed his life for the country.
Some people are always heroic in war; some people go from cowardice to heroism in war; some people change from veteran oil to real warriors; some people really stop being melons in the end, some people are always afraid, always cowardly, and eventually become deserters...
But no one is wrong, war is the most worthy of criticism, it is a great destruction of man and human nature.
It is certainly a song and a cry to see death as a homecoming, but greed for life and fear of death is the true nature of man.
From these war-weary soldiers and the people watching the drama across the river, we seem to see a nation collapsing.
But are we qualified to harshly rebuke these "reckless and secretive" Chinese?
Whether he was a warrior or an ordinary citizen, they were all human beings, a flesh-and-blood life.
For any living species, survival is always his first choice.
This is the most instinctive struggle that a small person can make under the ruthless crushing of the cruel years.
Everyone is forced to show their different faces in war, and it can force an ordinary person into a warrior, and it can also force a warrior into a melon.
In the film, a panoramic panorama is tear-inducing: in the mournful singing of the singers in the concession area, the camera sweeps over the banks of the Suzhou River, and a river that is not wide divides the two worlds, on the one hand, the wolf smoke scorched earth in the sihang warehouse, and the corpses are everywhere; on the other hand, the prosperity and prosperity of Shanghai after it became the British and French concession.
Heaven on one side, hell on the other.
And this shot should be more than just a simple criticism of "the businesswoman does not know the hatred of the country, and sings the backyard flowers across the river".
Those Chinese on the other side of the concession who were outside the matter, watching the Chinese defenders in the Sihang warehouse stubbornly block the Japanese army again and again, watching the Japanese army hang the Chinese soldiers on scaffolding, one by one Ling Chi fell into the Suzhou Creek, their eyes were also full of tears, and their fists were creaking.
The bravery of the soldiers in the Sihang warehouse inspired the patriotic feelings of the people of the concession.
Similarly, the patriotic feelings of the people of the concession also inspired the soldiers of the Sihang Warehouse to kill the enemy more heroically and defend the country.
When the soldiers who are not afraid of life and death support the Chinese flag and raise it above the Sihang Warehouse with their bodies, it is a challenge to the Japanese, and it is even more for the world to see that China will not die.
An indescribable emotion like the waves in the sea of anger slapping everyone's heart may be a long-lost sense of national pride, or it may be a belief that the Chinese nation will not die.
The cohesion it unleashed was indestructible, tying together the people who watched the bustle and the defenders of the Sihang warehouse.
This is also why mingzhe can protect himself in the concession area, but so many people have petitioned, risking their lives to deliver telephone lines and collect medicine and food for the wounded.
Another touching scene in the movie is of Chen Shusheng (Zheng Kai), who did not even leave a photo, and he jumped into the Japanese position with an explosive package... With a roar, he exchanged his life for the determination of eight hundred brave men to fight to the end.
From this moment on, I truly understood the words of Commander Xie: "The opposite is the human world, and here is the grave." ”
The people of the "paradise on earth" on the south bank of the Suzhou River looked at every figure that jumped down on the other side of the river as a sting, and the name they reported was a cry of "the desire to live", and at the same time it was also a painful question: Why can you remain indifferent?!
Every sound resounded throughout the world, as if the father and mother who were waiting for their children at home to return also heard the cry of their sons.
At this moment, my whole body was trembling, tears flowed down unconsciously, and the shock and heart-wrenching could not be hidden.
It is also for those who really built the Great Wall with flesh and blood in history, but did not have the opportunity to shout out their own names.
This is true of all the chinese people, how dare the Japanese army?
When I was a child, every time I saw the revolutionaries in the TV series, I was always asked by adults: If it were you, would you be as brave as him? At that time, I always replied without thinking, "Yes!".
When I grew up, I gradually understood that it was not a shame not to be a hero.
But seeing the appearance of this group of "scattered soldiers", I couldn't help but ask myself: If it were me, would I be as cowardly as they were?
I have always believed that no one is born brave, and people always become brave after recognizing their abilities and responsibilities.
The "Eight Hundred Heroes" are called heroes not because they are emotionless war machines, but because they have found meaning above life and death.
They are also afraid, they also want to survive, they want to go home and farm, they want to have a good time, but they have no way to retreat, because behind them are thousands of compatriots, the whole of China.
At the end of the film, a conversation between the commissioner (Huang Xiaoming) and The leader of the Xie regiment is desperate to listen to:
Xie: "The anti-Japanese enthusiasm of the soldiers is getting stronger and stronger. ” T: "It will fade soon, and the enthusiasm of these people will not change the tide of the war." ” Xie: "I don't believe that history will remember this place, remember these people!" ” T: "What's the point of you keeping going?" ” Xie: "Because this is our country!" ” T: "You are here to perform for the Western countries, and if you continue to persevere, you will no longer be warriors, will you see the actors on the other side of the ship?" Don't let this feat become a bigger laughing stock! ” Xie: "That's how the state defines this battle?" ” T: "Because, behind the war is politics!" ”
But Xie Jinyuan and more than 800 brave men are not "calling foreigners to see" acting, they have long put life and death aside, and defend the dignity of the motherland with their lives.
These fighters became the "outcasts" of the party-state.
After the main force collapsed, they were left behind, looking at the song and dance across the river, where the drama stage was sung.
This side is also sacrificing their lives to "perform" to show the British and American powers and tell them that Shanghai is the Shanghai of Chinese; to show their own people that some people are still fighting for them; to show the Japanese and tell them that there are still warriors in China.
The big picture needs to be abandoned, and politics needs to be performed, but this performance must be completed with one's own life.
The tragedy of this lone army is the sadness of the weak And Small China.
Fortunately, the world is still that world, and China is no longer that China!
The great motherland today is prosperous and prosperous.
It's just that the years are quiet now, and there have been thousands of heroes who have sacrificed their lives for us!