As a result, the West is desperately searching for stories and directors from the East when the use of various film and television technology has reached a state of saturation. This can be regarded as Hollywood's humility.
"The Courier" is the first film made by the Peng brothers in Hollywood, but unfortunately, the film has nothing to do with the Pang brothers. All have disappeared, and what is left are just ghosts that appear or disappear again and again. Could it be that the author's immunity is indeed strong enough to be invincible?
The answer is of course no. Looking at this film, the most impressive thing is of course the attacks of the crows. Inexplicably, there is no answer to the horror, but unfortunately, the hero of this horror is Hitchcock. Elderly, the Pang brothers only used "The Birds" for reference.
The first is the beginning of the film. In that set of wooden houses like Gothic, crows stand on the eaves in the middle of the night, and the sky is a grayish black. Although there is no thunderstorm or lightning, it is basically the same. It is the horror of the West, because the narrow and obscurity represented by the Gothic architecture, the evil represented by the crow, and the gray-black texture are all the dark feelings of the West in our impression. Of course, the most important thing is that the scene of this scene is far away from the city, in a wasteland, so a sense of loneliness is formed, and loneliness itself is always terrible. This destined terrifying environment is fundamentally different from the horror formed by the East in the crowd.
The next thing is what happened in the house. The three people were chased by the shadow. All the murders were clear to the audience. Although the shadow never appeared, this way of killing people was too dynamic, as if it were a wrestling. , Was put to death one after another, which cannot but be said to be the powerful ghosts of the West. Therefore, the spirit of the Peng brothers can not be reflected in this scene.
In many commercial films, in the first few minutes, a dramatic plot is used to cover the film’s style introduction and background settings. This is the most common practice in American feature films. Of course, this film is no exception, but the beginning of this film This kind of presentation makes it difficult for the audience to find the shadow of the Peng brothers. What is left is an ordinary American film. In other words, the Peng brothers have disappeared at the beginning of the film.
In fact, we don’t have to post the labels of the Peng brothers to prove that the United States may have a kind of self-transcendence in the film. As long as the film is good-looking, it doesn’t seem to matter what technique is used, whether it can achieve the purpose of frightening people. It is the level of horror movies. If this opening part really scares some viewers, I have nothing to say, but in fact, this kind of opening is too common and can be controlled by any director, so there is no surprise. It's impossible to scare people.
Going back to the film itself, this is a typical Meishi film, not to mention the Peng brothers' mastery of the film, only from the story, this film is very American.
The family is not harmonious, especially because Jessie has made a mistake, so there is almost nothing to say with her parents. This is a contradiction between people. In horror films, people must have their own problems. This is indeed the concept of Eastern terror, and then the occurrence of some supernatural terrorist incidents. After these events are finally overcome, people’s own problems will also be solved. A good solution. Just looking at this contradictory setting, the film does have some Eastern concepts in it, but it is a pity that Hollywood has long been familiar with the inner setting of this character, so it loses its original freshness.
Americans’ attention to family can be seen through many films, so this film uses family as the starting point. The last shot is in that patch of sunshine, where the family hugs each other, which also fully demonstrates this kind of family. The influence of ideas on the film. But it is precisely because of this kind of family problem that the film is very incapable of setting the story and the setting of those horror points, and often shows a terrifying and terrifying bad design.
First of all, Jessie and her younger brother are often haunted by ghosts. Perhaps because children are naturally sensitive to supernatural phenomena, Jessie told her parents what they saw, but they were questioned. Of course, the relationship has deteriorated further. From this perspective, family problems have indeed emerged. But it is strange that if the crow attacked Jessie’s father Solomon because the evil spirits died at the hands of the male master, then why would the ghost appear to the brothers and sisters? Is it just their sensitivity to supernatural phenomena? So, this is obviously illogical.
For ghost films, especially for ghost films that seem to be a reference for the reincarnation of the two families, the appearance of ghosts, especially the appearance of unjust ghosts, generally has two purposes. One is to ask for justice, but because the ghost does not Knowing how to express it, it often scares the protagonist first. The second type is because of the ghost’s own experience, so he mistakenly regards the protagonist as his own enemy. Because the two families have similar situations, the second type is Most likely. But unfortunately, Jessie is more like a victim than his father in the film, and the ultimate murderer who killed the family is the former male owner, so this dislocation is obviously very unconvincing.
The reason is that because the heroine of the film is a 16-year-old woman who has gathered many commercial elements, the ghost approached her. This is extremely ridiculous, as if the ghost also understands commercial factors. Therefore, the practice of being horrified for the sake of horror abandoned the Peng brothers' grasp of the characters' hearts and the humanized explanation of ghosts when they were screenwriters. In this way, the film is even more of Meishi, and the Peng brothers are just playing a ticket here.
The most ridiculous thing is the madness of the hired workers. As the real murderer, the sunflowers have grown up, but the evil spirits have not moved him until the crow is used to force him to kill the protagonist's family. This is even more unreasonable.
Therefore, this film appears to be chaotic in the layout of the drama, which also caused many horror points that are horrible and horrible. On the other hand, the handling of horror points also lost the Peng brothers. That kind of aura, which also caused the failure of this film.
Going back to the concept of horror mentioned by the Peng brothers, it is obvious that the horror of the East is not just as simple as thunder and rainy nights, but more importantly, it is a humane interpretation of ghosts. In other words, ghosts are the inner darkness. The reflection of the outside world, perhaps only in this way can the true psychological horror of the East be brought into play. Therefore, for this film, the Pang brothers were obviously a little hastily, and they couldn't succeed in any case in the face of an inappropriate script.
Let's look forward to the original works of the Peng Brothers themselves, maybe that would be better!
Han Xi
was
produced by Tongzhou Tom Film Critics Group on May 15, 2007, please do not reprint!
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