From 1988 to 1989, the famous "Miyazaki Miyazaki Incident" (also known as "Tokyo Saitama Serial Young Girl Abduction and Murder Case") occurred in Japan. Four girls were abducted and sexually abused by Miyazaki Miyazaki who suffered from multiple personality disorder. Invade and kill abandoned corpses. Because this person often watches pornographic, sexually abused, sexually perverted cartoons and videotapes, the media took the opportunity to criticize related ACGN products (animations, cartoons, games, novels) and otaku, and the government also launched a series of purges and crackdowns The actions of the ACGN industry have caused a devastating blow to Japan's animation industry, and this low period did not begin to slowly improve until 1995. One of the reasons for the recovery is the launch of Anno Hideaki's TV version of "EVA", and the other is the release of Oshii's theatrical version of "Ghost in the Shell".
If I were to choose the pinnacle of Japanese animation, then my TOP3 would be Oshii Mori's "Mobile Police Theatrical Series", "Ghost in the Shell Theatrical Series", and Anno Hideaki's "EVA Theater Series". It is true that this is because of my preference as a man for science fiction, cyberpunk, machinery, and the future of human society. , human society and the thinking of human beings are very forward-looking, which makes me worship. At the end of this month, the live-action version of "Ghost in the Shell" will be released, which has aroused my desire to revisit Oshii's version of "Ghost in the Shell" and review it in the following five chapters.
three gods
Masamune Shirou, the author of the Ghost in the Shell manga and the founder of all works in the series. In that era full of blood and love comics, he used indifferent cyberpunk-style stories to expound his philosophy, political views and views on the relationship between people and technology, especially his persistent reflection on electronics and biochemical technology Among the countless high-tech professional terms that appear in the works, it has become the charm that attracts otaku or geeks. Shirou Zhengzong is a sci-fi author with an oriental Zen flavor. His grasp of cyberpunk elements and his shaping of the world of attack in the shell laid the foundation for the breadth and depth of this work, and gave infinite possibilities for subsequent creations.
Oshii Mori, whose status need not be mentioned, is the only master figure in the Japanese animation industry who can stand side by side with Miyazaki. Viewpoint expresses pessimism about the future. Although the original author of "Ghost in the Shell" is Masamune Shirou, Oshii Mori's theatrical animation has contributed to the spread of this work. The director, known as the "Original Smasher", integrated and adapted the information of the original work, and pushed "Ghost in the Shell" to the metaphysical road of philosophical speculation, with a strong personal stamp. A completely different style from the optimism of comics, giving people endless thinking.
Kenji Kamiyama, director of the TV version of "Ghost in the Shell". If Oshii Mamoru's theatrical version is introverted and introspective, then Kamiyama Kenji's TV version is extroverted and social. It can be said that they used the same story platform to create two works with completely different styles. The TV version of the story pays more attention to political and social elements, and emphasizes suspense and reasoning. Whether it is the "Smiley Man Incident" or other independent events throughout, it has the nature of a social experiment. The theatrical version and the TV version of "Ghost in the Shell" are a pair of works that complement and complement each other. The former is metaphysical and the latter is grounded, each with its own charm.
Cyberpunk
Cyberpunk, consisting of the words "Cybernetics" and "Punk", is a branch of science fiction. Its stories usually take place in the future where science and technology are highly developed. Elements such as artificial intelligence, large enterprises, and the confrontation between man and power have a strong dystopian nature.
Generally speaking, the cyberpunk movies we have seen have relatively fixed art styles, such as single cool colors, rainy weather, row upon row of high-rise buildings, desolate and dilapidated landscapes, crime-ridden cities, and so on. Due to Westerners' curiosity about oriental culture and the mentality of the yellow peril, oriental cities have become the location of many cyberpunk movies since Ridley Scott's "Blade Runner".
In that era, Hong Kong was undoubtedly a very representative example. There are not only the prosperity of Victoria Harbour and its surrounding skyscrapers, but also the slums like Yau Ma Tei or the Kowloon Walled City, with high-rise buildings, dark alleys, and dazzling neon signs. It combines a sense of technology and a sense of dilapidation. At the same time, as a city where Eastern and Western cultures meet, Hong Kong is itself a melting pot of cultures and nations, which is quite similar to the future vision of humans, clones, and robots in the cyberpunk world. As a result, Hong Kong is almost a recognized cyberpunk holy land, and later films such as "Cloud Atlas" and "Pacific Rim" were also filmed in Hong Kong.
"Ghost in the Shell" is no exception. The fictional city "Xingang" in the film is designed with Hong Kong as the prototype, and both the high-rise buildings and Chinese signboards have a strong Hong Kong flavor. When talking about the production process of "Ghost in the Shell", Mamoru Oshii said that when he was looking for an image of a future city, he first thought that it should be an Asian city. It must be highly realistic and must be able to be expressed through animation, and then he thought of it. Hong Kong.
It is worth mentioning that in recent years, perhaps the elements of Hong Kong have been exhausted, and Shanghai has become another popular location for cyberpunk or sci-fi movies, such as "Transformers 2", "Her", "Ring Messenger". All of them have Shanghai presence.
Major Sakura
Major, namely Motoko Kusanagi, the first protagonist of "Ghost in the Shell", the captain of the Ghost in the Shell of the Nine Section of Public Security. Except for the brain and spinal cord, the whole body has undergone prosthetic transformation and is the first batch of full-body prosthetic users. Before joining the Public Security Section 9, he served in the Japanese Self-Defense Forces with the rank of "Major", so everyone in the Public Security Section 9 also called him "Major".
The major's appearance is the image of a female royal sister, with a slender and well-proportioned figure, a soft appearance, a calm personality, proficient in fighting, gunfighting, computer warfare, and strong commanding ability and psychological quality. In the TV version, "Major さま" is often shown in low-cut clothes and briefs. Such a sexy and intelligent character can be regarded as a goddess-level character for the majority of royal sisters.
In the major of the theatrical version of "Ghost in the Shell", Mamoru Oshii removed the sense of humor of the original work, retained realism, and added self-doubt and self-examination. In the film, there is a section of the Major diving, in a dialogue with her colleague Bart, the Major stated why she likes diving: "(Under the water) I feel fear, anxiety, loneliness, darkness, and maybe... there is hope. When I float to the surface, I even have a feeling of being reborn." As a prosthetic person, Major is confused. If the water surface is regarded as a mirror, then the underwater and the water are the two sides of the virtual and the real. Most of the time, we are struggling in the dark world underwater. Only when we surface can we see the essence of everything. Unable to resolve his spiritual predicament, Major can only rely on the symbolic ritual of diving to gain the experience of rebirth.
Here I have to mention Kenji Kawai's soundtrack "Puppet Ballad". The lyrics are taken from "Manyoshu", and the song is sung in Bulgarian folk songs and matched with Japanese drums. With the decadence of the West and the psychedelic of the East, every note is like a morning bell and a drum, and it goes straight into the heart. The song appears twice in the film, once during the opening sequence of Motoko Kusanagi's artificial prosthesis assembly process, and again when her self-doubt and hesitation are at their peak. The former is the growth of "physical" and the latter is the growth of "spirit", which has an unparalleled sense of fit with this soul-stirring song.
artificial intelligence
Since the days of artificial intelligence movies, "self-awareness" has become the most exposed and secret theme. The so-called "self-awareness" means that a machine has the freedom to think like a human being. The point is not to learn to think, but to have freedom. Skynet in "Terminator" and The Matrix in "The Matrix" are all excellent in this regard, but compared to sci-fi films that are used to setting artificial intelligence as the villain, "Ghost in the Shell" is serious and serious. Gentle, Mamoru Oshii did not judge between good and evil, but cast a more pretentious gaze.
In this film, the representative of artificial intelligence is "Puppet Master" - a pure computer program. After continuous evolution in the online world, it has self-awareness and believes that it should have the same freedom and freedom as a "life". dignity. In refuting that others see it only as a program, it says: "I think your human DNA is also just a program designed to store itself, and life is like a node born in a flood of information. DNA is for life. Just like the human memory system, unique memories make unique people... Contemporary science is far from accurately defining life."
In the TV version of "Ghost in the Shell", there are also representatives of machines gaining self-awareness. The combat robot "Tachikma" of the Nine Section of Public Security has gradually developed personality, preferences, and even in the interaction with humans. sacrifice spirit. The vision is wider. In Spike Jones' "Her", the artificial intelligence system "Samantha" is the same as "Puppet Master". It is just a program, but it also evolves in the process of continuously acquiring knowledge. Leave the male protagonist and explore a deeper existence.
For the "Puppet Master", its predicament is that as a program, it cannot obtain a real "life"-like experience like a human being with a physical body. It feels that its system lacks some basic life functions, such as death or reproduction. ability of offspring. Motoko Kusanagi asked it, "Can't you copy yourself?" His answer was eloquent: "Copying is just copying, and a virus may completely destroy me. Just copying can't produce variation and individuality. For survival, and for the sake of species The balance between life has been constantly multiplying and evolving. Cells are constantly repeating the process of death and regeneration, metabolism, growth and transition. When they die, nothing is left except genes and offspring. This is a kind of tenacious resistance Defense mechanisms against all kinds of devastating disasters.”
After meeting the "puppet master", Motoko's previous doubts about herself were confirmed and resonated. She had undergone a full-body prosthetic transformation when she was very young, and had hardly experienced the concept of a real body maturely. In essence, the element in the prosthetic shell is no different from the "puppet master" in the online world. "Puppet Master" said that he saw himself in Motoko, so why not Motoko? Thus, the two roles of the two-in-one have a common ultimate direction—evolution.
spirit in shell
The English title of the film is "Ghost in the Shell", which literally translates to "ghost in the shell", which is the phrase "the ghost" said by Masamune Shirou when he objected to Descartes' "mental-mind dualism". in the machine", but obviously "ghost" and "shell" refer to "soul" and "body". In fact, "Ghost in the Shell" is all about the relationship between "spirit and flesh".
According to our usual cognition, or from a materialistic point of view, the soul and the body are inseparable wholes. Human beings are human because they have a soul and a body, both of which are indispensable. However, with the increasing development of technology, this view has been shaken. Nowadays, many human organs can be artificially manufactured, and prosthetic arms and prosthetic legs have long been no surprise. The importance of the body seems to be getting lower and lower. Coupled with the highly developed artificial intelligence, the proud soul of human beings is also as if it could be replaced. In the face of divine technology, the boundaries between man and machine are gradually disappearing.
The confusion of Kusanagi Motoko in the film may be the confusion of human beings in the future: the body can be mass-produced and replaced at any time, and the uniqueness of the soul presents a state of separation and opposition. Looking at the same body, how can we determine our soul real existence? ——“Probably all the cyborgs with full-body prosthetics have the same confusion. Maybe they died a long time ago, and now I am just a virtual personality composed of prosthetics and an electronic brain. Maybe the real me has never been at all. Existed. After all, my existence is only a judgment made by the surrounding situation.”
Then the question comes again. On the evolutionary path of human beings, has the body, as the carrier of genes, become a non-essential item besides reproduction and death? The answer given by Oshii Mamoru is yes. Motoko and the "puppet master" abandoned the body and merged at the spiritual (data) level, just like a genetic reorganization. The new individual after the fusion is neither a prime nor a "puppet master", but inherits some of the characteristics of the two.
As a digression, Luc Besson also has similar settings in "Super Body". The protagonist Lucy has undergone accelerated evolution, and finally broke away from the material state and became a pure spiritual existence. Interestingly, Scarlett Johansson is the heroine in the above-mentioned "She", "Super Body", and the future live-action version of "Ghost in the Shell". The throne of the "Goddess of Science Fiction".
The fusion of Motoko and the "puppet master" is quite poetic and imaginative. Humans and artificial intelligence achieve a state of selflessness that is free from the shackles of "self" through spiritual fusion, so the soul is freed from the double bondage of the body and the spirit and becomes free and ascends. Beyond, and whether this "flesh" is flesh and blood or a data network is no longer important. At the end of the film, the freshman "Motoko"'s self-questioning and self-answering in the face of the world in front of him is impressive:
"So, where should I go now?"
"The network is infinitely broad."
Through "Ghost in the Shell", Mamoru Oshii solemnly and meticulously explored the survival challenges faced by human beings as a species in the digital age, and creatively described the future picture of human evolution, with profound philosophical connotations and powerful shocking power. . It can be said that "Ghost in the Shell" (including comics, TV version and theatrical version) is a work that can change the audience's world view and make people learn new things. The information it contains is enough for us to apply it to the present or even the future. in the world. Let us wait and see how the development of mankind will go.
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