I think "onward" is another masterpiece of pixar studio. The narrative rhythm and emotional resonance are very natural and smooth. The lyrical part is neither sensational nor vulgar, and the humorous part is not caught in slick superficiality. A typical counterexample, China's pixar-like animation still has a long way to go.
" 1/2 of the magic " is the Chinese translation of the movie's English name " onward ". This is an excellent free translation, which is undoubtedly better than "XX General Mobilization", "XX Romance", and "XX Adventure". It can be seen professionally. People are gradually doing professional things, which makes people very happy while amazing. The following is an example of the " 1/2 " image in the film to try to illustrate the rationality and ingenuity of this translated name, and to further consider the meaning and color represented by the " 1/2 " image.
Perhaps an incomplete example
1. The ideal setting of the world view is a modern society where magic and reality each account for 1/2 (here refers to the ending)
There is an interesting monologue at the beginning of the film:
Long ago, the world was full of wonder.
It was adventurous...exciting...and best of all...there was magic...Boombastia
And that magic helped all in need...Flame Infernar!Voltar Thundasir!
But it wasn't easy to master.
So the world find a simpler way to get by.I call it the light bulb.'Tis so easy!
Over time, magic faded away.
But I hope there's a little magic left...in you.
This monologue is extremely fun, and the amount of information is very large. In the narration process, many story templates are used. It is extremely easy to resonate in the common memory, especially the last word "in you" can follow the film. It is understood mechanically as the father's expectation of the brothers Ian and Barley, and it can also be understood as the invisible film author's expectation for the audience.
In any case, what I want to tell at the beginning is that once the world was full of magic, it was amazing and stimulating to help everyone in need, but because it is not easy to master, people found a simpler way-technology-but the film It is the specific event (or common experience) of lighting the light bulb by Edison (Edison has become a female, the extension of American political correctness of gender and race in the field of animated films) to express this meaning, this kind of use of the prism of historical moments The concise way to show the changes of the times is very narrative, and it is unwilling to say the word technology, but to let the audience guess by themselves, which is equivalent to an invitation to enter the puzzle for the audience, and for narration. , Restraint and ambiguity have always been scarce virtues.
The two pictures above and below are the contest between the light bulb and the fire curse.
The magic has disappeared, but "I" still hope that a little magic remains in "you"-the last sentence should be said to be the theme of the whole film. Magic can be regarded as one of naturalism's romantic imagination of primitive wildness. The film The whole tone is also "good old days", and the nostalgia for magic is also a remembrance of the past lifestyle to a certain extent . Such films often include the question "Is the beauty of giving up for efficiency really worth it?" ( Thinking backwards is often more suitable for elegant sentimentality), but "onward" seems to give the answer to this question at the beginning: "magic faded away" is inevitable, but we can keep a little magic in our hearts Imagination; that is to say, the ancient way of life may have passed away inaccessible, but we can still maintain our vision and imagination of its beauty in life, so "good old days" becomes a mark of cultural imagination and spiritual remembrance Stay on us who keep walking~
The end of the film also has a rather explicit echo. The invisible author said through Ian, "I think if you use a little magic in your life, you will be omnipotent." This topic seems to reveal another function of "magic". And identity, especially when we look at it with a sense of reality, the magic here may be understood as " instinctive impulse and ancient potential. " When we go to life with such a mark, we can discover the "second self", which is the "omnipotent" mentioned here. (The relevant discussion will be expanded in detail in 8 below)
2. The protagonist of the story is two brothers with diametrically opposite personalities (1/2)
Barley is brave and reckless, nervous, Ian is weak and careful, and introverted. They are not complete with each other, and neither of them can complete the adventure without each other. They have achieved completeness through cooperation with each other. The brother’s experience in teaching magic, At the critical moment, there was a whimsical idea. The younger brother with magical talent cast the spell, and finally teamed up to defeat the cursed dragon, found the Phoenix gem, and successfully restored his father for a short time. The two brothers are both incomplete "1/2" of the fatherless, but they have found the integrity of their spirit and personality in each other's cooperation and communication.
3. In the beginning, only 1/2 father was summoned (lower body)
PIXAR's ingenuity in this detail is extremely successful and intriguing. The father who lacks the half of the upper body has no hearing and vision at first, and can't even recognize the two brothers and confirm the surrounding environment. He can only recognize the two brothers by the touch of his feet. The existence of this person (given that he is Elf, let’s say this fine design) is ingenious to avoid sensational and vulgar scenes by excluding the body and face. The grasp of emotion is the necessary secret of successful art works. , Must not make it a lasting treble. At the end, the father becomes a complete individual, which means the full expression of the climax family affection. It is expected that this climax will end soon, so the film just came to the end, and PIXAR is in In this short ending, the lyrical part of the complete dad has also been handled with considerable restraint. The camera is given to Ian in the distant ruins hole. He can't hear the sound or the exact expression, because the turbulent emotions are extremely difficult to grasp. Not paying attention will lead to boring emotions, and inappropriate expressions will greatly dilute the concentration of emotions. So since it is quite difficult to trace the expression, body and language of the father, PIXAR simply let these elements be deleted, and all the language that is difficult to grasp is silenced, leaving only speechless legs and silent shots from a distance. . This kind of restraint and concise wisdom is one of the reasons why I have a soft spot for this film.
The lack of the upper body not only ensures the avoidance of abusive emotions, but also causes the dilution of the content and the richness of the characters. It is boring enough to look at a lower body with pants for a long time, isn't it? (I just drove! Righteous) So the geniuses of PIXAR came up with the magic operation of the sunglasses men's suit. This mask male is like a game character in the game "Human Failure" (I highly suspect it is a tribute), so it is a mask. The sporadic nature of male body movements has become an interesting topic. He can often lie down on specific occasions, and he can complete extremely interesting body language expressions in that context. This expression is based on randomness in the plot. Yes, so it appears interesting in rationality, and does not show deliberately humorous slick. A simple truth is that humor must not be deliberate, and it will appear boring and dull.
This choreographer is definitely a diehard fan of Human Fall Flat, and I am quite convinced.
When we cannot fully control our body, the actions we make may also be closer to the soul, because there is less deliberate creation and some permission to love.
4. A detailed egg with the coexistence of the ending moon and 1/2 Satsuki
I will mention later that one of the characteristics of "1/2" is the poetic and gentle acceptance of its own incompleteness. The crescent moon is also a symbol of incomplete romance. The two crescent moons, both large and small, are exactly "1/2". "The most perfect representative symbol, combined with the plot of the two brothers driving to the sky, can imagine that this important symbol may be a symbol of the two, not perfect, but dependent on each other to warm and illuminate to seek a certain poetic integrity.
5. Onward and Backward (departure and return are 1/2 of the journey)
"Onward" tells a rather simple adventure story of departure and return. It can be said to be a poetic imagination of the ancient roaming tradition. The two protagonists search hard, born to death, and finally find that the end point is the original starting point (the phoenix gemstone they are looking for). Hidden in the ancient building that Barley wanted to protect in the beginning), the storyline of this kind of circular structure is not uncommon, and the structure of "The Fantasy Journey of the Shepherd Boy" is also one of them.
The biggest feature of this kind of narrative mode is that the end point (destination) is set at the starting point of departure, so the departure and the return journey form a set of graceful confrontations and intertexts. There are many dexterous and interesting responses in this film (such as that change). The cartoon dragon head on the college graffiti wall with Jackie Chan's head was my main laugh that day), I can write an article to study it, so I won’t repeat it. Another advantage is that the treasures that enlighten people do not lie in the distance, but exist in the seemingly mediocre life. When interpreting Mr. Wang Xiaobo’s article, Professor 21 Yiping has a wonderful term " spiritual nomadism and poetic homecoming ". Can be used to refer to this kind of narrative mode.
Another important feature of this type of narrative mode is that even if the final destination is the starting point of departure, the final goal will never be accomplished without taking risks. In other words, although the final destination is included in the starting point early Factors, but if you don’t experience the baptism of risk, it will be difficult to unearth them, and it is even more difficult to reach the destination. In "onward", Ian would not be able to learn to deal with the dragon's magic without adventurous training, and Barley would not find the key stone and the final lock, and then the phoenix gem.
On the other hand, this kind of narrative mode has a wonderful application to PIXAR’s old-fashioned "growth" theme. After the protagonist has gone through some roaming and adventure for a certain motivation, the "growth" proposition is overcome on the adventure. The difficult process is completed. This growth is often not reflected in the changes in the size and body shape of the characters, but in the growth of the mind and personality. When the two protagonists return to the old place, the new self faces the previous environment. Different reactions are also one of the main manifestations of character growth.
6. Two phoenix gems
A common rule is that if two objects appear in the movie, how easy it is to obtain the first one, and how difficult it is to obtain the second one.
7. For Ian, the two identities of the father's role
At this point, I have lost the freshness of the record. Let me just say it casually. For Ian, the role of father has two identities. On the one hand, his father is Will, the ethical father of Ian and Barley. In terms of his spiritual father, Barley is more, as stated in Ian's monologue below, Barley and Will are each 1/2 of Ian's father.
This memory is concise and clear, very PIXAR.
It can be said that Barley played the role of father for a long time in the childhood and youth when Ian’s father was absent, and Ian and Barley’s adventures can also be called "father-finding journey" to some extent. For Barley, that father’s The image is complete and distinct, with dual identities of mind and body. For Ian, the image of his father is vague and missing. He even lacks any memory of his father (but Barley has four memories of Will), so for Ian For Ian, this "spiritual journey of finding a father" is also a circular narrative of "spiritual nomadism and poetic homecoming", and finally found that the spiritual image of his father was always by his side, and his elder brother had always made up for his company as a father. And lack of care.
8. The duality of self-potential and identity recognition
As mentioned above, "growth" is one of the themes that PIXAR studio is best at expressing, and this is no exception in "onward", and "magic" can be regarded as " instinctive impulse and ancient potential " ( These two theories are not groundless, but have appeared in the film many times explicitly), then the journey to find magic is a kind of "the calling of nature" (a call to instinct and wild nature, this call is accompanied by for the reflection of modern lifestyle diseases ), and this call would bring out everyone within a new second self, that is, the completion of the hidden personality of self-discovery, self-awareness or complete identity explicit and implicit, and This kind of cognition not only completes self-growth, but also liberates oneself from the previous mindset, which greatly enriches the diversity and tolerance of individuals and society. This is the "growth theme in PIXAR" as I understand it. "The deep connotation of ".
There are many characters in the film who have completed the "growth" in this sense. I will not expand it in detail. Let's taste it yourself. I will put a few pictures:
Ian’s growth and opening journey (young man, recharge to make people stronger)
The growth of the Griffin Girl and the upgrade of the tavern (Good A, I like it!)
The transformation of a good wife and a good mother to a female warrior (sister, I can!)
The transition from walking chicken to flying elves (As we all know, elves can fly)
The middle-aged man and horse greasy uncle's transformation to the high-spirited Chiron (what kind of car does the centaur drive, brother, you have four legs), the reflection on urban diseases is more obvious here.
I think the least obvious change is Barley. Maybe the screenwriter of PIXAR Studio didn't think about how to grow this kind of critic character. If it becomes deep and serious, then the growth will certainly grow, but the whole movie It became a black fairy tale. But I think he is relatively less frivolous.
While looking for the picture, I found an amazing foreshadowing, like a cleverly inserted prophecy, which hinted at the subsequent plot. "Watch out for the Gryphon running away" was released by the radio at home when Barley went out to throw trash at the beginning of the film. The sound, this foreshadowing is really clever, I haven't noticed it inadvertently. This makes all the details of the film bring the allegorical mystery and the magic of time and space reversal. The radio plays the role of an omniscient god here.
Of course, we must not forget the transformation of this baby car Guinevere. The car at the beginning is inlaid with a hexagonal fake gem, and the inlay at the end becomes a quadrilateral gem (unknown true or false, nor I want to understand what the meaning is.) At first, I thought the item inlaid on this car was a phoenix gem. Later I knew I was wrong, but as Chekhov said, "If a gun appears in the first act, then The third act of the gun must sound", this principle also applies to the movie, all details must play an appropriate role.
Analysis of a bit of personal experience
"1/2" is a magical and unique number. Because it is incomplete and incomplete, it is often eager to seek the opposite self in the mirror, a certain antithesis of the eternal proposition, to achieve ambiguous integrity. In fact, everyone is incomplete in some sense, and it is a poetic and beautiful process to bravely recognize and accept self-deficiency.
In the world, incompleteness and imperfection are often the norm. On the one hand, half of the magic calls for completeness, prompting people to embark on a hard-to-find adventure for the other half, but in the end, the incomplete other half is not far away. , And it happens to be hidden in the ordinary and boring ordinary life, which needs to discover the mystery of the aesthetic eye; on the other hand, 1/2 of the magic calls for self-cognition, and the incompleteness of the self is often due to the one-sided and narrow self-cognition. When we have the courage to step out of wishful thinking, we will find that there are more different and rich possibilities outside the boundaries of self-definition, where 1/2 can also become a self-sufficient and fulfilling perfection, which represents With the harmless wisdom and non-conflicting harmony, just as magic and technology coexist in the world of Mythos, tolerance for diversity can often reach an extremely beautiful state.
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