Before introducing the plot, let’s take a look at popular science about what the "Beat Generation" is. When the post-90s had just spawned various social problems, some people called this generation "Beat Generation." This term was first put forward by an American writer, and the Beat Generation described the genre of writers and their lives were simple. , Rough, they always seek new excitement, seek absolute freedom, indulgence, and drug use. The characters in the play are not absolute representatives of the "Beat Generation" and have nothing to do with the writer, but the dark life revealed in the movie is not far from this term.
In the play, Harry and his friend Tyron are selling drugs on the street to earn money and hope to live a happy life with his girlfriend Marianne. Harry and Marian had always dreamed of opening a clothing store, but they were addicts. They wanted to make the first pot of money from drug trafficking but were squandered by them. They became puppets of drugs. Harry's mother, Sarah, is a TV fan. One day she received a call telling her that she could be on TV. She started a weight loss plan in order to wear the red dress that she wore when she was young, but she didn't want to be overwhelmed by drug addiction. Several people who were manipulated by drugs and drugs in their minds and bodies fell into nightmares because of the pursuit of "dreams," and sang a suffocating requiem.
Anyone with a jumping mind will like the reorganization and editing of this film. When Harry and Tyron took drugs, the director only used the unpacking of the poison powder, the imaging of the drugs under the microscope, the movement of cells, and the enlargement of the pupils. And it creates a picture of drug abuse in a rhythmic manner. Although there is no conventional drug abuse shot in the film, the shooting is more detailed and has a more sense of picture than the film itself. The film gives people a "different" feeling. There are not many shooting venues for the whole movie. Most of them are shot in closed houses. A large number of flash cuts (superimpose the images of different shots together for quick playback) and jump cut shots are not used for the movie. Major surgery, but filed out very naturally. There is a section in the film where Harry's mother Sarah does housework at home because she wants to lose weight and doesn't want to be distracting from the refrigerator. Quick jump cuts are accompanied by panning-cleaning from the bedroom to the living room does not make people feel funny, (jump cuts are generally used in mimes or comedies, giving people a funny feeling) because of this The background music of the time is exactly the sad song of "Requiem of Dreams", which is very natural and smooth from the perspective, camera, editing and background music nodes. The faster and faster picture overlay makes people have the illusion of playing photos-and the director or editor wants this illusion.
The two lines of the film are linear editing in a positive order, and the details in it make people feel that the details cannot be finer. This shooting method is incompatible with the sad and cramped style of the film, and it always makes people feel a kind of panic and restless discomfort. feel. In the film, in order to show the illusion presented by the characters during drug addiction and drug addiction, the director uses a fisheye lens and special processing of the sound, so that the audience will subjectively notice the distortion of the real scene, thus knowing that these pictures are all It's an illusion. The whole film does not have a big plot jump, so it is not a big problem to understand, but it is absolutely necessary to praise the director's stylized performance technique. Because the subjective feeling of creating a lens is difficult to grasp in this type of movie, it is not like an action movie, as long as the plot and the subjective and objective viewpoints of the camera are skillfully used, the audience can be easily brought into it. If you want to concentrate on being attracted by the film, you have to create unlimited possibilities. The montage under each shot and the close-up time of each actor must be repeatedly selected to achieve the most detailed, and the two lines in the film are described separately. Trivial but coherent, the plot is not distracted by the audience due to the compact photography and editing, and even brought into a gloomy mood. This kind of movie is terrible, maybe I've watched it once and I won't forget it again.
Talk about the plot. Everyone in the film has a "dream" that is neither big nor small. Harry and his girlfriend's dream was to open a clothing store, and Harry's mother wanted to put herself in a red dress when she was young. Their eyes were very soft when describing scenes about dreams. In the film, Harry had hallucinations twice: he saw his girlfriend Marian standing on a trestle bridge that stretched out by the sea. Once before taking drugs, his idea was pure at that time, that he could realize his dream and lead a peaceful life with Marian, and once was the fantasy that appeared when he had his arm amputated at the end of the film, and he walked to the coast. At the end of the night, Marianne disappeared, looking back, but fell into the dark abyss. The road ahead has not changed. What dream can be pursued on the long road of life? They are not the iconic characters of the Beat generation, but like "Guessing the Train", they describe the chaotic generation. You can find all the negative expressions on their faces, but they don't know it. , These people in the movie are deeply absorbed in the contradiction of self-reproduction, but there is no way to redeem themselves-they are not willing to redeem themselves at all.
Reality is a heavy hammer, but our dreams are always woven into a fitted uniform, so some people will take drugs, create illusions, and imagine what we are desperately eager to accomplish. This is the contradiction between dreams and reality;
When our mind and body are in a state of tension or pain, we will let ourselves go. Regardless of whether it is the mind or the body that is emptied, even the same can be released. So Harry and his mother satisfied themselves with drugs, but they were satisfied with the spirit but trampled on the body-that is, health. If you want to be healthy, the spirit has no sustenance. So they become passive after repeated struggles and self-compromise, until they lose everything. Although there is a good saying, the soul and the body must be on the road. They are indeed on the road-on the road to death, this is the contradiction between the body and the spirit;
what is endless? We have forgotten what despair is when we exchanged terms with the god of death. If you can imagine everything you desire when you are addicted, but being sober can only bring you loneliness and despair, then how would you choose? Anyone with normal thinking knows that being sober is the correct navigation in the life guide, but it is the pain of choice that makes them force themselves into the shackles that they cannot get out of. This is a contradiction between indulge and soberness. So just like those people who have dreams but go astray and continue to repeat contradictions, what we see is either melancholy or death.
The time transitions in the movie were extremely rough, the screen fell down, and the subtitles popped up, making people seem to be shocked by a violent bump. In the film, Tyron found drug dealers in the car to talk to them about a deal. There was a sudden gunshot, followed by a heavy sound. On the dark screen, the big white letters read "FALL". Fall means to fall. It has the meaning of autumn, which caters to the action of rudely dropping the screen. It also explains the changes in seasons, and it also hints that several people in the film are about to fall to the bottom of the follow-up plot. I was deeply shocked by this scene and impressed by the director's ubiquitous ghost thoughts in the film. This must be a beautiful art that can only be presented by an imaginative person. Just like his other film "Black Swan", all the dark and gentle things are kneaded together and poured carefully on the film, creating too many montages to "torture" the audience-you will always love it The image vomited by that invisible mouth in the movie.
Talking about music is the same as talking about colors. Music is an efficient auxiliary means to promote emotion and rhythm into the image. If the film and the soundtrack can interpret each other, then the soundtrack can no longer be called "background music" alone. The soundtrack can express what the dialogue in the film can't express. At the end of "Requiem for a Dream", the music has truly reached the realm of silence rather than sound. All people in the film lie in bed, curled up like babies and fall asleep. They continued to dream, but this dream was more real. Harry's mother saw in her dream that she was on a TV show. In the end, the movie ended with a mother-child dialogue and hug. The dreams that all people have are a kind of memorial to the former "dreams", which makes people want to sigh endlessly. For the expression of emotions, in order to fit the plot and the main idea, the film does not make too much viscous, salty and wet narration. If these are not enough to make us choke, the song "Requiem of Dreams" is played at the end of the film. "It is enough to let us store up a deep sense of melancholy and sorrow.
By the way, let's say an exaggerated introduction: If you dare not take drugs but want to try the endless gloom and suffocation after drug addiction, then go watch this movie. If you are willing to watch it a second time, then something must bite your pain point. I didn't mean to magnify it too much, it's just that this movie is the best dark material movie I've seen so far. In the film, Sarah fantasizes about her "confrontation" with the refrigerator after her drug addiction is shot very cleverly. Due to taking diet pills for a long time and not daring to open the refrigerator to eat for fear of gaining weight, Sarah has a sense of fear of the refrigerator. When she fantasizes about being on TV, the refrigerator will hunt and hunt, so she is very afraid and keeps going. Take diet pills. On the one hand, she fantasized about being on TV and was thrilled, while the refrigerator on the other side threatened her constantly, forcing her to eat things that would kill her. In fact, all this is an illusion, and even at the end the director told us that the TV was not turned on. This contradiction grew stronger and stronger. In the last half hour of the film, the audience was sucked into a moist and painful net with strong tension, but at the end of the film, they forgot to take us out of the gloom. Do you think there is a way to relieve the pain that accumulates because of the plot? The answer is absolutely no, we can only hold a breath and tell ourselves that this is just a movie.
Our lives are definitely not like this, our lives will not coincide with their life trajectories, but in this movie neither the political darkness nor the hideousness of society is seen, but an invisible color and sunshine are shown. The sorrowful background. "I don't see a color in ten days", there is no decent explanation in the encyclopedia, but this sentence alone is enough to dig into the pulse of despair.
When I was young, I was always asked what my dream was for the future.
Now I understand that dreams with colors are all good.
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