Author: Chuanjiang Rat
Author's Blog: http://chuanjiangrat.tianya.cn
Title: Tsotsi
Translation: Gangster Thug/Redemption
Director: Gavin Hood
Original Work: Ah Athol Fugard
Screenplay: Athol Fugard/Gavin Hood
Starring: Presley Chweneyagae as Tsotsi
Terry Pheto as Miriam
Kenneth Nkosi as Aap
Mothusi Magano as Boston
Zenzo Ngqobe as Butcher
Genre: plot/crime
Country/region: UK/South Africa Year
: 2005
Length: 94 minutes
Level: R-level
Award: 78th Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, 63rd Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film Nomination , Toronto Film Festival "People's Choice Award", Los Angeles Film Festival, Edinburgh Film Festival award-winning films.
Synopsis:
The film is set in a town near the South African capital of Johannesburg, and tells the transformation of a local gang leader Tsotsi in 6 days. One stormy night, a group of thugs clashed in a dispute due to robbery and murder, and Tsotsi lost his mind and beat his colleague Boston to injuries. Then he shot and wounded the female car owner Pumla and seized the car and fled. While driving fast, he heard the cry of the baby. He drove the car to a sparsely populated place and found the baby girl left in the car by the owner. He couldn't bear to throw the baby in a deserted place. So he took the baby home, learned to take care of her by himself, and threatened the young mother Miriam with a gun to feed the baby. In order to solve the problem of raising, he led his accomplices to rob the baby's father Jhon's house. Tsotsi killed his comrade before his companion Butcher shot Jhon to death. After that, he took only the baby supplies from the owner's house. Under Miriam's maternal sex, Tsotsi's kindness revived and returned the baby to the child's parents.
1. Yu Yu
on the issue of name translation. Chinese translation of foreign films has always been very low, Hong Kong people like to join the market to increase their selling points, and mainland people like to be smart and put the "central idea" of the film to you. For example, when Antonioni’s "Blow-up" was translated as "Happy Together" in Hong Kong, and the mainland named "Zoom"; last year's "Eight Below" was translated by Hong Kong people as "Antarctic Adventure", and mainlanders will bring it to you. "Eight Sled Dogs"; this time, "Tsotsi" was translated into "gang thugs" by Hong Kong people, and mainlanders simply shook out a "salvation".
The director’s peculiar experience. According to a report by South Africa’s "Sunday Independent" on February 26, 2006, before the announcement of the 78th Academy Awards, the director of photography of "Tsotsi", who was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film, and his friends on the 25th There was a robbery in Johannesburg in the early morning. What is even more bizarre is that the robbery was surprisingly similar to the plot of the movie: the incidents all happened on rainy nights, the robbers were novices, and the vehicles robbed were silver-gray German luxury cars (the robbed car in the movie was a Mercedes-Benz). ——Mouse Note), when they were found, the doors were wide open, and the tires were nowhere to be seen. Afterwards, an interesting plot happened: Prince, who was in the same car with Gowell, saw that one of the gangsters was still friendly, so he boldly asked him if he had seen the movie "Tsotsi". Unexpectedly, the gangster not only watched the film, but also said to Prince: "This is a good movie, so please forgive me for treating you like this. Rest assured, I will not kill you." The gangster finally drove Prince. The car fled the scene. The police found the stolen car in Alexandria, a black district of Johannesburg, on the same day.
We often say that no coincidence cannot make a book, and the film’s director of photography proved Yu Hua’s words with a peculiar experience: The writer can never write about reality.
2. My childhood dream when I grew up.
Someone once said this sentence: If you don't have a good family background, you must have a good school; if you don't have a good school, you must have a good teacher; If you don't have a good teacher, you must have a kind of survival wisdom. After graduating from university, I regretted that I had not gone to a good school and met a few good teachers; and for many years after I remembered it, I kept complaining that I did not have a good family background.
I was born in a poor peasant family in a remote mountainous area. When I was a child, I did not play with any electric toys or dolls. I did not go to kindergarten or preschool. The primary school stayed in the predecessor of Hope Primary School for five years. Ordinary and ordinary schools waste their youth. Before going to university, I didn't read two extracurricular books, I never wrote a decent article, and I never even boldly said a sentence of more than 5 words in English. Therefore, I often attribute my poor level of ability to my own congenital deficiencies and acquired disorders. I also often think of when I was young, my sister and I asked each other: Why are our parents not workers, teachers, or state officials? For many years, I have been thinking: What kind of talent would I be if I had a good family background? I really want to choose to reincarnate and reincarnate.
Later, I gradually realized that I had no choice in my birth. What made me calmer was that although my parents did not give me a good material living environment, the good family education of my parents made me a good person. They The simple teaching to me will benefit me throughout my life. I am lucky.
If Tsotsi knew me, he would not envy the family of the baby picked up from the car, he would envy me. Because achieving my goal is much less difficult.
3. Tsotsi's lonely running and searching.
When Tsotsi ran alone in the wilderness after beating his companion Boston, the sky flashed with thunder and lightning, and the film switched to childhood Tsotsi from time to time, and also ran alone in the wilderness.
Running alone like this, Tsotsi was already familiar with it, and it was so familiar that it suffocated him. The rainstorm is approaching, and he can only vent his loneliness and fear by running.
Tsotsi’s childhood lacked the warmth of his parents. His mother was ill with AIDS, and his alcoholic and ruthless father did not allow his mother to touch his children. Tsotsi’s nostalgia for his mother became close at hand. The father brutally kicked the barking dog into a crippled man, and the poor little Tsotsi could only hide behind the chicken coop and cry silently. He could not feel the warmth of his mother, petting the dog became a luxury, and he might even be beaten like a dog. Can, so he chose to escape. He ran across the vast wilderness, and his father's cries had long been drowned in the sound of his heavy footsteps.
He lives in a concrete pipe with other street children. In the round concrete tube, the children are curled up like babies in the mother's womb. All the children who run away have a deep attachment to their mothers. The children run lonely to find shelter like their parents embrace. In the process of running alone, they have been looking for their spiritual father and mother.
Real parents cannot give Tsotsi protection. Therefore, when Boston asked him "Where is your father?" "Where is your father and mother?", Tsotsi was so embarrassed that he beat him up, because Boston hurt his fragile nerves and self-esteem, and no one wanted anyone to reveal it. Own scars.
Tsotsi often remembers his mother. The mothers of the two babies in the film are both very majestic in front of Tsotsi. When he threatened Miriam with a gun to breastfeed the baby, Miriam opened his plump breasts, and Tsotsi's face suddenly showed a child-like shyness; when Miriam bathed the baby, he felt the warm caress passed by the mother to the child; every time Miriam used it Staring at him, he would feel the majesty from his mother, and he would think of his mother's call to him. At the end of the film, the baby’s parents, Jhon and Pumla, completely resolved the confrontation between the police and Tsotsi, facing Pumla ordering him to "give me my child!", facing Jhon’s sincere advice and comfort to him, he was completely obedient. Like his children, there is no resistance. How he hopes his parents can protect him like this! In a sense, Miriam and Pumla are the spiritual mother he is looking for, and Jhon is the spiritual father he is looking for. When his companion Butcher aimed his gun at Jhon, he resolutely shot Butcher-it was his duty to protect his father.
4. If I can raise myself and grow up,
we always imagine that we will grow up in a good family environment. This complex will accompany us throughout our lives.
After Tsotsi took Jhon's child back, he began to try to take care of her by himself like a parent, but the baby was too small, there were no baby supplies at home, and he lacked experience. When the child cried, he often felt at a loss. He clumsily used the newspaper to change the child's diaper, and scrambled to find food for the child. He soon discovered that the child must be breast-fed, so he had to force Miriam to feed the child and let Miriam temporarily assume the role of the child's mother, and at the same time he thought he could take on the role of the father.
From his subconscious mind, he believed that his parents had not taken good care of himself, his mother was limited by the patient, and his father was completely dereliction of duty, so he assumed that if he were his father, he would take care of himself. And this idea can only be put into practice in raising the next generation. When Miriam asked his baby's parents, he did not answer directly, but repeatedly emphasized that the baby was his; when Miriam asked him the baby's name, he said that her name was David-Tsotsi's real real name. In the process of getting along with Miriam, he tried to perform the duty of raising children ("self") in the name of his father ("own father"). At this moment, we find that everyone's inner assumptions about their own origin are lingering illusions in the process of growing up.
At the same time, Tsotsi's heart was full of resentment for the injustice of the world. When the baby was crying, he asked the child: Do you want to go home, want to go back to your magnificent home? He took the ignorant baby to the place where he settled after running away from home-beside the concrete pipe. The film very cleverly arranged a conversation between Tsotsi and a group of vagrants. The vagrants came over curiously to look at the child's bag. Tsotsi said, "You want it, give it to you." The vagrant said, don't fucking joke, we can't afford him. Tsotsi said that one of the cement pipes was originally his home, and the tramp said, "Why did you bring him here? Did you bring her to see your home?" He wanted to tell the baby that I was forced to live in such an environment by my father, and you can at least live in a slum with me now. Why can your rich children live in such a magnificent and luxurious residence?
Tsotsi hopes to provide children with good material living conditions, but his dream has suffered a great setback in reality. So he chose to go to the baby's parents' house with his companions Butcher and Aap. Pumla was still living in the hospital and Jhon drove home alone. They sneaked into Jhon's house and put a gun on Jhon's head. Butcher, Tsotsi's companion, wanted to quickly kill Jhon, but Tsotsi objected. Afterwards, Butcher searched the room for gold and silver jewelry, Aap looked for food, but Tsotsi walked into the baby's room in a daze-more beautiful and luxurious than the master room. He sat in the radiant room, thoughtful, never Never thought that a child could live in such a luxurious room. He wanted how happy it would be to live here when he was a child. Then he put the baby products in the room into the bag-large and small dolls and toys, milk bottles, milk powder, but did not bring a single one. At this time Jhon rang the car alarm, and the panicked robber rushed out. Butcher aimed at Jhon with the pistol he had just seized. The gunfire rang, but it was Butcher who fell, with blood splattering Jhon's head. As mentioned earlier, Tsotsi is not upholding justice, but the "father"-the baby's father, his spiritual father.
Tsotsi took the baby products back to Miriam's room and set up a cozy room for the two children. He pushed all the money for selling Jhon's car to Miriam and asked her to raise the child, but Miriam refused to accept it. Miriam already knows the baby's history through the newspaper. She told Tsotsi that the child’s mother may never be able to stand, and you can’t return the leg to her, but you must return the child to her. In desperation, Tsotsi took out the robbed bottle and milk powder and said that he could raise the child. Miriam said that even so, it cannot make you her mother. At this time, he suddenly realized that in addition to the basic material conditions for the growth of a child, the more important thing is the tender maternal love and father's love, which is what he couldn't have in his childhood.
Anguished Tsotsi brought the child to Jhon's door. He could put the child down and walk away and escape the police. But he was worried, he rang the doorbell and told Jhon that he had sent the child back. At this time, the police car honked the horn and the child cried. Tsotsi took the child pityingly, and helplessly waited for the child's parents to come and take her away under the police's gun. Seeing the child's parents in order to protect the child's majesty, painful Tsotsi reluctantly handed the child to her father. At this time, he was already in tears, not because he was in a desperate situation, but because he was moved by the fearlessness of his parents and caring for their children, and sad that he could not have such happiness.
5. The paradoxical feelings of growing up.
Everyone suffers from the mental torture of childhood longing to grow up and the desire to return to childhood after adulthood. But things backfired. Even if Oscar in "The Tin Drum" stays forever at the age of three, he still sees the evil and hypocrisy in the adult world. The fact is that we have not grown up until we are 18, and we will never be able to return to childhood after 12 years of age.
Tsotsi wants to live like an adult. He ran away from home at the age of twelve or thirteen, took other homeless children to live, took care of his companions like an adult, and led them to find a source of life. In the end, he even hoped to find money to support Boston to study and realize his dream of being a teacher. Perhaps, there is the support of the loyalty of the gang leader, but for him, it means more that he wants to be an adult.
People in the slums called him "Little Robber". When he was walking with his accomplices in the poor streets, others laughed at him for not being able to drive, so he could only raise his middle finger in protest. Driving in the film became a special ceremony to distinguish between adults and children. Tsotsi is eager to grow up, but he can't learn to drive, and is ridiculed repeatedly, even to deny the possibility of his carjacking crime. When he was hiding from the rain under a tree, he saw Pumla getting down from the car, and he rushed to the ground to hijack the car. He didn't want to hijack the car to make a fortune, because he abandoned the car by the wilderness. All he wanted was the nervous and excited feeling when driving. He tried to prove to others that he had grown up.
The most obvious sign of growing up is to have children. Therefore, taking good care of the baby has become Tsotsi's most urgent desire. He patiently learned to feed the child, forced Miriam to feed the child, and provided the child with baby supplies and money, all trying to show that he took the responsibility of the child's father. Later, under Miriam's probation, he finally realized that he had no right to bear the responsibility of raising the baby, nor could he give the child the love of his parents.
Later, Tsotsi really matured. He plucked up the courage to ask Miriam: If I send the child back, can I come to you in the future?
6. Dignity and Hope of Life.
Boston, who was called a "little teacher" by his accomplices, has repeatedly emphasized that people should have "dignity", but he himself cannot know how to make his life dignified. He has fallen from a teacher to an alcoholic.
They killed the fat guy with the tie during the robbery in the subway. Afterwards, Boston was sick and vomited. He asked Tsotsi: Dignity, do you know the word dignity? I still have a little bit, so I feel sick.
Later, another gang leader Fela asked Boston to follow him, and he said: Tsotsi has never been to school and doesn't know what dignity is. Do you know Fela?
After Fela spelled out the word "dignity" completely, he said: Dignity is a fucking decent life.
Boston said: Dignity is respect... Respect for yourself has nothing to do with a fucking decent life.
An angry Fela said: You want to respect, I'll show you respect, why don't you give up drinking and get a driver's license? What I want is that the driver is not a drunkard. Fuck the dignity of your mother.
Boston said while drinking: Go to hell with dignity. He was already broken, and his dignity could only be on his lips.
There was a saying in ancient China that "laugh at the poor but not at the prostitution", and the poor all over the world are trying to find the dignity of living. As far as Tsotsi and Boston are concerned, there is no place for them, and dignity seems to have nothing to do with them. What they have to consider every day is three meals a day.
The conversation between Tsotsi and a lame beggar in the subway after the conflict was also a questioning and torture of the dignity of the poor.
Tsotsi wants the poor lame old man to stand up, (Tsotsi said: You stand up and walk. The beggar said: Who do you think you are? Christ Jesus?-This question and answer has a lot of meaning, see Appendix 1) He I don't believe that lame beggars can live so humblely.
The poor beggar peeed his pants when Tsotsi threatened him with a gun. He asked Tsotsi painfully: Why are you following me?
Tsotsi said: I once saw a dog, someone kicked it, its back was broken, and it could only be lying on the ground like you.
From the previous confession, we can know that the fate of that dog has been haunting him like a nightmare, and he does not want himself to be like a dog kicked by his father. His escape was also because of this fear.
The beggar told him that he had broken his legs because he was smashed by a beam while digging a gold mine. Tsotsi asked him: Then why are you still alive? Live like a dog?
The beggar said: I like to feel the sunshine on the street, even if I only have two hands, I can still feel warm.
The words of the beggar made Tsotsi realize that the dignity of life does not lie in getting rid of poverty and humbleness, but in his attitude and expectation towards life. Especially when he was getting along with Miriam, he felt that Miriam, who was also poor, lived so happily.
Miriam's husband suffered an accident when he went to work, leaving behind an orphan and a widow. But Miriam still maintains his passion and hope for life. She raised her children meticulously, dressing up her joys, anger, sorrow, and joy. She made rusty iron wind chimes to represent her sad mood, and also made glass wind chimes to express her happy mood. She sews clothes for people, makes wind chimes and sells them for money. She lives very hard but refuses Tsotsi's funding. When Tsotsi was surprised that one of her glass wind chimes could sell for 50 yuan. She said: You only saw the glass, but did not see the color, light and shadow shining on you. Of course there is also a pleasant sound.
Everyone must find a reason to live. Especially the poor and the disabled, let them live strong in the endless poverty and suffering. The lame beggar, Miriam, made Tsotsi feel the beauty and hope of life, dignity and decency.
Seven, Tsotsi's tears and my tears
I really don’t like the Chinese translation of this movie by Chinese people, because I have never liked to call the protagonist of a story "salvation" from bad to good. How do you understand "Shawshank's Redemption"? I think the movie moved me because the protagonist was moved in life, and because the protagonist’s tears made me shed tears.
The process of our growing up is the process of continuously reducing the number of crying and weeping. When we were young, we cried whenever we wanted to. Crying is the best way to express desires and satisfy desires. When we learned to speak, we replaced some opportunities for crying and weeping with words. When we grew up and found that tears could not solve the dilemma in life, we chose anger or hysterical yelling, and then escape and confrontation, violence and killing.
Tears are a manifestation of moving and a natural expression of emotion. Tsotsi burst into tears when he ran away from home, and then he began to "strongly" face the hardships of life and the bitterness of the world. He has learned to fight and retaliate against this unfair world. He felt the pain of fate, but he would not cry. Later, in the tears of the lame beggar, in the cry of the baby, and in the tears of Miriam, he felt the warmth and kindness of the world. He began to learn to experience the power of love. In the baby room of Jhon's house, his silence was filled with sentimentality; when he said guiltily "Brother I'm sorry" to Boston, tears were already in his eyes; he was delivering the baby. When giving it to his parents, he let tears flow freely on his face. At that time, he was crying heartily like a child. At that moment, his emotional world had recovered.
And I, already tearful eyes.
Appendix 1: The story of "Peter Performing Miracles" in the Bible about Jesus and the gods making lame beggars stand
One night while praying, Peter and John went to the temple. Outside the gate of the temple, they saw a lame man begging for people who entered the temple. Peter and John watched him carefully. Peter said, "You look at us." The man looked at Peter and John carefully, hoping to get something. Peter said again, "I don't have any gold or silver, so I can only give you what I have. I will tell you to stand up and walk in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth." After that, he took his right hand and supported him. When he got up, the handicapped person's feet and ankle bones immediately became strong. He jumped up, stood still, drove off, and entered the temple with Peter and the others. As he walked and jumped, he kept praising God. The people recognized him as the disabled man who usually sits in front of the temple door and begs. He is struggling like flying without knowing how to do so, full of surprise. Peter said to the people: "Israelis, why do you take this as a surprise? Why do you look at us intently? Do you think we made this disabled person walk by our own ability? We believe in Jesus. The name is the faith given by Jesus Christ to restore this person to health in front of you.”
Appendix 2:
A collection of film reviews: a highly emotional and explosive film. ——Under the
indifferent mind of Chicago Sun-Times , there are ocean-like emotions hidden. ——Boston Globe
was pleasantly surprised to find that this is a movie where hope can be seen from despair, why the novel always assumes that people can overcome fate. While this movie exaggerates violence, it also focuses more on the character of the characters. ——New York Times CHICAGO Sun-Times
film began with a game of throwing falcons, and soon we learned that life is just a little more chance than gambling. ——CHICAGO Sun-Times'
sharp hurting emotions deeply touched people's hearts. ——USA Today
did not make this movie fascinating because of violence, the story itself contains a deeper social significance.
——The salvation and rebirth of the soul of a gangster thug in the New York Times . ——Xinmin Evening News
This is an unusual movie that shocks people's hearts, a movie that belongs to men. -Rolling Stone
A touching movie, filled with long-term sadness. ——San Francisco Chronicle
salvation, let us be cut off from the evil that we can't get rid of; honesty makes the moment of emotion extraordinarily gorgeous. ——ReelViews
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