When we watch a movie, there is always a stereotype, who is the protagonist, who is talking, is it the present or the past, whether it is a memory and how to recall it, when to start dreaming and how to wake up, everything is too clear. However, when there is a movie Confusion and confusion always confuse us. The two male protagonists seem to be the same person, and the two female protagonists also seem to be the same person, and the mother and the mother are not separated from each other. The first-person recollection and the ongoing present are also indistinguishable from each other. The confusion in the first half of the film is in contrast to the continuity of the long shots in the second half.
We always say that movies are dreams, but for ordinary movies, the purpose and intent of ordinary movies are unreal. This time, this film is unabashedly created a dream for us, but it makes us cramped. Speaking of studying Wong Kar Wai, I don't think so, it barely reminds me of "Last Year at Marienbad". Movies these days are so lacking in uniqueness that when a film that is disturbingly unique comes along and is absurd to our viewing experience, there is no way to deal with it.
The film is anti-movie within the film, establishing a real dream that is real and confounds you, trying to pull the audience into it. In the first half, it builds up symbols and then dismantles them. So keep creating confusion, such as watches and clocks, linking Wan Qiwen, Kaizhen and mother. For example, Luo Hongwu's past and present wait for several tenses, and sometimes he shares an identity with Bai Mao and even his father.
It is Luo Hongwu, the white cat, and the father. All the women are one woman, and Kaizhen is also Wan Qiwen and the mother. Three people share a green book, a green password, and a revolving room. Male and female, it is the same Oedipus desire.
So, sometimes it is mother and child, sometimes it is lover. There is no fixed identity. When I start watching a movie, it is like waking up after watching the movie. Made an open text. Whenever there is a point to think about, the character's identity disappears immediately, which is where the ambiguity of the first half lies.
The first half is broken pieces that don't build up, but the second half is that full long shot. With a completely real time and space. A long and complete period of time that cannot be changed, and a complete space of time, to respond to this pile of debris. Because, a complete long shot means an irreplaceable time and space, but the movie still makes some anti-"real" transformations in this time and space.
Even, at the beginning, let "you" in the movie theater wear glasses with the protagonist. It's rude, doesn't let the "fictionality of the movie" kidnap you, but directly reminds you that you're going to dream. This is a dream. You do it. This is a movie, the protagonist sees it, and you see it too. Let Luo Hongwu's past or present or future identity be directly equal to you. It's you! Go into the cave from now on, face the dead you, this is you, this is the future you and the present you.
(Why do you have to make such a complete long shot continuously in one go for an hour, it is technically possible to break in the middle, and design some small intervals so that the shot is completed in several parts. The current technology is also so simple and achievable. But Director Bi Gan didn't do that. He understood the meaning of time and space going down completely. This "handmade feeling" will condense in the air. It can make us feel all the truth and tension.
Every minute, I was sweating for this long shot. For example, the horse would run around, the billiards would not enter the hole, the fireworks would burn out, and the aerial camera would fall to the ground, but everything was arranged in an orderly manner, that kind of weird blur. It's amazing how good the atmosphere is. )
In this hour, we saw the compressed time like burning fireworks, all the people of the past and the future, all kinds of symbols, all kinds of flying magic, and turning houses. Misidentification and hesitation. When the protagonist sees his mother, his feelings confuse us, he is both a son and a father. When the male protagonist meets the female protagonist, we don't know whether this woman is Wan Qiwen's past or a copy of her mother. (I only noticed in other people's comments: Xiaofeng left the watch to Luo Hongwu before leaving, and he gave it to Kaizhen at the end of the film, but when Luo and Wan Qiwen met twelve years ago, It was again worn on the wrist of the latter. Many of these "puzzles" were made in the movie.). All the characters are insane, only the kiss, that emotion is real, bypassing all kinds of "logic" and conveying it to us truly.
In the long shot of "consistent time and space", there is even 3D technology. In this incomparably realistic technical aesthetics ontology, the film challenges it, conquers the real aesthetics of this long shot, and creates a strange illusion , told one charming lie after another - as said in the movie, Bai Mao or Wan Qiwen also kept lying. And this kind of dreams and lies, the confusion of the characters, is actually built in this real and real 3D long shot.
At a time when all Chinese literary films are still thinking about realism, this film bypasses the chattering and arguing realism, and presents a surrealist thing outside our field of vision, which is a miraculous contribution.
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