1. This is a film that is even more avant-garde than the New Wave, and at the same time it shows the possibility of a new avant-garde film with its brazenness and the different attitudes of New Wave film directors - through the long-shot Continuous recording, the splicing of film sequences, has successfully created the space-time continuum of film art.
2. The most splendid thing about this movie is that when we think of it as nothing more than a documentary aesthetic dazzle, but a real visual spectacle of witnessing an impossible escape, the movie begins to transform into a more Deep, subtler, interpersonal, human psyche and psychological drama.
The Hole is a moment in film history that constitutes the juncture of two cinematic eras, French poetic realism and the New Wave. At the intersection of such a historical collision, an old French director made an extremely excellent film. In this film, he really tried the artistic achievements that film as a recording tool and an artistic means can bring about.
The film begins with a moment in cinematic history: a regular shot of a man burying his head in repairing a car, suddenly, the man looks back at the camera, and then he goes to the camera to face the camera, telling the audience that he will tell his own story. Story - A prison story set in the 1940s.
One of the most basic taboos in film performance is called: "If you don't see it, you should look at the camera." Looking at the camera is absolutely not allowed. Actors must not look directly at the camera. As a tacit understanding, it is the basic premise of closing the film world and making the film world an imaginary space. It must not cause any visual difference between the play and the audience. "Communication" on . But the film broke that taboo at the first moment, and for an old director like Jacques Baker, it marked the beginning of a whole new era of cinema (New Wave). But then, the film seems to have entered the expression form of the French high-quality film tradition, which seems to be quite satisfactory.
But when you watch the whole movie, you will find that this is a movie that is as avant-garde as the New Wave, or even more avant-garde, and at the same time, it also has the unscrupulousness of the New Wave and the directors of the New Wave movies—— Such as Godard, Truffaut - different gestures, indicating the possibility of a new avant-garde film - through the continuous recording of long shots, through the film's sequence-style assembly, successfully created the time and space of film art continuum. And when this time-space continuum is tied to such a highly cinematic subject matter as the escape story, it becomes a peculiar virtuosity. And this kind of peculiar dazzle makes a prison break such an extreme resistance in the sense of society, but in the sense of the film, it is a process of turning a spectacle-like story into a "real". It allows us to actually witness how a group of people escape in a space completely deprived of their liberty. The movie shows us this process.
In this film, the highly documented means, long shots, and time-space continuum form a peculiar connection with the spectacle, the drama and the legend of the film's story, which are usually considered to be unique to commercial films.
This film was a shortlisted film at the Cannes Film Festival that year. It became a film that was watched and valued by the highest art film award, and the director passed away two weeks after the filming was completed. The film became a smash hit, a cinematic testament of Jacques Baker, and in the sense of film history it deserved to be a cinematic testament. From this film, we can learn what film is, how to use film, and how the record of film and the spectacle of film, the artistry of film and the commerciality of film are integrated.
Just a quirky, fantastic escape story done by recorded means isn't enough to explain what this movie means in cinematic history. A complete recording process, the collaboration and friendship among five men in a peculiarly small prison cell that unfolds in front of the audience, finally becomes a testing ground for humanity. The film ends by showing the audience the frailty of human nature and the meaning of betrayal in a fraternal, shared destiny scene.
This film pushes the documentary aesthetics of the film to a certain extreme. It is not only an iconic work where French high-quality cinema collided with the French New Wave, but also an iconic work where Italian Neorealism collided and converged with the French New Wave.
In this film, all the principles of documentary aesthetics are implemented in the strictest sense, and the director strives to use natural lighting effects consistently and without exception-all lighting effects in the movie scene have the effect of natural light sources. in accordance with. For example, the light in a prison cell enters through doors, windows, and through lighting. The most exciting thing is that in the scene of escape and digging, all the light sources come from a self-made oil lamp, and the light effect of the whole movie scene is completely obtained from this single light source, and the natural light effect of this single light source is not only necessary. Satisfy the illumination of the scene, and at the same time complete the real reproduction and real distribution of light and shadow in the entire scene.
In 1960, under the technical conditions of using film, it was impossible for an oil lamp as a single light source to achieve the light effect that meets the technical standards. However, the director successfully used subtle technical means to make this natural light effect almost perfect.
In the film, all the sound is sound source sound, all the sound in the film has a scene basis, there is a sound source on the scene, there is a sound source, there is a sound, there is no sound and music without any sound source, the whole environment is controlled by real sound. The composition does not in any way resort to the means of music that is necessary, directly appealing to emotion, and even to a certain extent manipulates the emotion of the audience. The most important role of sound in movies is to break the thinking of the picture frame. The voice-over can expand the picture space almost infinitely, and the visual space enclosed by the picture frame can be infinitely extended by the sound.
In this film, sound constitutes the most basic and important element of documentary aesthetics. In the almost impossible passage of prison escape and burrowing, the sound of the simultaneous works in the environment serves as a cover and support for the escapers.
The film uses a lot of sequence shots. The protagonist digs the floor of the cell and enters the underground passage that runs through the entire prison. They saw off the steel bars. Frankly speaking, I have some reservations about the scene of sawing off the steel bar, because the steel bar seems to be easier to saw than wood. Let's just trust the hidden hacksaw provided by the movie director and the protagonist who has three successful prison escapes. Sophisticated skills.
We see the entire visually complete tracing process, the thick steel bars are sawed off, they pass through the railings into the through underground passages, each door is opened one by one, a master key is made, all of this. They are all in continuous shots, under the direct witness of the audience. Therefore, it is not only a spectacle and dazzling skills in the sense of drama, but also a real process of visual performance by all the actors' movements, bodies, and the craftsmanship shown by the bodies and movements. Stunning scene.
A very striking scene in this passage is that under the illumination of a faint oil lamp, the moving camera falls, and the two protagonists are walking in depth under the illumination of the faint light source, and they are getting further and further. Far away, only a weak light source illuminates the long corridor in the entire picture, becoming the only box illuminated by light in a completely black picture.
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This scene and the temporal continuity caused by the scene have aroused endless associations - about captivity, about freedom, about escape from prison, which the audience can express in their own minds with the help of imagination. In the whole scene, light and shadow, sound and painting, long shots and mise-en-scene are not unfolded under a highly technical dazzling appearance. It uses seemingly simple and clumsy paragraphs to complete a dazzling scene. The performance of the technique is a higher dazzle.
After watching the film, we can almost believe that we have witnessed an escape from a prison, the achievement of an impossible task in a reinforced concrete prison. But of course it is impossible for us to witness the whole time in the limited film time. What we see is still a filmed and processed time and space, still a life minus the trivial fragments, and still a highly condensed dramatic story.
The highly cinematic element of editing is prominent in this film. This is a very good teaching material for learning film editing. The director chose the editing points accurately, so that we are completely unaware of how a continuous process is cut, assembled, and compressed. In our sense, only A continuous process of escape, as well as in the process of continuous escape, is extremely subtle and profound, showing the abyss and warmth of humanity with a high degree of indifference.
This representative and iconic work at the juncture of two important periods in film history serves as the perfect textbook showing how the aesthetics of documentary and an era of avant-garde cinema have collided to produce masterpieces.
This film uses sound source sound and natural light effect with light source to achieve a natural sense of realism throughout the film. And the "real" long-shot sequence shots show a spectacle-style, miraculous-style complete escape. In the documentary aesthetics or virtuoso, "technical flow" films, the most important thing is the authenticity of the details. In this movie, we see exactly how to create a spectacle of escape under the living conditions of the prison.
In the film, we see the specific, harsh and brutal process of the prison guards' inspection of the parcels sent. Every loaf of bread is cut, every sausage is cut open, every piece of butter and cheese is cut into pieces, and every bucket is cut into pieces. The sauce is stirred and each sugar cube is poured roughly, which tells us that there is almost no possibility of transmission from the outside world.
Then we see how prisoners hide things that are forbidden and dangerous, how small mirrors and saw blades are securely hidden above skirting boards or table trim; how they use one of the prison hammocks as a convenient and Effective tool; how people pass things from cell to cell in a completely closed cell - we see very effective packet transfers from prison windows.
The most amazing thing is that the film allows us to see how a mirror to monitor the corridors of the prison is made in one complete shot. We'll experience some of the film's most terrifyingly dramatic moments in this mirror, which completely succeeds in recreating the dramatic and shocking "flashback" of the film's cut shots. In the prison, the camera is not allowed to obtain a reverse shot. It is just a peep on a small mirror, but it achieves a spiritual and spiritual shock that cannot be achieved by the deliberately created reverse shot in most movies. And successfully created the drama of the movie.
Too many details - like the hourglass, how the prisoners won a timer, how to steal the small glass bottle from the prison infirmary, how to carry the glass bottle through the guard's inspection, and how to make the hourglass out of the glass bottle , including the acquisition of sand, including how to interpret the delivery and carrying of these sands, is seamless.
The material I read said that one of the five main characters actually experienced life in prison, he was a prisoner, and he also participated in a real escape, but the material did not tell me which one , but he must not be the hero Gaspard.
The film uses a large number of vivid, extremely real and accurate long shots to show the details, which completely and accurately substitute us into the prisoners' psychological, social, spatial and temporal positions.
The prison in the story is not a formal prison, but a prison for prisoners awaiting sentence. Except for Roland, the protagonist who has magical skills and has successfully escaped from prison three times, the other three are felons. But the director consciously did not mention what crime they committed. The director did not intend to bring some kind of moral judgment into the story situation. The old director also shared the moral stance of the artists of that era. , they are not prepared to make their own judgments on social crimes and social crimes from the perspective of society. On the contrary, the film is to make the audience identify with these people who lost their freedom and fought to win it back.
From this standpoint, and under the choice of a series of accurate and complete cinematic means, the film begins to unfold.
The prison escape operation began. The five prisoners took turns to enter the tunnel they dug, enter the underground corridor, and cut open the sewer vent. They needed some kind of camouflage so that the five prisoners were all safe in the eyes of the prison guards. The illusion of falling asleep. They even used processed cardboard boxes to make human figures that could be moved by machines to fool the prison guards.
If it's just to achieve a movie effect, it's not difficult for a film artist to make such an effect, but the movie wants us to witness that this is made by prisoners with limited data, so it lifts the blanket to let us We went to see how the cartons were connected, how they were pulled, how the prisoners put another towel over the cartons to give it a more human-legged feel.
We not only saw the spectacle of the movie, but also how the spectacle of the movie was made. This spectacle is precisely limited to the context, within a cell, where everything is monitored, everything is limited, and materials are extreme Under limited circumstances, how can prisoners create this miracle of escape.
In the movie, the prisoners sawed off the iron door leading to the basement and put it back in place. In the movie, the actors' performances are as smooth as flowing water. This is not a literary shaping of the characters, but what Roland said: he is a skilled craftsman, he is a prison escape expert, he is a constantly imprisoned, but constantly The escape master who stubbornly escapes, all of which is not described in literary terms, but through visual, performative bodies and movements.
The most brilliant thing about this movie is that when we think of it as nothing more than a documentary aesthetic dazzle, but a real visual spectacle of witnessing an impossible escape, the movie begins to transform into a more profound, More subtle, interpersonal, human psyche and psychological screenplay.
The film shows a process of psychological qualitative change in a documentary aesthetics-style accumulation of time. Several characters have changed in the process. The two characters that remain unchanged in the film are Roland, the escape master, and the seasoned and composed prisoner called "Your Excellency" in the play. One of the characters in the process of change is Manu, the backbone of the prison escape. His change is manifested in his extreme suspicion of the newcomer Gaspard from the very beginning. It can be said that this is some kind of social experience, this is some kind of social experience. Intuition, and the whole process made him believe gradually, in the tacit understanding between the two when they went to dig the passage in pairs, and in Gaspard's confession, he said that only this time I fully believe me Made the right choice.
Another very interesting character is Gio, who from the beginning is a character who always sleeps in his own bed, inattentive, rough, refuses to cooperate, refuses to join the tight connection of the cell. He refuses to do work, refuses to have any communication with everyone, and constantly asks erotic and embarrassing questions inappropriately. The gradual evolution of the character begins when he confesses "I'm not going" to "Your Excellency". He didn't leave when the jailbreak was actually carried out. He said that my mother cried so sadly when I was arrested. If I escaped, they would go to her again, so I didn't leave. It's not just a choice, it means that as the insider he will bear the full punishment, he will have a longer prison sentence, he will be in a darker and more hopeless situation.
Then he joined the jailbreak and worked as hard as everyone else. It was also with him that the director designed the rare dramatic landslide in the film. They dug him out. When the dirt and stones were finally peeled away, the film gave one of the rare close-ups: the four hands were tight. Hold tightly together. Then, on the eve of the action, he said I would not go.
Throughout the story, we keep hearing about the crime of the protagonist Gaspard, about his indictment, about his innocence. All statements about his crimes are "truths", but all "truths" are only part of the truth and not complete. The lie that the "truth" succeeds in masking the story behind it that we will eventually recognize. A dude who has lost all his inheritance, a car dealer who sells cars -- a dealer, especially a car dealer and a real estate dealer, is the most despised role. He apparently married a wealthy daughter and then committed adultery with his wife's sister, the story he told. The story he didn't tell was that his wife had already come out and she was ready to betray. For Gaspard, it wasn't an emotional loss, it was a property loss, so that quarrel, that fight , What was the accidental injury like? The audience can continue to stretch in the mind.
Under the premise of such a story, he participated in the escape operation, and he became more and more involved, more and more integrated into the group, until the dramatic moment appeared. On the eve of the escape, the warden called him to say that your wife dropped the case. Then in this scene there is a cut shot. In the close-up shot, the warden asks: Is there anything you want to tell me? Then there is a long fade, and the picture sinks into darkness.
The audience presumably already knew what was going to happen, and the audience still held out their anticipation, until in the mirror we saw the assembled prison guards and saw that the raid was about to break out. And this is when prisoners are ready to be free.
Before that, a shot from the street to the prison in Gaspard and Manu's point of view suggests that there is real freedom already in sight.
Raid inspections take place. The prisoner was brutally stripped of his clothes and held in the corridor by the prison guards, and the entire prison was in turmoil. Gio, who was innocent and decided not to go, would share the fate, but the police just walked up to him and told him, "Number six, another cell." Roland's meaningful dialogue became a lingering voice in the film. He said: Poor Gaspard. Maybe the warden's dialogue is a trap at all. The news that the warden told his wife to withdraw the lawsuit does not exist, or even if the wife withdraws the complaint, he will inevitably be imprisoned, and the warden does not want to help him at all, he just uses this kind of villain, Just use this despicableness, just use the darkness of human nature.
Here, this film has shifted from a peculiar prison escape spectacle, a wonderful dazzling technique streaming to the stage of human nature, the testing ground of human nature. There can be warmth in tough times.
dictionary:
1. Documentary Aesthetics
The documentary style originated from Lumière, the founder of the film. French film theorist André Bazin summed up the creative experience of neo-realist films and put forward a whole set of aesthetic ideas of the French documentary school. Documentary aesthetics emphasizes the photographic nature and recording function of film, characterized by recording life in a faithful and objective manner, maintaining the integrity of the object of life, striving to reproduce the original appearance of life realistically, and revealing the "polysemy" of life itself. , to discover the poetry and philosophy contained in life itself.
2. Paragraph shot
French film theorist Andre Bazin's "paragraph shot" theory is the technique and aesthetic proposition of neorealist films, which opposes single-shot editing, and advocates that, like some neorealist films, more "paragraphs" or one shot are used. The scene acts as an editing unit. In Andre Bazin's view, only this editing method is more in line with life. The theory of "paragraph shot" prompted the later film theorists to have new arguments and viewpoints in terms of film narrative techniques, montage editing, photography, performance, and the structure of drama scenes.
3. French Poetic Realism
Poetic realism is a trend of film creation that appeared in France after the 1930s. A group of films in this period inherited the innovative spirit of the Impressionist and avant-garde films of the 1920s, but maintained a close connection with social reality. Representative figures include Rene Creel, Jean Viggo, Jean Renoir, etc., and representative works include "Zero Points for Conduct", "Freedom Belongs to Us", and "The Rules of the Game".
4. The space-time continuum
(space-time continuum), a four-dimensional space-time structure composed of time and space.
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