Most people think that the origin of the Anti-Japanese War God drama is mainland film and television personnel, but it may not actually be the case.
Personally, if we seriously discuss the origin of the "Anti-Japanese War God Drama", there are two important teams that cannot be ignored.
One is the Hollywood team. Here, we must mention the great Spielberg director.
Spielberg is actually a "number one player" himself, whether it is entertainment or serious films, he can play well. He can make illusory works come to life and reproduce real historical events as if they were on the scene.
The second source is Hong Kong directors. Many of the ideas in "The Anti-Japanese War" come from Hong Kong directors. For example, in "Great Shanghai 1937" directed by Hong Kong director Cheung Che in 1986, he showed an anti-Japanese element who played acrobatics with a bicycle and played Japanese soldiers round and round without any temper.
Let's not talk about the source of the Hong Kong director, let's focus on Spielberg.
In "Empire of the Sun" filmed in 1987, the first half of the film focused on the plot of the Japanese army's invasion of the public concession.
Spielberg used a crowd tactic to create an amazing wave of refugees on the Bund. This scene partly adopts the plot of the original novel, but it is still significantly different from the original.
The novel mentions the plot of his own car being crushed by Japanese tanks later in the movie. However, the novel does not blindly write about the escape process of the Jimmy family, but also about the Huangpu River where his father ran to the Bund. The scene of saving the British sailor from drowning was cut out by Spielberg in the movie.
The original design of "Empire of the Sun" can be seen to face the Huangpu River.
But there is an extra scene of Chinese guerrilla sniping in the film.
This scene is a complete failure in this movie.
Because according to historical records, the Japanese army did not encounter resistance when they occupied the public concession in Shanghai.
Let’s take a look at the historical statement of the Japanese army before and after the invasion of the concession by the American scholar Wakeman in the book “Shanghai Bad Land”:
The book points out that after Japan occupied Shanghai, it "besieged" the foreign concessions on all sides, but did not invade the concessions, making the concessions an "isolated island" pattern. During this period of time, the struggle between Chongqing and the Japanese puppet regime continued. For a long time," reaching its peak in August 1941, when many people were shot and blown up. These events made people insensitive to the Japanese occupation and shredded the barely woven fabric of recent years under the Kuomintang rule. The fabric of civilized society rose up. These violent and barbaric conflicts were so exhausting that when the Japanese entered Shanghai's First and Second City on December 8, 1941, and finally seized the concession, everyone acquiesced."
This period of the underground war between Chongqing and the Japanese and puppet parties is still shown in a lot of spy movies. For example, "Lust and Caution" reflects the gladiatorial confrontation in this period.
At the end of the book, it is reiterated: "The Japanese occupation has left Shanghainese with painful memories, but after the Japanese imposed their 'new order' on all Shanghainese, no civil uprising actually occurred. and open confrontation. One of the reasons the Japanese army was able to easily seize and rule this largest city in China between 1942 and 1945 may have been the various riots that gave the city great trauma between 1937 and 1941.”
That is to say, when the Japanese invaded the public concession, there was no fierce battle, because after the long-term suppression by the Japanese, the energy of the resistance organization had been exhausted.
In "Empire of the Sun", we see a group of "anti-Japanese militia organizations" (the title comes from "World Film Appreciation Dictionary 3"), which launched an attack on the Japanese army on the high-rise building.
And this set of shots Spielberg handled quite confusingly. The location of this set of shots is roughly at the intersection of Jiujiang Road and Sichuan Middle Road. This should be on the back of a row of famous buildings along the river on the Bund. However, there is a subjective shot in the movie, that is, the little boy heard the sound of the plane in the crowded crowd, and when he looked up, what he saw was the shot of the plane flying over the background of the Sassoon Building, and the Sassoon Building It is located on the part of the Bund facing the river, and now Jimmy's position is behind the Bund, so you can't see such a lens anyway.
According to the original design of the film, this group of scenes of refugees escaping should take place on the Bund Avenue near the Huangpu River, but if the Bund Avenue is really closed for filming, it is unrealistic. Now it is closed in the movie. The location is only the section at the intersection of Jiujiang Road and Sichuan Middle Road, which reduces the difficulty of shooting relatively closed.
When the militia organization first appeared, it was through the eyes of a little boy Jimmy. According to the description in the movie, he should live in the Chinachem Hotel in the Sassoon Building. When he came down from the upstairs, he saw from the window of the opposite building, a group of armed militia organizations scattered on the roof to the Favorable terrain, ready to snipe the Japanese.
Then the little boy entered the street with his parents and was swept away by the crowd. At this time, the militia organization opened fire on the Japanese army below. In this group of shots, we can see that the militia organization members just put up a few open shots. The action of the gun, the muzzle obviously has no flash.
Later, when the militia organization was shown again, flames erupted from the muzzle of the gun. It can be seen that Spielberg, no matter how capable he is, would have missed Jingzhou carelessly here.
The Japanese immediately returned fire. When the camera below opened, it was the corpses of two militia organizations, and the Japanese dragged the corpses out of the picture.
These militia organizations wear guerrilla clothes and look very conspicuous. Wearing military uniforms like this and fighting guerrillas in the city does not seem to have any strategic significance. In fact, there was no blind organization at that time, and it was meaningless to carry out such completely unequal sniping when the Japanese army occupied the concession.
After all, the concession is the territory of foreigners, why should your anti-Japanese militia organization snipe the Japanese for the foreigners?
Therefore, what Spielberg interprets here is just a very unreal "anti-war drama" that he imagined.
So why did Spielberg add this paragraph abruptly?
We have found a piece of information that may be able to solve the mystery behind this.
In the fourth issue of "Film Story" published in Shanghai in 1987, there was an article reporting the shooting dynamics of "Empire of the Sun", in which the reporter interviewed the Chinese representative and the deputy manager of the Shanghai Film Corporation. He specifically mentioned: "The earliest script, It mainly wrote about the disasters that foreigners suffered at that time. We believed that this was a relatively weak writing against the Chinese people's war of resistance, and we made suggestions to the director. Now, the film reflects our war of resistance and opposition to aggression to a certain extent. Deeds. "
See the relationship between them.
In the second half of the film, when Spielberg showed the bravery of the Americans, he didn't need the Chinese side's ear and face. 's flash.
In reality, Shanghai and Nagasaki are 475 miles apart, making it impossible to see an atomic bomb explode. Just like the nuclear leak occurred during the earthquake in Japan, but China, which is separated by water, was not affected. In order to exaggerate the "myth" that the United States decided the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, Spielberg is really out of nothing and has no bottom line.
But the problem is, your bravery must be consistent with historical facts and give people a sense of authenticity. If it goes against historical facts just to express subjective wishes, then this kind of thinking is precisely the reason why the "anti-Japanese war drama" has been criticized.
From this point of view, Spielberg can't be blamed for opening the "anti-war drama". Do you think so?
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