Cate Blanchett is another genius.
Why do humans admire genius? Because genius represents the development direction of human beings and is the hope of human beings.
Most of the geniuses portrayed in movies are a painful image, because: movies need drama, and they need to show the unknown side of genius.
Successful "genius movies" all have two things in common: first, while showing the painful side of geniuses, they give enough compassion and tell the audience that they have undertaken all kinds of hardships in order to promote the future of mankind, such as "Beautiful Mind", "Hawking's Biography", etc., Nash endured the pain in his heart to publish game theory, Hawking endured the pain to build the physical world; second, the pain of genius is not only at the level of life, he (she) also points to many levels of social life , has a certain degree of representativeness, such as "The Pianist at Sea" also points to the drawbacks of the capitalist social system.
The film "Where have you been, Bernadette" I'm going to talk about today not only shows the pain of a talented woman, but also raises a social question: how many talented women are finally forced into a bad life housewife?
Where have you been, Bernadette? To find the long-lost genius
The screenwriter and director of this film, Richard Linklater, is a well-known independent filmmaker. He has produced the "Pure Love Trilogy" that is regarded as a love bible by literary and artistic youths: "Love Before Dawn", "Love Before Dawn" At Sunset Twilight", "Love Before Midnight".
The starring role of the film is Cate Blanchett, an absolute Hollywood heroine, an old drama character who has won many Oscars and Golden Globes. Her performance of Galadriel in "The Lord of the Rings" made many fans exclaim: the beautiful face of the prosperous world, coupled with the glittering fairy spirit, is like wallpaper. Lawrence Fishburne, who played a supporting role in the film, is a famous black movie star.
With such a lineup, fans thought they were going to hit the big Oscar production. Unexpectedly, what was finally presented was a feature film about a middle-class family focused on talented women.
The story told in the film is not complicated: a talented architect (the youngest recipient of the MacArthur Genius Award) who, through her genius design, can turn ruins into architectural landmarks full of artistic inspiration and artistic expression. However, it was such a genius who suffered a devastating blow in her life (the "Twenty Mile House" she painstakingly designed and built was destroyed), and she stayed away from architecture and buried her genius in a fit of rage... The movie is called "Bernard" Where have you been, Date?", the family is looking for the heroine Bernadette (played by Cate Blanchett), because the whole family made an appointment to travel to Antarctica together, but Bernadette suddenly disappeared. are looking for her. The essence is this: Bernadette is lost in life, a talented female architect lost in the ordinary family life for 20 years, and now has reached a critical point, she has to find herself again .
At the beginning of the film, Bernadette's identity as a talented female architect is not explained, so what the audience sees is: a housewife with a messy life, living in a strangely decorated house, she and the surrounding people. People and entire communities are out of tune.
The story takes place in a middle-class neighborhood. Other housewives in the community pay attention to their husbands and children every day. In addition to doing housework, what they need to show their ingenuity is family gatherings. What they do with their brains and brains is to constantly gossip about the people around them, and gain the attention of the people around them through gossip and food to make themselves more popular. And Bernadette's thinking: Popularity isn't that important.
The film is here, showing a traditional picture of the American middle class: the husband Kochi, Dokin, the wife quits her job to take care of the children, and every day she thinks about how to be more popular in community gatherings. But there is always a few out there in this crowd trying to find popularity, smart, quick, kind, but always out of tune with the vibe.
Bernadette was buried in such a life for 20 years, until the whole family went to Antarctica to travel, conflicts always broke out: her daughter was going to high school, her original task of caring for her daughter was no longer empty, and the neighbors began to attack. I quarrel with her every day, but her virtual network assistant is a transnational network fraudster, and her husband suspects that she is mentally ill and wants to send her to a mental hospital... All of this prompts her to escape, escape from her current life, and embrace her inner truth. desire.
Therefore, on the surface, the movie looks for the love and warmth between family members through an unforgettable family trip, but at a deeper level, it is the housewives whose talents were buried in the American middle-class family, who regain their value in life . Where has Bernadette gone? To find the long-lost inspiration of genius.
Cate Blanchett: The Neurotic, Charming Genius
Cate Blanchett's acting skills are all online in this film. In addition to playing the fairy princess Galadriel and the domineering Queen Elizabeth, she can also play this kind of neurotic genius.
The last time she played a genius was in the movie "I'm Not There". In this film, Kate plays a young Bob Dylan. Here's the magic: Kate plays a young Bob Dylan as a woman, paranoid, blurry, and a little dissociative. Once the film was released, Kate's acting skills were rumored to be good news.
In 2008, Cate Blanchett won the 65th Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Movie for this film. And this magical film in which 6 actors played Bob Dylan at the same time was greatly appreciated by Bob Dylan himself. Cate Blanchett challenged the most difficult scenes, which shows her true character. "There is only a thin line between a lunatic and a genius", because lunatics and geniuses have powerful energy in their bodies, and this energy can be turned into creativity that is unfavorable, or it can be turned into destructive power. It is precisely because of being trapped in the life of a mediocre housewife that the genius Bernadette will enter the situation of beasts and make life a mess.
Off-screen, Cate Blanchett, an actor, also has this powerful energy deep in her heart, so the neurotic genius she plays has that kind of power.
In "Where Have You Been, Bernadette", Bernadette maintains a certain sense of alienation from family, community, and the world. This sense of alienation makes her look cool. What comes out is truly transcendent. For example, she will take out all the pills in the house and put it in a beautiful glass bottle, like a beautiful art installation; she will transform a dilapidated yard and turn it into a love nest of ocean style; She would wear a vest with lots and lots of pockets, sleep in the common areas of the mall, and wait for the trousers to be cut...
However, she is so cool and distressing: she could have had her own space to shine, but she had to be with these worldly people and accept the unjust alienation and division. This is probably the fate of all geniuses, and it is also the price that geniuses have to pay.
Is the life of a genius lucky or unfortunate?
The movie also left another strong impression on me: Bernadette’s genius was reserved for the world of architecture thanks to her 20 years of self-isolation from middle-class worldliness, and her early escape.
In middle-class families, there are many talented women who were buried in those days. They finally found husbands and children, organized parties, collected gossip and talked and tried to become the most popular people. This kind of life, in 20 years, has already abandoned all the geniuses.
In fact, this is also one of the most controversial aspects of the film: Can a genius who has been wasted by his family life for 20 years still turn around and have an epiphany? I believe Bernadette has guarded this genius.
If you want to wear a crown, you must bear its weight. With this genius, you must endure the loneliness of keeping a distance from the world. Is this lucky or unfortunate for Bernadette? I feel lucky. People like Bernadette have a world of their own that is so interesting and engaging that they turn a blind eye to the real world and carefully distance itself from it. She can always find beauty and fun in her own world, and that's enough. What's even more gratifying is that there are many people standing on the same side of her, helping her protect her inner little world. For example, she won her inheritance, inherited her intelligence, and understood her daughter; the female neighbor Audley, who usually does not deal with her, but will bravely stand up to help her at a critical moment; on the way to the Antarctic Helping her female supervisor.
Those who understand her, admire her, and help her at critical moments are all women, which also makes the film have a feminist connotation. In fact, it is already a very feminist film to bring up the theme of talented women buried in middle-class families.
How many talented women are buried in marriage and family, acting as excellent wives and mothers, but can't find "self"? This is a good question for film exploration, deep enough. That's it, this movie is worth it
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