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Sullivan's Travels (1941) is
another Hollywood "Golden Age" Movie, I like it!
The film tells a story triggered by a director in order to experience life. The actor is a well-known Hollywood comedy film director. He is tired of shooting comedies and wants to make a realistic movie that reflects poverty. The producer made him understand that these are just fantasies, because he doesn't know what poverty is. After hearing these words, the actor decided to experience poverty in person. The protagonist puts on his shabby clothes and begins to travel. In order to ensure the protagonist's health, safety, records and other issues, the producer arranged a car to follow him closely, with all kinds of personnel and facilities in the car. The hero wanted to get rid of them, so he had to let these followers leave. After the entourage left, the lone actor boarded with a widow. In her house, she was repeatedly harassed by the widow. The truck arrived in Hollywood, and the actor returned to Hollywood. In the restaurant, the protagonist dressed as a tramp only needed a small breakfast, which made a beautiful lady in the restaurant invite him to eat other things. In this way, the two chatted. After some chatting, the actor wanted to repay the beauty, drove his car out, and devised a scam that was caught. When the hero's servant led the two from the police station, the beauty knew the hero's true identity, and angrily pushed her off the swimming pool at the hero's home. After listening to the actor's explanation, the beauty will go with the actor. Then they started to travel again, this time they got on the train. After the train drove all night, the beauties were hungry, but the two had no money for breakfast. When the protagonist knows that they are in Las Vegas, he finds his entourage, and the protagonist and beauty return to modern society. At this time, the actor fell ill, and the two continued to travel after he recovered. They experienced a lot this time, suffered a lot, and suffered a lot of sins. The journey was successfully completed, and the actor decided to give some money to the wanderers, but was knocked unconscious by a person who saw the money and threw it into the train compartment. Because of a mistake, everyone thought that the hero was dead, and newspapers published news of the hero's death. The protagonist woke up in the carriage and attacked people in a vague way, and was sentenced to six years in prison by the court. The hero only remembered everything in the prison, but it was too late, and he had been closely guarded. During the film screening in the prison, the actor finally understood the real needs of ordinary people. The male protagonist who doesn't want to continue wasting his life came up with a clever plan-to get his picture to appear in the newspaper. The beauty and the studio owner discovered that the male protagonist was still alive. After some activities, the male protagonist finally returned to his normal life. At this time, the actor, who was favored by the beautiful women, told the producers that he would continue to shoot comedies. The movie ends like this
The overall style of the film is joyful. It uses comedy to reflect the poverty, depravity, and darkness in the real society, and shows the lives of the wanderers in the picture one by one, so that the audience can truly experience the word "poverty" Meaning. In addition, the film also uses the protagonist’s rich identity to experience the way of life of the poor, reflecting the injustice of the society and the cruelty of the real world, and uses the protagonist’s experience to express the director’s point of view that happiness is the greatest wealth of poverty.
Although the film is a comedy, its style is not uniform. The overall tone of the film is cheerful and relaxed, but some paragraphs are depressed, and the black is heavier than the film noir, which makes the style of the whole film uncoordinated. The most obvious passage of this inconsistency is the scene when prisoners enter the church before watching a movie in the church. In this scene, the music is low and sad, and the picture will show the prisoners in a unified pace like a walking dead, especially the scene of prisoners walking outside the church, which is more terrifying than horror movies. These images vividly express the slave-like life and desperate mental state of prisoners. In addition, the film does not deal with the "comedy" of the tramp who took all the money from the actor. The film shows the plot of him being crushed to death by a train through a series of images. How does this look like a comedy? In short, although these scenes clearly express the intention of the director, they make the movie look weird. A comedy that has been watched very heavily, who can laugh?
In addition, after watching the whole movie, thinking back to the specific plot, you will find that the plot development is not natural, and the film is deliberately making a laugh. For example, the scenes where the male protagonist is boarding at the widow’s house and when he escapes. They have nothing to do with the main line of the plot. They exist only to make jokes. For another example, the appearance of the heroine is clearly to increase the viewing of the film. After all, a man is not worth seeing when traveling, and it looks good with a beautiful woman. Also, such as the car chasing scene in which the hero gets rid of his followers, the hero's wife and his absurd marriage, etc., they all exist for the purpose of making laughter. Through these, we can be sure that this film is a mass-produced comedy in the golden age of Hollywood, and the traces of artificial axe are quite obvious.
The film was selected for AFI100 not because of its funny plot, but because of the theme it expresses, which is what I just said-happiness is the greatest wealth of poverty. On this subject, it is obvious in the movie. Before traveling, the actor wants to shoot a movie with a profound theme and reflecting social significance. This is because he lives in an ivory tower. He doesn’t know the hardships of life. He thinks that everyone can eat and wear. He is willing to explore various abstract concepts such as "class", "value", "society", etc. . When the male protagonist really comes into contact with poverty, he realizes that those abstract words are not what the poor people need. What they need is simple happiness, nothing more. One sentence can sum up the new understanding of the male protagonist: art is to serve the people.
Finally, the movie itself. From the look and feel of the film, there are many impressive things. The first one is that the hero gets rid of the street chase of his entourage. The car chase scene was thrilling and breathtaking. It is hard to imagine that such a thrilling picture could be taken in 1941. The second is the description of the two people’s poor experience and the rescue process of the hero in the movie. There is no dialogue in these two paragraphs. The film only uses the pictures to narrate the whole process in a detailed and comprehensive manner. The director concisely shortens the film time. This kind of director is the most lovable. The third is the scene when the hero is being tried. The movie shows the protagonist's state of confusion through blurry pictures. This is the unique way of expression in movies of that era. However, it demonstrates its role well. The fourth one is the classic dialogue in the movie, especially the dialogue between the male protagonist and the beautiful woman, which is romantic and funny and extremely interesting. In addition, the most funny thing in the film is the photo of the dead husband in the widow’s house. His expression will move! Once angry, then at a loss, closely cooperating with the actor's behavior, it's funny to death. On the whole, this film is absolutely top-notch in terms of appreciability, a "good-looking" movie.
The actors in this film are not familiar with it. The male protagonist Joel McCrea looks ordinary and is a typical Hollywood handsome guy. His Chinese information is blank and he doesn't know anything. The protagonist Veronica Lake is a stunning beauty. She has a perfect look in this film, especially the wavy blond hair, which is very beautiful. It's a pity that beautiful women like her have never acted in a few good movies. Others are unfamiliar, let alone talk about it.
Overall, a good movie. There are smiles, beautiful women, big scenes, and meaningful and positive themes. With these, what else is required for a movie?
Veronica Lake
Veronica Lake
Sequence: 0601
Sullivan's Travel.Sullivan's.Travels.1941.D9.2Audio.MiniSD-TLF
2011-10-24
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