When I just watched "New Godzilla", I was very excited and posted a short comment, thinking that although it does not have a good sci-fi aesthetic presentation in terms of audio and visual, its sci-fi view is enough to make it into the ranks of excellent works, and I feel that "New Godzilla" "Godzilla" hangs "The Monster of the Han River" (at that time, Bong Joon-ho's "Parasite" just premiered in Cannes, and it happened to think of "The Monster of the Han River"). Then in the past two days, the two films were repainted again, and I felt that the position might have to be changed (quantitative score).
Of course, it stands to reason that the expressions of the two films are actually different, and the comparison is only because of the different aspects reflected by the attack of monsters: In "The Monster of the Han River", the two generations save their granddaughter as the core of the narrative, and in the process of rescue The reaction of the entire government agency and the public to monsters/viruses brought out. What we see is the reaction of one person after another; and the point of "New Godzilla" is not here, Anno Hideaki's response to the public Not interested at all. What he wants to describe is how government agencies operate when a major disaster strikes. The implication is that the focus is on the operation of the state machine and the twisting of every gear in the machine. "New" is not so much a complete sci-fi view, but rather, through the setting of Godzilla, it is about the process of replacing the older generation by the young soldiers of the government. Its attributes of political films are greater than those of science fiction films.
1. Science fiction expression
As the driving force of the whole film, Godzilla plays the most important role in the narrative of the whole film, which is to let the government find a way to solve it. It has no behavioral logic in itself, so instead of treating it as a character, it is better to treat it as a disaster, and it is not its actions in the narrative that make it unique, but its setting— A monster that exists as a symbol of the nuclear problem.
Godzilla has always existed as a symbol of the nuclear issue. Since the two atomic bombs exploded in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Japanese have no way to get out of the shadow of the nuclear issue. The original sin of the nuclear issue. Once this symbolic relationship is clarified, how to solve Godzilla in the film becomes the creator's expression and attitude: At the end of the film, Godzilla is not destroyed, but stands in the middle of the city, which means that Japan obviously cannot get rid of it Nuclear influence, it can't be "eliminated", you can only learn how to live with it. Connecting with Japan now, even if there is such a catastrophe as the Fukushima nuclear accident, it is still impossible for Japan to completely get rid of nuclear energy - you can only find ways to coexist with it, not to eliminate it. And the sci-fi expression of the entire movie ends here. The rest is where "New" has the most ink.
2. Political expression
The first impression of this film on all audiences should be meetings, endless meetings. This is almost a simulation of the operation of the high-level Japanese government, and the director took the trouble to mark each bureaucratic member with a long name when they first appeared, such as the Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary (government). A meeting is the operation of the machine, and the bureaucracy is the cog of the machine. The film's dehumanization of the bureaucracy is very vivid.
Under such a framework, the main idea is to say that the aging of the parts of the old bureaucracy will lead to the rigidity of the operation of the state machinery, which will cause the country to suffer heavy losses. New parts replace aging, unresponsive old parts.
As mentioned above, Godzilla's main role in the narrative is to let the government find a way to eliminate it, and its second role in the narrative is to kill the old generation of bureaucrats, only write them to death , in order to allow the young warriors to form a provisional government and show a set of efficient state machine operation mode, in order to achieve the creator's intention: Japanese politics must undergo a reshuffle, otherwise it will become a major disaster for the country, just as Akasaka told Yaguchi at the end of the film. As he said: "The government and the capital have been destroyed with great difficulty, and we must take this opportunity to make changes."
Of course, the operation of the entire state apparatus is inseparable from the intervention of other countries. Compared with the replacement and replacement of the state apparatus described in the length of a whole film, "New" does not have much space for describing international politics, but it is very exciting: after learning that Godzilla had landed, the United States felt the smell of blood. Lion, came immediately, hoping that Japan and the United States would share the control of Godzilla, while Japan was almost led away; after learning of Godzilla's evolution, China and Russia requested that it be handed over to an international organization; Yaguchi's freezing plan went well Progress, the Japanese side hopes that the United Nations Council will delay the release of the nuclear bomb, considering that China and Russia will refuse to delay because of fears that Godzilla will land in their own country (Japan is too close to the Asian continent), and France's research on the nuclear industry will make its attitude more relaxed, Therefore, the Japanese side took France as a breakthrough... This kind of sand table interpretation of the international political situation has been done very well. Not to mention the very intentional dialogue at the end of the film. In the medium panoramic shot, Kayoko and Yaguchi are in the foreground, and the star-shaped hollow shape of the background building is very similar to the stars on the American flag. Kayoko said to Yaguchi: "I am the president and you are the prime minister." Yaguchi said: "I It is the ideal puppet." - To this day, even in the long future, Japan cannot escape the shadow of the United States.
3. A little comparison with "The Monster of the Han River"
After finishing "New", and comparing "The Monster of the Han River", you will find that the former is more of an expression of hope that after a blood change in the system, Japan will be reborn from the ruins again; while the latter , more on the government, down to the people, to a whole irony. The problem with "New" is that this very crucial process of changing the bureaucracy is carried out in such a dramatic and coincidental way that Godzilla kills an older generation of politicians, which makes the whole tone of the film become To a certain extent, the main theme, or we joked that it is "anti-corruption within the system"; and "The Monster of the Han River" failed to do better is that its story structure is still built on the family, and the whole film is two. The story of saving children on behalf of others, and in this film with the family as the core of the narrative, the irony of the family seems to scratch the itch. It is more a joke than irony, and once out of this family, Feng Junhao can be said to be from the family. It’s been hacked from top to bottom—this seems to be saying, it seems that the entire social structure is scolded, but the family that is also a social structure is simply forgotten.
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