In the "Bronze Age" of Greek mythology, the world is no longer peaceful and beautiful, but full of lies, violence, and blood, and people step by step toward snares and sins. The balance of justice and evil in the hands of the goddess of justice Dicher was overwhelmed. Her companions, "Shame" and "Awe", could not even bear such a sight. They finally abandoned human beings and returned to Mount Olympus to join the immortal gods. The ranks of her, leaving her angrily flying over the city in clouds and mist. From then on, mankind will suffer from its own evil consequences and fall into the "Black Iron Age". Those who deceive Goddess Dicher with lies will bring disaster not only to themselves but also to their own cities. Today, whenever they encounter injustice, people still think of the goddess who presides over justice: in Diche, bribery and begging for forgiveness have no effect. She blindfolded her eyes to show that everything in the world is treated equally, and she is not blinded by feelings; She holds a balance in her left hand, and no matter how good it is to cover up, it is obvious that the evil is placed on it; she holds a sharp sword in her right hand, and any person or thing who does evil at ease will become a sacrifice under the sword.
In Western movies, the principle of "Be Sure your sin will find you out" (Be Sure your sin will find you out) has always been followed. No matter how powerful the power and cunning means, they will never escape the justice of the law. In Francis Coppola's "The Rainmaker" (The Rainmaker), Matt Damon plays the fledgling lawyer Rudy Baylor. He is young and vigorous, has a sense of justice, and is based on conscience and justice. The spirit has exposed the conspiracy of a powerful insurance company, and regained justice for the victims who have been unable to make claims. In the movie, Rudy Baylor, who is young and knowledgeable, faces the coercion and temptation of the lawyers who formulate today’s law, but still dare not original intentions. No wonder that in the eyes of many people, he is simply "eggs against stones". ask for contempt. But justice is always on the side of the few who hold the truth. Whether you say this is a good wish or a miracle, Rudy won the lawsuit. However, what he won was only a lawsuit, and those who sway the judgment and play with power still exist and cannot be shaken. Fortunately, the movie leaves people with hope: as long as you fight for it and stick to your beliefs, the few weak will also win. This kind of spirit that firmly believes that no matter how good the evil is hidden, the evil will always follow. It is more vividly reflected in "The Nember 23". Although it is said that time can erase everything and memory can selectively bury bad memories, Walter Spiger's crimes committed 13 years ago have still been found to him again, and some blood debts are always to be repaid.
In addition to these orthodox movies that follow the above spirit, there are some that go the other way. "Memories of Murder" is a typical example of a work that makes people fall into bottomless grief and unprecedented helplessness. The movie is set against the riots and riots on the eve of the democratization of South Korea in the 1980s. It tells a serial rape and murder case in the countryside.
The story begins with the rolling wheat waves and the endless fields. The naughty children tiptoe to catch the wheat-tip grasshopper. For them, this is the most vivid and beautiful era in their memories. The lens squinted, and the picture presents a distant beauty like a dream. The children laughed and jumped chasing the creaking tractor. Police Officer Park Dorman sitting in the car thoughtfully responded to the children's ridicule impatiently. In the ditch beside the wheat field, Police Officer Park had to bend down vigorously to see the naked female corpse with his hands tied back. The female corpse was densely covered with black insects. When the light came on, they scattered away. Officer Park stood up, in a bad mood, cursing the noisy child in the distance. He still doesn't know what significance this day will have. On October 23, 1986, his life changed.
Dating back hundreds of years, determining whether a person is guilty or not has mostly relied on the torture of a suspect to extract a confession. Many bloody and violent penalties such as shelling, imperial torture, torture, tattooing, and car splitting have also emerged. He was crippled for life and was pushed to the gallows. In 1764, the Italian criminal jurist Beccaria could no longer bear such a dehumanizing shadow and cold light, and proposed the concept of "presumption of innocence", that is, "a person cannot be called a criminal before the judge's verdict." This humanized principle has been applied to modern international interrogations to avoid the occurrence of many unjust, false and wrong cases.
In "Reminiscences of Murder", Police Officer Park Doman obviously didn't care about the assertion of personal rights. Every time a suspect was picked up, it was a head-to-head interrogation. Without giving the other party any opportunity to argue, he directly yelled and blamed the other party. Shameless homicide, and induce the suspect to show off the sexual desire of the victim. Pau Duoman posted up several pages of the suspect's photo, confidently telling others that he has a pair of eyes that can read people and can tell who the criminal is. Therefore, after collecting some so-called clues, he concluded that Bai Guanghao, who likes to track victims, was the first-class suspect, or that Bai Guanghao was the criminal, more accurately. The rest of Park Duoman's job is to force Guanghao to confess his crime. In the eyes of ordinary people, Guanghao was just a poor mentally retarded boy with a short stature and a shameless appearance, with a scar on his face that was burned by fire. Everyone knows that his hands were so shrunk that he didn't even have the strength to tie a rope. How could he be a murderer who was carefully planned without leaving a trace? But our policeman can't see this. The grumpy police officer Qiao Yonggu came up with a neat flying kick, and put Guanghao to the ground, kicking Guanghao fiercely and muttering "Your face" It's disgusting."
Whenever it is foggy and rainy, people in the village are in panic. No one dares to go out in a red shirt, and the air is filled with gloomy death. Xu Taiyun, a senior police officer from Seoul, was accused by the shocked woman as a rapist and was beaten by Park Doman for nothing. Regarding this, Xu Taiyun can only politely pouted and mocked Park Duoman. Where can I see a police officer who can't distinguish black and white like him? Xu Taiyun is a high-achieving student with a very bright mind. He has the mind of a legendary police detective in a detective novel. He follows the evidence and finds out who is the next victim from the list of missing persons, and prevents Park Doman from attacking the two suspects. With such an impeccable police, the investigation of the case seems to be just around the corner.
With the advent of the rainy season and frequent rainfall, the number of victims has gradually increased. The methods of the prisoners have become more arrogant and cruel, and the pursuit of the police has not been taken seriously. Because of the different philosophy of handling the case, Park Duoman and Xu Taiyun frequently rubbed each other, resulting in a big fight. The rampant crime makes everyone sit on pins and needles, lose their patience, become manic and desperate. When all the clues point to a factory mechanic, Park Heung-kyu, every policeman became excited and couldn't wait to convict him. It is true that Park Heung-kyu has all the characteristics of a prisoner they have, but they still lack evidence. On the night when they had no choice but to let Park Hung Kyu go, another crime happened. And this time the victim was just a child. Just the day before, Xu Taiyun was still chatting and laughing with this child. He lost his mind and found Park Xing-Kyu, punching and kicking him with an angry roar, forcing the opponent to show his true colors. At this moment, Park Duoman brought the suspect's DNA test report, and the results showed that Park Xing-gyu was not a criminal. Xu Taiyun's world collapsed, and all the step-by-step reasoning turned out to be such an ending. He refused to believe the result and shot at Park Xing-Kyu.
After witnessing the tragic situation of Guanghao being killed by a train because of fear of the police, Park Duoman began to re-examine his life. He resigned from his position as a police officer, went to Seoul to work as a salesman, and lived a peaceful and prosperous life.
In 2003, he passed through the village of the year because of his work. Nothing seems to have changed, the same golden surging wheat field, the same quiet afternoon, the difference is that when he bent down to look deep into the ditch, he never saw the female body again. Park Duoman took off his glasses, as if looking into the depths of memories through time. A student passed by here and curiously asked Park Duoman what he was looking at. She said that a man also squatted here a few days ago and said that he remembered what he had done here before.
The breeze blew across the wheat field, and this voice kept rustling in Park Doman's memory, and time seemed to freeze at this moment. He held back his tears and carefully asked the man's looks, his eyes were again mixed with hope. The girl can only tell him that the person is just ordinary.
As if a stone fell heavily into Park Doman's heart, he looked around helplessly. The dying hope, moaned twice, was trampled and trampled again until it choked silently. Park Doman looked at the camera with tears in his eyes, a bottomless abyss in his eyes.
In Kim Kidd’s films, the protagonists are mostly dumb or unwilling to speak. Whether it's the dumb guy in "BadGuy" who has a crush on female college students, the young man in "Empty Room" who doesn't speak a word and likes to sneak into strangers' rooms, or the almost blank lines in "The Bow". This kind of setting gives Kim Kidd’s film a kind of silent power that is ready to go out of repression. The director seeks to shout in peace, just like Wu Yusen’s speed in a still picture. Just as only day can set off the power of darkness, only suffering can set off the brilliance of virtue, they all use extreme contrast techniques to show more powerful lens language.
Bong Junhao, the director of "Memories of Murder", makes everyone in the camera "blind", so that they will never see the murderer in the boundless darkness. Every clue that the police officer finds seems reasonable, but they will always lead them astray at critical moments, all in vain. Those who have seen the murderer are either mentally retarded or children, and no one can tell them what the criminal looks like. That face is like any face among all living beings, like a drop of water in the ocean, there is no way to find it. The director used such a clueless setting technique to plunge the audience into the abyss of inextricability like everyone in the story, with wailing and crying of never-reaching despair. This feeling fits the psychology of Koreans who have experienced the 1980s. It is not difficult to explain why the film won the box office champion for several weeks and won many awards once it was released. At that time, the Korean people were still struggling in the early days of democracy, resisting desperately amidst repression, and could not see the dawn of the future. The dissatisfaction of the masses with the government and the fear of the masses under the oppression of the army can be seen everywhere in the film.
The director turned the blindfolded goddess of justice into a blind goddess of justice. Good people fall under the sickle of death time and time again, but bad people can commit crimes at ease, and even revisit their hometowns after many years to enjoy their “masterpieces” leisurely.
So, is there really no justice in this world? I can only say that justice is not like in Hollywood movies that the good guys finally win and the bad guys get the punishment they deserve. After all, the Goddess of Justice does not have glaring eyes, she is only responsible for weighing and making judgments. It is not within her responsibility to catch criminals. In the film, no innocent suspect died unjustly. At the end of the movie, when Officer Seo Tae Yoon broke down and raised his gun to shoot Park Heung Kyu, many viewers, regardless of whether Park Heung Kyu was guilty or not, also hope that Seo Tae Yoon will kill him first and then soon. After all, everyone wants someone to bear the burden of the long-term depression. This crime. However, the Goddess of Justice did not make his bullets misaligned, every shot hit the wall, nor did the speeding train run over Park Heung-kyu's body. He finally just staggered into the depths of the tunnel.
The Goddess of Justice is not responsible for hunting down, only for trial. She couldn't cast a skynet, but she knew exactly when to cut down the sword of justice in the face of the suspect and when to put it into the scabbard.
[Park Dorman tears looking at the camera, eyes are bottomless abyss]
Second, Bong Joon-ho political metaphor
Bong Joon-ho reason only made three movies will be among the ranks of first-line director, fame and fortune, not only It lies in his proficient lens language, and also because of the political metaphors in his films, that speaks out the voice of the majority of the Korean people.
Although South Korea has achieved democracy, many things have long been entrenched in their national character and cannot be reversed. For example, it is hierarchical and advocates authority. In "Not to Believe Fate", seniors one grade higher can order, scold, and even pick up a stick to beat the juniors. No matter who calls people older than themselves, they should use honorifics. In "Memories of Murder", when the police officers questioned and interrogated, no one dared to question and resist. They were all honestly scolded and trained. This is an indelible part of the Korean national character, and it is also the source of their oppressive pain. The pain of this contradiction is particularly evident in Bong Junhao's films.
There is a detail in the movie: the interval between Bai Guanghao's torture, dinner with police officers Park Duoman and Qiao Yonggu, and watching TV dramas praising the courage of the police to solve crimes. Bai Guanghao exclaimed in excitement, saying that this TV show was his favorite, and he wanted to call his father to tell him. Qiao Yonggu had a good temper and persuaded him not to talk so much and eat well. The atmosphere between the three people can be described as weird and happy. Who can imagine that one of them was still being beaten up just now? The role of the police in "Memories of Murder" represents a kind of power, and the pressure of this power often comes from the South Korean government. On the one hand, the people feel that the government deprives the people of their human rights like the police lynching and torturing criminals. On the other hand, they admire this power and feel protected, just like Bai Guanghao likes to watch the TV drama about the police. Not only Koreans, but many people have this dependence on power. Perhaps this is due to people’s inertia and servility. Isn’t there an old saying among the Chinese, “Lean with a big tree with your back? statement. Human power is too small, and I always hope to rely on strong power to seek protection.
In the story, the police officers seem to always be obstructed by the masses in inquiries about the case. For example, Xu Taiyun called to ask the address of the song orderer on the radio, but they thought it was a prank and hung up the phone; Park Duoman went to the bathhouse to check the man’s genitals according to his own judgment, but was ridiculed by the bathhouse owner; the police officer was investigating At crime scenes, people who vandalize the scene are often disrupted. The police arrested criminals for the safety of the people, but they did not get the support of the people. Instead, it can be seen that every time a suspect is arrested, a large number of people will demonstrate at the police station to protest the police handcuffing the suspect or cursing. They caught the wrong person incompetently. This fully reflects the people's suspicion of the government, some suspicions are well-founded, and some suspicions are unfounded. It is this mutual distrust that led to the criminals' impunity and the victim's death.
The appearance of senior police officer Xu Taiyun seems to be inconsistent with the conservative and backward atmosphere of the local area. He is like a booster, injecting a new mode of thinking and vitality into the police force. He and Park Doman respectively represent the faction that wants to innovate in South Korea and the faction that is still backward and conservative. One of them believes in rational judgment, and the other believes in feeling. But with the development of the matter, the psychology of the two has gradually changed: Park Duoman witnessed Bai Guanghao's tragic death because of fear of the police, and began to reflect on his way of finding a case and whether the principles he had always followed with peace of mind were correct? And Xu Taiyun was complacent from the beginning, but later found out that all his efforts were in vain, and the girl he knew became a cold female corpse on the ground overnight. His worldview collapsed completely. He found that instead of following the rules step by step, it was justified and well-founded. It would be better to simply kill the bad guy with a single shot. If he had done this long ago, the girl might not die. Even if the evidence told him again that his speculation was wrong, he would rather believe that the DNA test result was wrong than that there was any reason in this crazy world. The encounters and emotional changes of Seo Tae Yoon and Park Doman also alluded to the struggle between the two factions in South Korea in a certain way. They all firmly believe that they can make the country more harmonious and prosperous, but in the process of struggle and debate, they all become confused and no longer insist on their original intentions and compromise with reality.
In addition to police officers Park Duoman and Xu Taeyun, there is also a compelling police officer, Qiao Yonggu. He is good at all kinds of kicking and torturing criminals. Whenever Park Duoman doesn't want to ask any more, he waved his hand to indicate that Qiao Yonggu would pounce on him without hesitation and kick the opponent down and beat him up. Although this character is violent, he also has his integrity. For example, he is conscientious in his work, persevering when chasing suspects, and does not yell when he is injured, but calmly pulls the nail out of his leg. These are actually commendable military spirits and commendable aspects of the military government at that time. However, the evolution of the situation is like that section of the right leg that needs to be amputated due to rusty nails. When his actions are no longer in line with the development of the real world, he must reluctantly cut it off in order to survive. This is the end result that South Korea needs to abolish military rule to continue to develop better.
There are many interesting details in the movie. For example, the scarecrow in red standing by the paddy field. The scarecrow was originally used to frighten the birds that stole the rice. People put it on the red shirt that criminals like, just to divert the criminal's attention. However, everyone knows that this is a way of covering one's ears and stealing the bell. It is useless and can only give himself some psychological comfort. From another aspect, it shows the turmoil in society. People are powerless to change all of this, so they have to entrust hope to a useless scarecrow.
[Bong Joonho’s movie is full of metaphors]
Third, pray or resist?
The brutal and clever murderer in "Memories of Murder" is like an unpredictable powerful force, everyone will eventually lose their hands and feet in the face of him, and there is no room for counterattack. People can only watch him hiding behind the cemetery, secretly laughing. This is people's fear of some unknown power, full of fear of the thick and muddy darkness.
In "Signs" directed by Nate Shamaran, when the crop circles appear on a large scale in all corners of the world, people can only stare and watch the aliens’ spacecraft with their eyes wide open. Occupying the sky, running around screaming. Facing such an unprecedented scene, people gathered in churches, churches, and temples, and the hosts on TV could only pray "May God be with us."
In another Korean film "Princess Aurora", the director has a different attitude. Zheng Shunzhen, played by Yan Zhenhua, seems to be a dedicated and hardworking car salesman, but is actually a soldier who avenges her dead daughter. The pain in her heart is like a poisonous snake gnawing her heart every day, making her anger more and more prosperous. . After Zheng Shunzhen's daughter was raped and killed by a pedophile man a year ago, she was thrown into the garbage dump as trash. And the man who deserved a thousand swords was protected by a lawyer, defending his neurosis and escaping the sanctions of the law. Although Zheng Shunzhen's husband, Police Officer Wu, is a policeman, he can only sit back and watch the criminals play with the law. Facing the irreversible facts, he chose to pray peacefully and determined to be a pastor.
Zheng Shunzhen carefully planned so that everyone who caused her daughter's tragic end would not die. And those few people all represented an unfair phenomenon in ordinary society, and Zheng Shunzhen flattened them one by one in the name of the goddess of vengeance. Seeing his wife surrender her life for her daughter, blood flowed into a river, heart-piercing wailing, Officer Wu woke up like a drunk man with a sap, quit his job as a police officer, and continued his wife's unfinished revenge.
Former Republican Party spokesperson Newt Greenwich said when evaluating "Star Wars", "The weak on the right side defeated the strong on the wrong side. This is a deep-rooted American myth." In other words, victory always belongs to the righteous side. However, for most people, it is difficult to imagine that they are the heroes who defeated the big figures. After all, those are hero images created in novels and movies, and the number of heroes born in history must be far fewer than those who died. The people under the devil's claws, and more people charging and fighting, all acted as cannon fodder for Silence. Therefore, in absolute terms, whether we should pray or resist in the face of a crisis is unconvincing.
I can't say that Zheng Shunzhen's approach in "Princess Aurora" is correct. As a mother, she is worthy of respect and awe, but as a person, she has no right to decide the life and death of others, not to mention that some of the people she killed are actually not guilty of death. I think the director still wants to express his dissatisfaction with social injustice.
The concept that can be understood and accepted by most people is still the image of the dock worker Ray Ferrell played by Tom Cruise in "War of the Worlds." Ferrell had two children at a young age and was divorced once, but this did not increase his sense of responsibility. He still wandered around all day, pursuing material enjoyment. When aliens struck, he had to hold his daughter and lead his son to start their escape career. During this, they experienced quarrels and a crisis of trust. The son left him to fight against the aliens, while he was desperately guarding his daughter. At the critical moment of life and death, Ferrell's sense of responsibility for his daughter was awakened. For the sake of his daughter, he killed the man who was insane and almost exposed them; after the alien captured his daughter, he picked up the grenade on the ground and stuffed it into the alien's core. In the eyes of outsiders, this is a heroic deed, but for him, he is just to protect his daughter.
For most people, the belief in overcoming evil is a lofty ideal but out of reach, but many people will do it to protect their families, and it often creates miracles because of this.
In "Memories of Murder", Park Duoman boasted of his sharp eyesight and was able to distinguish criminals. The chief once asked him that there was an attempted rape man and the victim's brother were writing confession, let him see who he was. Is a criminal. The director did not let Park Duoman make a judgment, just like the serial murder case that couldn't be settled.
Some truths will be run over by the wheels of time and buried by the wind and sand of history. What people can do is not to pursue meaningless results. Many things have their own determinants, just like in "The Signs of the Sky", the son’s asthma, the girl’s hygienic addiction, and the mother’s death all indicate things that will happen in the future, and many of the results are not something we will be able to see soon. What we can do is to do our best like the father who protects his daughter, and see how life answers us.
Please indicate the author: Nine-tailed Black Cat
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