The reason for its endurance is not necessarily due to its profound thoughts and complicated plots, but because of its extraordinary entertainment. Coward has always been good at writing witty words, and his works have always matched the local spirit of the middle class, popular without losing elegance. The humor is long. Before the filming started, he had instructed Lean to say: "Young man, just follow the script to shoot." But as the actor Rex Harrison said, "When you are shooting a movie like "Happy Ghost" It’s extremely painful to work with someone who doesn’t have a sense of humor like David Lean.” The future epic master blended his personal style into this typical Coward play, so that he saw it after the film was completed. Coward couldn't help saying: "You screwed up my most proud work." The
film tells about the crime/spiritual novelist Charles. In order to collect material, he invited the psychic Mrs. Arcadi to the mentality of reading jokes. The family "calls the soul", do not want to really call out the undead of his ex-wife Avila who died young. At first this evoked the old feelings between him and his ex-wife, but as Avila and his current wife Ruth broke out In the jealous battle between women, he gradually felt that he didn't want any woman...
"Happy Ghost" combines horror and supernatural elements, but it is still a downright family drama in essence, and it is full of black humor: Avila moved her hands and feet in Ruth's car, causing Ruth He died in a car accident. However, even such a tragic accident still cannot change the light and bright style of the film. Charles not only did not show much sadness for Ruth's death, but even after Ruth returned as a ghost, he was bored and wanted deliberately. The expulsion of the ghosts of the two deceased wives further highlights the cruel nature of the absurdity and nihility of the married life-in terms of achieving this level, Lien has contributed. Although his dignified and restrained adaptation lacks the hilarious flavour of the drama, it is more literary.
This film does not have the strong sense of the stage in a movie adapted from a general drama. The performance strives to be true and natural. The language of the lens is the same as that of a general movie. In the scene of driving out with Avila, the police saw with horror that Charles was talking to the empty driver's seat in the car that was going away. It was interesting that the theater did not have. In addition, he has made a lot of changes to the characters' personalities; Coward is a prolific mass artist whose works are mostly not polished. Although the lines are wonderful, they are not tailor-made for each character. If judged from a professional perspective, how much Will feel a little unhappy.
In the original work, the distinction between the two wives is not very great, because they both give people the impression of chattering, which makes the audience easy to feel sympathy for the male protagonist mixed in, so as to forget his arrogance, selfishness, and acrimony. In fact, the disciples are the root of all tragedies, and have evolved into a drama of "how miserable men are". Ruth in the movie is much more cute. In this movie with countless weirdos, she is the closest to ordinary people. All actions are to defend her rights, and she is no longer a wayward and arrogant Xiaojiabiyu; Avila It has the demeanor of a mysterious mature woman and is quite temperamental.
Of course, Coward’s characterization is also remarkable. The psychic Madame Arkadi is an image that can be included in the history of drama. For decades, many actresses have been honored to challenge her. In this film, Ma Greet Rutherford set a benchmark for this role. At a glance, you can see that Mrs. Arkadi is incompatible with her surroundings: her face always has a brilliant smile that can't eat the fireworks, even if she is tall and walks, she still floats like dancing, her tone of voice is suppressed, and her body language is extremely rich. , So a little carelessness will be exaggerated and disgusting, but Rutherford’s heat is very appropriate, creating a weird but not stupid effect, even though there is no witch’s crucible and crystal ball in her room , Just relying on daily objects such as kettles and bird cages can also create a magical atmosphere. Due to the large space for this role to play, the drama actresses of the younger generations are not limited to this, creating a variety of Mrs. Arkadi, which has become a major attraction of "Happy Ghost"-for example, some In the version, Mrs. Akadi becomes a red-haired, hard-faced strong woman.
Lean’s greatest contribution is a far more interesting ending than the original play. In the drama version, Charles was unable to "exorcise ghosts", so he decided to make the best plan, but he closed the door and the two ghosts smashed the house to pieces. In the movie version, the actor also decided to run away from home and announced that he would take a boat (because ghosts cannot exist on the waterway for too long) to spend a big vacation in the distance, because he finally "understands that he has never enjoyed a personal life in his life." "; The two ladies packed his boxes, put on coats, opened the door, and put the luggage into the car. He accepted them happily and drove away happily. Driving to the bridge, the car was destroyed by the ghosts and turned over the cliff. Charles died, joined the team of the dead wives and became another "happy ghost"-they would never be separated. According to this, Lean’s version and the drama version have become two completely different stories in connotation, deeper and more humorous, and some critics even think that it is quite the style of Sartre’s “Confinement”.
For this reason, although the film received low reviews when it was first released, it has now been regarded as a representative work of David Lean in his early years, from which we can see the future with films such as "Lawrence of Arabia" and "Doctor Zhivago". The master of fame. In addition, although the ghosts in the film are green enough for photosynthesis from the current point of view, they not only won the Hugo Award "Best Drama Performance" nomination that year (in 2012, the winner of the award was "Dr. Who" "), also won the Oscar for the best visual effects, which can also help the audience feel the style of the 1940s film industry.
(Originally published in "Watching Movies")
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