"Fantastic Daddy Fox" is Anderson's animated debut, and "Isle of Dogs", released on April 20, is his second stop-motion animation. As an "author-director", Anderson's film style has a certain complexity, but it is not difficult to summarize; as an "obsessive-compulsive" director with a childlike innocence and a brain hole, his stop-motion animation gives us a lot of room for imagination and Unique aesthetic experience. Lao Na will share with you Anderson's stop-motion animation world from the perspective of the film structure and the theme of the work.
Let’s look at the structure first. A common chapter-structured movie is to arrange events into chapters in chronological order, such as "Kiujiro's Summer". The big goal is to find a mother for the male, but there are many incidents along the way - the male is on the journey to find his mother. When he met a group of people to play with him, and then parted, it came to an end-the whole person felt loose, and the advantage was that it was fresh and daily life.
Anderson likes to use this structure, especially in "Isle of Dogs". Similar to "Summer of Kikujiro", it is also a combination of dramatic structure and plate-like structure. There are different small themes under the big goal, and the big and small themes have little relationship.
"Canis Island" has a main goal of "finding dogs", a shell of a political power struggle, and a vague and distorted social background, but it is interspersed with many small stories that seem to be irrelevant. If you don't believe it, please read:
Stage 1: Dogs are independent, but are domesticated by humans Stage 2: Dogs are pets, but abandoned by humans Stage 3: The little boy likes to be a "guardian" and a pet at the same time, and resolutely looks for it Stage 4: The little boy wins a few Loved by dogs, but hated by stray dogs Stage 5: Get separated from a few dogs, the stray dogs pity the little boy and become a helper for the little boy Stage 6: Ditty is found to be his own family, and the stray dog becomes the boy’s guardian instead of Diandian Stage 6 7: Boy accuses dog of hurting dog, becomes new mayor
After Lao Na roughly divided "Isle of Dogs" into these seven stages, it is not difficult to find that Anderson played cards according to common sense. If "Phase 1" is removed, the whole story will be established, and the look and feel will be more comfortable, because the contradiction in "Phase 1" is not resolved until the end of the film, the dogs have not returned to independence, they are just re-accepted by humans, that is, resolved "Phase 2" paradox.
Anderson is an "obsessive-compulsive disorder" who pays attention to perfect symmetry, but he tells a story that "has a head and no tail". Lao Na believes that this must be a conscious arrangement, and it is also a kind of "blank integrity".
In "Island of Dogs", a large number of man-made disasters wrap the fate of dogs, and it is also dogs whose status is up and down. In order to satisfy themselves, humans can domesticate, abandon, love, find, restore, and exalt any object.
Anderson’s uncompromising storytelling in a chapter-like structure is a forgiving way of telling the story, which makes it hard to detect the cruel core of it, but it also feels vaguely wrong.
The same is true of "The Great Fox Dad", Lao Na was once moved by one of the lines:
Mother Fox: You promised me that if we survived, we would never steal chickens, turkeys, geese, ducks, or squabs. I believe you. why are you lying? Dad Fox: Because I'm a wild animal. Mother Fox: You are also a husband and a father! Dad Fox: I want you to know who I really am. Mother Fox: I don't want to know who you are. The ending of this story is too predictable. Dad Fox: Good prediction, really? What is the ending? Fox Mother: The end is we're all dead, unless you change.
This line is a typical turning point that led to the change of the protagonist, but when he saw the last scene of the film, the old man was dumbfounded: the fox father led everyone to sweep all the food in the supermarket through his digging skills. After the great joy, the film came to an end... The expected change of the protagonist, is that the end?
The main contradiction in the film is that Mother Fox wants to live a stable life and hopes that Father Fox will become more mature; and the dual nature of this line is revealed: we see the initial affection of Father Fox and Mother Fox, so it is reasonable to think that Father Fox has experienced In this dialogue, Mother Fox's opinions will be seriously considered, and the conflict will be resolved in the end. But after the disaster, Father Fox said that he still liked taking risks, and Mother Fox also said that when he should not have married him in the first place, the audience was a little confused.
The fact is that the common expectation of family life is ultimately no match for the expectation of father fox's personal realization of value . Satisfy the unilateral values of Father Fox . It's like there are two themes fighting, and one of them wins in the end.
You will see how absurd logic this is, but this is the difference between the logic of reality and the logic of the film, and obviously Anderson is more focused on expressing the former. Not the only theme, the outcome that deviates from the expected, is the reality of our lives. Doubt and regret are the beauty and perhaps the essence of Anderson's film.
Starting from the personal growth in the film, you can also see clear thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. In his films, the growth of characters is not to reconcile with the outside world, but to find a balance in their own divided values and contradictory lives.
▲ "The Great Fox Dad" is like this:
Main topic: I want to be a down-to-earth working and family-friendly father, so that children can live a stable and unharmed life;
Antithesis: I want to do my old job "stealing chickens and dogs";
Combined topic: Take your family to escape after the accident (temporary security), and then continue to do your old business (intensify).
▲ The stray dogs in "Canis Island" are also like this:
Proposition: do not want to be enslaved, want equality;
Antithesis: want to give love, want to be loved;
Synthesis: Enter into a master-servant relationship with an "equal and loving mentality".
The old man was stunned to see such a "wonderful" combination of themes and antitheses. This is definitely not the way of mainstream commercial films, but isn't it Anderson's willfulness when we come to the theater?
Of course, this "Isle of Dogs" is much more "gentle" than the previous Anderson movies. If the attitude of "Fantastic Daddy Fox" is to resist to the end, "I love you but I can't compromise", "Isle of Dogs" The attitude is "Forget it if you pity me, it's okay to compromise, not to mention... In fact, I love you", and I have to admit that Anderson is arrogant and cute.
But what hasn't changed is Anderson's laissez-faire to changes in the environment and the relationship between people, and he values his own heart and choices. Whether prevailing or being passive, he values "the choice of free will."
Therefore, when I look at Anderson again, I have less over-interpretation of the ending, and more attention and attention to all the details of the process. The details of "Canis Island" are very impressive. The cherry blossoms that stay on the face for a long time give people hearts throbbing. The dog biscuits taken out from the special pocket can't help but have a good impression of the little boy. , the different shapes of each dog's tears reveal different characters...
Just like the terrier "Save the cat" is used to express a character's daily love, "Canis Island" also has many small stalks to let people know more about the characters, and uses Japanese + no subtitles to naturally bring people into the puppy. Psychological, natural estrangement and emotion are intertwined.
After watching the movie, you will forget who achieved your goal and who compromised. You will only feel that you do not regret these choices, because every moment is so beautiful. As for the ending, it is just another game. There will always be people who will break the game until some end.
Anderson has a wonderful magic to keep innocence and maturity at the same time. He uses stop-motion animation, a meticulous, complex and real form, to bring imaginary and exaggerated worlds to our eyes. He shows us that innocence and maturity are not contradictory, innocence is a vision and perspective, it can see the cuteness of all environments, even garbage dumps; maturity is the understanding of things, the understanding of winning and losing, the understanding of The understanding of dreams, it no longer judges people based on whether they succeed or not, but focuses on each choice to see if it matches their own identity. The essence of the sophisticated style in Anderson's films is here.
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