But in this way, it depends on the skill of the director and the actors. With the same ingredients, a good chef can make a full-fledged meal, but a sloppy fire head can only cook a hodgepodge of dishes.
In the same way, with similar plots-conscience overwhelms evil, redemption defeats killing, "Schindler's List" can become a legend in film history, a shining star forever, but "The Children of Yellowstone" has become a mediocre work after all. Only slowly forgotten.
First of all, the most important problem is that the film is too short! Trying to condense such a story full of human brilliance and ultimate concern into a 2-hour movie can only show that the director's ambition exceeds his ability. It took Spielberg several hours to shoot Schindler. The plot is complete? Can you outshine others?
As a result, all the plots in the movie were not unfolded, and all the characters were not explored. What we see on the screen seems to be just shadows, only names, no flesh and blood, even the hero He Ke, a typical Gao Daquan character, with Puritan virtues and Wagner-like dedication, but that's all, and then There is no deeper spiritual level.
He Ke started to be like an angry youth, intent on entering the devastated Nanjing and exposing the beastly behavior of the Japanese, but after being rescued from the shining Japanese sword, all his courage seemed to have vanished, and he even saw His companion was shot and killed, and he was indifferent, but only symbolically tried to return to the front line once. After being persuaded to return, he immediately hid in the orphanage in Yellowstone with peace of mind, and assumed the responsibility of being the king of children.
Of course, protecting the orphans and reporting on the frontline are both great, but there was no psychological transformation in the process. He Ke was neither shaken by anything, nor showed any signs of sudden spiritual sublimation. This can only mean that The director's haste and roughness.
Secondly, these Huangshi children are super simple to deal with. Although there are 60 children in the plot introduction, there are no 5 who have shown their faces on the screen... Even these five children give people the feeling It is not pitiful and helpless, but arrogant and unreasonable. It is hard to believe that two internationalist fighters who have come from far away will throw their minds on them.
Let’s talk about the No. 1 orphan Liu Shikai first. The actor’s choice is like a copy of Emperor Li Yi-his family was killed by the Japanese, which is very sympathetic, but this cannot be the reason for his lack of personality. No one is pleasing to the eye, and it is difficult to get along with others. At first, he led the crowd to beat He Ke for no reason, and then he smashed the generator, and finally almost killed everyone on impulse. I even have a sense of relief for this man's final death, if he were alive, it would be a real trouble. But then I thought - no, you just died like this? Before he died, he didn't reach an understanding with the protagonist, and spit out a few heartfelt words? Although Chinese movies have always been hypocritical and not sensational, but now they are not even hypocritical, and they die too lightly... The
second orphan, Xiaoqing, was the first boy to express friendship to He Ke, but when he came out, it seemed like Like an idiot, he held on to He Ke's textbook - table, table kept shouting. You don't practice foreign languages like this. Anyway, listen to the lecture first and then review it. Well, this is a complete study method. Later, his suicide was even more inexplicable. As soon as he heard that he was going to leave Huangshi, he hanged himself. I really didn't understand why. Could it be that the director felt that there was no need to elaborate?
As for the other children, even the names are omitted, and they are the first, second, third, and fourth. At the beginning, they didn’t know what they looked like, and in the end they didn’t even know where they went... All the children feel like they are foils. , but he did not bring out the great qualities of He Ke, but destroyed his image. After watching the film, I felt that He Ke was a second-hand man. Before the Japanese soldiers came, he was nervous and wanted to flee to Gansu. Those who climbed snow-capped mountains and crossed the grass didn't care that the children were not the kind of soldiers of the Red Army. Even worse, there is even the hypocrisy of Gu Liuxuande to bring people across the river.
Later, when He Ke died, he didn't even have a last word, no regret for the child, no longing for his hometown, no love for the heroine, not even letting the audience meet him at the end, the camera turned ——The burial filling has already begun! The person who feels dead is not the protagonist at all, just an irrelevant person, and it is not worth wasting the shots at all.
Then there are the other actors - even the protagonist is in a mess, you can imagine how the other people are.
The heroine first appeared in the image of Bethune, but then gradually changed her taste. For a while, she fell in love with Fa Ge, and then turned around with He Ke. Later, it was revealed that she was still a drug addict. Maybe the director wanted to Showing a hero is also a mortal view of history, but the amazing thing is that she explained through the mouths of others in the middle of her heart, but there is no bodhisattva heart to help the Chinese people, she just came here with pure blood, and there is no place to go now. , and more than once said that those children are trash, they will only do things like destroy, create an idol and then smash it? I don't know what the director's intention is.
The GCD member played by Chow Yun-fat surprisingly appeared in the rubble Nanjing city. He was responsible for the destruction. The devils bombed the building and they also bombed, and then they rescued He Ke, who was about to be beheaded. Even more surprising, he claimed to be Graduated from West Point Military Academy. As far as I know, when Nanjing fell, there were no New Fourth Army troops in the city, and none of the Red Army generals graduated from West Point... Although artistic processing is allowed, such a relatively regular film cannot be made up like this after all. Make it up.
Brother Fa's appearance is even more shocking. He is just like the king in the golden armor. Even the beard shape is exactly the same. How to pull it down, he is the most powerful person in the whole film - he was obviously hit by random guns at first, but it turned out that his head was just scratched... Later, unfortunately, he got malaria, and under the condition of no quinine and no nursing care After two days, I was alive and kicking again, and it was only after I got to the back. The protagonist and others have been wading through mountains and rivers. At first, there were carts, and then there were trucks. It was hard to reach the destination, but Brother Fa was able to come and go freely on two legs. He disappeared and went back to Yan'an, and after a quarter of an hour, he miraculously appeared in front of the protagonist, and he didn't feel at all dusty, as if he had just come out of the bathroom.
Michelle Yeoh's Mrs. Wang seems to be showing her face purely because of Chow Yun-fat. Even the director said, "Have many people seen Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
? So we want this effect, this configuration. !". A giant sweat, is the director making a movie or a nostalgic party?
Moreover, there is nothing to say about Mrs. Wang's performance, but the plot arranged for him is disgusting - Mrs. Wang was moved by Ho Ke's spirit of internationalism and has been helping him silently, but Ho Ke has He was inexplicably imprisoned in the party-state prison, and then a bald Kuomintang official coveted Mrs. Wang's beauty and agreed to release He Ke on the condition of a spring night. As a result, Mrs. Wang sacrificed her life for justice and had to "serve" the official. I seem to have suffered a slap in the face here. This plot must be fictional, and the screenwriter has seen "Ball of Suet", but why did NMD arrange for the Chinese to be this shameless character? And a party-state officer? The following plot is even more TMD full of the rich style of the old movies. The national army began to recruit strong people in 37 years, and even 10-year-old children were not spared; the national army had no fighting power, and was completely starved... In fact , this kind of thing started when the competition between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party became more and more unfavorable; the national army in 37 years was quite effective, and major battles such as the Battle of Songhu shattered Japan's intention to destroy China in three months. The loss of Nanjing is really a huge disparity between the enemy and us. Too big... I originally thought that under the current good situation, future anti-Japanese films will only want to belittle the brothers of the national army, but I was wrong. The films made by foreigners also made this tune, and I can only say that the film investment is from the mainland.
Generally speaking, the first 20 minutes of this film are still worth watching, and the value becomes lower as it goes on, and in the end, it has degenerated into a very ordinary bad film... I am not pouring cold water on this kind of film that reflects the suffering of China, nor is it What angry youth, I just deeply regret that an excellent subject matter was wasted.
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