On October 4, 2019, a controversial horror movie: "In the High Grass" was launched on Netflix.
As soon as the movie was launched, it was labelled by fans such as "grass version of horror cruise ship", "frustrated party + horror cruise ship" and other labels, but at the same time expressed disappointment at the ending of the story, thinking that the pit in the early stage of the plot was too big to be filled. Pit work becomes extremely difficult.
The story tells the story of a sibling who heard a boy calling for help. The two ventured into a meadow in Kansas, but they found themselves in a dead end...
A similar beginning is already a bad street in horror movies: a few people strayed into a certain place, and then experienced a terrible event.
However, the crew has played new tricks in the bad stalks, making a horror movie brain-burning and suspenseful, thanks to the two master-level characters behind the scenes:
Stephen King, a master of horror novels that has taken the world by storm. Back then, "The Shining" and today's "Cry Clown" are all written by him, and this time "In the High Grass" is adapted from the novel of the same name written by Stephen King and his son Joe Hill;
Vincenzo Natali, a director known for his meticulous design and superb atmosphere shaping, his masterpiece is the "Painful Fang".
The two great gods personally managed to get the movie to attract attention before it was released, but it is an indisputable fact that the word-of-mouth pre-cooling after it went online.
Before sorting out the movie, we have to sort out the relationship between the characters:
There are not many characters in the film, and the relationship between the characters is not complicated, but what really makes people head is the disorder of the movie timeline.
1. Confusing timeline
Timeline① (A time and space)
On the way to San Diego, Bech and Carl heard a child (Tobin) calling for help when they passed a meadow. Out of kindness, they followed the child's cry for help and entered the meadow.
But they soon discovered that the problem was not that simple:
One is that the mobile phone signal is disturbed and the alarm call is interrupted. Compared with the two of them, they are already isolated from the world at this time.
The second is the constant movement of the voice, whether it is the cry of the child (Tobin) for help or the conversation between Becchi and Carl, sometimes the voice is still on the left for one second, and then ran to the right for the next.
In order to break the dilemma of the high grass and avoid running around like flies headless, the two wanted to quickly rendezvous before looking for the child (Tobin). Betsy thought of locating the two people by jumping.
The first jump found that it was very close.
And the second time...
The horrified eyes of the hostess Becky explained everything: not only the distance between the two of them was stretched far apart, even the church that was very close at first now has only a small spot left because of the distance, and there are two jumps. The interval is less than five seconds.
The panicked two were aware of the seriousness of the problem, and Karl was more certain of his thoughts after seeing the dead dog. Even so, they couldn't get back to the road no matter how they tried, like a maze, and the exit was unknown.
Until the night, Betsy met Tobin's father Rose (then walked away), Carl met Tobin who was dressed in dirty clothes (seeing the black boulder), and then Betsy was attacked by an unknown person, and screams echoed deep in the grass. The suspense of the story has risen sharply.
But when the camera turned, it was already two months later. Beck’s boyfriend Charles came to look for them. According to his later explanation, Bets and Carl had been missing for two months.
The film is indeed very accurate in terms of details: the dusty car, the bread covered with maggots, and the skinny corpse that Charles saw after entering the grass (you can judge that it is the dead Becky through his clothes and belongings. ).
These traces of the passage of time undoubtedly indicate that what happened to Betsy and Carl two months ago.
At night, Charles met Tobin, who was dressed in messy clothes. At this time, he did not know Tobin, but Tobin knew him and knew that he was here to find Becky. This kind of embarrassing plot is not only Let Charles, even the audience in front of the screen, start to think about the weirdness of the grass.
Timeline ② (B time and space)
The appearance of the Ross family once again pushed the suspense of the plot to a climax.
Charles (from A time and space, hereinafter referred to as A) in the grass called for help after hearing the voice, but when he determined that Tobin was among them, Charles (A) tried his best to prevent them from entering the grass, but it was too late.
After the Ross family entered the grass, they all dispersed. Tobin looked for the dog, Natalie looked for Tobin, and Rose encountered the black boulder at night and touched it with his hands.
The next day Tobin called for help and attracted Bech and Carl in the time and space. They had just arrived (on the way to San Diego), and then went into the grass to prepare for help. When they found that they were lost, they started to try A time and space duo. Method: Use voice positioning.
The poem that Carl recites attracts Charles (A)'s attention, and Betsy and Carl are confirmed by shouting.
When Tobin told him that he was with the dead dog, Charles suddenly remembered Tobin (A), who was dressed in dirty clothes, and was told that the deceased would not be moved, so he called everyone to gather around Tobin.
So far, the people in the grass gather for the first time: Charles (A), Bache (B), Carl (B) and Tobin (B).
But then Beck received an inexplicable call: "Don't let Karl hurt Charles, don't leave him, stay with him, otherwise we will never stop making the same mistakes."
What is certain at this time is that this movie is indeed talking about the cycle of time and space, but it is not a reincarnation, but a labyrinth, and it is not a "horror cruise ship" in the strict sense. "Cruise Ship" tells the classical tragedy of Sisyphus pushing the boulder, which is always trapped in an endless loop of contradictions, while "In the High Grass" tells about the supernatural phenomenon caused by mysterious and unknown factors, which completely disrupts time and space, and can be found in any location. May enter the cycle of time and space.
Timeline ③ (C time and space)
With the help of Charles (A), Tobin (A), dressed in messy clothes, fled the high grass from the exit of the church when a new round of time and space (C) arrived, and successfully prevented Becky (C) who was about to enter the grass. And Carl (C).
Charles (A) stopped endless reincarnation at the expense of himself and completely saved the people in C time and space.
Although many details in this film can be seen, the reincarnation of these people has existed for a long time-B time and space Karl (B) saw his own corpse all over the grass, but in the subtle plot, "in the tall grass" The design is indeed not as clever as "Cruise of Horror", but it is not inferior in terms of the concept of time and space at the beginning of the plot.
Two, fixed reference
The concept of the film is very good.
The high grass in the plot is an existence similar to the "Bermuda Delta", with magnetic interference, time and space chaos, and under the blessing of mysterious power, every grass has vitality, so trapping people is completely unnecessary.
As the male protagonist, Charles showed extraordinary wisdom when he entered the grass: using the sun to identify the direction, and marking along the road, it is convenient to find Becky and evacuate quickly.
However, the grass is also a trick: constantly changing the position of the space, the sun will soon lose its effect, and the markings along the road are automatically unraveled by the vitality of the grass.
Of course, in order to prevent the protagonists from completely losing their confidence, the screenwriters gave friendly reminders in details: in the face of such a bushy of ghosts and animals, there are no rules to follow.
Reference 1 "Grass will not move dead objects"
In other words, objects and dead bodies (animals or people) do not participate in the grass maze, they are important references for the grass to distinguish the direction.
Reference 2 "Only a few groups of people in contact will enter the same cycle"
From the many vehicles parked at the entrance of the church, it can be known that there are still many lost people in the grass, but not all of them will meet each other.
So when you enter the grass, you will definitely see people related to you.
Third, the mysterious black magic stone
The key point of the whole film is the black boulder in the middle of the grass.
The name of the church indirectly reveals the theme of the film and the value of the boulder: salvation.
In the movie, three people touched the magic stone: Rose longed to be noticed, and Blackstone awakened his inner desires, which led to blackening; Charles longed for redemption, so he ended the reincarnation and completed the redemption; and Tobin longed for help, so he He helped others as well as himself, and belonged to the object of redemption, and finally left the high grassland.
The plot surrounding the boulder in the later stage of the film is the climax: after all the mysteries are revealed, the mysterious magic of the boulder is awakened, and the grass is guided to complete the sacrifice engraved on the stone, thereby achieving an unknown goal.
But the plot starts from here, breaking the suspenseful atmosphere created before and entering a "shining" crazy chasing mode. The blackened Rose obeys his heart, kneels and licks the black stone, and regards his family and Karl and others as The prey was killed one by one, and according to his own heart, he completed the sacrifice that Black Stone needed—killing the newborn.
But what Blackstone needs is a ritual similar to a religious ritual, but Rose deliberately broke the rules and forced Becky to eat the baby he had just given birth.
Although the cult has a strong meaning, it is really difficult to convince people that the story is placed in front of a suddenly darkened person without any foreshadowing, so the audience has nothing else to say except astonishment.
4. Story vending machine
As a master of horror novels, Stephen King is very good at describing people's psychology.
"Witch Carrie" describes the cowardly and introverted Carrie's psychological changes after possessing superpowers; in "The Mist", when a person is in a crisis-ridden white fog, inner despair and various impulses; the schizophrenic writer in "The Shining" Jack.
Jin is good at showing concern and torture about the essence of human nature under the shell of horror.
However, "Shawshank's Redemption" has given up the horror coat on a certain level, reaching the depths of people's hearts, so once the film was adapted, it left a strong mark in film history.
The tall grass this time may be disappointing: the accumulation of high concepts makes the opening full of suspense, but the mystery is revealed in the middle and late stages. The inexplicable pursuit makes the story enter the inherent vicious circle of horror movies, redemption and redemption, good people and crazy bad people ( Ghost), the ending point ends, but forgot to fill in the holes. The omission of details makes the film full of regrets.
The only optimistic thing is that Stephen King's "story vending machine" is still going on. The next novel (film adaptation) can be expected and waited.
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