Limitations of Hong Kong-style art concept
"Dance it!" "The Pleiades" is a work I like very much. Masato Tsang transplanted the atmosphere of life and death, limits, and blood and tears in "Firefighter's Story" to the seemingly soft and elegant ballet theme. Dance is also the problem of LIFE AND DEATH. When the heroine Subaru Miyamoto was a child, she used dances to communicate with her terminally ill and demented twin brother every day. Even the trivial things like "seeing a cat on the street" had to do her best to jump out of the cat, otherwise the younger brother Unable to understand, Subaru felt that his younger brother was pulled a little further away by the god of death. For Subaru, dance is a matter of life and death, and an incredible breakthrough occurs at the limits of the mind and body. For example, Subaru wanted to dance the group dance of "Swan Lake", but because she had always been a lonely genius and couldn't integrate into the rhythm of the group, she was forced to walk on the street blindfolded to learn, just when she was almost hit by a truck. , She discovered that at the time of life and death, under extreme concentration, the movement of time and everything would slow down, and everything could be transported in the palm of her hand, and she entered a new realm. In serious pursuit, extreme perseverance, and true elites, art presents its cruelty. It is an ideal country, but it is also extremely cruel. Subaru's teacher, Isuzu's mother-in-law, was turned away by the world's top dance troupe when she was found to be obese in her family. And the fat Isuzu explained his past to Subaru and asked Subaru who was about to dance in Vienna: "Even in such a cruel palace of art, do you want to go in?" Subaru also went forward resolutely.
Later, this set of comics was adapted into a movie and directed by Li Zhiyi from Hong Kong. It immediately became an unusually mediocre, middle school student trial-style scene. At the end, Subaru performed a public performance of "Swan Lake". Her father originally opposed his daughter's career in dancing. After that, she turned to affirm her daughter's ambitions, and her daughter was also very pleased, as if she was very satisfied. This is really a Hong Kong-style perspective. After watching the movie, I was irritable: Art was originally a problem of LIFE and DEATH, why once it is in the hands of Hong Kong people, art is not even a matter of taste, but only a matter of career choice? Years ago, there was a theater work "Fasting Girl K", and there was a similar situation-based on Kafka, but it seemed that he only wanted to persuade parents to let their children engage in art.
Art beyond everyday morality
"Black" talks about art in a popular drama style, but with the kind of vanity pursuit of status, the pursuit of perfection, and the suppression of sex by the special family environment, the heroine Nina ( Nedali Baowen) The tension of engaging in art can be understood by the general public, and it has also found an interpretation of daily life for art themes. And the film has been focusing on several basic principles of art.
What must be insisted is that Nina was entangled by the heart demon and fell into chaos, so that she was jealous of the former chief dancer, betrayed her mother, and was seduced by sex. The movie does not regard it as a depravity, but the completion of art. In everyday society, art often ignores the standards of good and evil and morality. Nina has a tendency to be morally clean, sexually restrained, and guilty of her desire to snatch the position of the chief dancer. She couldn't face her dark heart. Movies allow art to submerge reality and require thorough physical and mental investment to perform perfectly. For the modern people represented by Nina, who generally only pursue technical perfection and have some inner reservations, it seems very harsh and painful. The film clearly shows that her self-deception is an obstacle to artistic breakthrough (compared with California dancers who represent freedom and liberation). The dark part of daily training that needs to be suppressed, but art has to force you to face it, and even force you to release it. [quote]
Negating reality is sure to rebel
"Black" is almost all subjective narrative, a subjective perspective of a mental patient. In fact, the audience knew that everything was Nina’s own demon, "Nothing happened." However, a large number of hand-cranked mirrors followed Nina's back and close-up hair buns, as if ghosts followed. The thriller format is predictable. Still call for sensory reactions under the plot. The tension of the movie lies in the audience's limited knowledge and the same angle as the hallucinating Nina, a state of "I don't know what Nina did." And the film is different from the novel's first-person limited perspective. Nina has no time to reveal her feelings. She spends all her time discovering (real/illusion), and covering up, in the two positions of the victim and the criminal. Conversion, orgasm is always accompanied by fright, and the movie relies on these points to create a sense of tension.
And this consistent subjective narrative, to the end, is not to call the audience to sympathize with Nina, on the contrary, it requires the audience to surpass themselves in extreme self-pity together with Nina. When Nina knew that she was badly injured, but determined to play the full play, she was relieved and radiant with makeup powder on the mirror, the key transformation was completed: Nina could even complete her tragedy in ecstasy.
Like Isabel in "Piano Teacher". Like Yubei, Nina has a sickly restrained and ambiguous mother. The mother is both protection and shadow. Nina wanted to escape from her mother's control, but escape also meant danger. No matter how annoying this mother is, from a realistic point of view, she said that her daughter is "ill" and "this role will ruin you." It turns out to be the truth. And the film sticks to the perspective of the mentally ill, the perspective of rebelling against the daughter, that is, the perspective of art: it is better to fight for your life than to bow to reality. In the end, the daughter gave a performance that shocked the audience under the illusion and awakeness. The mother was also shocked by the performance in the audience to tears. When approved by everyone including the director of the dance company, she was fatally injured, but Nina was bathed in perfect light (perhaps in a state of complete narcissism), completely ignoring her own injuries, and even others’ Praise-the self-completion of art is fundamentally beyond the above two. The movie does not even explain whether Nina is dead or not, to show that art is out of life and death. The long applause at the end of the film affirmed Nina's performance, morbidity, rebellion, and desperateness, and affirmed the victory of the daughter who cannot support herself against her mother.
Art and the public
When talking about art in Hong Kong now, the most talked about is how to be hindered by the surrounding environment and unable to do what you want to do. In a word, it is similar to the question of choosing a career—and this is only the most marginal part of art. From the perspective of artistic creation, instead of persuading, it is better to perform directly, so that those who do not understand can be directly persuaded by the magical charm of art, instead of being persuaded by the pitiful situation of the art workers. Of course, this has something to do with the marginal position of art itself in Hong Kong. Hong Kong people may not even understand what it means to be the principal dancer of the No. 1 Ballet in New York in "Black", or even harder to understand that Hong Kong is often right and wrong. The full-time art is actually A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH; art workers are also inevitably affected. A little concentration on art or insisting on seeing things according to the standards of art is considered to be a serious matter. But it's like "Dance! Good mass cultural products such as "Pleiades" and "Black Swan" can start from a realistic situation, and in the process of interpreting art, they can infect the public with the LIFE and DEATH force of art. Good mass cultural products are not necessarily art, but at least one must understand what art is.
The real experience of a woman fully echoes the art work-this idea is often ridiculed in the art world in Hong Kong, but on the one hand, it is not only a dream of some people, but also in line with the evergreen law of classic art. For art and revolution, there is the same question: cynics who are crazy about art and ideals, or are soberly detached, which one should we choose?
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