If someone is reading a textbook on the techniques of film shooting and wants to watch a "textbook"-style movie at the same time that can clearly show the various techniques mentioned in the textbook, then I would recommend Paul Thomas Anderson's Punch-Drunk Love (someone translates to "Boxing Love"-but this is really easy to mistakenly think that this is a movie about boxing). This is a work of the PTA director's style, and it is also the movie where Adam Sandler is least like "Adam Sandler". Punch-Drunk Love's use of colors, the scheduling of photographic light sources, the composition of the lens, the use of background music, metaphorical props... It is not the best, but it is very stylized-and stylized It is usually best for example. The most distinctive feature of Punch-Drunk Love is the following images that appear from time to time in the film:
These seemingly psychedelic patterns, along with the same psychedelic background music (created by Jon Brion), create an atmosphere, a kind of... honestly, I don’t know what it creates (using professional film reviews) The standard answer that people provide us: It creates a representation of the emotions of the main characters in the film-but what are the emotions?); it is certain that these colors represent the two main characters of the film: Adam Sandler played Little businessman Barry, and "elder sister's colleague" Lena played by Emily Watson. These color pictures may seem psychedelic, but in fact there are two basic colors: blue and red. And PTA "tells" the audience throughout the film, Barry=blue, Lena=red. It can be seen from the color of the clothes they wore most of the time in the film (especially Adam Sandler, he hardly changed his clothes in the whole film)
Barry is an introverted and thoughtful person; at the same time, because he is too tolerant, he will turn the stress under certain circumstances into extremely violent behavior (well, it is reasonable to say "boxing" this way. ); In English, "blue" also means "melancholy". It is more appropriate to use blue to represent Barry's emotions. So Adam Sandler is wearing a blue suit and his office is also blue
(And this empty office and the blue paint on the wall make Barry's loneliness even more evident) And red symbolizes happiness, freedom, openness, and enthusiasm. For a melancholy person like Barry, he needs a "red" person to guide him. Out of melancholy, to happiness-Lena is such a person. The two met for the first time in front of Barry's company warehouse. We noticed here that the binary structure of blue and red has been established; and as Lena got out of the car and approached Barry step by step, the sunlight on the right side of the lens became stronger, shining towards Barry from Lena’s side, as if It is the light emitted by Lena-a typical film bridge segment is to use a strong light source to represent the direction leading to the road.
However, it is also said that this blue-red binary structure can be traced back to Godard's "A Woman Is a Woman" (1961):
(What do you think? Whether this is far-fetched or not, I don’t know; anyway, no one knows to what extent PTA has been influenced by Godard.) In the color link, another feature created by PTA in this film is lens light. Halo (lens flare). Once again, according to the textbook, we can think that the halo is an enhanced expression of the emotions of the characters in the film (but the early view is that the halo is just the photographer's shooting error). What emotion? In most cases it is the emotion between Barry and Lena; whenever there is a plot where the relationship between Barry and Lena will be further sublimated, the halo will appear (such as the first time the two mentioned above meet) . Interestingly, most of these halos are blue-the color symbolizing Barry. 1. On the eve of the second meeting between Barry and Lena-Barry's sister is bringing Lena to the factory, preparing to formally introduce Lena to her younger brother (actually a matchmaking):
At this time, the halo was not very strong, but faintly caught in the eyes of the audience. 2. After the first date, Barry drove Lena home, and they chatted in the car. At this time, the two people's feelings for each other have gradually become stronger, and the blue halo covers the entire picture frame:
3. In the final stage of the movie, the two finally overcome all the "difficulties", and the lovers finally get married. Barry came to Lena’s door and apologized to Lena (as for why you apologize, please enjoy this film for yourself), and asked her to wait for the future to travel around the world by plane (Barry has accumulated a lifetime of inexhaustible use through some special tricks) Flight points), the two embraced together:
The use of halo in this lens is the most purposeful in the whole film. The halo is gradually appearing and increasing when Lena walks into the company warehouse. Barry is sitting in front of a small organ and playing; Lena hugs Barry from behind and says: "So here we go"-the emotional relationship between the two has entered the next stage. The halo reappeared from the left side of the frame. End of the film
Composition The surface division of the frame is a long-standing composition technique. Using various straight lines, vertical lines or other elements that appear in the lens, a specific area in the picture is enclosed, like a fence, which forces the audience to focus on the characters or other things in the enclosed area. Some time ago I saw a vlog on the YouTube special analysis of the King of Sunglasses in the Mood for Love. The author pointed out a special feature in the movie:
From the 5th minute, the frame of each shot contains a frame (a frame within a frame). Due to the limited geographical space where the story of the Mood for Love takes place, many scenes will be repeated; and the shots represented by this staircase will appear repeatedly, resulting in a feeling of circulation (appearing in this staircase shot, the first few minutes is Tony Leung, Maggie Cheung will be in the next few minutes). This "picture frame in a picture frame" theory can also be applied to Punch-Drunk Love. For example, when Barry saw his sister and Lena coming, he was very nervous and hurriedly walked out of the office. The door frame at the entrance of the office naturally forms the dividing line
Barry and Lena met in a park in Hawaii. Lena came happily from a distance, and Barry, who had been waiting for a long time, stretched out his right hand in a panic to prepare for a handshake. Both of them are in the middle of the two dividing lines in their respective shots (also in the middle of the frame)-I have marked the dividing line with a red line, forming a thirds. The PTA "forces" us to pay attention to the expressions of Barry and Lena.
Barry was still about to shake hands, but Lena stepped forward, hugged Barry directly, and sent him a kiss that lasted more than ten seconds. These three shots constitute a proposition of pros and cons, and finally end with such a three-division picture.
This is where the poster comes from. The lens not only uses the plane division effect of the line elements to enclose Barry-Lena in the center of the picture to form an interior frame; it also uses a backlight lens, with the black silhouettes of the two in the foreground and the back The bright outdoor environment in the scene forms a sharp contrast, which strengthens the audience's attention. The above-mentioned plane divisions mostly occur in flat spaces-might you say that this is not nonsense? All movie frames are a two-dimensional plane space. However, sometimes, we can create some depth cues in the picture frame to enhance the three-dimensional feeling in the two-dimensional picture frame. 1. Barry hurriedly returned to the building where Lena was, trying to find Lena's apartment; but he forgot which room Lena's house was in, so he ran around in the corridor. If the lines on the left and right sides of the ceiling are used as reference lines, from the viewer’s perspective, the two lines are not parallel, and the extension of the two lines to the far side will eventually intersect at a certain point of the frame-this point Called "vanished point" (vanished point). With the vanishing point, we can create a longitudinal plane in a two-dimensional frame. The audience will involuntarily focus their attention on the vanishing point.
The door and the "exit" sign on the door also extend to the vanishing point; and the "doorway" and "EXIT" themselves are very symbolic (contact Lena mentioned above to lead Barry to happiness): Finding Lena=Finding a "way out" 2. In order to see Lena, Barry bought a plane ticket to Hawaii, he hurriedly walked into the waiting room, ready to board the plane
The picture on the left shows that Barry is preparing to check the ticket. He is at the vanishing point and walks along the deep clue line to the airline's check-in office. It is a symbol of "Lena is waiting for me in Hawaii in the distance") The picture on the right shows Barry walking along the aisle to the plane after checking the ticket. At this time, a deep plane is formed, and Barry is once again on the vanishing point; in the distance , A white light seems to be "calling" Barry. It is worth noting that in the left picture, Barry is moving towards the camera and close to the lens; in the right picture, it is moving away from the camera and away from the lens. And the camera is just at the 90° corner of the boarding aisle, just like standing in the middle of the road watching Barry approach and go away. 3. After Barry and Lena met in Hawaii, they came to the hotel where Lena was staying. The two of them walked along the hotel aisle without a word. The ceiling, walls, and wall lights in the corridor formed deep clues, and the vanishing point was between Barry and Lena. This in-depth clue can be seen as a portrayal of the long emotional journey of the two-"After walking for so long, it is finally this step."
At the same time, according to the method of plane division mentioned above, this hotel corridor can also be regarded as a dividing line, dividing the picture into half (halves). Lens metaphor 1. Earlier I said that Barry and Lena are walking in the hotel corridor. It symbolizes the emotional journey of the two, because the "cognition-understanding" is about to end and enter the next stage. The camera once again stood by at the 90° corner of the aisle. When the two moved from walking towards the camera to moving away from the camera, a blue light swept across.
Combined with the effect of the blue halo we mentioned earlier, it shows that this is an early warning, and the character's emotions are going to be sublimated. really
PTA ends with an iris-out in this shot. This is a classic lens transition effect, very common in the silent film era. Circled here, with a soundtrack that looks like a black-and-white film era, which is very suitable. 2. Barry came to Hawaii, but he didn't know where Lena lived. After many twists and turns, he finally found the correct number and called Lena's room. Barry makes the phone call in the phone booth on the street at dusk. Generally speaking, as night falls, the phone booth will naturally light up. However, here, the time when the phone booth lights up is really "thinking about it." When the phone in Lena's room is connected, the phone booth lights up; at the same time, the parade team on the roadside also burst into cheers. Is this all coincidence?
3. The most weird item in this movie is the small organ that runs through the movie. It's like the spinning top in Inception
Barry was in a daze in front of the factory early in the morning when suddenly a taxi stopped in front of Barry. The people in the car put down a small organ and left immediately. This organ seems to fall from the sky. No one tells us who this organ belongs to or where it comes from, let alone what it symbolizes.
Barry moved the small organ back to his office and learned how to play it; at the end of the film he was able to play the piano proficiently (see the analysis of the blue halo above). What does this organ symbolize? There can be many explanations, but they are basically related to Barry-Lena's love. Three explanations are provided below:
① This small organ seems to have fallen from the sky into Barry's life, just like Lena did-it also descended from the sky into Barry's emotional world. Barry is becoming more familiar with the small organ, just like Barry’s growing passion for Lena ②The small organ is called "harmonium" in English, and its etymology is harmony-implying the "harmony" between Barry and Lena. ③Lena is an alien (explain) The extreme version of ①) Each explanation has a certain reason, but it is a bit like nonsense. This may be the essence of movie reviews. (As to why PTA uses the small organ as a metaphorical object, there is a theory: because PTA is deeply influenced by French new wave movies, and the new wave boss Truffau has a movie "Shooting the Pianist", the male protagonist is a The bar pianist, and the heroine’s name is Lena) 4. In the 21st minute of the film (at this time Barry does not know who Lena is), Barry "shopping" in the supermarket (actually collecting puddings for flying points) , He searched and searched, but couldn't find it. At this time, he looked into the distance of the shelf, and in the distant view, there was a vague image of a woman in red.
This is a very inconspicuous plot, and most people may not even notice it. Is this woman in red Lena? Or is it Barry's subconscious? The woman in red disappeared quickly after Barry noticed her. Barry walked in her direction and found the flight points pudding he was looking for. (Does this imply anything?) Mark Kermode commented on the plot: If you notice the woman in red in the supermarket, then you will find that the power structure of the relationship between Barry and Lena has been completely reversed. Simply put, this movie seems to tell the story of how Barry pursues Lena, but this adventure in the supermarket shows that Lena is the one who really pursues Barry. In fact, Lena confessed to Barry on their first date: the first time she drove to his factory, she was passing by on the surface.
Well, all the analysis of this film is over-although there is still a lot of things left to be said. You can think that what I said above is all nonsense, it doesn't matter, because I myself have this feeling when watching other people write film analysis. However, if you have watched this movie, you will know that what I am talking about is not bluffing: Don’t play phone sex casually, let alone tell strangers your credit card password casually.
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