1 The street battle at the beginning and the refugee camp scenes in the middle and later stages are seriously uneven, and many clues in the later stage are in The front is not unfolded. In addition, the narrative style before and after is different, which leads to a serious sense of rupture before and after the film, and the rhythm is disordered. I don't know if it's a matter of cutting too much.
2 There is no shortage of stunning details and pictures. Cross-cuts of the massacre of Chinese prisoners of war; the famous line "My wife is pregnant again"; the long shot of Yitian after Tang Tianxiang's death; the kneeling of John Bella; the Japanese dance and memorial scene on the Shura Field. etc. But the overall lack of fluidity and coherence in the film leaves these passages scattered throughout the plot like relics.
3 In terms of plot, the first half is too tragic, compared with the excessively loose middle and rear parts: the migration of the climax part leads to the slowness and dullness of the second half at a glance. The clues are scattered, the contradictory settings are thin, and the sensationalism is not very successful. This should be the director's ability.
4 The characters are too concentrated, especially the Chinese. Lack of better representation. The relationship between characters is too "chained" instead of forming a perfect network. The angle of view is not large enough. Makes the movie less convincing.
5 I don't know if it's a budget issue. All we saw in Nanjing was a safe area and a small group of troops. The scale of the international safety zone is unrealistic (the historical Nanjing safety zone is centered on the seat of the US Embassy in China and the church institutions such as Jinling University, Jinling Women's College of Arts and Sciences, Jinling Theological Seminary, Jinling Middle School, and Drum Tower Hospital, covering an area of about 3.86 square kilometers. , surrounded by roads on all sides). Such petty scenes and themes don't even match the movie's title. We do not see a city in hell. And only saw a corner of the city.
6 did not achieve an even distribution of roles for each character. The story of the Tang family of four undoubtedly accounts for the majority, while Jiang Shuyun's portrayal is weak in comparison. Little Bean is missing from the mid-story story. Although Liu Ye's role is impressive, due to the limited role, the promotion of the story and the relationship between the characters is very little. The functionality of this role is minimal. All in all, this was not a successful group show due to the unevenness of the scenes.
7 Character performance. Liu Ye's eyes and smiles are undoubtedly very brilliant. Gao Yuanyuan Jiang Yiyan but not lost. Fan Wei broke through the different feeling that he gave people, but he always felt bad. Nakaizumi's hero Kihata Ryu is undoubtedly very good. Especially the Kiba dragon.
8 The film lacks a macro narrative right up to the end. That is, the lack of epic temperament. Can't compare with movies of the same genre. From the plot explanation to the character relationship, they are all so petty. In particular, it is worth mentioning that although using subtitles to explain the background is not a very bad method, it undoubtedly exposes the director's lack of narrative ability.
9 The Japanese perspective is really the highlight of the film. Although the perspectives of China and Japan are asymmetrical, Lu Chuan's handling method is inevitably suspicious of the theme first (again exposing the lack of director ability). But this is a rare innovation in China. A love story between a comfort woman and a soldier. A dance ritual in hell. A group of giggling ordinary soldiers turned into beastly murderers. These bridges are so stubborn and powerful. Let people think and understand war and human nature from a new perspective.
10 The film Lu Chuan reminds me of "Letter from Iwo Jima". It's just that Iwo Jima is full of all kinds of flaws that are out of the historical facts and Eastwood's own assumptions, and this movie is the limitation of the director's strength.
11 Enough of the previous criticism, now say something else. After reading his various interviews before, I felt that his understanding of the Nanjing Massacre and his thinking about the war were in place. The citation of historical materials and the adoption of new perspectives all show his admirable sincerity to the film. Maybe he really didn't have the talent to steer the film, maybe the problem was the cuts. But no matter what, this sincerity has put him above those so-called main theme directors, and has brought us into a new field.
12 Regarding the ending, Lu Chuan's attitude is undoubtedly ambiguous. Can we still have a smile on our face like Little Beans after going through hell? People say: there is no poetry after Auschwitz, then after Nanking.
13 Although this movie disappointed me a bit, it was still worth watching. I thought so.
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