There are two births, one from the mother and the other from the lover.
Lost from the mother's body into this world, from the personal small but full of security space to escape into an unknown and unfamiliar world. In the learning of cognition and language, all the names have historical and social conventions, and the first meaningful word uttered from the mouth enters a collective norm and communication.
From the lover's eyes, it is the discovery of individuality again. All the language systems suddenly start to get out of control, and all the words start to become inappropriate. Whether it is a description of a person or an expression of yourself, there seems to be no rules and permanence between words, and you begin to doubt whether what a word can refer to can be measured.
In addition to social, collective conventions, a complex emotion that is difficult to express in words makes personal feelings salient. “My efforts for carefully controlled language were undone by the stunned eyes and tears in my voice.” (Roland Barthes, “A Lover’s Whisper”)
The novel "Merry Christmas on the Battlefield" was originally called "The Seed and the Sower". If a seed is rooted in the heart, then the heart will feel its own existence as the seed germinates and grows. , the aroused individual emotions give those who are submerged by the collective their own "feelings", and the love for the person they love (the same is true for friendship) is the basis for empathy for others.
Director Nagisa Oshima 's "Sensual World" made the avant-garde of the Japanese film "New Wave" shock the world cinema. In the intense eroticism, looking into the hole of desire is an inexhaustible void.
But the forbidden love in this movie is in repression and restraint, like the trembling of a begonia in the wind, the emotion that has not been fully revealed is as soft as light pink petals, just pluck the heartstrings that may have been dusty in your heart, and it will lead to The uncontrollable joy and panic.
One of the leading actors, Ryuichi Sakamoto, made his film dubbing debut for the film. When "Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence" ("Forbidden Color") sounded at 1 minute and 23 seconds, at the same time British prisoner Lawrence and Japanese officer Sergeant Hara walked out of the prisoner of war shelter, a long shot followed their figures into the depths of the jungle. The music stopped abruptly when the figure was about to disappear.
This one-minute and forty-five-second soundtrack turns this small island in the South Pacific into an exotic place beyond a certain geographical sense.
As if separated from the war and detached from the problems of life and death that will be faced at all times on this island, the cyclical characteristics of Javanese gamelan music are like a sense of destiny, and the bells seem to echo Christmas, something sacred and oriental of lightness.
Ryuichi Sakamoto talked about his soundtrack in an interview, "My soundtrack is a bit detached from the movie image, in fact, the soundtrack should echo it, the movie plot changes every moment, there is a certain regular flow, you should To add color to the story, that's what I think the purpose of film music is, but what I've done really takes the soundtrack beyond the story and the image."
Indeed, listening to Ryuichi Sakamoto's music after watching the movie, the mind is not only the picture of that moment, but more of a review of inner emotions. The hidden emotions in the play flow out in the form of music in the inability of words to express. Although it is a gurgling trickle, it is no less moist than the moist rain and dew falling on the dry and cracked earth.
It is worth mentioning that his soundtrack (Rain) in "The Last Emperor" three years later, when Wenxiu filed for divorce from Puyi, she threw away the umbrella handed by her servant and said "I do not need it", in the rain. The music stirs up a freedom that he has fought for.
The other star of the film, David Bowie (David Bowie) and Ryuichi Sakamoto, seem to be twin flowers belonging to the East and the West. He ranks with the Beatles and Queen as the most important rock star of the 20th century in Britain. In the movie "Daydreamer", a song "Space Oddity" seems to be a call from space, just like the slogan in the movie: I just love by the ABCs.Adventurous,brave,creative.
Whether Army Captain Yonoi (Sakamoto Ryuichi)'s affection for Army Major Jack (David Bowie) is a sympathy between two soldiers or a secret same-sex love is not really the core of the film. What matters is the relationship that took place between people in the prison camps and the seeds that were sown, and after the war the seeds began to germinate between the East and West peoples.
"The idea of Japan's military empire transforming into an economic powerhouse, while its standard is the United States, appeals to Nagisa Oshima, who understands it as a relationship between lover and fellow criminal."
Japan is a nation that attaches equal importance to chrysanthemums and swords. On the one hand, it is the madness of collectivism and the pursuit of the correctness of Bushido. When the war broke out, for them there was only the right to obey and the shame of failure.
Shame, a word that is repeatedly discussed in the film, the chat between the former sergeant (played by Takeshi Kitano before his facial paralysis) and Lawrence is like two cultures that cannot understand each other are probing each other. Sergeant Yuan couldn't understand the surrender of the British soldiers. In his eyes, those who surrendered could not be called soldiers. The Japanese soldiers would rather choose to have their belly cut than surrender. Shame is more unacceptable than death. For Lawrence, there is no Shame, only Guilty or not guilty.
Perhaps it is the difference of beliefs. In Japan's primitive Shintoism, its worship does not distinguish between good and evil. People seek to become gods with their own flesh. In Christianity, people are born with original sin, and people are the ones to be judged. The screenwriter once said that Jack's image has a metaphor of Jesus, and his punishment is the trial of his betrayal when he was young, and the person who carries out this trial is the one he loves.
Yonoi and Lawrence said in a chat, "What a beautiful thing it would be, if we could invite all of you to enjoy the flowers and drink under the cherry blossom trees in our hometown." He was a very simple man who insisted on war In the "correct" position, but at the same time has a rich and sensitive heart, all the emotions after meeting Jack are presented in its most direct way.
For Yonoi, Jack's intrusion made him have an affair that neither Bushido nor military correctness would allow. Emotional favoritism is involuntary, and the lover is like an evil spirit, shaking the correctness that has never been suspected before.
That kiss was the most amazing. In my opinion, Jack's kiss not only transcended the individual emotions between two people, but also was a touch almost divine. It is not a provocation, but a kind of trust and understanding. It cannot be expressed simply. The word love can only be used to describe this emotion. It is beyond the definition of good and evil and is eternal. Tiger.
Yonoi, who was unable to hold himself back in the trembling and fell powerless, is a testimony to this power. In the confinement, Lawrence said of Japan "their whole nation is restless, and they never go it alone, so they go crazy collectively...I don't want to hate the Japanese as individuals." Compared to the concept of collective sociality , the individual is more intimate.
In the collective, the sense of drowning annihilates the uniqueness of the individual, like grass and dust, being carried and drifting in the wind uncontrollably. In such a group, "I don't love any people, I only love my friends."
Jack's personality makes him stand out from the group, and whether his relationship with Yonoi is friendship or love, his fate is like a moth to a flame under the hostile position of war. Near the end of the story in the movie, we suddenly find that Jack and Yonoi have disappeared from the narrative, but the past has begun to take root and grow.
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