long bow
The 2016 Indian film "Sultan" has recently entered domestic theaters, starring Salman Khan, a Bollywood superstar who is one of India's "Three Khans". The audience knows it. The film tells the story of the country man Sultan who fell in love with the wrestling coach's daughter at first sight. In order to pursue his sweetheart who returned from the big city, he became a wrestler, and went from a local champion to an Olympic gold medalist all the way. He was carried away by the victory, became arrogant, and his wife left him after the death of his son. The sultan was depressed for a time and gave up wrestling. Until the son of the former president of the Olympic Committee wants to introduce international mixed martial arts to India and invite Sudan to participate. Sultan, who lost both his career and love, returned to the game and won his own victory.
The film is a standard Bollywood "Masala" (meaning mixed spices in Hindi) film, which is interspersed with "three songs and dances, six episodes", integrating male and female love, family ethics, beauty Scenery, exotic customs, action scenes and other elements. Indian audiences can watch a wonderful, rich, well-characterized, easy-to-understand mass entertainment film for a low ticket price. In addition, India is a multi-ethnic, multi-religious and multi-lingual country, and issues such as the gap between the rich and the poor, urban-rural differences, religion and caste are all hidden dangers of dividing society. Bollywood films have always paid attention to reality, and their strategy is not to hide and avoid problems, but to expose real dilemmas, and then imaginatively resolve conflicts and reach a consummate social consensus. Creating leisure and entertainment and reconciling social contradictions are equally important, so that the audience can obtain both internal and external satisfaction, "entertaining education with entertainment" and "entertaining entertainment with dreams", this is the magic weapon for mainstream commercial films in India.
"Sultan" begins with the famous sentence of the protagonist Sultan, "Wrestling is not a sport, it is about inner struggle". The son of the former president of the Indian Olympic Committee wants to introduce the international combat competition into India, but it is difficult. The Indians are only keen on traditional cricket. He thought of the retired wrestler Sudan for many years. "If an Indian wrestler beats a foreigner in this event, the stadium will be full." Under the theme of the battle between tradition and modernity, it expresses India's desire to change the old and international standards and become a sports power. The film shows the conservative and backward, male superiority, and poor medical conditions in rural India. The protagonist, Sultan, became a wrestler from an unmarried, unsatisfied rural man, gained love and career, and finally won the international competition by relying on the traditional Indian mud wrestling moves, and won the prize money to establish a blood bank for his hometown. Through physical confrontation and inner struggle, Sultan obtained a personal story of growth and success, and at the same time resolved various real contradictions between tradition and modernity: the father recognized his son, the second generation of wealth and the second generation of farmers became friends, and men and women understood each other. , cities and villages communicate with each other, and the pursuit of internationalization and national self-esteem can be satisfied at the same time.
At the end of the film, the sultan and his wife, who are honored to return to their hometown, have a daughter, and the young daughter puts on a wrestling suit and inherits her father's business. The ending reminded the audience of "Wrestle, Dad," when in fact "Sultan" was being made a year before the film, and Indian movie star Aamir Khan said it inspired him a lot. It was "Wrestle, Dad" starring Amir that created a box office miracle of 1.295 billion in mainland China last May, igniting the Indian movie craze. "Sultan", which also has wrestling elements, was obviously re-released in China with the help of this residual heat.
Before "Wrestle, Dad," Indian movies were tedious and tedious for our audiences, with songs and dances. "Wrestling" has both the splendor of a commercial film and the reality of paying attention to current social issues, which is both familiar and surprising to the Chinese people. Including the stubborn ideas of traditional society, the relationship between parents and children in the East, and the importance attached to the honor of home and country by late-developing countries, all of which resonate fully with the Chinese people. The vivid stories, kind characters, and real social problems in the film allow the audience to see the daily life and the society they live in. At the same time, it is not boring and preaching, and it is humorous and interesting. The presentation of sports games, the production technology is no less than that of Hollywood, it is amazing that Indian movies have reached this level. The film unifies Chinese audiences of different ages, classes, educational backgrounds and interests into one film, and has achieved unprecedented consensus.
The great success of "Wrestling" made Indian filmmakers burst into confidence, but then "Baahubali (Part 2)", which is known as the largest investment in Indian history, took the epic route of ancient costumes of handsome men and beauties, but high-concept and large-scale productions went high and low. Unsatisfactory. Later, "Little Lolita's Monkey God Uncle", which focused on ethnic and religious issues, "Starting Line", which reflected the issue of children's education, "Mysterious Superstar" about women's topics, and "Toilet Hero", which expressed the status quo of public construction and women's survival, etc. It is well-made and also pays attention to social reality, but the word-of-mouth and box office failed to continue the glory of "Wrestling". In general, the Indian film fever is gradually cooling down, which also shows that Chinese audiences are returning to rationality and can view India and Indian films with a fairer look.
The success of "Wrestle, Dad" is firstly adapted from a true story, reflecting social issues and having real power. The second is the transformation of the film's internationalization - consciously cutting out songs and dances, condensing the plot, and shortening the duration. As a predecessor that is not the predecessor, "Sultan", which explores traditional and modern topics, has returned to the style of the old "Masala" movie. The traditional advantages are still there. The film is full of color, grand scenes, and overflowing with emotion, which will only make people feel that it is too full but not insufficient. In particular, the plot is complete and complete, the foreshadowing and foreshadowing echo before and after, and no loopholes can be found. Indian actors are strong and beautiful, and their acting skills are sincere and superb. The Indian athletes in the film always talk about the honor of their hometown and the country, and they also insist on vegetarianism when competing in foreign countries. In the end, they defeated the British players in the competition, and the national complex remains the same. But the shortcomings are also obvious, the plot is long and sloppy, and the theme is greedy and comprehensive. Women's rights, getting along with husband and wife, traditional habits, religious customs, sportsmanship, life struggles, etc. have everything. The divergence of strength makes the structure loose, and nothing is explained. In addition, they sang and danced at the same time, and the starring dressed in cool costumes and staged the MV, which made people come out. The love blocked by the high and low portals, the story of the poor boy pursuing the girl in the big city is stereotyped. The characters are masked. In order to show the sultan's honesty and single-mindedness, several gorgeous women are arranged to come to court, but he is unmoved and seems deliberate. The most exaggerated and distorted thing is that Sudan has his own protagonist halo. This "lion of the state" can win the state championship, national championship, and even world championship after training for six weeks. After training for another six weeks, he played with a broken rib, and he won the international mixed martial arts championship with a single "Indian back fall". This kind of "opening" that is divorced from reality is really unconvincing to the Chinese audience.
The biggest problem with "Sultan" is its representation of women's issues. Labeled as sports and love, the film focuses on women's rights and is actually a growing up story of a male hero. Sultan from a village with nothing to do and no ambition, he learned wrestling because he pursued women who came back from the big city. After being looked down upon by the opponent, he worked hard to become a world champion. The wife also had the dream of being a wrestling champion, but she gave up because of her pregnancy and became her husband's sparring partner. Sultan became arrogant after his success, and his injured wife separated from him but did not remarry, and returned to take care of Sultan after he was injured. From a vulgar villager full of machismo, the sultan has become a mature and brave man who has social interests and national honor in his heart, and respects women. Sultan's wife seems to be a new woman who values her own rights, has new ideas, and dares to think and act. In fact, she is still a beautiful foil for following traditional morals. Grow in and within, become a better person, and win success in life.
The sultan, played by Salman Khan, has tangled muscles, infinite strength, and excellent dancing skills and skills. In "Wrestle, Dad", Amir, who is the same age as Salman, has restrained his superstar brilliance and is willing to be the green leaf of a young actress. The image of the female wrestler in this film is already a breakthrough compared to the "kind and sexy" vase in the original Indian film where women are just love scenes. However, many female viewers have seen the flaws. The film is not so much a promotion of women's rights as it is to "listen to my father's words". To get rid of the fate of women in a patriarchal society, we must rely on the norms of patriarchy for women. and guide. The daughter's "dream" was imposed by her father and tied to the honor of her family and country. The daughter is forced to be a sexless tomboy, submissive and dependent on her father, not the realization of a woman's self-worth. In "Mysterious Superstar", the expression of women's rights has progressed to "sing out women's own voices". Women's own pursuit and growth, women's emotions and psychology, mother-daughter relationship are placed at the absolute center. The girl chases her dream of singing, and the little boyfriend looks at the girl with admiration and helps her realize it. The old aunt, mother and girl in the film represent the image of three generations of Indian women. They have gone from being absolutely dependent on men, with no self-confession, to resisting patriarchy and bravely pursuing the realization of self-worth. At the same time, it shows that knowledgeable women such as female teachers and female lawyers are role models in society, and they have a status that rivals men in both family and society. After watching "Sultan" after "Wrestling, Dad" and "Mysterious Superstar", the greatest significance may be that we can see the growth of Indian movies in just a few years.
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