I watched this movie without knowing the plot and without any presuppositions.
I started this movie because of Frank's big head on the poster. I thought it was a cartoon, but I didn't expect the rhythm at the beginning to be very appealing to me.
At the beginning of the film, Jon, the male protagonist, hummed a few words when he was inspired by the music, but he couldn't make it up later, so he gave up irritably, and then wrote on Twitter:
Working hard for songs all day. Now for dinner.
Hahahahaha.
Isn't this me who loves art and thinks it's too troublesome to create, but uses art to advertise myself.
This light-hearted, sarcastic humor runs through most of the film, and the scale is just right to stop. The first half was really enjoyable. In addition, the jungle creation life of this group of musicians is so beautiful and presumptuous, and their brains are wide-open. Even Jon's annoyances are manageable, but under British humour, they become funny jokes.
Then the plot takes a nosedive when they head to the music festival.
The contradiction between Jon's "pseudo-wenqing" and the "real-wenqing" represented by Frank began to manifest through the music festival. As a result, the band broke up and Frank fled back to his hometown.
In the end, Jon finds Frank and reunites the band; then leaves quietly, knowing that he has no place in the group.
As a "pseudo-literate youth", I saw this movie more from Jon's perspective.
I've had so many experiences similar to Jon's.
I like art, like fine art, I like to watch and occasionally draw. But sometimes people ask me, why don't I paint full-time?
It's not that I don't want to, but I know that my qualifications are mediocre. The so-called mediocre aptitude is not only the difference in painting skills, sensitivity or aesthetic level, but more importantly, I have too many worldly thoughts.
In my opinion, the difference between genuine literary youth and pseudo-literary youth is whether you can completely surrender yourself to art. Is it to let go of yourself and let art lead you, or do you control art with your subjective consciousness.
A man who gives himself to art, his life is driven by the desire to create, which he has no control over himself.
Frank is such a person who can only live in art. Just like Gauguin in "The Moon and Sixpence", "I have no choice but to paint", thus abandoning his wife and children and embarking on the road of artistic wandering.
But more art creators are using art, manipulating art, catering to the tastes of the world, in order to seek fame and wealth in this world.
There is no such thing as good or bad, high or low, just different artistic creations and lifestyles.
I'm more like the latter. Like Jon, I post my recent paintings on the Moments, sell them for a few bucks, and get a few likes.
But in my heart, I wish I could be like Frank.
But this creative impulse, it is a talent, innate and unwilling.
Besides, being Frank comes at a price.
The price is that you can only be withdrawn from the masses and become a lonely minority.
The public is something you will never understand.
They are dark, they are unpredictable, their faces are blurred.
Before going on stage at the music festival, in order to please the audience, Frank specially changed into a white gauze skirt and painted exaggerated makeup on his big head.
This detail shows his panic - he doesn't know what the public likes, he can only guess based on his experience. It's a pity that he is not a public person, and guessing is too bad.
You don't really need to be a musical geek to understand how he feels about this.
I believe that many people who are engaged in creation and media have a similar experience - what do the public like? Why are their tastes different from mine? Why some people's things are liked by everyone, but mine are not recognized?
Some time ago, my friend and I made a public account. This is also our trouble: what do you want to see? What do we want to express? Is what people want to see important, or what we want to express?
There is no answer. The result is that the official account has been abandoned for a long time now.
I have a theory about aesthetics. From vulgar flattery to white snow, public tastes are normally distributed. If your taste is right in the middle, then you can get a larger audience; if you are high and low, the people who understand you are destined to be pitiful.
Therefore, some people can get a lot of praise when they are themselves; some people can only be outside the public when they are themselves. It's not anyone's fault. It's just that some people are more fortunate.
As for where am I? I think I'm in the front of the middle, and I think it's also Jon's position - I have the ability to appreciate the minorities like Frank, but I am attracted by the world and can never be one of them; at the same time I am unwilling to become a mediocre public, Not sure about the public's taste.
The embarrassment of being inferior to others makes me sometimes afraid to talk aloud about what I like, and I don’t know who to share with me how touched my art has been.
It's not because you're arrogant, or because you think you're awesome, but when you say it and it doesn't resonate, you feel lonely.
That being said, whether it's Jon or Frank, there's a bit of tragic overtones.
What's more tragic is that Jon wants to integrate into Frank's group, and Frank wants to be liked by the outside world through Jon.
The result was futile: Frank lost the helmet protecting him, and Jon walked away sadly.
I can't put in Frank's feelings. But Jon's feeling of wanting to fit in but not being able to fit in is all too familiar to me.
It reminds me of the business club in college, the Christian Fellowship in graduate school, and the improv troupe I've been in recently. I love admiring everyone on the team, but I just can't seem to fit in.
For example, an improv troupe is fine. Because of the average performance, I am not the lead actor and can participate in the rehearsal, but not in the performance. To get more involved, I'll help with some logistics. But no matter what I do, I always feel like an outsider.
Once chatting with an improv actor, he asked me, not an actor, why I am so keen to help in the group.
He got the point.
"You guys are cool, I want to play with you." After a pause, I said, "But I'm not playing well."
Yeah, I can't play well. Acting has never been my strength, rather, it has been my weakness. It is precisely because it is weak, so I want to make up for it; it is also because it is weak, so I have no ability to become one of them.
How contradictory, how unwilling.
Finally, I want to talk about mental illness.
The public likes to associate artistic talent with mental illness. This will help them understand the heterogeneity of genius.
Just like Jon thought: He must have been through something to get mentally ill. He must have gone through some pain in order to create a good work.
In this regard, Frank's mother gave me a very moving statement
Nothing happened. His family is very happy. He just had a mental illness. Pain does not create art, art is everywhere, and mental illness is just holding him back.
He just got sick. Just like someone has a cold, someone has diabetes, someone has cancer.
The illness is not himself, nor is it the whole explanation of his way of life and creative talent. Sickness is just one of his thousands of attributes.
Jon didn't understand this. He thought it was cool to be mentally ill when the band was doing art, but Jon wanted to take off Frank's headgear and help Frank get rid of his mental illness when Frank's mental problems prevented the performance.
In Jon's eyes, mental illness is just a tool.
But for Frank, it's a real fact that he can't go without a hood.
At the end of the movie, Frank finds the band back. Instead of giving him a big hug or surprise that he took off his hood, the band followed his song and played with him, just like in the past.
To their drums and bass, Frank sings over and over, restrained and emotional, "I love you all. I love you all."
What a blessing it is to find someone who understands and resonates with you.
As for Jon, who does not belong to their world, it is lonely to leave, but only by staying away from Frank's light and abandoning unrealistic delusions can he live his own wonderful life.
Come on Jon.
I want to cheer up too.
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