To represent the Tang Dynasty architecture in the film is naturally not a documentary, so it is difficult to restore it perfectly. What's more, only a few temple buildings remain in the Tang Dynasty buildings in my country, and there is limited reference for restoring larger-scale and more complex sleeping buildings. But in general, I think that the kiss beast, roof slope, bucket arch system, window method, and color matching are not too different. The kissing beast in the film is a typical Tang Dynasty owl tail; the slope of the roof is relatively gentle (the fighting in the upper room is also relatively stable); although the dougong can't remember the details, the Tang-style Bamboo Ang at the corner still has a deep impact. In my impression, the windows do not seem to see the more mainstream mullioned windows, but the lattice windows were not absent in the Tang Dynasty; some people criticized the color matching problem. Although most of the buildings in the Tang Dynasty in the general impression are indeed green tiles and red lacquer, it is not static. The rigid color matching of the film, and considering the background of the film's decline and turmoil in the late Tang Dynasty, and the tone of the film does not want to show the flourishing atmosphere of the Tang Dynasty, the color matching in the film is also reasonable.
I am not very familiar with other objects such as utensils. At least in terms of architectural textual research, this film is well done even among all Chinese costume films.
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After watching this film, I feel that this kind of film has been released in domestic theaters. If someone like Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige knows a little bit of shame, they can announce that they are closed. At least they will no longer make costume films, but only modern romantic light comedies.
However, this film can't help but fall into the boring discussion of pretending to be coercive or not, and of literary youth not being literary. Some film critics really can’t stand it, or they regard themselves as directors, and the film reviews are more abstract than the film, or they try their best to show how familiar they are with the director, and gossip about Hou Hsiao-hsien’s life and all his works from beginning to end. The funniest thing is that some people analyze that Nie Yinniang has autism, especially a character in the legend of the Tang Dynasty, you can analyze whether she has autism, why don't you analyze whether she has irregular menstruation and frown every day?
The reason for the opposition is that although the picture is good and there are many long shots, the plot is boring and unwatchable. It seems that Hou Hsiao-hsien said that one long shot will finish the story. It doesn't matter whether the shots are long or not, and the plot is not the whole of a movie. Many art films and films for storytelling are not the same kind of thing, but they just happen to be called films, just as the government work report and "Returning and Returning Ci" happen to be written in Chinese characters.
But in fact, this film belongs to the category of good storytelling. First of all, the narrative is not very pretentious, making people incomprehensible. The only thing is that the two roles of Princess Taoist and Princess Jiacheng were not explained directly, but in fact, it was also prompted by the high-noise picture when Princess Jiacheng appeared in the following text. And Zhou Yun's one person and two roles are obviously the same character, because the director did not give Zhou Yun a face shot in the killer state from beginning to end (of course, the audience can recognize it is Zhou Yun by looking at the chin), so from the film's narrative purpose It was said that Zhou Yun wanted to cover up his identity as Yuan Shi, and the audience could realize this from an omniscient perspective.
Other than that, the film doesn't have much pretense in its narrative. In short, it is indeed a story of "a lonely girl who cannot kill her beloved". Although it is easy to say that it took half a day to shoot only one very mentally retarded story, this minimalist narrative style, like Carver and Salinger's novels, should not actually be summarized as a story outline. Everyone understands the law of icebergs, but the key lies in whether the part under the water is purely pretending to let you guess in the fog, or whether it actually expresses the huge capacity of the entire iceberg with a minimalist part on the water.
For example, when Nie Yinniang returned to Nie's house, listened to Nie Tian's conversation, she sat outside the camera at the beginning. When Nie Tian finished talking about Princess Jiacheng's past, the camera moved to the right, and Nie Yinniang, who was obviously expressionless throughout the film, was covering her face and crying. Princess Jiacheng is not her mother, why is it so sad that she is about to cry? As the film goes deeper, you can gradually realize that because Princess Jiacheng is actually the most important connection between her and Tian Ji'an. It was Princess Jiacheng who engaged them, and Princess Jiacheng broke them up. On the one hand, Yinniang has complicated feelings for Princess Jiacheng herself, and on the other hand, Princess Jiacheng symbolizes her memories of Tian Ji'an. Although she still loves Tian Ji'an in her heart, she cannot express it because of the humiliation she has suffered, the status quo that Tian Ji'an has a new love, her identity as an assassin, and the restraint of her master's orders. So all the feelings can only be vented under the excuse of Princess Jiacheng. The emotions of the characters contained in this shot are very rich (no autism at all, okay).
Another example is a scene in which Tian Ji'an held Hu Ji and recalled Yin Niang. Although it is relatively restrained, there are already too many lines in this film to be forced. However, the foreground of this shot has always been hazy with candlelight and wind blowing tulle, making the picture sometimes blurry and sometimes clear. In addition to being very beautiful, it actually conveys the complexity of Tian Ji'an's feelings for Yin Niang in the line, holding his only remaining soul in his arms to susten Hu Ji, and at the same time, he is still shifting between falling into dreamy memories and cruel reality. Wu Ji's words made Yin Niang injustice, and Yin Niang later helped her to save Wu Ji. This delicate feeling between the old love and the new love is also implied in the iceberg under the water in this group of shots.
Tian Ji'an's role is simply interpreted by many as being cruel and irritable. However, after he was demoted to Tianxing after wrestling a knife and nails, he took on a wrestling scene with a child. He is also his son. In the latter part of the film, he took a paper figure to confront Yuanshi, but stopped between him and Yuanshi with a hateful expression. At this time, the processing of the camera is that Tian Ji'an drew his sword and threw the vase, and then appeared on the scene, leaving footsteps in a voice-over, and did not fully explain his anger. However, this suffocating appearance made people feel Tian's loneliness and depression even more. Conversely, in this scene, Yuan Shi, who was clearly skilled in martial arts and possessed unique skills, faced her aggressive husband. First, he pretended to calmly call the two children over. He could only use his son as a shield, so why not make people feel embarrassed. Rather than saying that Yinniang is a lonely protagonist, it is better to say that she is just a point of view, and she outlines the loneliness of Tian Ji'an, Yuanshi, Princess Jiacheng, Taoist nun and other characters in her wandering.
However, loneliness is certainly a theme. Whether it is Princess Jiacheng or Yinniang, they all directly use the lines to point the question. It can be said that they do not care about the audience, but in the film I understand, it is only a small part. The "Nie Yinniang" I have seen is actually more about aesthetics, which has been lost since the Manchu Qing Dynasty, and the revival of traditional Chinese scholar aesthetics that disappeared after the Cultural Revolution. Sure enough, this resurrection came from Taiwan.
The reason is that the scholar rather than the literati. Because third-rate scholars are also considered literati, and those who refer to themselves as slaves in the Manchu Qing Dynasty are also considered literati. In ancient Chinese society, scholars must be successful first, or at least resign after passing official duties, or live in seclusion in the mountains and forests but have been invited by many people. For the literati class, their values are always divided into binary. On the one hand, they hope to achieve success and fame, and on the other hand, they admire the idyllic life in the mountains and forests. Although they usually tend to the former when they are happy in life, they fall to the latter when they are disappointed. These feelings are genuine. In the film, what caught my attention in particular was the chirping of birds and insects and the sound of drums that didn't stop for a second. Even in all indoor scenes, the chirping of birds and insects that can be heard between the curtains, seems to be the call of an idyllic song, which brings an incomparably cool texture to the whole film. And although the drums that symbolize power and politics can temporarily suppress the sound of insects, they will eventually dissipate.
Therefore, although there are Yingge Yanwu and silk and satin in the film, there are always long-term landscape mirrors from time to time. After Yinniang rescued Tian Xing, in the picture of walking in the mountains, the proportion of the characters relative to the mountains and rocks is extremely small. I guess Hou Dao even wanted to put the picture upright to better match the artistic conception of Fan Kuan's "Journey to Mountains and Streams". In the lens, it is like unfolding pictures of "Viewing Clouds on the Rock", "The Fishing in Xishan", "The Poetry of the Grass Court" and "The Night Tour with Candles", which can be said to be the pinnacle of Chinese aesthetics. Maybe it's because I don't watch too many movies, but I really can't think of a second Chinese-language movie that has achieved such an artistic conception. Those who pile up leaves and chrysanthemums should really hide in shame and anger.
Supporting this lofty aesthetic is the brushwork that strives to be close to reality. Needless to say, the textual research of life in the Tang Dynasty, the details of bathing, games, farewell customs, the restoration of architectural clothing and makeup (although the clothing in the late Tang Dynasty did tend to be conservative, I am still very moved that there is a Tang Dynasty film that does not sell meat), all make people. satisfy. The classical Chinese lines in the film may be controversial, and some people feel that the classical Chinese with a Taiwanese accent is inconsistent. In fact, many official servants in the film also have various obvious local accents (one of the Jiangsu and Zhejiang accents is particularly impressive), which is actually in line with historical facts. Under the ancient government system, it was normal for officials to have various accents, and even many people could not speak Mandarin well. The pronunciation of Middle Chinese is almost different from that of modern Chinese, and it is not practical to restore it completely. So the Taiwanese accent should be regarded as some kind of local accent.
The half-literal dialogue was also the reality at the time. The screenwriter must have worked hard in terms of the characters' titles, but in order to take care of the audience, some vernaculars are not perfect and difficult to demand. In fact, the differences in characters can also be seen from the prose of the lines. For example, the Taoist nun, who is the most proficient in classical Chinese, can also feel her cynical and conceited feelings from her difficult language. Yinniang also used classical Chinese a lot, but she was usually abbreviated and comprehensive, as if she wanted to use classical Chinese to restrain and hide the overturned emotions in her heart.
More realistic is its martial arts design. The story of Nie Yinniang is of course the originator of Chinese martial arts. However, the martial arts world of Jin Yong and Gulong has long been out of touch with the martial arts world that really existed in ancient China. Its essence is something like "Dragon Ball" or the Marvel Heroes series. This film finally drags "Martial Arts" out of that obscenity world and retrieves its original texture. Therefore, its fights are almost without flower punches and legs, and it is full of one-shot kills. Although there is also Qinggong, it only stops at the previous roof, and does not fly around. Although it cannot be said that it is not beautiful, it always feels a little awkward, which is very different from ordinary martial arts. In addition to fighting in the shadows of the distant view, which is very characteristic of Hou Hsiao-hsien, what is more interesting is the battle between Yinniang and the masked Yuanshi in the woods. After the mask was cut, there was no close-up of the front, but kept in the distant view, and the two left. This is probably the only shot that shows how to exit the stage after a long time shooting a master duel. However, this awkward scene has already expressed the delicate relationship between Yinniang and Yuanshi. It's like the kind of shame that you accidentally know I'm the bad guy, I'm so miserable that I have to do it myself, when you show up, I can only be the third unwilling in my man's heart... I can't face this kind of face at all. The two who were in a relationship only left silently.
In this realistic brushwork, adding the plot of the Western Regions Hu Seng using paper people to perform spells makes this kind of supernatural and more realistic. It is another finishing touch to make the whole story finally take on the "legendary" color.
In short, this film is full of scholar spirit and can truly represent Chinese aesthetics. But of course it can't be an archway and an XX, so you can't expect Nie Yinniang to be responsible for the functions of the pancake man and help the audience to be funny and emotional. To the audience, it is nothing but a radish and cabbage, each taking what they need.
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