In 1987, in a small town called Luton, England, 16-year-old Javed was very distressed. His parents are Pakistani immigrants, his dignified and rigid father works in a factory, his thin mother earns some change by sewing for others, he has a sister who is to be married and a sister who is still in school. The father is the absolute head of the family, and the money earned by the mother will be handed over to the father, and the father will control everyone's pocket money. In a small British town in the late 1980s, a family clinging to their own culture and dignity under poor living conditions, was out of tune with the beautiful white world around them, and was severely discriminated against by the surrounding white people. Javed doesn't want this kind of life, he writes poetry, he writes lyrics, he likes Western music, which is not acceptable to his traditional family. His father wanted him to listen to traditional Bollywood music, be a doctor, be a lawyer, be in finance, and he wasn't interested in that.
Until one day, he heard Bruce Springstein's song for the first time, such as lightning strikes. Bruce's rock sings about the anguish of factory work and the anguish of young people in small towns, "I've accomplished nothing here, I'm leaving this suffocating place". He walked out of the house on rainy nights, running and jumping in the rain, listening to Bruce. Bruce sang his anguish, his unwillingness, and his inner rebellion. He found his idol and found his goal. He dressed like Bruce, got a white girlfriend, and he was free.
But at this time, his father was laid off, and the stubborn father insisted on wearing a suit to read job advertisements every day, and returned disappointed every day. The mother increased her workload and looked thinner and gaunt. The family struggling in poverty is thinking about food and clothing, and it is his sister's marriage. He sees that he is getting farther and farther from his dream. He chose his dream. He received a job as an intern in a newspaper office, which does not make money but trains people very well. He had a manuscript posted and made a little money, which he used to buy tickets to Bruce Springsteen's concert.
On the day of buying the tickets, it was his sister's wedding. Because he wanted to grab the tickets, when the groom came to pick up his relatives, he sneaked out and asked his sister to cover, and planned to meet at the groom's house after buying the tickets. Ironically, there were very few people who bought tickets for the concert that originally thought it needed to grab tickets. As for the originally happy wedding, there was a demonstration of white people against immigration on the road. A happy event turned into a frightening farce. On the street, the usually dignified father was pushed to the ground, and the gorgeous clothes were only worn at the wedding. The robe was also torn in the shoving, and the father, who was sitting on the ground with blood on his face, looked funny and pitiful. On the other side of the street, he was stunned as he watched his relatives retreat and cry under the onslaught of the mob.
After returning home, there was a storm, and his father shredded the concert tickets he bought. He shouted angrily, "I bought that with my own money!" Run away from home. After he left, he continued to study. The Chinese teacher in school who admired him helped him sign up for a composition competition. His composition was published. He got the opportunity to go to the United States. Hometown, take pictures on every street corner where Bruce has been. At home, the aging mother misses him and always weeps, complaining that his father is too strict with him, and his father just sighs. After Javed came back from the United States, he was saddened to see his dejected father who had just come out of the recruiting place on the street.
At the end of the film, Javed was selected to speak at the graduation ceremony because of his composition award. Javed's girlfriend secretly invited his parents. Originally Javed was going to talk about how Bruce changed his life and let him escape from the town, but he changed the script temporarily to say that without the support of his family, none of this would make sense. In the end, everyone was happy, and the son who returned to the family and the proud parents cried together.
The visual effect of the film is very good. The setting of the late 1980s and early 1990s, the combination of various retro colors and the background of the industrial town, is very enjoyable to watch. Of course, the music is also good, with a lot of Bruce Springsteen soundtracks, young people running and dancing to release themselves. The story selection is also good. The impact of old immigrant families and new trends, young people who yearn to break out of bondage and run towards freedom, resonates with me very much. It is a pity that the three views are not correct, which is outrageous.
When a thin mother stays up all night doing needlework just to earn a few extra dollars, you go to see the so-called "idol" with dozens and hundreds of dollars. When your sister gets married and the family pulls together a big moment, you run away to buy a ticket. When your family is insulted and bullied by the strong, when they need you most, you are still smiling in your own petty bourgeoisie world. If I were his sister or parent, I probably would never have forgiven him. Yes, the family of origin is indeed rotten, but from the family of origin, he can only ask for and squeeze, but there is no return. When he was able to repay, he justly refused on the grounds of "I earn the money". Why is his family looking forward to his return and are proud of him, because their love is deeper and more selfless. It's a pity he was blinded by the light, he was blinded by the light of the idol, and he couldn't see his family. It is a pity that the prototype is the screenwriter himself. Of course, the screenwriter will not criticize himself in the film. Maybe he does not realize how stupid and selfish he is when he is young. The film focuses on how he broke out of the shackles of the young people in the small town. The stills searched on the Internet are all photos of him running and dancing happily with his friends. It is difficult to find photos of his parents struggling to maintain a living. The most ironic thing is that Bruce Springsteen, whom he admired, never worked in a factory for a day and never left the place where he was born. This flaw, as a whole, lowered the style of the movie.
What resonates most with me in the film is the repression of living in such a rigid family, and the selfless love still in such a repressed family. I cried when I watched his father read job postings over and over again and come back disappointed. I cried when I watched his mother, who was thin and mature, lit the lamp and boiled the oil. Because I think of my father and mother.
Although I wasn't born into an immigrant family, the culture at home and the culture shock outside of it were more than Javed's. My parents were old-school college students and poor civil servants. I have never had pocket money since I was a child, chasing stars is stupid, falling in love is shameful, pop music is useless, and TV shows are a waste of time. When "Huanzhugege" first became popular, I could only piece together the plot from the children's discussions, and I couldn't get in a lot of the time, but I still stubbornly played the role of Little Swallow and Lagerstroemia with the children, and even pretended I have also seen it. When I was in elementary school, the rich lady in my class lent me a copy of "Lavender", which was Xu Shaoyang's edition. When I was secretly reading it at home, my dad found out, and my dad tore the book right away, saying that I didn't study this kind of love book well, and the girl who borrowed my book was precocious and didn't study well. They might not say the word bitch, but the tone I recall clearly today was slut shaming. I was embarrassed at that time, and the next day I went to school and told the girl that I had lost the book, so I was generous with the rich lady, didn't say anything, and didn't know that my reputation would belong to my parents from now on. It's an unorthodox pronoun. My mother found the boy written in my diary, I stood in front of her with my head down and tremblingly, she flipped through my diary with her hands, and said with a half-smile, "I don't see how complicated your mind is. "Then threw the diary directly at my feet. Now that I think about it, she's terrifying almost perverted.
But slowly, I gradually realized that I have nothing to be ashamed of, the things I like and the people I like, they are all so beautiful, why should they be suppressed. When I was in junior high school, I borrowed the CD player at the same table, and I slept in the quilt at night listening to Stefanie Sun and the Feier Band. During the day, I borrowed "Sprouting", "Contemporary Music Circle" and "Legend of Modern and Ancient" from classmates. In high school, I fell in love, secretly texted, and saved money to buy small gifts for my boyfriend. Then again, my diary was torn, my phone was confiscated, and the clothes my boyfriend gave me were cut by my dad with scissors. But this time I didn't tremble. I was crazy when my parents were crazy. I picked up a painting at home with a glass frame and slammed it on the ground, shattering it. They were both stunned because I had always been the oppressed and submissive daughter, and they were caught off guard by doing this. After that, I went on my own way and had a sweet time with my boyfriend. Only once my mother said lightly afterwards that the painting was a pity. I felt distressed for a moment, but then my heart hardened again. Without that painting, I might have been tortured and mad. The things and people that my parents opposed made up my wonderful youth. If my youth did not have these, it would be such a boring youth. I would rather not have lived.
Such parents love me deeply. When my mother was earning a civil servant salary of 700 yuan a month and a mortgage, she asked me to take a 100 yuan guzheng class once a week, just because I like. My dad always goes to great lengths to cook for me and let me live on campus with the best fried chestnuts with fruit milk candy. Later, the two of them did their best to send me to study abroad, let me realize my dream, and then save a little money and send it to me to pay my mortgage. But in the process, they got older, stopped arguing with me, stopped interfering in my life, and even started to ask my opinion. My mother's legs and feet are no longer flexible. When my father was seriously ill, he lay in bed every day and looked at my photos on the phone. Watching my father in the film walk alone on the street, without a job, looking anxious, but still insisting on wearing an old suit to stay decent, I couldn't help crying.
The fathers who were so powerful, frightening and depressing in memory were actually so small and fragile, and they actually struggled in this cruel world. And they use such a small and fragile body to prop up a small sky for us, give us warmth and food, let us have enough time to grow before we have to face life alone, and then slowly shrink when we grow up Retreat, as if their mission had been completed. And we, in the colorful world, are shone by the light, and we may not see the figure of them slowly smiling and disappearing in the dark. When the light dissipates, they may not be what we remember at all, and they may even be gone. At that time, we will be powerless.
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