This year's Oscars broadcast a short film about how women and ethnic minority artists overcome prejudice and realize their creative ideals. Among them, Salma Hayek said: The true human nature is hidden by stereotypes, and our film industry must have the most sincere curiosity about it.
This sentence is the best response to some doubts. The Oscar is only an award for following the mainstream American trend of thought, and it has never been awarded the "Uniform Global Most Aesthetic Film Award." The significance of this annual event to me is that it has an opportunity to discuss movies. It's like a group of people around a hot kang, outsiders eating melons, insiders chatting, and fans huddling together to keep warm. It's all fun.
There is only one kind of boring person: despising the preferences of others, disrespecting the choices of others, and humiliating things they don’t like as non-authority and rubbish.
As an ordinary viewer, I would like to talk about why this film won the best picture of this year’s Oscar from the following points, and why I love this film.
1. More "Oscar-like"
① The overwhelming advantage of being nominated for the Technology Award
It is also realistic to say that it is not good to say: most Chinese audiences judge a movie only by "the story is not wonderful", the pursuit of sensory stimulation, easy to be sentimental, lack of artistic appreciation and technical common sense. The importance of technical indicators is no less important than the script.
Going forward for nearly ten years of Oscar BP Technology Award nominations (★said winning): 2017 "Moonlight Boy" (photography, editing, soundtrack) 2016 "Focus" (editing) 2015 "Birdman" (photography★, mixing, Sound editing) 2014 "Twelve Years as a Slave" (editing, art direction, costume design) 2013 "Escape from Tehran" (editing★, mixing, sound editing, soundtrack) 2012 "Artist" (costume design★, soundtrack★, photography , Editing, art direction) 2011 "The King's Speech" (photography, editing, mixing, art direction, costume design, soundtrack) 2010 "The Hurt Locker" (editing ★, mixing ★, sound editing ★, photography, soundtrack) 2009 "Slumdog Millionaire" (Photography★, Editing★, Mixing★, Soundtrack★, Sound Effects Editing) 2008 "Old Nowhere" (Photography, Editing, Mixing, Sound Effects Editing)
It's clear at a glance. When a film is not nominated for any technical awards, it can basically be judged that it is not destined for BP. This year's nomination list, through screening and exclusion (in line with the script and technology award nominations), it is clear that this year's BP is a dispute between "The Shape of Water" and "Three Billboards". In contrast to "Water", which almost dominates technical nominations, 3BB's is only nominated for editing and soundtrack, and its momentum is a bit weaker.
② The ideological component accords with the conservative choice of the college
In a word, it is the "political correctness" that many people always talk about. Except for the "accident" of "Birdman", the best films of the past five years are closely related to popular social issues and satisfy the demands of different people. Oscar's "de-artistic" is the current trend.
I put quotation marks above to express doubts about this general view. Are "art" and "political correctness" in conflict? Is "political correctness" vulgar and boring and should not be promoted? When did “political correctness” be stigmatized as automatically standing opposite the truth and art?
We should be vigilant and reflect on this trend: to speculate that any artistic creation full of painstaking effort is a curiosity and speculation on capital, an insult to the artist, and a sorrow for the audience.
Second, beautiful love
To accept the beauty and love of this film, the main premise is to have multiple aesthetic abilities, which is destined to be unacceptable to a large number of people. They have a single judgment on "beauty". Exquisite makeup, palaces full of artworks, and beautiful natural scenery are pleasing to the eye. In addition, things beyond common sense are curiosity and ugly.
The monster designer of this film, Mark Hill, said that the designers spent several months repeatedly debugging and pinching the face to make sure that the murloc has a "protagonist face": a perfect nose, well-spaced eyes, and a look that does not affect the appearance. Fish gills. The top always carries the back view photos of the Murloc, so that he can consult others at any time. ——These efforts have only evil taste in the eyes of people who are incomprehensible.
The audience is eager to be moved. People who don't like to watch movies can also recite the shocking film history. This is all invalidated in "Water", one is a dumb girl, the other is a murloc with language barriers. When love can't make a sound, so love can't happen?
Who said that voice must be used for communication? Elisa is an orphan picked up by the water. She seems to be born in the water. She is very curious about everything about water: bathing in the bathtub in the morning, staring at the eggs boiled in the water, tracing the water droplets on the windows, and cleaning with water. dirt. At the end of the film, the scar from her birth turned into the gills that allowed her to breathe freely underwater, just as she gestured to Giles: All my life and experiences are guiding me to meet him.
Water is an opportunity for Elisa and the Murloc to get together, and art promotes the progress of their relationship. The first advancement of their relationship was when Elisa put a record by the pool and gestured to teach the murloc the word "Music". The murloc smiled for the first time; the second advancement was when Elisa found the murloc in an empty movie theater. , They look at each other tacitly, and they are connected in the background of the screen. When monsters have human minds and aesthetics, why should they be called monsters?
The change of color also reflects the process of Elisa falling into love: in the first half of the film, she wears dark gray-green clothes at work; when she gets along with Giles, she will change into a slightly bright loose green cardigan; after rescuing the murloc, she is the first She wore a red headband for the first time; after making love to the murloc for the first time, she put on the red shoes she had liked for a long time.
Beauty and love are born from the heart. It is not only the heart of the watched, but also the heart of the watcher.
3. Subversion and rewriting
Putting fairy tale characters in exaggerated costumes, throwing them into a modern background, and learning superpowers and magic, is it subversion and innovation? I just think the film's rewriting of fairy tales is subversive.
There are roughly three functions of monsters/animals in the movie: 1. A friend of mankind, a bond connected with nature 2. A dangerous existence that has a sexual meaning to tempt humans 3. A villain that threatens the survival of mankind. Type 1, mostly about the process of living things from being unwilling to contact with humans to being domesticated by humans, and living in harmony with humans. In the past few years, the trend of "sprouting" and "peting" has become even worse. It is not an exaggeration to say that humans are based on the superiority of species. Type 2 and 3 are not to mention.
The subversion of "Water" is that its monsters have not turned into human beings, which is precisely why the audience cannot accept the film. Prior to this, no matter how human the monsters are, they would not end up marrying humans in the image of monsters, unless they turned into adults and knew the language of humans. Frogs and beasts will eventually become princes, and mermaids and Bai Suzhen will become human forms.
This film not only makes the heroine and the monster fall in love, this love is even the only purely true love in the film. Zelda's marriage exists in name only. Giles must conceal his sexual orientation. Richard's wife is only his object of venting work pressure. Only Elisa can pursue love freely and dominate love. Elisa and the mermaid can't talk, but they are more like humans than all "normal people".
If the fairy tale does not retain its pure core, it is meaningless to rewrite. Even though the film has no lack of B-level erotic elements, it still celebrates the theme that has remained unchanged for thousands of years: no matter what the situation, the pursuit of love and freedom.
4. "Normalization" of marginalized groups
Marginal groups in film and television often go to two extremes, either inspiring stories about fearing hardships and powers, or living in miserable lives without seeing the sun, awakening people's reflection on reality. Some stereotypes are due to excessive “artism”: Mentioning autism is "Rain Man" and "Stars on Earth", they are all talented and potential stocks; when talking about fat people, it is Zeng Zhiwei and Shen Dianxia, Warm, humorous, brave and righteous. And how are they in reality?
Elisa's life is so rigid: I hear the alarm clock ring, wake up, take a shower, make breakfast, go to work, and every day Zelda cuts in for her. Isn't it the same as our daily life? Get up on time, go to work, have one or two close colleagues, and occasionally have happy little things.
Elisa's self-discipline is not puritanical. She loves life, staring at the high-heeled shoes in the shop window, imagining that she can become a princess wearing them, the shoe cabinet is full of collections, and she brushes her shoes with bird-shaped shoes every day, and she hums when she walks. She also felt that this kind of life seemed to lack something. When she put the felt hat between her head and the car window, her eyes looked calm and curious. Ordinary people are the same, in the dead of night, they will dream and desire to change.
Both Zelda and Giles were resistance to Elisa. "Every time I go to a Chinese restaurant, do I have to rescue every fish in the fish tank?" They felt that Elisa's sympathy for the murlocs was unreasonable. Because they did not automatically stand in Elisa's camp, their image was flesh and blood. Compassion is not cheap, but friendship is more precious.
Elisa and Zelda are often criticized for their work. Giles’ paintings can’t be sold, and they are driven away by the tavern owner. They live poorly; they are happy to get two movie coupons, learn to tap dance to the TV, and complain to their boss in private. They live a life. Happiness; the marginalized people who are least valued, like Richard's blackened fingers, become obstacles that move the whole body, and they are free to live.
This is the life of ordinary people.
Five, classical setting
The blue-green tones of the walls permeate the damp atmosphere, the scales brushed on the edges of the windows, the mottled tiles on the bathroom walls, and the cracks in the wooden cabinets are full of dust, which not only highlights the murderous atmosphere of the Cold War period, but also lays the foundation for the film. The keynote of "water".
The wall of Elisa's room is painted with huge waves. It is Katsushika Hokusai’s representative work "Kanagawa Surfing". In order to prevent the audience from paying too much attention to the paintings on the wall, it is deliberately old and hidden in the wall.
Humid, but not cold. The curved floor-to-ceiling windows of Elisa's room and Giles's windows can form a complete semicircle. The two went from sharing a window to sharing everything about them. Snuggle on the sofa, tap dance, share cakes, and tease cats to keep warm. Bookcases, drawing boards, old-fashioned TVs, and carpets soften the old space.
Richard's house is a typical middle-class detached house, and her wife is also a typical Blond image. Under the appearance of harmony and order, a clue can be seen from the chromosomal wallpaper in the bedroom, which symbolizes their sexual and loveless marriage.
Sixth, the fascination complex
In 1962, it was an era when people didn't like going to the cinema. There were only a few people sitting in the cinema downstairs of Elisa's house. A creature salvaged from South America had just brutally eaten a cat and walked out. When I found it in the movie theater the next time, he stood quietly in the empty theater and was deeply attracted by the screen.
Murlocs are always attracted to art. The music flowing from the record player, Giles's paintings, and the images broadcast on the TV made it obsessed. "You'll never know just how much I love you." The singing, dancing and confession that Elisa imagined also came from the movies she had seen. This dream dance is presented in black and white tones, which echoes and pays tribute to the original film.
This kind of love can only be found in movies, and this kind of love also arises from movies.
"Our journey is the sea of stars." The journey of the film industry has stretched to the edge of the universe, but it is unwilling to touch the source of our lives. In the past, the best works on the ocean, the commercial has "Great White Shark", the art has "Blue Sea and Blue Sky", and then look forward to "Twenty Thousand Miles Under the Sea" and "Moby Dick". In recent years, the number of narrative films about the ocean is not only sporadic, but the stories are also unremembered. The underwater details of the documentary film become more realistic, has humans lost their imagination of the deep sea?
More than 90% of the world’s oceans have not been explored. The dreamy and mysterious mermaid, the seductive singing siren, and the legendary Viking squid all have real documents available in history. Who can be sure that they must not exist. ?
The admiration of mankind for new technologies has overshadowed the obsession with old things. I hope this film can help Hollywood's classical revival.
Seven, never forget
The film was inspired by the movie "Black Lake Demon" that Gyro had seen when he was a child. The monster fell in love with the heroine, but the monster was killed. This made the young Gyro very sad. He also sympathized with the untreated monsters in "Frankenstein" and "Doctor Incarnation". The regrets of his youth turned into dreams of movies, which affected his life.
Many teenagers who used to be angry with horses in fresh clothes took their childhood dreams as jokes on the wine table, dismissed them, and even trampled under their feet.
People love movies, because movies always make dreams. The montage at the end of "City of Philharmonic" rounded out the real regrets of the hero and heroine, so it left a famous film history. The ending of "The Shape of Water" transcends time and space, and the regret of a little boy is circled outside the movie. It is a higher level of dreaming.
The long-cherished wish for the ending of "The Shape of Water" and the long list of acknowledgments at the end of "Pacific Rim" are all telling one of the hottest and purest dreams: never forget.
8. The Shape Of Water
Translated "The Shape Of Water" into "Water Shape Story", the accent fell behind and lost the ignorant dream of the original name: What shape is water?
The big sound is loud, the elephant is invisible. This is the highest aesthetic concept. Water has this "invisible" quality, transparent, soft, ubiquitous, and has the power to connect all hearts. I can still remember a text I learned in elementary school, Helen Keller’s description of water in "My Teacher":
We walked to the well, someone was hanging water, and the teacher put my hand in the water. Cool water poured into my hand, and the teacher spelled the word w-a-t-e-r in the heart of my hand. At first, she spelled it slowly, but later, the faster she spelled it, my attention was focused on On her finger. Suddenly, with a flash of inspiration, I realized the word "water", which refers to this wonderful, cool thing that flows through my hand. It is this word that awakens my heart, Set my mind free, because the word is alive.
Other organs of the disabled have more sensitive perception. They are born with misfortune, but they have a unique language: turning the intangible into the tangible. Elisa and the murloc hugged and sank into the water. What she felt was love, life, and freedom.
postscript
When I watched this movie for the first time, I thought it was a warm love fairy tale. Seeing that many people distilled the film into only a few pale keywords-this is also the common way for film critics to make short comments, and I feel, my God, the adult world is too boring.
You must have had this kind of childhood. There are no good or bad in that world, only thinking and not wanting, likes and dislikes. You think it's boring to award the Oscars to "political correctness". I think the Oscars are willing to award fairy tales. It's awesome.
When you make a movie, you always want to fill a certain emotional need. I need to make such a movie, it will allow me to continue to live in this world. I feel that this world is full of malice and mistrust. I can hate, hate, and hate everyone without asking why, and imagine others as demons. I want to reverse this situation. I want to make a movie, like a song, to admire the greatness of love and movies, and to heal the world. ——Gilmore Del Toro
May filmmakers always have sincere curiosity.
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