01 Reverse Boxing: Boxers and Agents
Undoubtedly, "Million Dollar Baby" is an anti-routine film. In a general commercial film, the protagonist will go from being unknown at the beginning to being a little famous, and then losing and sinking after suffering a blow, and finally cheering up and succeeding. . But this film broke the traditional routine of commercial films. After a small plot climax and a sharp turnaround, there is no new turning point. In fact, from the fact that blue or green tones have been used throughout the film, it can be seen that it will not have a perfect ending like ordinary commercial films.
The movie begins with Frankie's boxer Willie, a boxing match at a turning point, and then introduces a voice-over, which has been interspersed in the main plot of the movie ever since. But unlike many movies with voice-overs, Skrep who tells the voice-overs is also one of the main characters of the movie-once a boxer, Frankie used to be his wound caregiver, and now he is in Frankie’s boxing gym. Hit in the middle. This arrangement is not only to make it more convenient to show things that are difficult to show in the lens language, but also to effectively reduce the feeling that the audience is just watching a story due to the voice-over, thereby providing a more immersive experience.
As a boxing-themed movie, the three main characters in the film can correspond to two identities: Maggie and Skrepp are boxers, and Frankie is the agent. At the end of Willie's game, Maggie went from the dark to the light, but there was still a part of her face in the dark. The same was true of her conversation with Frankie in the corridor. Under the fixed row of lights above their heads, their faces flickered and dimmed, as if everything was in uncertainty.
Skrep repeated "everything in boxing is reversed" several times in the voice-over. On the surface, he was talking about the characteristics of boxing movements, but actually it corresponds to the relationship between the boxer and the agent. Frankie believes that the most important thing for a boxer is to protect himself forever. Therefore, he did not let Willie go to the championship two years ago. He also rejected Maggie's victory in 12 consecutive games against Billie, who is known for his vicious methods. Competition invitation.
The boxer’s characteristics contradicted the agent’s view. After a period of training, Maggie began to ask Frankie if she could go to the competition. After winning four rounds in a row, she told Frankie. She has been able to participate in six rounds of competition. She wanted to participate in the championship game against the British after she was promoted to welterweight. All of the above said that even if Maggie would listen to Frankie, she was a boxer. , She seems to be born not to seek stability, she loves challenges, loves physical fighting on the boxing ring, loves the cheers of the audience for her after winning the game, she has to rely on her fists to strike a world. For her, Protecting herself is not as important as challenging the strong and winning the game. In other words, as long as she stands on the boxing ring, the combative characteristics of boxers boiling in her blood will make her temporarily forget the need to protect herself.
This characteristic of a boxer is also shown in Skrep. He took Maggie to see another agent, Micky, and told Maggie that if she wanted to win the championship, Frankie was not a good choice because he was too safe, and the price of being safe was that the boxer might miss some opportunities. The same is true for Skrep himself. Frankie wanted to take back Skrep's 109th game all his life, but he wanted to participate in the 110th game, even if the 109th game blinded him.
People who have watched this movie would not think that Frankie is not a good agent, especially when he saw Maggie participate in the first game, Scorep told Frankie who went to watch that agent Sally was the first. Maggie, who participated this time, played against a boxer who had won 11 consecutive games, just to give another boxer under Sally a chance to compete with the champion boxer under the opponent’s agent. He didn’t care if Maggie could win or be hurt. Beat, even just want her to lose.
What boxers think is to beat their opponents in the boxing ring. For this reason, they need to take risks with their bodies and even their lives. What an agent like Frankie thinks is that boxers need to protect themselves instead of having to fight for it. All bet on the game, let his career end prematurely. The boxer and the agent’s ideas are so contradictory, but this contradiction creates the complementarity between the two types of people. Boxers need the strategy of an agent to help them have a greater certainty to win the championship, and the agent needs the cooperation of the boxers to give them more space to arrange. If these two different directions are to find a balance point that can play the most role, it requires the unreserved dedication and trust of the boxer and the agent in each other. This is exactly what Maggie and Frankie showed in the film.
02 Absence and reconstruction: father, daughter
In addition to boxing, the movie has another line-Frankie and Maggie's family. The scene of Frankie praying for his daughter soon after the movie opened, but apart from mentioning the name, his daughter never appeared in the movie from beginning to end. The letter he wrote to his daughter has been returned, Frankie Live alone all the time. At the end of the film, Skrepp wrote in a letter to Frankie's daughter: He hoped that Frankie who disappeared was looking for you, to ask for your forgiveness again. It is speculated that it may be that Frankie’s daughter left because of dissatisfaction with her father. The movie did not tell the audience that there was any conflict between Frankie and her daughter. It might be because the daughter could not accept that the father had been investing a lot of energy in operating the boxing gym and Training fighters ignores family members, and the gym has almost always been losing money. Of course, the director Eastwood did not explain the contradiction between Frankie and his daughter. On the one hand, it is because of the length of the film. If this layer is added, a two-hour movie may seem a little long, on the other hand. On the one hand, because deliberate blanking is necessary in the movie, the audience will think about the content of the blanking in the corresponding plot, and it will also make the movie more insinuating reality. The reasons are various, but there must be parents and children in reality. Contradictory and similar results of no longer living together or even contacting.
Contrary to Frankie, the film takes a relatively long time to show Maggie’s family. In addition to her dead father, her family has appeared in the film many times. The relationship between Maggie and her family is also cracked. But until the family came to the ward and asked her to bite the pen to sign the agreement on the transfer of property, she never completely disconnected from her family. Even on the way to take Frankie to eat the lemon pie that she had eaten with her father, Maggie has realized that no one cares about her except Frankie, but she has been waiting in front of the ward window to say something. Come to visit my mother. Just like Frankie kept writing to his daughter and going to church for mass, they all realized that it was impossible, but they still yearned for love from blood relatives deep in their hearts.
This lack of family love forms a strong contrast with the feelings between Frankie and Maggie that go beyond the boxer and the agent. They are more like real family than blood relatives. Just like in the car that night, the faces of the two are looming in the light. In fact, it also corresponds to the lack of love from the original family, and at the same time, there is a reconstruction of the family relationship between the two.
There are scenes of Frankie going to church four times in the film. The first two times are about him and his daughter: he asked the pastor what the Trinity means, what the Holy Spirit is, and what Jesus is. The priest hated him very much and called him a pagan. He didn't even understand the difference between Christianity and Catholicism. He asked Catholic priests about the Christian Holy Spirit. But Frankie went to church every week to celebrate Mass and prayed for his daughter. These two extremely contradictory behaviors appeared in a person, which made people feel Frankie's inner struggle. There is no doubt that he does not believe in it. Religious, but he needs an outlet to release his guilt and deep feelings for his daughter. Like most people, he chooses to seek help from God, but at the same time he knows that God cannot redeem him. The last two times about him and Maggie: the first time I only gave a flash shot, Frankie was sitting in the empty church with his head down, the second time was a conversation between him and the priest, facing Frankie was in pain at Maggie's request. He asked the pastor what to do, and the pastor told him to give Maggie to God. Frankie replied: She didn't ask God for help, she asked me for help. Significant However, in the most helpless when Frankie, he even went to seek the God of this export, but his heart still can not believe in God, he knows what needs to Maggie, at least better than God.
03 Achievement and loss: blending, making choices
The movie ends with an abnormal ending that shows the blending of the two identities of Frankie and Maggie. As a boxer, Maggie has played her last and most exciting game. She hopes that she can stay at the time when the applause and cheers are the highest; as a daughter, she has become Frankie’s burden, Frankie Kee spends all her time taking care of her, and she is even worse than the daughter who lost contact with Frankie, tying Frankie so that he can no longer do what he loves. As an agent, Frankie knew how painful it was for a boxer to lie in bed for life; as a father, he wanted to keep Maggie by his side. Another contradiction was revealed in the two of them separately, but Frankie had to make a choice. And in the end, it was not God who supported him, but Skrep, both as a boxer and as a friend.
Frankie became a boxer, but at the same time he lost a daughter. Just like a reverse boxing, sometimes the best way to make a heavy punch is to take a step back, and sometimes you have to take a few punches in order to expose your opponent. Everything can't be perfect, and even for Frankie, what he loses is more important. Danger is back at the end of the movie. There will never be a shortage of people who love boxing. The defeat of a champion means the birth of a new champion, but the family relationship between Frankie and Maggie, which is based on each other, is unique and will never be seen again.
04 The show of family affection in Eastwood movies
Most of the films that Eastwood starred in in his early actor career were western films. The western cowboy he played was deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. After switching to director and actor, he began to explore more possibilities in addition to western films. Since "Unforgivable" , He has directed "The Perfect World", "Land Bridges", "Mysterious River", "Million Dollar Baby", "Classic Cars" and other works that are different from the previous styles, discovering multi-faceted and multi-level emotions Present. Among them, "Perfect World", "Classic Car" and "Million Dollar Baby" all reflect Eastwood's understanding of family affection. In the three movies, the protagonists' affection from their native families is missing. They experience the care that should have come from their relatives from people who are not related by blood. Perhaps this is related to his own experience, but it allows us to see a perspective that is different from the traditional understanding of the family, and it also corresponds to the current discussion on the impact of injury from the original family on people. The expressions of movies tend to have stronger contrasts. In reality, perhaps some people's missing family affection from their original family will be made up for others, and perhaps not, and become permanent scars and pains.
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