When I first went to the theater to watch this film, I just experienced the blow of the master's title. At that time, my eyes were filled with tears several times in the theater, and finally I cried in the ending song, which caused the people around me to be puzzled. This is also normal, for this film, people with a Christian background see a completely different story. A lot of people might just see a clichéd topic with some political correctness, but what I saw was almost a Moses. The theme of mission and calling that the film has always emphasized, Moana’s incomprehension, hesitation, and final confidence in the face of the call, as well as the climax of finally parting the sea, remind me of Moses being called in the wilderness, and finally accepting the mission to lead Judea. The story of the nation coming out of Egypt. Over the past few years, whenever I feel lost and lack confidence, this film has always been a great inspiration to me, and I have always wanted to write a film review and say what Moana is in my eyes. Now, on the verge of graduating from my Ph.D. and traveling far away, I feel that I can finally write this article and give my praise to this film.
1. The Name of Moana: Realizing Individuality in Calling and Mission
"Moana" tells the connotation of Moses' story more authentically than "Prince of Egypt". "The Prince of Egypt" just retells the story of Moses. The innovation lies in highlighting the fraternal entanglement between Moses and Ramses, and finally showing the ancient teaching that God's will overcomes personal love. And "Moana" finds the intersection between personality, emotion and divine will, and tells a story of Moses in line with the modern spirit.
Modern people hold high the banner of subjectivity, demanding to get rid of the shackles of tradition and to show off their individuality, lest they become ordinary people. However, this absolute emphasis on individuality is often groundless, just like some so-called young people who insist on music dreams, give up their studies, go to the streets to play and sing, participate in various talent shows, and hope that one day they will be recognized by the public. The reason may be "I like it" at first, but gradually, in various setbacks, he may still be immersed in his dreams, turn to hatred of a society that cannot make his dreams come true, or he may have lost his initial interest, but Trick yourself into saying "I still like it" in order to save face or avoid sunk costs. This kind of personality will even evolve into a special and special, smoking, drinking and burning head tattoo, just to show that you are different and not blindly follow. As everyone knows, this kind of non-blind obedience is the biggest blind obedience, because you just choose among the many options given, all the strange things used to express your personality have been incorporated into commodities by capital, and the so-called personality realization is just a seller. created ideology. When people finally realize the fragility and falsity of their personality, they will turn to the opposite of their personality, completely surrender to the mainstream of society, and become "mature" adults.
In the film, there are similar personality themes. When Moana's father kept emphasizing tradition and family, Moana seemed to be stunned. He must go out to sea to find the ethereal Maui and Tefiti. According to the people here, it is a good birthday. However, to die. But is Moana's personality groundless? Unlike many American films, Moana's personality comes not from "I like it," but directly from God's calling. God appeared in the form of the sea, pushing Moana to the sea again and again to find Maui and return Tefiti's heart. It is wise to use the sea to represent God. The all-encompassing nature of the sea, the creation of life and death, the lack of facial features, etc., are more in line with the image of God than an old white man. As the sea of the gods, and the grandmother as the envoy of the gods, they called Moana again and again, asking Moanna to accept and complete her mission. When Moanna was confused, God pointed out the future direction for Moanna. When Moanna was weak, God gave Moanna encouragement and confidence. When Moanna encountered difficulties, God sent help in a timely manner, although it might be her Unexpected way. But if that's all, the story becomes a boring mission story, and everyone will think that it's a prophet's story, what's with me? Nor will this fulfillment of a mission be seen as the realization of individuality. The key point here is that God is not the flame of the calling in the thorns, the sea is only giving general directions, and the real calling comes from the grandmother.
Grandma's centrality to Moana's confidence is undeniable. It was grandma who told Moana the myth of Tefiti's heart and the secret that her ancestors were navigators, and gave Moana the content of her mission; it was grandma who always encouraged and even ordered Moana to go to sea at the end of her life and pushed Moana to complete her mission; When Moana was passively lost twice, and when she actively discarded Tefiti's heart once, it was her grandmother who put it back in her hands to regain her confidence. Therefore, this mission is not abstract for Moana, it comes first from the most intimate emotions. Her father described her innate mission as the successor of the chief to Moana, but Moana could not integrate her personality into this mission. When her father found this, he strongly demanded Moana to suppress her personality and accept the mission. Grandma does not give specific instructions as aggressively as the ghost of communism and Hamlet's father. She always expresses respect for Moana's personal choice, but she always asks Moanna to listen to her inner voice. It can even be said that grandma's instructions are "Listen to your inner voice". Different from the external mission instilled by her father, her grandmother always pays attention to Mo Anna's troubles, encourages Mo Anna to explore on her own according to her inner voice, and then guides Mo Anna to establish her inner mission, that is, to go to sea. It is precisely because Moana established this mission through her inner voice that she was able to forge ahead and rush out of the sea. (An obvious image is that Moana had always been baptized by sea water before, but she drove a boat out of the waterfall and accepted the baptism on her second trip to the sea.) It should be noted here that going to sea has social significance It is not just the personal interests of Moana or grandma. Only going to sea can solve the survival dilemma encountered by the tribe. Therefore, it can be said that Moana has actually better fulfilled the mission of the chief. (The father actually understands this, but he himself lost his brother in the attempt to go to sea, so he refuses to let his daughter take great risks to find a way out with almost zero possibility, which is also out of love for the child. However, The real love for children is to dare to let go, even if they may die prematurely.) Mo Anna’s motivation for going to sea includes her own personality realization, emotional connection with her grandmother, and more love for her family. The meaning is unstoppable.
Therefore, from the perspective of historical materialism, the film actually tells a good story about the relationship between the individual and society. Society must develop its own history through individual activities (the sea needs to choose Moana to complete the return of Tefiti's heart), and the realization of individual special meaning of life must also satisfy social needs in order to have the dimension of universality. Moana's motivation to realize her personality, if not for her love for her grandmother and her clansmen (that is, the inner mission triggered by the benevolence of oneness, in the initial test of saving sea turtles or picking up conch shells at the beginning of the film, Moana showed her benevolence, Therefore, the choice of the sea is obtained, and after completing the mission, the conch is really obtained, which is the realization of Moana itself), but only for the sake of personality, or more fundamentally, it is induced by a certain ideology (i.e. external mission, one of the characteristics of which is given in advance, rather than continuously groping and gradually becoming clear in the process of growth), then this personality is false. Moana is Moana not through some behavioral characteristics that distinguish her from others, but through the special role she plays in the social and historical process. Special (which is exactly how God/society "choose" her), on the other hand its motive and purpose are love and thus universal. In the end, Moana completed her mission, burned her story into human history (her story became Maui's new tattoo, and her face became the face of Goddess Tefiti in this world), and finally completed her self-knowledge. , answered the question "Who am I" (finally, the father also changed from the alternative answer at the beginning to admit "this is you"). Therefore, the whole film can be said to be the growth history of Moana's self-construction and self-knowledge. The universal dimension exists in it through the call with emotion as the core. In the unity of individuality and mission, we see the individual and society. unity.
Attachment: Interlude "I Am Moana" lyrics
I know a girl from an island what a great girl
She stands apart from the crowd
She loves the sea and her people
She makes her whole family proud
Sometimes the world seems against you
The journey may leave a scar
But scars can heal and reveal just where you are
The people you love will change you
The things you have learned will guide you
And nothing on earth can silence
The quiet voice still inside you
And when that voice starts to whisper
Moana you've come so far
Moana listen
Do you know who you are
Who am I
I am a girl who loves my island
I'm the girl who loves the seaIt calls me
I am the daughter of the village chief
We are descended from voyagers
Who found their way across the world They call me
I've delivered us to where we are
I have journeyed farther
I am everything I've learned and more
Still it calls me
And the callisn't out there at all It's inside me
It's like the tide Always falling and rising
I will carry you here in my heart You'll remind me
That come what may I know the way how hard it is to face it bravely
I am Moana
2. The name of Tefiti: Human self-alienation and self-sublation
On top of Moana's personal growth story, the film also has a grand narrative framework, that is, the theft and return of Tefiti's heart. If the conflict between Moana's personality and the traditions of the islanders is a minor contradiction in the film, and Moana represents an individual in the social and historical process, then the conflict between Tefiti and human beings is the major contradiction on which the film's plot is based. The loss and gain of the heart suggest a certain unfolding process of social history. How do Disney films in general unfold the big contradictions? Or set a bad person, the bad person may be inherently evil, and if it is deeper, it is created by the imperfect society itself, and then eliminating the bad person can solve the problem, or it is more friendly, the villain itself is not evil, just because of some misunderstandings. Once the misunderstanding is eliminated, everyone shakes hands and reunites with the family. The film seems to belong to the latter category. The only villain evil card is finally found to be Tefiti, and then the contradiction is resolved. However, unlike the opposition between good and evil as two parts, the evil card is not a part, but Tefiti who is the whole of the world. Then, we have to ask, what is the source of the bad card? In other words, why does the world divide and conflict with itself? This is easily reminiscent of the question about the source of evil.
In the biblical story, Adam and Eve stole the fruit of the tree of wisdom and committed original sin, so they were driven out of the Garden of Eden, and human beings fell into strife and suffering. Biblical interpreters tend to interpret original sin as arrogance, that is, man stole wisdom from God by trying to be on par with God, and at the same time he was punished by God and separated from God. This is consistent with the myth in the film. Humans attempted to master Tefiti's power to create life, thus stealing Tefiti's heart, while losing a rich life and being invaded by dark forces. The skeptics of the original sin theory will say that the omnipotence and perfection of God are contradictory on the issue of the origin of evil. God created human beings with arrogant attributes, which actually presupposes the occurrence of original sin, so evil itself It comes from God, and human beings should not be required to bear original sin. The myth of the film seems to be subject to similar questioning. There are various theological responses to this question, but what we are concerned about is, if the myth of the film is regarded as a symbol of social history, why does the evil card appear? Evil card + Tefiti's heart = what does Tefiti mean?
The film's creation myth illustrates this point. In the vast ocean, God created life and gave Maui the demigod power of the wind and the sea, and brought it to human civilization. After that, at the request of humans, Maui stole the heart of Tefiti, which led to the appearance of monsters in the sea, and the dark forces occupied the island. This is consistent with the alienation history of human society. When human civilization started, people did not understand the source and true nature of their own power, which led to, on the one hand, people regarded nature as an object external to human beings, and eventually evolved to regard nature as a useful resource, and demanded endlessly from nature , nature responds with various ecological crises, which is the alienation of man and nature. On the other hand, people regard society as an object outside of man, which eventually evolves into an individual dominated by society and a confrontation between man and man. , which is the alienation of man and society. The film focuses on the former aspect. In order to grab more natural resources, human beings stole the heart of Tefiti, but this brings natural disasters and a reduction in resources. . The key point here is that the dark forces are nature itself as the source of people's happiness, just like the coconut pirate was originally the coconut as people's basic living material, and the fire demon evil card as the destroyer was originally the creator of Tefiti . Only by returning Tefiti's heart and returning to the state of unity between man and nature can we truly resolve this contradiction and make nature no longer the enemy of man. But this kind of unification is not retrogression, but sublation, that is to say, on the premise of retaining all the achievements of civilization, human beings complete the return to nature with the consciousness of the unity of man and nature.
At the climax of the film, although Moana pays homage to Moses' actions, it actually reaches the realm of Christ. Moses separated the Red Sea to separate the Egyptian army, and he and others were still in a confrontational relationship, but Moana separated the sea to redeem the sins of mankind and let the evil card find herself, even if it meant Moana's own sacrifice. , where Moana seeks real reconciliation. It would actually be more accurate if the film, like Journey to the West or Harry Potter, made Moana's sacrifice a necessary condition for the evil card to return to Tefiti, rather than just relying on Maui's post-mortem apology, of course We can explain that Moana was ready to sacrifice at the moment of leaving the sea, because Moana gave the evil card full freedom, and the evil card could choose not to return and kill Moana. Moana herself did not commit a crime (of course, she also inherited the original sin in the sense of inheriting the way of life of her predecessors), but she took the sin of mankind and was willing to use her life to pay for it. This kind of compassion can truly eradicate sin. In the end, people achieved reconciliation with Tefiti, and returned to the free life of sailing around with all the achievements of previous civilizations and the consciousness of the unified relationship between man and nature. People in the future will no longer steal Tefiti's heart, because everyone has understood that only by keeping Tefiti's heart in Tefiti can they truly have Tefiti's heart.
Attachment: Interlude "Know Who You Are" lyrics
I have crossed the horizon to find you
I know your name
They have stolen the heart from inside you
But this does not define you
This is not who you are
You know who you are who you are
3. The Name of Maui: Rational Loss and Consciousness
In the previous description, we have been omitting Maui as one of the protagonists of the film. Is Maui's character necessary in the film? If it is changed to Moana who accepts the mission and returns to Tefiti's heart by herself, can she also tell the theme of the film? Before answering this question, let's take a look at the two characters in the film that seem to be more redundant, the pig and the chicken.
I once thought that pigs and chickens were purely cute decorations added to please young audiences, and had nothing to do with the theme of the film. At most, they failed to bring pigs to sea and successfully brought chickens to sea to imply Judaism's dislike of pigs. But later I found out that the failure of taking pigs to sea and the success of taking chickens to sea are of essential significance. Compared with pigs who are very sensible and thus know how to seek advantages and avoid disadvantages, chickens seem stupid or even crazy, but they eventually accompany the entire sea. And it has also played a supporting role several times. The former is like Maui with abundant strength, and the latter is like Moana who insists on conquering impossible goals (pecking at rocks) but is crazy (jumping into the sea) in the eyes of ordinary people. In the film Maui even directly accused Moana of being unreasonable like a chicken. Thus, pig and chicken constitute a pair of metaphors, as the first outing is in the daytime (for rational fishing goals) and the second outing is at night (for irrational mission goals), The real driving force for the development of human society is not the heroic power of the Apollinian spirit, but the wisdom of the Dionysian prophet.
Maui seems to be full of emotional power, especially when Moana is still unfamiliar with sailing, but in the later stages of the film, Moana shows more and more emotional power, while Maui is lacking and needs to lead. party. This cannot be simply explained as the apprentice surpasses the master, Moana has something that Maui did not have from the beginning, and this thing is the reason why she was chosen by the sea. Maui looks like a strong and strong man, but from his desire to gain the approval of others, even at the risk of committing crimes to please others, and the belief that his strength only comes from the hook, we can see that he is actually weak emotionally—— In action, his love for others can only be achieved by the pursuit of fame; in knowledge, he cannot really identify his own power and think that it comes from something external. It was only when Moana said it was Maui who made Maui Maui that he shed his obsession with the hook and had some kind of real courage. Maui is like a modern rationality with huge productivity due to science and technology. On the one hand, he does not know where this power will be used, but it will cause huge disasters. On the other hand, he thinks that this power is external to himself, so For example, workers think that the machine is the main body of production, and that they are nothing without the machine, so they do not really have this power. Moana represents a certain insight into the sins of human beings - she did not rely on rational calculation but faith and intuition. She dragged Maui to redeem Maui and let Maui complete self-knowledge. Again, this insight is not clear at first, it is vague at first, and it is only when Moana finally discovers the fact that Tefiti does not exist, after all the hardships, that she really does not exist. Understand the content of the mission.
Therefore, Maui and Moana constitute the two poles necessary for the development of human society. Moana needs the power of Maui to complete her mission, while Maui needs Moana's inspiration and guidance to prevent her power from destroying herself. . Maui's indispensability is shown in the fact that in the first confrontation with the evil card, Moana did not fully respect Maui's wishes, but just wanted to pass the level as soon as possible, just like disregarding the will of the people and trying to coerce the people with a strong position. The vanguard party that rushed to the end suffered a huge setback as a result. Maui, without Moana, not only used his own power to create a split in Tefiti, but also created his own split. This is shown in the film as Maui and the Crab Monster have changed from friends to enemies. The Crab Monster is actually Pointing to the fishhook that was out of control or hidden due to being out of control, and with the help of Moana, Maui retrieved the fishhook from the crab monster and realized the initial recombination between himself and the fishhook (this recombination is not complete. Sexuality manifests as a loss of control over the ability to shapeshift). After that, under the guidance of Moana, Maui regained control of her transformation ability, and finally stopped obsessed with the hook and made the choice of sacrificing herself, so she really had the hook (shown as Tuffy in the film). given a new hook). At this point, Maui has completed self-knowledge, and has truly mastered his own power, rationally understands his own irrational basis, and thus becomes a spirit of self-reliance. It's like in the ending of the film, Moana's clansmen no longer hide their ships as their own strength, nor cling to their past homes, but become their own pathfinders, consciously walking towards the mountains and rivers, and constantly creating new ones. Homeland, previously regarded as an external, uncontrollable, or even catastrophic productive force, is ultimately possessed by people as the essential power for self-realization and self-enjoyment through social consciousness.
Attachment: Lyrics of the episode "We Know the Way Thousands of Mountains and Rivers"
We set a course to find
A brand-new island everywhere we roam
We keep our island in our mind
And when it's time to find home
We know the way
We are explorers reading every sign
We tell the stories of our elders in a never-ending chain
We know the way
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