"Jin Yiwei" is such a dragon that travels through time and space. It inherits the golden age of all Hong Kong movies, and it has made further progress, but found that the so-called "Old Port" that was nurtured by new martial arts movies no longer recognize it. . The reason is "the story is too superficial and the lines are too ridiculous". This dislocation is embarrassing. So, who is wrong? Is this movie really ordinary and not worth it? Or have we been so edified by the wind knife and frost sword of the mainland movie market that we can't distinguish the good from the bad?
Let me pick my point of view first. I think this movie is the best martial arts work in the new century, and its aesthetic form is the forefront of Chinese martial arts movies. After deducting the points lost in the plot, even in the new wave of martial arts in the early 1990s, it will be of medium-to-high quality.
In order not to overcomplicate the problem, we can start with the new martial arts movies of the 1980s and 1990s to interpret the ins and outs of this work. The first reason is that this recent work obviously has the deepest connection with this type of film, and the second is that the new martial arts film is the pinnacle of Chinese martial arts movies, through which all the previous martial arts context can be traced. Here we will not mention the mainland martial arts movies of the new century, because those are freaks.
Let’s start with the most basic question. What are the core elements of the new martial arts works that fascinated us back then? After distinguishing these, we can talk about the origin of "Jinyiwei". I have summarized it myself, there are about 4 points, 1, animation-style exaggerated art, 2, photography, editing and special effects, 2, music, 3, Hu Feng. This is certainly not complete, and I look forward to adding it, but I think it basically covers the most impressive aspects of the works we call "New Martial Arts".
Let’s talk about them one by one below.
One, anime-style exaggerated art
For a long time, Hong Kong martial arts films are all Chinese martial arts, and their art can be roughly divided into three stages. First, before the early 1960s, the stage of the stage represented by Cantonese fragments and Shaw Brothers' martial arts, mainly borrowed from the costumes of Peking Opera. Of course, it is said that there are also western cowboy costumes in "The Three Heroes of Wang", which I have not seen. , Shaw’s costumes and dance styles in the late 1960s were mostly borrowed from Japanese sword halberds, which I have learned. Let alone the nonsense of nationalism, this reflects the vigorous vitality of mutual absorption and integration between genres.
The second stage is the realistic stage. Shaw Brothers movies began in the late 1960s and gradually abandoned those stage-oriented and unfavorable appearances. With the evolution of martial arts movies to kung fu movies, costumes and props that meet the requirements of human movement and have a certain historical and realistic basis have become the mainstream. The final stage is those we saw in TVB martial arts dramas. Hu Jinquan’s films represent the ultimate in realism, but they have not become mainstream due to the cost of labor and materials.
The third stage is the exaggerated anime style of the new martial arts. One of the sources of this style is the animation culture represented by Japan, such as the undefeated Imagawa Yoshimoto in the East and the short dress in the Renfeng. But I think-I'm going to risk the world's worst-the main source of inspiration for the new martial arts movie is Hu Jinquan!
Everyone knows that Tsui Hark and Master Hu had a very unpleasant quarrel in "Swordsman and Swordsman", but it is also obvious that the form of Tsui Hark's movie is obviously very similar to that of Hu Jinquan's movie, especially in terms of clothing, which is 90%. Copied. Examples can be said to be everywhere. The handkerchief worn on Tanzi's head in "The New Dragon Inn" was worn by Wu Mingcai in "The Rain in the Sky". Ning Caichen's rucksack in "A Chinese Ghost Story" was also borrowed from Sun Yue in "The Rain in the Sky". The scholar uniforms worn by the knights in "Swordsman" is obviously the same as Wu Jiyuan in "The Picture of the Loyalty". Of course, a gust of wind is not only the clothes, but also the white ones, which were lent to "Green Snake", "Blessings of Love" and "Sword." Xu Feng's hair bun in "The Rain in the Sky" was passed to Xiaoqian in "A Chinese Ghost Story". The burqa in "The Drunk Man" is also called Gu Gonggong in "The Swordsman" to perform qigong.
There are too many to mention. If you are interested in comparing Tsui Hark's previous martial arts works such as "Butterfly Change" in "Swordsman", you can see how much he has been influenced by Hu Jinquan in terms of art. So that his works look like they happened in the Ming Dynasty no matter what dynasty the background of the era is! The new martial arts standard bearers are like this, not to mention those who follow suit.
Because of this, it is hard to say that the style of the new martial arts is realistic, but can only be said to be an anime style that combines Gothic, Oriental, and Rococo styles.
Needless to say, "Jin Yiwei" inherited this vein. And it was very pure and pure—I went directly back to Hu Jinquan. The director himself explained that hat that has been criticized a lot, but he still doesn't understand it. If you have any questions, please see here. You can question Li Rengang's historical common sense, but you can't jump up and say that Hu Jinquan is also confused, right?
There is also the pure quiet crown of Zhao Shenyan played by Liu Songren.
The art in "Jinyiwei" is divided into two types: realistic and freehand, and freehand, we will talk about it later. As long as it is clear and realistic here. The propaganda always compares Li Rengang and Zhang Che, and he himself admits that, but I always think that whether Tsui Hark or Li Rengang is good, they owe Hu Jinquan far more than Zhang Pili.
Second,
the achievements of photography, lighting, editing and special effects in this aspect of the new martial arts film can be called its most distinctive feature. I still remember the first time I saw "Human Dao" in the video room. After I came out, I was stupid.
Those who have watched old movies such as "Wulin Sacred Fire Order" and "Tathagata Palm" should understand that those methods such as rapid editing, steel wire and animation special effects have roots in Hong Kong movies. But the masterpiece is obviously the new martial arts, which completely revolutionized the form of Chinese martial arts movies.
After all, the title of this article is not "New Martial Arts Film Theory". In order to save space, I will choose some of the paragraphs involved in "Jin Yiwei" to discuss.
Regarding photography, the style of "Jin Yiwei" is quite different from the style of Tsui Hark's school in the new martial arts. There are basically no tricky positions and perspectives throughout the article. I think this is because Li Rengang's worldview is different from that of Tsui Hark, which is more moderate and peaceful, not so extreme. When Li Rengang is shooting literary dramas, the camera is mostly kept in a horizontal position, which is quite satisfactory.
The most reminiscent of the photography of "Jin Yiwei" is the other two new martial arts classics "The White Haired Witch" and "Evil West Poison". There have been several times in the middle that used to render the details of heroes. If you are interested, you can pay attention to it. The people who are photographed are particularly attractive, the so-called romantic martial arts. This method is simple to say, it has not been seen on the big screen for more than ten years!
The other is the fast and slow mirror that only emerged after the decline of the new martial arts, accompanied by the rapid movement of the camera. Since Lao Du played this trick in "Dark War", he quickly copied it from the martial arts TV series, but it was a pity that it was used too much, and it was too bad. There are impressive shots in "Jin Yiwei", including the beginning of Qinglong hoisting a steel cable to avoid the oncoming officers and soldiers in the mansion of Zhao Taifu, and a shot of the middle musket team on the way. I probably used a few rendering characters in the play, but not obvious. This is the cleverness of Li Rengang-use it, but don't abuse it, only use it where it should be used.
The shots of the whole film can be said to be very meticulous. It is said that it is a commercial production, and it is more beautiful than domestic art films. For example, in the conversation between Qinglong and Zhao Shenyan in Taifu's Mansion, as the content of the conversation deepened, the scene of pros and cons continued to grow, and finally Qinglong shouted: "Enough!" It was already a face. The close-up shot unexpectedly jerked and turned into a close-up, sharply increasing its power. Hong Kong directors can be meticulous to this point.
The lighting of the new martial arts movie, Dabing has summarized an important feature, that is, the use of volumetric light. This is most obvious in the cellar of Yanmenguan and in the ancient city of Sirius. The former is accompanied by a gate with complicated patterns, and the latter is a hideous statue of King Kong. The effect is super good!
The lighting in the first half hour of the film is the latest martial arts. According to Dabo, the night in Hong Kong in the film is always strangely blue and bright. The first half hour of the plot reminded me of the first episode of "Wolf with Strap" (the coolest episode), and the pure night scene shooting reminded me of two other movies that also focused on night scenes, "The White Haired Witch" and " "The Swordsman". By the way, this arrangement of the film is reasonable. The front shows the dark mission of Qinglong, so it is a night scene, and the back is mostly a day scene, which shows the recovery of his humanity after he abandoned the dark and cast the light. In the end, he rode his horse in the setting sun. The meaning and the light become one, cleansing the evil. They are all very well arranged.
The editing of "Jin Yiwei", of course, follows the fast editing of the new martial arts (in fact, the source is from Hu Jinquan). Many people complain that the editing is too broken and unsightly. I suggest these people go to watch the taekwondo competition. That will definitely understand. People who are not nurtured by the new martial arts, it is difficult to receive so much information quickly, and then put together a complete fighting scene, which is the same as the parents can not understand the comics.
At the end of this paragraph, I talk about computer stunts. The so-called computer stunts of the new martial arts are actually very crude. It's not comparable to the following "Feng Yun", "Chinese Hero" and the like, but it has one advantage, that is, it serves the plot and does not twist the bridge for the sake of showing special effects. This point, "Jin Yiwei" has also inherited, the film actually has a lot of special effects, but they are all properly embedded in the development of the story, so that you can't watch the drama. For example, a bird’s eye view of the Tianying gang charge is suddenly pulled into the air, presenting a panoramic view of Yanmen Pass. This is an explanation of the environment. The magical skill of getting rid of gold and shelling is integrated with elements of fighting and beauty, and only feels a kind of weird beauty. It's not to demonstrate technology. Stunts appear here to create dramatic conflict, which is a good habit.
Speaking of the Tianying Gang charge, there was an editing error that I had to talk about. It was the straight forward path in the long-term view. Later, in order to avoid the question of why Jin Yiwei's crossbow arrows could not hit them, an explanation of the horse team's turning was added.
Three, music.
In terms of music, the new martial arts are a big improvement over the old martial arts. Needless to say, the soundtrack of traditional martial arts films, the Huangmei tune era, in the 1970s and 1980s, it was copied a little bit from the east and a little bit from the west. The film really had a special soundtrack for the original soundtrack, which was also the contribution of the new martial arts. And there is one more ancient theme song in this soundtrack, such as "Don't Come at Dawn", "Proud", "A Laugh from the Sea", "White Haired Red Face", etc. Needless to say. Counting, the only exceptions are "New Dragon Inn" and "Evil and West Poison", but the soundtrack is also a classic. It can be said that there is a complete film soundtrack and a theme song that complements the drama. This is a magic weapon for the new martial arts to ramp up the arena.
The soundtrack of "Jinyiwei" can be said to be a collection of the symphony style of "Evil East and West Poison" and traditional folk music theme. A desolate and heroic mood. In the play, whether the "White Tiger Fights and Tuotuo" are charming and charming, or the bloody battle in the ancient city of Sirius, the soundtrack greatly expands the atmosphere of the screen. Finally, the scene where Qinglong riding his horse and stepping on the drums in the yellow sand sunset reminds me of the classic soundtrack of "Heaven and Earth alone" in "Evil and West Toxic".
The theme song "Jin Yiwei" opens with a melodious matouqin. Although Sa Dingding's performance is slippery, the song itself is indeed a rare masterpiece in recent years. Regardless of the attitude towards the movie, at least this is recognized by everyone.
Related to music is sound. The sound of the fierce fighting scenes in "Jin Yiwei" is indelible. What impressed me the most was that when the whip was released, at least two sounds were used to set off the power, one is the sound of metal breaking through the air, and the other is similar to the sound of a rattlesnake crawling on the sand. One is rigid and the other is soft, and the effect is excellent. When the judge of the desert took off from the duel, a lion roar sounded at the moment of a split in the air. Comparing with "The Thorn Tomb" a while ago, it can be seen that the use of sound in the play of "Jin Yiwei" is much more sophisticated. It's a pity that these catching sound effects are forgotten by ordinary viewers after being nervous, and they don't know how to experience it.
From the perspective of music and sound, "Jinyiwei" not only inherited the achievements of the peak of Chinese martial arts, but also made further progress. Even the sound effects of cutting bamboo are hyped in domestic martial arts films, which is a joke.
Fourth, Hu
Feng Hu Feng is just a general statement, a little more literary words should be multicultural or mixed culture. History is inherently mixed with multiple cultures, and this has increasingly become the mainstream of historiography. The ancient background of martial arts films makes it inevitably to express its stance on this issue. The difference in this statement is also one of the characteristics of the new martial arts.
Traditional martial arts movies are generally about internal struggles in Han society, and aliens appear as challengers or admirers of the Central Plains civilization at most. The Japanese samurai challenged the Central Plains knights without getting tired of taking pictures. That was the challenger, and the Fanbang woman who had a crush on the knights in the "Ruxia" in the 1960s was the admirer.
This situation changed a lot in the 1980s and 1990s. To a certain extent, the new martial arts can be regarded as the aftermath of the new wave, and the standard bearers of the new wave have a background of studying abroad. If you are fascinated by the new foreign history and have experienced cultural collision yourself, you will naturally be sensitive to foreign cultures. Reflected in the movie, that is "Hu Feng" flourishing.
There is no need to mention those few classic trilogy of Tsui Hark. The old dryad’s hair bun was borrowed from the Mongolian nationality, and the western dress of the thirteenth aunt was fascinated by Huang Feihong. The good-looking Sun-Moon Sect was placed in the Miao area, under the hands of the undefeated aunts in the East and the undefeated aunts in the East and the West. It is from the warriors and ninjas of the East to the Spanish Musketeers, the entire Allied Forces of the Eighteen Nations. The pirates in "Dragon City Fighting Overlord" talked about their affair in Paris. Before they finished speaking, they were killed under the revolvers of Huang Feihong and Guijiaoqi. In "The Knife", Ding'an bought the cross on the market and finally saved him. In a disaster, the white-haired witch's beaded and jade head is clearly dressed as a Tibetan. Until "Seven Swords", Old Monster Xu did not forget to equip each of the soldiers with a Spanish helmet.
All in all, the aesthetic style of Xinwuxia is a multicultural grocery store. As long as you have an open heart, you can travel the world in it.
What's fun is that the origin of the new martial arts is the inherited Hu Jinquan. As we said before, the artist of "The Legend of the Loyalty" can be the original form of the "Swordsman" series. From the scene of the Japanese Ronin standing on the beach trying to restore the country, to Wu Jiyuan's dress up, the "Swordsman Series" is always following the same steps. The dress of Wu Ruoshi, the heroine of the She nationality, can be considered to have inspired the setting of Miao borders-everyone who studies ethnology knows that Miao Yao She has no family. Hu Jinquan's aesthetic concepts were extremely cutting-edge back then. Just look at Zhang Che's virtues in photographing the Mongols in "Jianghu Manzi" and "Badaolouzi".
The artwork of "Jin Yiwei" directly reminds me of Tsui Hark's late "Knife". Although both of the two classics took place in the western border towns, the art of "Knife" is obviously a better reflection of the local cultural mixed situation than "Evil and West Poison". Those costumes that are rich in the characteristics of the ethnic minorities in the northwest mark Xu Kesheng's most mixed-and-matched art classic. "Jin Yiwei" went even further than that, and simply dressed Yanmenguan as an Islamic city, and all the people who ran in the market were Hu'er. I don't know if the characters are consistent with historical facts, but it is still possible that Husbands live in the distribution centers of the tea-horse exchange market. The key is Li Rengang's multicultural appeal. I guess it has something to do with his experience of studying in Canada, and he must be influenced by Tsui Hark.
Those who are interested can pay attention to the judge of the desert, don't just know how to criticize Wu Zun's Taiwanese accent, pay attention to the gold coin in his hand. Does anyone think it is weird? Why not an ingot of silver or a coin? Because that is the currency of Central Asia, which is quite common in border trade. From the close-up view of the one in the movie, there is a portrait of an Islamic warrior riding a horse, with letters on the edges. Li Rengang obviously referred to historical objects. Is the coin that Ji Sunsi threw to the servant in "Confucius" is the silver or the shovel coin, does he dare to show you a close-up? This is the work of detail.
The art of "Jinyiwei" combines the characteristics of the Central Plains and Islam. The key is that he did it well no matter where he started, from the temples of the Central Plains, to the rivers and lakes of the Han people, and then to the border towns of Hu'er, as long as he did not deliberately pursue the shape. The exaggeration, every detail is very authentic. Many people criticize "Jin Yiwei" for not understanding historical facts. The problem is that they have not proved that they understand historical facts!
Through the above analysis, I believe it can be clearly seen that "Jinyiwei" is the highest peak of Chinese martial arts culture-the inheritance and development of Hong Kong's new martial arts film, and encompasses all the most critical core features. Some people say, you haven't told the story yet! That’s because I think that compared to other core elements, the story of the new martial arts movie is not surprising. Most of the “what’s new” are new wines in old bottles, at most there are some more gay elements, compared with the old movies. It's not new. The key image signs of the new martial arts can actually be put into the different demands of each director to bloom different beauty.
I hope these analyses can show one thing, that is, "Jinyiwei" has roots, standing at the foot of the dragon veins of a hundred years of martial arts movies, and behind it is the accumulation of efforts of several generations of martial arts film workers. This was originally a legacy that belongs to all Chinese people, but it has been ignorantly discarded in the last ten years. The frivolous mainland directors think that they can transplant their success in the literary film on this fertile soil that has been turned over countless times. The facts only prove their stupidity. The new bargains they shoot are completely opening up history. Reversing. Although movies such as "Mo Attack", "Courage of the Name" and "Seven Swords" are also advancing on the basis of the new martial arts, they are only experimental products and have not yet formed a unique style. In the past ten years, there is only one movie that can continue the new martial arts context and advance on the basis of absorbing the advanced aesthetics of the East and the West.
So it is not difficult to understand why I am so excited. Movies are live art. For ordinary fans who walk out of the theater, the impact of sound and light will gradually become indifferent. Only the plot and lines can be chewed repeatedly. If you chew too much, the so-called unreasonable and mischievous will naturally come out. But don't forget that the surging emotions in the cinema are also not false, they are all paving the way for meticulous sound and pictures, and they are worth savoring. I'm not saying this to justify the unsatisfactory script of "Jin Yiwei". I just think that such a work with outstanding effects in audio-visual aspects should not be dismissed by the scene of "zero score in literary drama, good martial arts".
For fans of martial arts films, if you are indeed influenced by the new martial arts, if you are not satisfied with the current situation of martial arts films in the last ten years, then I hope you can support "Jin Yiwei" like me. Just because he proved one thing-our memory has not died, he is still growing up with us. Faced with an old friend who has returned from the tragedy, are you still willing to recognize him?
PS. Five years ago, I was also excited about "Seven Swords" and wrote a long article. The process was very happy. Five years later, this feeling came back again, because it made me feel that I was back to the little fan of the sky. At this stage, a lot of the sophistication and vulgarity that have been contaminated in the past five years have been lost. Because it is casual writing, it is inevitable to be scattered and scattered. It seems that this is for Li Rengang, no, it is for the sake of volunteering for the martial arts movie. Thousands of readers beg for your understanding!
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