It is Hirokazu Ee's "Thief Family" that tells an uncomplicated story, three generations of six people who are not related by blood: Grandma Shibata, Uncle Oharu (dad), Mother Xindai, Sister Aki, Brother Xiangta, Sister Ling, Due to various coincidences, a temporary family was formed. Night talks around the stove and noodles were as good as one’s own. It relied on all kinds of odd jobs and pensions (probably by pretending to be paid). ), assist in communication, steal and sell for a living. So in fact, the four words "Thief Family" already tell the story of the whole film.
If it weren’t for the multiple appearances of Tokyo Tower in the hollow lens of the film, people who watched it would have forgotten that this story took place in the glamorous and fashionable Tokyo in the photos of Chinese tourists. Thief family.
Perhaps because of this, many people's first reaction after watching this film is to draw conclusions to the "thief family" .
Some people think that the "thief family" is not self-reliant, making people unhappy, and mourning his misfortune. So when they saw Xiangta fell and the police intervened to cause the disintegration of the temporary family, they thought it was the reason why the arrangement was made by Hirokazu Kee. I want to explain that I do not agree with the existence of this "thief family".
It is also said that in this completely unrelated family, love and warmth are embodied in everyone, which is in sharp contrast to the sense of alienation and loneliness in the metropolis of Tokyo. Some people even think that the director Hirokazu Edema is negating the traditional family through the "thief family" and discussing the feasibility of "free choice and reorganization of family relations". Imagine a society where you can freely choose to reorganize a new family and get rid of the original family and society. Is discrimination and injustice better?
However, in my opinion, the highlight of this film is that it is not eager to draw conclusions. For the temporary family composed of these six people, for the existence of this thief family, and for many similar group relationships that are likely to exist at the bottom of Japanese society today, Hirokazu Eede was the main creator. He did not arbitrarily completely affirm or completely deny it.
If it was Hirokazu Kee who wanted to make "The Thief Family" a "family of love", and wanted to embody the humanity carol of this family of six strangers huddling together in the metropolis, he could make it into the "Red Lantern" version of " "Cherry Chibi Maruko", grandma is not a relative, and father is not a relative, "but he is closer to relatives", there is snow outside, the family hides in the kotatsu to warm up in winter and eat hot pot and dorayaki, and then the grandmother said a song "Youzang New Works". If this is the case, Hirokazu Ke will not join the plot of the police ransacking the house, leading to the disintegration of the "thief family".
Obviously, it was Hirokazu Ke that did not stop at "simple touch", because there are many news about picking up an abandoned baby, adopting it across oceans, and then raising an adult, and it is not a special thing. Through the details of several characters, he constantly reminds the audience that a family is much more than just a few people gathering together to eat a meal. Xiangtai always said: "Children who can't study at home need to go to school."
Because the "thief family" has no legality, the children cannot go to school. Dazhi can only tell Xiangtai in a half-comforting and half-coaxing manner that only children who cannot study at home need to go to school. But from Xiangtai's constant chanting of this sentence, it can be seen that he has begun to doubt the authenticity of this sentence.
Yes, the "thief family" can allow children like Xiangtai and Ling who are abandoned (or disliked) by their native families to eat and feel the warmth of the family, but it cannot allow the children to receive education or learn more. More and more useful ways to make a living, change your life. So my sister Aki went to help socializing, and my mother Shinyo had done it before. Dazhi Dazhi was my mother’s guest, and my sister turned a guest into a boyfriend. The episode where mother and sister smiled at each other in the kitchen seems to be the director’s Everyone hinted: In such a family, there is always only this kind of bottom cycle.
At this moment, Mrs. Xiang was moved by the grandfather of the small shop. After witnessing the theft by Mrs. Xiang and sister Ling, the old grandfather not only didn't get angry, but also handed him two popsicles, saying not to let your sister steal in the future. The thing is out, it means that Xiangtai stole it before, and the old man actually knew it, but it didn't break it, leaving them a ray of life. The conscience of the pure-hearted Xiangta who repayed his grievances with virtue discovered that through the child's perspective, the director began to re-examine this seemingly warm "thief family" and began to suspect Dazhi's various lies. In other words, this family was not copied by the police, but started to disintegrate from the internal children's doubts about the past and future of themselves and the temporary family.
Because of the "thief family", there is no future.
Old people like grandma Shibata can let go without regrets, so when her family went on a beach vacation, she looked at the other five people laughing and playing on the beach, and whispered contentedly: Thank you (to spend the rest of my life with me).
However, the children, because they can't see the light, can't go to school, have no education, hide in hiding, can only steal, and have no future.
Not only through Xiangta’s suspicion, but also his mother Shindai’s counter-understanding after being imprisoned. Shindai frankly said to Dazhi that we can’t rely on us, and the child has no future. So he told some information about Xiangtai’s biological parents when he found Xiangtai. My child, I hope he can find relatives and get help someday.
Since there is no future, is the "thief family" useless? Nor is it.
It seems that each of these six people has the experience of being abandoned, abandoned, or hurt by their relatives or others. Take the little girl Ling as an example. The parents of the original family were young and fashionable, but they quarreled endlessly, even domestic violence. The father beat the mother and the parents beat the children. So when the little girl Ling was discovered by Dazhi, she was kept like a puppy on the balcony in winter. Even Dazhi was trembling with the cold. It can be seen how the five-year-old girl’s biological family treated her. So when it was discovered that the girl’s disappearance was in the news and worried that he would be implicated, Dazhi asked Ling to choose whether to go home or stay. As a result, Ling chose to stay. Down.
The "thief family" is a warm residence for the bullied and abandoned in the society.
Because he also likes to make family-themed movies, some people often compare it with Hirokazu Ee and Yasujiro Ozu. Because Yasujiro Ozu likes to shoot the most traditional Japanese families, such as "Tokyo Monogatari", he thinks Hirokazu Eeda is doing the opposite. He is deconstructing Ozu Yasujiro's traditional Japanese family with "post-modern family composition" such as "thief family".
Regarding Ozu, there is a detail. He believes that the height of sight of Japanese people sitting on tatami mats is the most real and closest height between Japanese family members, so he modified the camera to be as high as the sitting actors. . Please take a closer look at the scenes in "The Thief Family" where a family lives and eats in a dilapidated small house, as well as the scenes where Shindai and Rei gradually approached the mother-daughter roles and began to get close to each other, all of which are Ozu's sitting posture at the height of the photography. Ozu believes that this height can reflect the real life of Japanese families. So we can understand that it was Hirokazu Ee who paid tribute to Ozu through this high degree of photography. At the same time, he was also telling us that at least in that short time, they were indeed a family, a warm and meaningful existence, although only temporarily. of.
But Hirokazu Zhi did not express with great fanfare that he wanted to promote the free reorganization of the "thief family", nor did he completely deconstruct and deny the traditional family. He was cautiously speaking.
On the one hand, they say that the children of the "thief family" have no future. On the other hand, they humbly admit that the "thief family" is a warm and meaningful short-lived existence. What is it that Yukazu Kee wants to say?
What he wanted to express was actually expressed through Xiangtai's perspective in the film. The film starts from the perspective of Shota, and it culminates in the scene of parting with Dazhi on the bus of Shota. This little boy actually carries the perspective of Hirokazu Ee .
Since Xiangta has already begun to doubt a lot of Dazhi's words, such as the scene of picking up Xiangta back then, it is actually likely to be like picking up Ling. He stole something and met him on the way, but Dazhi described him as bravely saving. It's Xiangta. When they went to bed the night before, Mrs. Xiang asked another very embarrassing question: When he was injured, did Dazhi and the others leave him and run away? Dazhi admitted that it was.
Xiangtai's fond memories were gradually broken. But he was still on the separate bus, turned his head, watching Dazhi running behind the bus and shouting Xiangta's name, quietly said: Dad. That's what Dazhi wanted to hear Xiangta call him for a long time. The short-lived relationship between father and son finally made people sigh and regret.
As a child of the "thief family", he discovered many secrets of the family, and also discovered that he had no future. He began to refuse to steal, and even discovered many lies of the "father", and the illegality and fragility of this temporary family. But he is still willing to call him a father, admit the family, and admit this relationship between father and son, just because that short and warm companionship will become the strength that lasts for a lifetime.
For many reasons, many people will temporarily leave their families, or even temporarily away from society, but they cannot be isolated from the world forever. They will eventually return to society, but we still have to thank those who accepted them, warmed them, and accompanied them on their way out. Strangers they grew up.
View more about Shoplifters reviews
