There is a question behind the controversy about "Three Billboards", that is, how should we watch the movie? I will refute some of the accusations on the market, but this does not mean that I do not accept negative arguments. I only think that most of these criticisms are unsound, and none of them makes me feel reasonable. But when we watch a movie, how should we watch it? Or even, how should we be a good audience? If you are a producer or director, you will no longer be a pure audience when you watch a movie. How can you face the discrepancy in standards caused by the audience and your identity? I'm not here to talk about those empty truths, but after reading too many manuscripts, I try to make a mess.
◆Is this work too dramatic?
My answer: "Three Billboards" is indeed very dramatic in terms of structure, characters, and dialogue design, but drama is not the same as drama. The beginning of the story is a song and a set of billboard shots. From a distance, it is seen as a ridge with a peak. This is still the language of the film. If it is a drama, its starting tone needs to emphasize the overall sense of the space, which may be a fixed shot. Until the singing is finished. "Three Billboards" is still a work told in film language. No one in film history has stipulated how the shots must be shot and how long they last. The meaning of montage is very important to it. And its performance is still cinematic, not dramatic.
The shots of "Three Billboards" do not focus on portraying the relationship between people, but on the interaction between trivial words, so it looks fragmented. But this deliberate circumvention of the relationship between characters is also at play, and it expresses the loneliness traits shared by the characters in the play.
We still feel that the long shot of Dixon hurting the little boy is very bright. When we watch it for the first time, we don't even notice that it is a long shot, nor do we feel the director's dazzling elements. This roughly shows that Martin Macdonald has consciously chosen to reduce the lens traces and focus the audience's attention on the story and the characters. This is an appropriate approach for a highly dramatic story.
The lack of sharpness of the lens and audiovisual does not mean that it is inappropriate. Moreover, a musical movie is not just a playlist, hand-drawn cartoons, nor an art gallery. How should we face up to the vitality and possibility of film language as a language?
◆Some people also compared the plot of the heroine interacting with the deer with the deer in "Escape from Deadly Town", thinking that the latter is superior and the former is clumsy.
This is a one-sided statement that only made audio-visual analysis but not drama analysis, and broke the connection between the two. In "Escape from the Deadly Town", the appearance of the deer is a warning, a symbol, a metaphor, a mirror image, and a logo that needs to gather the audience's intelligence. The creator must use a very artistic lens to show it, here Remind the audience to pay attention to the deer in order to attract the audience's ideas. And the deer in "Three Billboards" is just like a cute dog, cat, and cat encountered in real life, and does not bear other meanings, just like the beetle that can not turn over at the beginning of the story, it is to show the female protagonist’s tender side. The props and tools, the camera still can't dominate here. Two different functions, the front is heavy and the back is light, naturally there is no meaning of contrast.
In fact, Lalang matching is meaningful, but Lalang matching also means that you are using existing experience to match another experience.
◆Some people think that Martin Macdonald is not a brilliant director with many details.
In fact, denying a person’s feelings in this way is the same as the official banning of an inferior artist, because it does not have the consciousness to analyze the authorship of the director, which can often see the creator’s own value system. The value system and cognition are the fundamentals that determine how far a creator can go. What is authorship? These are some consistent styles and concepts in his works. For example, in "Three Billboards", Martin Macdonald still used the priest segment to feed back his doubts about God (but this is not an antichrist), just like the "Little Christ" in his early drama "Pillow Man" , Also like the bloody and sinful things that happened in the church in "The Killer Has No Holiday".
Martin Macdonald established such an order: God, you see, these naked evils are happening under your nose, but you don't act, and even help the abuser. This is a distinct author tendency that can be explored. If we look at all the works of Martin Macdonald as a whole in the future, this will be one of the signs that summarizes his authorship.
For this reason, we are optimistic about a new director, often because of the reflection of ta's works, which can be called the potential of "authority". I often forgive them for not doing so well or mistakes in audio-visual, because audio-visual can be continuously improved, but the author can meet but not ask for it. And those big directors in history are not all good films, but they are still selected by us to watch, also because they have established a strong "authority" and created a series of works.
To deny authorship is basically to deny the meaning of philosophy. When the praise of chauvinism and Nazism appears in a person’s authorship, we will say that the creator is broken to the core, but we still will not deny him the right to create art.
◆Some people feel that the second half of "Billboard" is too dramatic and the transition is too deliberate.
In fact, if you think back to the entire Oscar-nominated film, you will find that each one has a similar dramatic twist, such as: Oliver who is going to get married in cmbyn and the gay couple invited by his father; "Money World" buys a newspaper and the wind blows Disorganize them; even "Darkest Hour" has strengthened the suspense of historical facts.
When we see some strong dramatic plots, we must not rush to accuse deliberately, we should pay attention to whether the dramatic power behind it is conserved and what its role is. When the story reaches the second half, the protagonist's anger has not got the results it should have, and they will fall into a situation where they can't get better. Should they continue or stop? At this time, excellent creators will arrange a plot with a strong sense of drama to give this accumulated internal force a vent, so there are these strong turning points. After the strong turning point, the power of the male and female protagonists will return to balance, and then there will be an open The ending, this ending still feeds back the true attitude of the creator. I can't laugh at this.
In order to write this article, I deliberately went to Rohmer's "Story of Spring". In the movie, when the two protagonists are in a deadlock, the necklace suddenly appears. This is very similar to "Billboard", and it is not deliberate, because the necklace alleviates the feeling of being in the throat. This is the kindness of the creator and the inevitable after the story accumulates power.
How to see whether a conflict is carefully designed or deliberately calculated? It may require you to dabble in an entire history of literature and art.
◆Some people think that "Three Billboards" is too clever. It was forced to express opinions by mechanical methods. He also cited an example of "Call Me by Your Name" which grew out of life.
Regarding this matter, it is very easy to refute. All the black humor works and all the absurd works are designed for expression. Is there any fool who is willing to wait for Godot in reality? Who can turn himself into a beetle? Reality themes grow out of life, but if you surpass reality, follow reality, magical reality, you must create on top of reality.
Both black humor and absurdity are based on knowledge. The audience can be sad and happy, but to make the audience cry and laugh, the creator needs wisdom. Repeated in this world day after day, few people think this is absurd, and no one unconsciously thinks this is absurd. When you realize the absurdity, it means you start to use your brain. Such critical remarks are really regarded as criticism and criticism.
You see, I came to endorse tb, but I didn't say how bad cmbyn is because of it.
Reading is useful.
◆Some people even think "Three Pieces" is too incorrect?
This is simply a misunderstanding. So, let me tell Martin McDonald’s own story to answer what the creator thinks. If the old man is the creator and the paper airplane is the work, then he obviously didn’t really want to save people, but the paper airplane saved the little boy——
There was a deaf-mute Chinese boy walking on a railway in a deserted wilderness. A train was approaching him quickly about ten miles away. However, the boy didn't know it. Less than a mile ahead, there is a strange tall tower. Inside the tower lived a lonely old man with a long beard and a strange hat. This old man never interacted with others, but devoted himself to his various designs, various researches, and various calculations every day. On this day, he had just finished a calculation, and then he looked out through the small arched window and saw the boy. Of course, there is also that train. Of course, it was also foreseen that the little boy might be knocked down by the train.
But he did not take any rescue action, just sat down and started a new calculation. He was calculating the approximate time before the boy would be knocked down by the train. Soon, he finished his calculations. At this time, the boy was 30 yards from the tower. His calculations showed that the boy would be knocked down by a train when he was 10 yards from the tower. After the calculation, he was bored with all this again. He folded the calculation result into a paper airplane, threw it away, and threw out the small arched window.
When the boy walked 11 yards from the tower, he saw the paper airplane flying out. He immediately jumped out of the railroad tracks excitedly and rushed to the paper airplane. The moment he left the railway, the train whizzed past where he just stood...
Political correctness is not the creator's first consideration, but the trajectory of the work's own life after the work is released, and this trajectory is not controlled by the creator.
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