The Shadow Writer is a movie I watched many years ago, and I remembered that I fell asleep at least twice when I first watched it. It's interesting that many of the movies that I watched the first time I fell asleep will become my favorite movies later, similar to David Fincher's Zodiac. I later considered that there were various reasons for the sleepiness of such a film at the first viewing. Some were because the storyline did not have much ups and downs, some were bland or deliberately de-dramatized due to the director's aesthetics, such as the Zodiac; some were Because the film conveys the atmosphere through some means, such as the soundtrack, such as the scene, the weather, and even the demeanor of the actors.
For example, although the soundtrack in this movie has some sense of creating a tense atmosphere, it does not have that kind of majestic feeling. In addition, the tone of the movie is dark, and the weather in the story is gloomy and gloomy from beginning to end. It rained when Shadow was looking for clues on the island, and it rained even more when he was drinking in the room with the Prime Minister's wife Ruth in the evening. But this rain is also the same as the soundtrack, it is not too robbing the scene, there is no strong atmosphere of lightning, thunder and deafening, it just acts as a background. So from the point of view of the soundtrack and weather tones, Polanski's political thriller doesn't strive for eye-catching effects, but rather restrained, this restraint can sometimes make people sleepy, like life on an island Same.
Compared with the previously mentioned soundtrack and weather, Ivan's performance is more hypnotic. In the first 20 minutes of the movie, he has four sleeping scenes, rubbing his sleepy eyes many times. Of course, this is not a boring performance by the actors, but is determined by the character setting of the script or the director's on-the-spot scheduling. So for the first twenty minutes of the story, he presents me as a male lead who is not very enthusiastic about the task of biography of a political figure. Like his first line in the movie: You know I don't know anything about politics, right? His subsequent interview with Reinhardt Press further confirmed his attitude towards the political and biographical protagonist, Prime Minister Adam Lang. He told the president of the publishing house that he could not bring the effect they wanted to the book, and that he had no interest in politics. This can be said to be a very honest male protagonist, and this character was also buried in the tragedy of his ending. Foreshadowing. Of course, Ivan also mentioned later that it was his ignorance of politics that allowed him to ask questions to the Prime Minister from the perspective of an ordinary person, to show the ordinary side of the Prime Minister, and these are exactly what people want from biographies. Seeing things, that's the key to selling, like his last bestseller on the biography of the magician. So he rewrote the beginning of the prime minister's biography, going into politics out of love for a girl, not a love of a political party or an idea. Of course it turned out to be just a good story, but it wasn't the truth.
To borrow the words of the Prime Minister's wife Ruth, Shadow's persistent and serious work attitude ruins a good story. But a biography is a biography, not fiction, and truth is greater than everything else. So, the biographer or shadow writer started his research on the island. There are two clues in the follow-up story. One is the political scandal of Prime Minister Lang, who handed over the terrorist suspect to the US CIA for torture. Facing the pressure of public opinion, Lang was at a loss, and later followed the advice of his lawyer and fled to the White House to chat with the Secretary of State and Vice President on international hot topics; Another is the shadow investigation into the cause of death of former writer McCalla. The BMW driven by McCalla appears at the dock at the beginning of the movie. There was no one in the car and it was towed away. It should have escaped from university professor Emmett and drove to the dock. Then he abandoned the car and fled without being killed, and the body was left on the beach. . This is followed by the current shadow appearance. The male protagonist's investigation found that McCalla died of murder rather than stress and alcoholism. Later, I found important photo clues under the drawer of the room where McCalla lived, and with the help of the BMW car voice system, I found Emmett in the photo, and successfully escaped under the pursuit, and then found it on the Internet in the motel where I temporarily evaded. The identity of Agent Emmett Cia. At this point, the shadow basically knows most of the truth of the story, and also realizes the extremely dangerous situation he is in.
At the end of the film, there is a kind of fateful reincarnation. At the end, the manuscript papers scattered in the air are like the Chinese cleaning uncle in front of the island villa cleaning the leaves in the wind in vain. The male protagonist paid a heavy price for his honesty, and like McCalla, he was not able to get out of this political conspiracy.
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