"Soldado" is undoubtedly the kind of very rare sequel movie: from director, starring, drama to photography, the whole team is almost reorganized. You can say that it is too ambitious, even arrogant, and it is easy to make people think of it. But in the end, all the above obviously failed to stifle its success. Where do you start? As a complete sequel, the two most necessary are the continuity of the plot and the continuation of the video style. The plot is the most intuitive embodiment. The "coherence" here is not a limitation. A reasonable sequel can be a multi-directional extension of the plot of the previous work, whether it is a follow-up or a prequel, even if it is only involved for a period of time, there are only one or two nodes. The existence of connections is a coherent plot. At this point, "Soldado" is understandable. Although it is an independent story, no matter the story background, characters, or setting, it closely inherits the previous works. In other words, the sequel movies with incoherent plots can be called successful, and they are one of the few. As we all know, the director of the previous film "Sicario", Villeneuve, himself has a great directorial style. Therefore, after Villeneuve left the production of the sequel, how to continue the image style must be the first issue, but the new work handles this very well. How to do? The most convenient way is-friends who have seen the movie "T2" (Guess the Train 2, 2017) will understand (although the director here is Danny Boyle, as an example), "T2" frequently Reproduce the classic fragments of the previous work, including the classic opening scenes in the previous work, familiar chase scenes, Renton leaned on the front window of the car and laughed after escaping, trekking on the Edinburgh prairie... even the plot direction is the same as that of the previous work. In the same way, such a setting can clearly capture the image style of the previous work simply and quickly. In short, it means to capture and emulate those memory points in the previous work, and re-emphasize them in the sequel, and then consider further innovation-on the other hand, innovation is the same, and even more important. "T2" is actually not a very successful sequel movie, because it has too little innovative content and too much nostalgic content, it looks more like a "training guessing fan meeting" 20 years later. ", was wiped out by the brilliance of the previous work. On the other hand, "Soldado" begins with the familiar Alejandro torture scene at the beginning of the film, including the following: a tactical helicopter wide-angle aerial perspective, a US/Mexico dual-line narrative structure, a confrontation on the border line, two male heroes fighting on two lines, female characters Set up and use, the collision of the main branch... Even the overall tone of the film and the style of the soundtrack are so similar. Therefore, I would like to say that "Soldado" is conscientious enough to restore the previous work. However, the restorations that make people see at a glance are just the cornerstone, and the reason for its success must be unique. Let me talk about the plot first. The background of the two films is the conflict between extremists on the US-Mexico border. The previous work focused on violent law enforcement. This work also uses this as an entry point. The film points out "get dirty" and the methods of law enforcement have been further violently upgraded: the previous work is in progress. The tricks of bait and torture are not repeated anymore, and the dark fishing law enforcement is adopted, and the law enforcement agents themselves act as criminals to commit violence. However, if the plot is confined to such a series, it would seem pale and monotonous, and there will be changes in the law enforcement process, and the story will develop further along the changes, and the conception is quite clever. Therefore, the meaning of the female role is derived. The female character Kate in the previous work "Sicario" is set as the only member of the team with a "conscience", and was recruited into the team by Matt and others using his FBI identity. In fact, it is more like an Aries that fell into a wolf's den . The early stage of the film revolves around Kate's subjective perspective. Kate has been trying to break through the system and intervene in actions, but in the end found that all his actions were just groundless, and the whole process seemed darker. In the end, Kate chose to turn a blind eye and put down the pistol in his hand. Perhaps the moral standard in his heart has not changed because of this, but the trauma has already formed and he has to compromise in order to obey the overall situation. It can be said that the role of female characters in the film is very important. Although on the surface, the existence of Kate has no influence on the direction of the whole plot, but the significance of the establishment of the role has been reflected. That is to provide a fragile and innocent perspective of outsiders, from such a unique perspective to analyze the behavior of violent law enforcement, regardless of the severity, regardless of the reputation, the intention of the film to express is therefore complete. In "Soldado", the director also expressed similar thoughts, thinking that Kate's role is already complete. If Kate's role is forcibly used to participate in a new story, it will not only appear weak, but will also destroy everything in the first work. Established character image. The female character in this work is set as Isabela, a little girl kidnapped by the protagonist team. She still has nothing to do with the plot, weak and deprived of initiative, but it is very important. From the perspective of the open line, Isabela is the source of the story from the start to the development of the story, the origin of the core contradiction, and the center of the story structure; from the dark line, on the one hand, it is to enrich the character image of Alejandro, on the other hand, it is the enemy who killed his wife and daughter. My daughter should not share the heavens, but at the same time she is an innocent girl who should have nothing to do with the world. There is no reason for her to be harmed a little bit in terms of morality and meaning. Alejandro ultimately chose to protect girls at all costs, even if they risked their lives, but to send the girls out of the border. This enriched the image of his father and the law enforcers also had a warm side. On the one hand, he also proposed new contradictions, whether violent law enforcement There should also be a bottom line to make the story proceed in the extreme darkness on the outside and the surging atmosphere of the inner warm current, with a fuller, more diversified and deeper intentions. Finally, an inconspicuous but very interesting reduction lies in the intersection of the US/Mexico double line. There are only a few descriptions of the Mexican branch in the previous work, but once it crosses the main line, from the moment Alejandro shoots the seemingly innocent and father Mexican policeman, the plot goes straight down, bloody revenge and violence. Law enforcement is entangled, such as heavy anchors slammed down, and the sound is settled, and the heaviness and three-dimensionality of the film emerge spontaneously. In "Soldado", the Mexican branch is slightly longer, and even the first encounter of the main branch is arranged in the early stage of the film, so the image of the little boy will appear three-dimensional (perhaps for the third part to make a certain degree of paving) But what remains unchanged is that at the beginning of the intersection of the main and branch lines, the plot turned straight down again. The inside of the bus immediately faced each other. Alejandro’s previous efforts were all in vain, and then dragged from the confrontation in the car until the boy outside the car shot Alejandro. , Followed by Matt and Alejandro's revenge, the film's rhythm accelerated in an instant, and once again played the role of "propeller" to fuel the flames at the critical moment. All in all, "Soldado" has room for exploration in many ways. As a sequel movie in which the main creative team is seriously absent, it has been quite successful in my opinion. Of course, the film also has a lot of low completion, and there are some doubts that are not consistent with the previous work, but these are unavoidable flaws, and they are not worth mentioning. And the more important inspiration is that to create a sequel movie, what you need is the perseverance to be treated like "Soldado", not blindly sitting on the skyscrapers of the previous work and building childish building blocks, but really looking at the previous work attentively. To create something new of your own.
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