Single-role film, from the silent era to the MV.
Indeed, not counting the women in the 20-second mobile phone video received by our tragic protagonist Paul, this Spanish film called "Buried Alive" has only his own role from beginning to end, buried in In a coffin more than 2 meters long. From the single-scene series of "Frustrated Fang" to the one-shot "Russian Ark" to the one-man show "Buried Alive" now, how confident the director must be, and how courage the investors must be, in order to take into account the market response everywhere. There are so many jaw-dropping magic tricks in the contemporary film format that must be calculated.
In fact, if we talk about single-role movies, then as industrial technology movies, at the beginning of their invention 115 years ago, due to conditions, there will be a large number of movies that resemble stage monologues, such as Lumiere’s "Little Girl". With Her Cat" (1895), George Merrie's "Journey to the Moon" (1902). No way, in front of the bulky camera that could not be pushed, pulled, and moved in the last century, the performers can only be like circus actors. Doesn't Chaplin often make everyone laugh at the camera alone? Before Griffith and Eisenstein turned upside down the editing technology and montage art, as a movie extended on theatrical stage, it could accommodate a group of people with a few sceneries or even just a face. Just show up.
The rapid advancement of the film industry has allowed genres to become more and more abundant and gradually established. However, whether it is a commercial film that guarantees the aesthetic security of the audience or an independent art film that pursues film language and conceptual innovation, they all have plot conflicts in the same destination. Create conflicts between the protagonist, between the protagonist and the supporting role, and develop and resolve conflicts in 90 minutes. After all, movies are stories, stories between people. Since then, the "one-man show" can only be seen in the cool 5-minute MV of dancing and dancing, and the longer ones are also short films, such as the middle-aged teenager who is still absent-mindedly stared by the camera for 10 minutes in "Bollero Drummer". drummer.
One-man drama is more interesting
After explaining the producers, producers, and directors at the beginning, the screen was completely black, accompanied by a crescendo of breathing and Zippo noise, there was light, illuminating a tired and desperate face. Well, there is light, there is hope, at least this is not an experimental short film in which the audience starts to talk or express weird ideas. Paul, the only character in "Buried Alive", easily broke free of the rope and began to hit the coffin plank desperately. The classic David escape magic is familiar.
David Magic used at least multiple cameras inside and outside to switch back and forth between live hosting, anxious audiences, and struggling David, and never gave the result of the transformation from hideous to chic. As the movie "Buried alive" has to be a play, there must be contradictions. Now it’s fine. Paul found an empty wallet, a cell phone with a signal and a half-tube battery, a Zippo, a pencil, and then a weakly-powered flashlight, paper strips, and fluorescent lights. Stick and Knife, the movie became the classic web game "Escape the Room".
However, how can a single player create drama conflicts and how can they evolve the development of the plot? The pile of "voice actors" in the ending subtitles and the cell phone in the coffin came in handy. Obviously, a person in a 1.5 square meter confined desperate situation is better than a guy sleeping in a large apartment. "Buried alive" has almost a 1:1 real time ratio with reality. The plot time is more dependent on the standby time of the mobile phone. Therefore, the mobile phone creates the strongest dramatic conflict between square inches. "Hello, welcome to call XX Bank, we will serve you wholeheartedly... Please dial zero for manual services... The call is being transferred... I am the XX department, and it is not convenient to answer your call now, please leave a message after the bee... "We all have the unfortunate experience of being exhausted by the telephone connection service, not to mention Paul in the coffin. I guess that the director must have the concept first in this story, and then cleverly arranged many links for this life-and-death escape, in order to complete the 90 minutes and convince the audience. For example, let the character naturally have anxiety and find medicine for 5 minutes; give it a cobra friend and send it away, 5 minutes. And for the "phone show", special voice-over roles are set up, such as dogmatic operators, bureaucratic FBI, experienced and inexperienced commanders, step-by-step threatening terrorists, unrelenting company personnel department, and mothers suffering from dementia. , There are contradictory girlfriends in life. SMS, MMS and mobile phone video together add narrative capabilities to telecommunication technology. Whenever the anxiety reaches its extreme, the character gets tired, and gives the audience a black screen in due course.
Everything looks so much so that the spectators are even more worried than the contestants in diving and weightlifting competitions. The story of a single character who was also trapped in a desperate situation also appeared in "Remains of a Deserted Island", "The Moon" and "127 Hours". The loneliness and imminent death are the most frightening. Although several films are not as extreme in form as "Buried Alive", they all use rich soundtracks to extend emotions, use fantasy and memories to make transitions, and even arrange many other characters before and after desperation or in subjective flashbacks to enrich Narrative, but it can bring the despair and struggle of the trapped to the most vital explosive height. Chuck in "Legend of a Deserted Island" is accompanied by Volleyball Wilson, Sam in "Moon" has a clone of himself to fight, and Aaron in "127 Hours" only has the crow on his head telling him to change day and night.
The extremely cramped and narrow scenes, the quick-cut shots that hope to light up the moment, and the desperate shouts that almost bite in the heart, a scene for one person is also very exciting.
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