Compared with fantasy films, there is no doubt about the real quality of "War Horse". However, every frame and every note of the film still exudes the temperament of precise Hollywood-style commercial considerations and sensationalism. John William James' soundtrack and Januz Kaminsky's photography perfectly interpret the top level of pre-digital Hollywood - Spielberg intends to make "War Horse" a "retro movie" isolated from the latest film technology, Even the beautiful natural scenes in the film do not have the slightest credit for CG computer effects, and the actors are also led by newcomers with no acting experience. In short, Spielberg is trying to make "War Horse" "original". stand up.
However, the emotionally charged, melodious and melodious background symphonies are all too familiar, those scene designs with high elevation close-ups and fluttering snow flakes are too familiar, and those upgraded shots of silhouettes in the sunset and flying horsehair are too familiar. Those scenes of heavy rain and stubbornness in the mud are all too familiar... If you've seen enough Hollywood blockbusters -- or just a few of Spielberg's masterpieces, you can learn from War Horse. ” to find those cookie-cutter techniques. "War Horse" is like an eight-part essay of Si's movie, which fully interprets the great director's porcelain work from the plot structure, character setting, picture composition, sound effect editing and other aspects. From this point of view, "War Horse" War Horse is actually very similar to Spielberg's previous work, The Adventures of Tintin. The only difference is that the latter uses the latest film technology.
Therefore, "War Horse" is a textbook. From the perspective of film techniques in the pre-digital age, this film is natural and impeccable. Every process of the film can become a textbook for Chinese films. However, the "truth" of "War Horse" only stays at the non-fantasy type level. From the perspective of the story itself, it is undoubtedly too legendary. In the progress of the plot, there are almost deliberate traces of coincidence and blood spilling. Although the horse did not speak, its "intelligence" is actually the same as the intelligent horse in the fantasy movie - saving the life of the companion horse twice, our horse protagonist is obviously in the spirit of IQ, emotional intelligence and self-sacrifice. The above have surpassed ordinary human beings, and the reunion of the little protagonist and Aiju at the end is also a happy ending that is particularly heartwarming but does not conform to the logic of the drama. The worst thing is that the side characters that the war horse encountered in the turbulent displacement turned out to be passers-by that did not exist in the end. At the end of the photo, the characters all flew away, which is really too much.
Spielberg owns horses in his own family, so he has special feelings for horses, and he once told the media that he actually shot "War Horse" to shoot people, to reflect the emotional projection of people from horses - from In literary theory, this is the fundamental purpose of animal narrative. Berg said in "Why Staring at Animals" that humans and animals once had a long and close relationship, but this relationship has been lost forever in contemporary capitalist society. "War Horse" seems to reconstruct the relationship between humans and animals. The "love and commitment"-style bond between them, but at the root, it is actually a hollow fairy tale wrapped in Hollywood clichés, and the superficial reconstruction cannot hide the essential loss.
In "War Horse", the protagonist's feelings for horses undoubtedly have some kind of childish paranoia, but this also proves once again that Spielberg's childish innocence - "War Horse" and "ET" are actually the same thing, horses and aliens People have become important objects for children to project strong personal feelings and separate them from the adult world. I believe there is a deep emotional silt between people and horses, but that's not what War Horse can express.
(Published in "Southern People Weekly" March 12, 2012 Issue 8)
View more about War Horse reviews
