Before the annual Oscars, in addition to the well-known Golden Globe Awards, there is another award that may be more of an Oscar vane than the Golden Globe Awards.
This award is not only closer to the Oscars than the Golden Globes, but also closer to the Oscars in the way of awards.
Yes, this award is the SAG Awards.
In the past 20 awards (1997-2016), the award-winning film for the "Best Collective Performance" of the Screen Actors Guild Award and the "Best Picture" of the Oscar of the same year have an overlap rate of 55%. "Best" Oscar for best film ("Birdman" and "Spotlight").
And this year, it is "Hidden Characters" that won the "Best Collective Performance Award" of the Screen Actors Guild Award
IMDB scored 7.9, rotten tomatoes scored 92% freshness, and Metacritic scored 74, which is quite a good result.
However, in my opinion, "Hidden Figure" may be the worst of all nominated films this year.
(Spoiler alert ahead)
***split line***
"Hidden Characters" is adapted from the non-fiction novel of the same name. It tells the story of three black women who made outstanding contributions to NASA during the Cold War in the 1960s.
Catherine, who is exceptionally smart, has shown great talent for numbers since she was a child. When she was only 10 years old, she was admitted to the best black high school in the area. When she grew up, she became colleagues and friends with Dorothy and Mary, who are also black female scientists.
In 1961, when the story took place, the black affirmative movement had not yet grown in momentum, and "apartheid" was still a shadow over all blacks.
At the beginning of the movie, there is such a passage.
The three protagonists' cars suddenly broke down on their way to work. The white police officers checked their documents, and they doubted the identities of their NASA staff.
I thought that the movie would pave some plots about racial contradictions here.
However, it did not.
The next second of the story is that the white police officer suddenly cleared the way for these black female scientists who were about to be late for work!
I have to say that this scene was quite igniting, and there were cheers or two in the sparse movie theater (well, I watched it in Los Angeles). However, this surrealistic plot setting scared me a lot: I'm sorry, I just know that NASA is pretty hungry, I don't know it can be so hungry.
Well, this is the Cold War background. The patriotism of the American people is unprecedentedly high, transcending gender, transcending race, transcending the daily duties of a highway patrol, and can privately escort unknown people to work.
Great, America.
Then, the temperature of the plot dropped, and we came to the daily work where the three protagonists hit a wall everywhere. After all, the main plot of the story still takes place in NASA, which is dominated by white men.
As the Soviet cosmonaut Gagarin took the lead in entering space and successfully circumnavigated the earth, the United States lost one game in the arms race in space, and NASA had to complete the mission of sending American astronauts to space as soon as possible. Catherine was selected to join the special team that calculates the orbit of the spacecraft's return capsule due to her excellent calculation ability.
The energetic Catherine had just stepped into the new office and was poured with a bucket of cold water. The little white brother thought she was a cleaner here, and the project leader "Xie Er" made things difficult for her.
Because of "apartheid", I had to go to a remote "apartheid" bathroom to solve the problem.
Coffee cups are labeled "People of Color" to distinguish them.
However, Catherine was never humble or overbearing and focused on her work.
On the other side, Dorothy's promotion and Mary's application for advanced studies as an engineer were also hindered.
After narrating a bunch of sweet love plots and family plots that don't make much sense, our film ushered in the first climax halfway through.
In a heavy rain, Catherine, who had been working at the desk, took the rain to go to the "apartheid" bathroom to go to the toilet. After she came back, she was drenched, but she was drunk by the department director who was always good at her.
This time, she finally no longer forbeared, but completely erupted.
This outbreak doesn't matter, the department head is stunned: What, you always go to the toilet like this? Why didn't you say it earlier? He picked up a sledgehammer and smashed the sign of the apartheid bathroom. Well, going to the toilet is not a problem now.
So happy, there were a few more cheers in the cinema.
However, there was another problem immediately afterwards. Catherine could not participate in the project briefing. Therefore, every time she worked hard to calculate the result, the data was already expired and invalid. her name.
In a hallway quarrel scene, Catherine was once again allowed to participate in this "high-secret" meeting with an exception. Sure enough, she shocked the four with her amazing knowledge as soon as she attended the meeting.
Dorothy and Mary also received new job appointments and court defenses, respectively, and were successfully allowed to enter a pure white school to study engineering. The three black female scientists all achieved staged victories.
Afterwards, there is Catherine’s most famous deed-manual calculation of the return capsule orbit before the rocket lifts off. Astronaut Green said, "If she says the numbers are accurate, I will be ready at any time." (Although it seems incredible, this The plot is actually happened in history). Catherine herself is called "human flesh computer" precisely because of such outstanding computing ability.
The end of the film is a routine that we can no longer be familiar with. There are large sections of live interviews and subtitles, rendering the deeds of three black female scientists over and over again.
At this time, the sporadic cheers in the theater have turned into continuous applause.
And I can finally start to spit for a long time.
***split line***
"Hidden Figure" is an Oscar candidate for best film, and I admit that it has no big problems in technical production. The theme is great. Although the plot is a bit slow at times, it is still smooth, the screen is neat, and the costume design of the three protagonists is remarkable. It is also a way to deal with serious historical issues with a humorous tone.
The trough of this film lies in its poor narrative angle and attitude behind the narrative.
First, it is the extremely flat characterization .
In the movie, the three black female scientists can be described as extremely inspirational: their misfortunes are all caused by the mean people around them, and their happiness is all striving for by their kind and beautiful self.
This is a typical Disney princess routine that is outdated. Why is it that people verbally criticize in the cartoon world, but it is glorious and great for black women?
Okay, we have to consider the background of the times. However, even in the context of the great age, human nature is complicated. However, in the creation of characters, the movie selectively ignores such complexity.
For example, there are also white people who are not so racially discriminatory, but as long as they are good, they will go to the end; if they are discriminatory, every cell in their body is filled with exaggerated "disgust."
Secondly, it is the extreme sentimentality of audiovisual language .
In several scenes of running to the bathroom, the director chose to use a light and humorous soundtrack to deliberately create a sense of absurdity, even the one before the explosion.
As for the collective scene, from photography to soundtrack to editing, it is a bit difficult to say that it is not deliberately sensational.
It's not that you can't use skills to bring rhythm, but you need to pay attention to it.
More importantly, such a film adapted from a real story is actually fictitious in several key plots that highlight the conflicts between blacks and whites, and between men and women.
Perhaps the only positive white character is Al Harrison, the head of the white department played by Kevin Costner. However, according to reports from Indiewire and USA Today, the design of this character is actually based on the deeds of three different characters. Only by merging together can we have such an image.
In the first half of the movie, Catherine's two "villains" who are not villains, Xie Er and "Old Spider-Man Girlfriend" Christine Dunst, are also fictitious. In the words of the director, these two characters represent the kind of people at the time.
Well, for making movies, I have accepted adaptations of this level.
But how do you explain the NASA racial discrimination problem that you use to create the main conflicts?
In a video interview in the early years, Catherine said in the original words about race:
"I don't feel any'apartheid'. Everyone in NASA is focused on research. Because you have a mission and you have to work hard for it. The implementation of this project is too important... I know that there is segregation. There is discrimination, but I have not felt it."
This video can be found on YouTube. It comes from WHROTV. WHROTV is a Virginia local channel under PBS. The name of the video is What Matters-Katherine Johnson: NASA Pioneer and "Computer". The content above is from the video 11 minutes 22 seconds to 11 minutes 47 Second.
In other media interviews, Catherine also said that race is not important in NASA.
I can accept that the director strengthens the contradiction in order to increase the drama conflict, but the main contradiction is out of nothing. He also uses the so-called "adapted from real events" to earn eyeballs and applause, which is disgusting.
Not to mention anything else, just take a look at last year's Oscar's best film "Spotlight" to see how it is extremely calm and restrained in a sensational story.
The director of this film is a white man. I don't know if the director chose this narrative angle for some reason.
But in any case, in my opinion, such a narrative tone can not bring any help to the current issues of race, gender equality, class breakage and other issues in the United States. It may even be counterproductive.
The red-necked people in the eyes of those elite Democrats choose to vote for Trump. Are they tired of this seemingly equal but deliberately "politically correct" argument?
Catherine, who relied on her amazing talent for making great contributions to the history of American aviation, won the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Dorothy, the first black department director in NASA history.
Mary, the first female engineer of African descent in NASA history.
Are they great? great.
Are their stories worthy of being written and chanted? worth.
However, the more important thing is how to look at this period of history. We disliked, joked, and ridiculed the anti-Japanese drama for so long. Didn't we also make such a mistake?
Forecast awards: none
Strong competition award: Best Supporting Actress
(If you have friends who have different opinions on the article, please come to discuss it)
View more about Hidden Figures reviews
