"The Last Emperor", just as it is a foreigner's scrutiny, investigation and artistic creation of China's culture and history at a specific time, has an indescribable sense of reality and illusion. Naturally intertwined or deliberately contrasted, at certain moments, there is an almost absurd magical realism.
A lot of movies make me feel like they're a fantasy created by light. These films are like a dream, separated between reality and fantasy: they are usually real in texture, but give people a sense of illusoryness separated by a mist, a strange and distant alienation. The same is true of the movie-watching mood, from the curiosity under the fame, to the sorrow and joy that lingers in it, and then to the sigh that comes to an abrupt end - if there is anything to hold this dream out of thin air, it is there Under the image that dissipates like smoke, leave some specious words, record some moods and thoughts that can only happen at this moment. "The Last Emperor" is a biographical film about the emperor Puyi, starting from Puyi's accession to the throne when he was three years old (1909). We might as well divide the film into two parts, the first part is the growth process of Emperor Puyi - a boy in the Forbidden City who was born unique and like any boy; , took refuge in Japan, and established the puppet state of Manchuria. The two parts were completely separated from when Puyi was expelled as a "rotten Northeast rat" on the tennis court of Jianfu Palace in 1924.
"The Last Emperor" was released in 1987. It is true that it is a Chinese film. It shows a piece of history of the grass growing in the Forbidden City with a lens with real texture; at the same time, just as Wan Rong's actor Chen Hong As Puyi's actor Zun Long said at the 1988 Oscars, it belongs to the world, its production company belongs to the United States, the director is Italian (Bertolucci), and the producer is British , the soundtrack is Japanese (Sakamoto Ryuichi), it should be international. Just as it is a foreigner's examination, investigation and artistic creation of China's culture and history at a specific time, it has an indescribable sense of reality and illusion. Contrasted deliberately, at certain moments, there is an almost absurd magical realism. We might as well call those clips that give the current viewers a real feeling and experience "real" or "real", and the strange and unfamiliar clips that make the current viewers "fantasy" or "virtual" . As far as personal first-time viewing experience is concerned, this film has at least three layers of illusion and reality: first, as mentioned above, the illusion in the first part of the film and the reality in the latter part; second, there is a sense of illusion in the real scene The feudal royal life; third, the reality and illusion of the changing situation and the change of things; fourth, the flesh-and-blood film and television image and the sighing, almost illusory career. The first and second layers can be combined for discussion. Let’s take a look at this movie from these four points. First, the curious and fascinating illusory feudal life and the rough historical mirror outside the Forbidden City In the first half of the film, Emperor Puyi ascended the throne at the age of three until he was expelled from the Forbidden City by Feng Yuxiang at the age of eighteen as a clue. Using the technique of film art, the life of Puyi at the age of three (infancy), childhood, fifteen and eighteen years was detailed. As a Chinese, after visiting the Forbidden City twice, I cannot say that I am unfamiliar with the Forbidden City itself. However, at the beginning of the film, the Forbidden City is shown a scene of barren grass, showing the state of the last dynasty in which the empire was precarious, moving the audience from When viewing the Forbidden City in contemporary times, the Forbidden City is viewed from a distance through the lens of 110 years of history (a more appropriate metaphor may be the dust and fog of 110 years of history). People have a sense of the vicissitudes of history and a strong sense of unreality arising from it. This kind of unreality is even more magical and incredible in the description of the Empress Dowager Cixi. The Manchu hair accessories, the ancient dragon pillars, the turtles living in boiling water, the official costumes like a heavenly official - and Cixi's In English, people seem to be watching a person and their stories from a country similar to India or some other country. 110 years, just as some eras say, the heaven and the earth have changed and happened in any past dynasty in Chinese history, whether it is the Qing Dynasty or the Tang Dynasty, it is clearly the country where our ancestors lived, but it is not as real as it is. It is to remove any foreign country in China at this moment. This kind of illusion makes me feel in a trance that the people who have lived here for generations at different times in the same space have much less the same thing than I imagined, but the differences are much smaller. Much larger than imagined, this difference, even surpassing people from different countries of the same time, also makes people feel like a dream. (In fact, when we appreciate any movie, such as any foreign movie, we will have such feelings. For example, there is a universal emotional resonance in an exotic scene. Our feelings originate from the curiosity of the unfamiliar and end with the unfamiliarity. The resonance of common feelings. It's just that this movie has the same unreal feeling in the scenes of the Forbidden City and Beijing that we are very familiar with.)
Second, under the change of the current situation, the real and the illusory of things are different from people. If we think that the first half is illusory, the life of feudal emperors is curious, however, in the first half, the May 4th Movement outside the Forbidden City is shown in a glimmering way. These shots are so convincing because they once appeared in history textbooks scene by scene, inside and outside the Forbidden City, separated by a wall and a door, as if two worlds. The same feeling appears in the historical comparison between the first half and the second half, which we are familiar with Puyi, and also in the second half. The extremely realistic narrative is interspersed with the dance of "revolutionary innocence and rebellion" in the Cultural Revolution. Among the strangeness in the book, the strangeness of the Cultural Revolution also made me feel stupefied. That trance is not a sense of disconnection between the real and the false, familiar and unfamiliar, of history and politics, but a sense of helplessness and sadness at the cosmic level, "envying the infinity of the Yangtze River, and mourning the fleeting moment of my life."
Third, the flesh-and-blood film and television characters and the sighing, almost illusory life course "The Last Emperor" shows the life of Puyi in the story from an almost calm perspective. What kind of identity is he? A three-year-old child who found a cricket alone among the civil and military officials crawling like ants in the dynasty, a child who was warmed by the naked breast of a nurse, a boy who lost his butterfly but could not save it, a child who was angry at losing his power and humiliating the country. A young man, a student longing for a degree at Oxford University, a young man addicted to love and sex - who seems to be the same as any 3-, 10-, 15-, 18-year-old 100 years ago and 100 years from now. Children are no different from young people. The sympathy in this character crosses the screen and resonates with every viewer; however, he is also the supreme emperor, destined to be the node of history, and destiny is destined to have nothing to do with the ordinary, this ordinary, The feelings with universality in time and space and the characters and destiny destined to become the historical spotlight form a powerful contradiction and contrast that runs through the whole film. Therefore, Pu Yi's life is so sighing and sympathetic. There are three directions I want to talk about here. First, the image of the door (Sakamoto Ryuichi's "open the door”ost), in fact, the door is a kind of powerless retention, a kind of grasping out of thin air, a kind of prohibition that can’t be lost. It appeared in the departure of Puyi's nurse, the death of his mother, and the departure of Wan Rong, the butterfly flew to a world beyond his reach, his door was closed, and the world went from opening to closing. It is just a mouse in a brocade bag, and if he wants to rush out of the door that imprisoned him, he will risk his body and bones. Facing the door, he chased, shouted, and cried. After all, he was silent, stopped, let go, and returned to his cage. I thought that Pu Yi in the New China War Criminals Management Office had lost his chasing mood. , However, the door suddenly opened, he regained his freedom and became a free citizen of the new China, but unfortunately, he has already lost all his butterflies. Second, the image of the cricket, at the end of the film, Pu Yi took out the cricket jar that he had hidden when he was a child from under the dragon chair, opened the mouth of the jar, the cricket climbed out and got its freedom, but his master dreamed , Smoke generally ended his life. Imprisonment is the life of the cricket, and the cricket in the jar is the emperor Puyi himself. I think the director clearly pointed this out. At the same time, the film came to an abrupt end, leaving a sigh of disappointment. Third, the imprisoned people are destined to be lonely. This is a simple conclusion that does not need to be discussed. Puyi's actor Zunlong has an indescribable and lonely temperament in him. That kind of loneliness is not a deliberate performance. It is a smell like smoke. There is also a sad vicissitudes of life about the actor Zunlong. His noble aristocratic temperament and charming face make this sense of loneliness even more disappointing. And helpless. Loneliness is the most advanced aesthetic, that kind of beauty, which Puyi in reality may not have, and Zunlong himself may not have such persuasive power, but in the artistic image of Puyi in the movie, I feel this helpless loneliness , this intoxicating, yet daring to touch loneliness; similarly, there is a sense of disappointment in all of Sakamoto Ryuichi's soundtracks. I felt lonely, so I fell in love with this movie, Zunlong and its soundtrack; or, in my opinion, the essence of all excellent literary and artistic works is loneliness; further, the essence of life is loneliness Whether it is the emperor in the temple or the mayfly in the rivers and lakes, whether it is the emperor in the temple or the mayfly in the rivers and lakes, they have saddened, laughed, loved, kissed and lost, and finally experience the inextricable things in life fairly. Lonely, this can not but make people feel sad. This kind of beauty, Puyi in reality may not have it, and Zunlong himself may not have such persuasive power, but in the artistic image of Puyi in the movie, I feel this helpless loneliness, this intoxicating, The loneliness that I dare not touch; similarly, there is a sense of disappointment in all of Sakamoto Ryuichi's soundtracks. I felt lonely, so I fell in love with this movie, Zunlong and its soundtrack; or, in my opinion, the essence of all excellent literary and artistic works is loneliness; further, the essence of life is loneliness Whether it is the emperor in the temple or the mayfly in the rivers and lakes, whether it is the emperor in the temple or the mayfly in the rivers and lakes, they have saddened, laughed, loved, kissed and lost, and finally experience the inextricable things in life fairly. Lonely, this can not but make people feel sad. This kind of beauty, Puyi in reality may not have it, and Zunlong himself may not have such persuasive power, but in the artistic image of Puyi in the movie, I feel this helpless loneliness, this intoxicating, The loneliness that I dare not touch; similarly, there is a sense of disappointment in all of Sakamoto Ryuichi's soundtracks. I felt lonely, so I fell in love with this movie, Zunlong and its soundtrack; or, in my opinion, the essence of all excellent literary and artistic works is loneliness; further, the essence of life is loneliness Whether it is the emperor in the temple or the mayfly in the rivers and lakes, whether it is the emperor in the temple or the mayfly in the rivers and lakes, they have saddened, laughed, loved, kissed and lost, and finally experience the inextricable things in life fairly. Lonely, this can not but make people feel sad.
Thank you for reading, the pictures are from the Internet.
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