This is Edgar, not Hoover

Danielle 2021-11-30 08:01:26

J. Edgar Hoover, anyone who has watched two American movies/televisions involving major crimes has heard this name in the corner of the line. The founder of West Factory—FBI—has been in power for nearly half a century and has served as eight presidents without failing. To this day, the interior decoration of the FBI office and the brand-name suits of Uncle Hotch and Rossi are still inscribed with the character and taste of this generation.

a legendary person. According to the statement in the film, in the field of "terror", in the United States of the twentieth century, J. Edgar Hoover is indeed the first person to be deserved.
The earliest advocate and practitioner of information warfare (personal data network and information taxonomy), the pioneer of criminology (especially forensic science and criminal psychology). Without him, there would be no CSI, no CM, no "Silent Lambs", no America today, and no other central judicial department that imitates the FBI established to deal with major crimes that the local police cannot handle.
However, after the end of World War II, Hoover did not change his "extraordinary approach" when the FBI was founded to deal with the "exceptional period after the war." When the Mafia was rampant, he was unwilling to make "organized crime" the FBI's primary task and insisted on fighting "domestic hostile forces" (hostile forces overseas were under the control of the Dongchang CIA). He put himself above the law and used FBI resources to monitor and eavesdrop on dissidents to gather a large amount of intelligence, so that the two presidents Kennedy and Nixon dared not do anything.

After the Watergate Incident, the status of privacy and security has risen abruptly. In addition, Hoover has returned to the west, and the term of the FBI commander has been limited to 10 years. The crowds are no longer afraid of chattering, and all kinds of criticisms are rampant.
According to the fine tradition of mankind, whether it is to praise or attack a person, Iraq's private life is always a more ideal goal than Iraq's work achievements. Hoover dealt with political opponents in this way, and was also attacked by political opponents in this way.
Hoover attacked Adlai Stevenson and threatened Eleanor Roosevelt with "homosexuality". At the same time, he was also involved in the rumors of his friends and was made up with his deputy Clyde Tolson. What's more, some people call it "transvestism." And neither the approvers nor the opponents of these rumors have strong evidence-Hoover is indeed unmarried for life, and is indeed "friendship" with Tolson (the latter is also Hoover's heir), but he also had a relationship with the female celebrity during his lifetime. Have had contacts.

The well-known documentary novelist Truman Capote (the one who wrote "Cold Blood") confessed that the gossip he poured into his pen was not true, and he just wanted to see Hoover make a fool of himself.
When a person is too famous, he becomes a target. The guy who supported him hoped that he was a guy, and the conservatives who hated him wanted him to be a transvestite. If you want to shoot "documentary" biographies, this verbal target is a trouble-if you want to avoid these controversies, you can't shoot anything; but if you don't avoid it, the needle point and the Maimang will always choose whether they want to. While standing over, standing too deep and too steady will inevitably be biased, and swaying on the wall, I am afraid that it will be empty.

Grandpa Dongmu said that he never did such things as rumors and rumors. Therefore, for this film, the title does not use Hoover's surname, which moves the world, but the abbreviation of the name and the Christian name J. Edgar, the first half of Hoover's signature.

Biographies have these rules. If it is official history, use the common names of the characters. Frida’s biography calls itself Frida, Patton’s biography is titled Patton, Milk’s biography is Milk, and those who run wild and intersperse with the plot of the novel need to be avoided. For example, Nesh's biography should be called A Beutiful Mind, Keats's biography should be Bright Star, and Sade's biography should be called Quills (Chinese does not have this rule, for example, Ye Wen and Huang Feihong also scream about Yunchang Shenma casually)

The name of the film uses Edgar, a name used by private relatives and friends. First, declare: The core of this biography is not to record the life and actions of the first FBI commander, but to use these materials to rely on. The facts and legends that have been circulated in folklore, to peep into the personality of this man named J.Edgar.
He cannot trust others but is eager to rely on someone’s contradictions. The fear of his own inadequacy (stuttering, transvestism, sexual orientation) is his intrinsic motivation to arm himself to the teeth to fight against all possible violations to protect himself.
His unprecedented success in political power benefits from the right time and place. It can be said that his inner fear and the desire to use to overcome these negative psychology reflect the mainstream views of the United States at a certain period of time.
Through J. Edgar, what we see is the American history of this period, the mental state of Americans in this history, the criminal history in this mental state, and the influence of these criminal histories on future American legislation and policies. Influence.
The influence skipped J. Edgar's middle age and jumped directly into his later years-Kennedy's political left, since he took office, the United States has entered another historical stage.

Grandpa Dongmu likes to do such things. He doesn’t judge, he doesn’t use "yes" and "no", "good" and "bad", "positive" and "villain" to shape and color his characters, and then push them out to show the audience. "Look, he is actually a Good/bad guy".
He allows the characters to speak with their own voice in their own time. Maybe this sentence is good in A's eyes, but Xu is bad in B's eyes. But the person who speaks, the person who does things, always believes that he is right.
And the important thing is not good or bad, but why... Why is there such a view of justice that you may not agree with, such a pattern of behavior that you do not agree with, in another time and space, another group of people agree with and agree with it? Even if we can't find the reason in the end, we must at least see, hear, and know that there is such a difference.

Use the historical view of the time to look at the history of the time, and use the person involved to talk about the events at the time. It sounds beautiful, but when the person involved is full of disputes and labels, full of rumors, the script chooses or rejects In the meantime, how to distinguish-at least infinitely weaken-the position of the photographer has become a problem.
Director An has his tolerance and gentleness, while Grandpa Dongmu has his monologue and denial.

There are three lines of note in this film, one is the current POV of the audience, the other is Edgar's dictation of his autobiographical recorder, and the other is Edgar's memories. At the beginning of the film, after Edgar finished talking about the Palmer bombing, the recorded agent asked him "Are you really at the bombing site?" Edgar replied, "Is it right that I was at the site is not the point?" All POVs are fictitious". Towards the end of the film, Tolson accused Edgar of saying, "You did not arrest John Dillinger (there is another narrative position regarding the case of "Enemy of Citizens"), and Lindbergh did not go downstairs to shake hands with you... All these lies, I am afraid that even You can’t distinguish between the true and the false"

and you will deceive yourself . Even the person involved can’t tell the true and false story. If you put it in an article and make it into an image, it’s even more impossible to verify it. Whether the things described in this film are true, like Edgar’s geographic location at the time of the Palmer bombing, is not important.

Therefore, at present, between the three narratives of Edgar's dictation and Edgar's recollection, the film does not make any distinction in tones. In addition to the strong atmosphere of the "fiction" in the Palmer bombing case, the shooting methods of all lines have also tended to be the same. Deliberately blur the distinction between fiction and fact. The so-called fake is true when it is true. When all records are not 100% reliable, which part of the desire to believe is ultimately determined by the audience's position.

Of course, through such a narrative, the message that Grandpa Dongmu wants to convey is that Zilai used the protagonist to explain it straightforwardly without shyness-Slogan1: Knowing history is to judge the present
Slogan2: Love is the greatest power in the world (JKR: This is my famous saying, hello!)

Not implicit enough, this is probably the biggest weakness of Grandpa Dongmu-if you want the audience to judge, you must trust the audience's ability to understand.
Out of distrust of the audience, this one is only about the Mafia issue. (Hoover's passive attitude towards the pursuit of the Mafia is all about various political conspiracy theories, which will confuse the subject) , On the issue of "transvestism", he tried his best to refrain from movies that avoid curiosity, but on the issue of Edgar's relationship, he was dripping with juice.
If there is no deep kiss that threw down, and the plain "I love you", just holding a small hand, just intersecting the eyes, just maintaining the position in this place, it will give the character and the audience more space, Give the film a clearer foothold.

But Grandpa Dongmu just couldn't help it. Every time he encountered such taboo alternative love, he couldn't help the sensational impulse that surged. Moreover, after being killed as a generation of women, Grandpa Dongmu filmed emotional dramas that lingered for words to be particularly good at brewing the audience's emotions.
In Clybe, Xiao Shou exposed a mouthful of white teeth and blue eyes, and said, "I only have one condition for accepting this job, that is, in the future, no matter how good or bad, whether in harmony or quarrel, we will have lunch and dinner together." (Is this a marriage vow Uncle script, you are too obvious, okay, dare you dare to be more subtle in your lines) When the audience started snickering, you still have to do a close-up of each other, you have to do it twice, ah, twice! ! ! What are you doing! The audience laughed lewdly! Then the two met on a trip, and when they said they were going to live in a suite, the audience began to snicker again (French audiences are very savvy!) You also cut the footage of the two of them washing together, and then use the middle shot of the two to come out together. In the hall, the audience started to laugh collectively again, sister, the GV expert, blushed! This kind of shyness of "peeking at a young couple's wedding night" is swollen! Grandpa Dongmu, when you were filming this episode, you basically traveled back to "The Bridge of Madison County", right? Even though I only watched it once in Girls’ Generation, I still remember the place where you ate with Aunt Mei and fell down. What a scene. Clybe's various performances are basically Aunt Mei's upper body!
You still don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop! ! ! Confess it, throw it down, roll over, kiss, over over, over over! ! ! It's over! ! (But the killing is in place. My sister went back to make up for a lot of follow-ups before falling asleep. After falling asleep, she still had dreams of this kind). How carefully the makeup artist who painted the old makeup like a zombie body returned the bruise that was bruised by a kiss on Xiao Li's lips! What the hell is this! ! !
Grandpa Dongmu, next time we hold it, will it be possible? Even if you grab the Valentine's Day stall with Foul Moss, you still hold it. You see, other people's calcium guides can only make Ah Fu and A Hua pounce around. You have to believe in the YY ability of the masses! ! !

Ah, well, in fact, because this scene sister secretly threw a half star to add a star
(Focus: You say one thing and do another such behavior What kind of ah!
A: Well, being a woman has a female rot rot The professional ethics! It’s the basic principle to add stars if you sell badly!)

Finally, let’s talk about Xiaolizi. This time I went to Ben Xiaojin again. To be honest, when I watched the trailer, my sister was very disappointed. Xin said that this time I just wanted to pray for you, and I was afraid that I didn't have the chance to use it. As a result, the whole film is ok (but the makeup artist must pull out and cut the belly eight times). The look of Lao Zhuang is indeed very similar to Philip Hoffman. When I watched the trailer, my sister thought that she could cut the character into three sections. Xiao Lizi played the middle age and Hoffman played the old age.
But because the movie is not "Hoover recorded in writing" or "Hoover in the audience's imagination", this casting is unexpectedly suitable-Edgar in the film calls the storm in the workplace and shakes the United States three times. , In private, there is always a sense of insecurity, a kind of vulnerability that needs to be affirmed, expected, and encouraged. P.Hoffman is too comfortable, this kind of tension can only rely on acting. And Xiao Lizi's sense of tension, incompetence, and anxiety that he can't handle at certain times is his own. Acting in true colors is always more natural and credible than acting in disguise. Tsao Jiao Gan still privately wants to see Hoffman do it)
Xiao Lizi's acting career is roughly divided into two parts by Da Chuan. The little plum in the first half is rebellious but sincere. He was particularly obvious when he played against J. Depp in who's eating gilbert grape-he didn't take himself too seriously, and he was too serious. In fact, my sister likes little plums of this period, including total eclipse and marvin's room. He doesn't have too many acting obstacles to play with the predecessor stars, so he will bring out what he has. I started to cheat in the second half, and all kinds of disfigurements are fine. I don't understand the mentality of wanting to learn how to send acting secrets by swinging a knife from the palace! ! ! What's wrong with natural actors! ! ! A good play is really good!
Grandpa Dongmu is very accurate when watching actors, especially those big stars who have been tagged with vases. J. Edgar is a complicated character, not easy to play. But his temperament overlaps with Little Plum. You can have the nomination for Little Golden Man, can you get it... Anyway, sister pray for you, Little Plum.

PS: Regarding Hoover's own sexual orientation, I personally tend to him because he is too afraid of being a friend, so self-hypnosis deliberately avoids this idea, let alone take action. The relationship with the celebrities should also be trying to straighten oneself, but in the end it failed. Transvestite is a bit outrageous-it's not that he doesn't necessarily have it, but even if it does, with Hoover's suspiciousness, he will never dress up in public in a different dress. The script holds any "alienated" Hoover legend that can increase the character level of the idea. It is a bit redundant to incorporate this rumors into the story, at least in the film, it is not fit in. It can be seen that Grandpa Dongmu was in the cross-dressing period. Hurry, it’s no more brewing than the filming part, I don’t know why I didn’t cut this section.

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Extended Reading
  • Cassidy 2022-04-24 07:01:06

    It's not so much a biography of a political figure, it's more a same-sex love movie. What should have been a big book has become an embellishment, and what should have been a one-off but added a lot of color, a movie without a theme.

  • Kacie 2022-04-24 07:01:06

    Compared with the recent IRON LADY, this biography is shot in a similar way, but it is more organized. Some reasons for the characters' characteristics are alluded to, which is also a screenwriter's skill. At the same time, I didn't forget to bury some HOOVER's private life. Not bad, worth a look.

J. Edgar quotes

  • J. Edgar Hoover: No one freely shares power in Washington, D.C.

  • Agent Stokes: The crimes we are investigating aren't crimes, they are ideas.