The protagonist of the movie Running With Scissors, Augusten Burroughs, unfortunately fell into such a crazy world. Augusten's mother, Deirdre, a failed poet who believed she would one day be famous, believed that her husband, Norman, suppressed her creativity and even murdered her; Deirdre's psychiatrist, Dr. Finch, encouraged her to go further and further down the road of madness. He even asked Deirdre to voluntarily give up Augusten's custody to himself, and persuaded Deirdre to live in a motel to "search for the poet's subconscious"; Augusten's father Norman ran away from home after Dr. Finch's suggestion of five hours of psychotherapy a day, and he will return to him later. I didn't answer my son's phone.
Augusten lived in Dr. Finch's house for two years, from the age of 13 to 15, only to find herself entering an even crazier world. Augusten's life is like a dream from one whirlpool to another whirlpool of madness. He wants to escape, but he has no freedom of choice. From the beginning to the end of the movie, it is like an inexplicable dream. Each character goes further and further on his own path of madness. Anger and despair are intertwined. When part of the anger is released, a deeper layer of despair is left behind. . Augusten longs for normality and order, only to find that he has finally, inevitably, embarked on a different life path and joined this massive symphony of madness.
The film uses extreme irony and ridicule, and is even full of comedy; but after the laughter, under the madness, there is deep and deep despair. The film is full of angry shouts and the thrill of destruction; but in the scene of Augusten chasing away his lover, in a plot that should have been enhanced by strong background music, shouting, or noise, the director adopted a completely silent expression: pain. To the extreme there is no color or sound.
In addition to the artistic and intense pictures and the right soundtrack, the plot of the whole movie is very weak, and the characters have almost no character evolution or development from the beginning to the end, more like a simple piece together in chronological order. Those crazy actions and personalities are not out of the ordinary, and it is difficult for the audience to identify with any of the characters in any kind of behavior. Such a plot arrangement would hardly succeed without a strong performance. Luckily, Running With Scissors has an incredible all-star cast in which Annette Bening's Deirdre, the poet teetering between madness and motherhood, is the perfect character since 2006, with both outbursts of rage , and the calm in madness, and the most touching expression of despair when he was separated from his son Augusten. If Annette Bening showed her strength to the world for the first time in "American Beauty", then in this film, Bening fully radiated the most dazzling brilliance. With the role of Deirdre, there is no doubt that Annette Bening will be nominated for the 2007 Academy Award for Best Actress.
The protagonist of the film, Augusten Burroughs, is a famous American modern writer. The film is based on his 2002 memoir novel of the same name. Except for his own character, the names of other characters have been changed. Much of the film's plot is basically true, but the family of Dr. Finch's prototype, Dr. Rodolph Turcotte, filed a defamation lawsuit against Augusten Burroughs in 2005, which was recently dropped after a deal with Sony.
For me, the film itself does not deeply move me, because the film depicts the inner development and evolution of the characters less, and more often uses comedy to show a scene of a crazy world. Several almost tearful scenes are not because of the emotional or shocking plot itself, but because of the powerful performances. Probably because of the film's theme of poetry and life, after watching this film, I couldn't help thinking of the film "Flying Like Chicken Feather", which has the same theme of poetry and life.
"Flying Like Chicken Feather" also adopts the expression method of patchwork, with a lot of jumping shots and elusive plots, as well as almost inexplicable relationships and emotions between characters. In terms of performance, I actually don't like Qin Hailu's performance in the movie very much. She expressed a character who could have been more primitive in a very simple way. Except for "disappointment and loss", the character's expression is very empty. Of course, this character with only one level does not give Qin Hailu much room to show. It can only be said that she has met the requirements of the film, but there is no real wonderful moment.
But compared with "Running With Scissors", "Chicken Feather" has an extraordinary sincerity and sincerity. Poetry and life, dream and reality, the same collision and struggle, abandonment and despair, "Chicken Feather" spends more pen and ink to describe the details of the poet's struggle, the cause and effect of disappointment. Of course, it does not mean that a movie must tell the whole story perfectly, but when showing a path of self-imposed exile or struggle, the audience can peep into the hearts of the characters more intuitively. The purpose of this kind of peeping is not necessarily recognition, or even sometimes to generate feelings of disgust and contempt, but the existence of this process provides the audience with an opportunity to understand the characters, from understanding to sympathy, or from understanding to more disgust; the audience's Emotions are naturally mobilized and unconsciously enter the film. That's what makes "Chicken Feather" so appealing.
For "Running With Scissors", it may be because real life is too unbelievable, the audience listens to one crazy character performing a crazy symphony, even with the best performance, the most sincere sympathy for the characters, but Except for Augusten, the movie hardly shows the inner world of any character. As a result, the audience is more curious, lamenting the superb performance, sympathizing with Augusten's crazy situation, but always keeping a safe distance from the movie.
It is worth mentioning that the young actor who plays the child Augusten is very similar to Liao Fan, the supporting role in "Flying Like Chicken Feather". Maybe, life itself is incredible, isn't it?
View more about Running with Scissors reviews
