The first time I came to feel the doorway, recognize a familiar face, and probably feel the acting skills of the three leading actors, and then find some obvious question marks and go back to study; the second time I saw it, I felt better, and I can appreciate you already I have studied the soundtrack, the historical topics interspersed in the film, the nuances of the actor's expressions and movements, and I found a few more subtle ambushes hidden by the director; basically, there is no need to deliberately observe and no longer be so nervous in the third episode. Yes, just as you please.
To experience the various ambushes of this film, you can't save the number of times you watch it. This can only be blamed on the director and screenwriter for being too ambitious and brewing for too long. Such a medium-length movie with few characters has to be overloaded with information and cultural background differences. It is really difficult to deal with carelessly.
Of course, it’s okay for everyone to watch it only once. It’s easy to see internal injuries in this movie. If you don’t have to, you don’t have to be tortured by me.
The title of the film is an interesting thing, so I must say a few words. Half Nelson-At first glance, my first reaction is that there is a character named Nelson in the movie. Later, someone told me that this was a song by Broken Social Scene, the band that scored the film. Some people on the Internet also said that this is an album from the American singer Willie Nelson called Half Nelson (1984). It’s fun to check the Wiki, half nelson is a way to choke the neck with one arm in wrestling. Alas, none of the previous explanations are. If you look through the official homepage and film-related interviews, you will find that the producers often turn a blind eye to this question.
Do some research. It turns out that Half Nelson here is a song of the same name released in 1956 by the jazz musician and trumpet player Miles Davis. Not only did this piece appear in the movie, maybe its hard rubber record was placed in Dan's house as a prop. Maybe Drey picked up from a bunch of records and held it in his hand is the black trumpet master. Of this work. I really thought about it. I wanted to freeze the movie in sequence on the scenes where Drey was holding the record, zooming in and studying the flashing envelope. Thinking about it, I still didn't really do that. If the director Ryan Fleck confessed it altogether, it would save me worrying about this detail all the time. This slicker plays well.
For a person like me who is almost music-blind, the allusion on this topic is much more difficult than the literal meaning. Isn't the so-called Half Nelson a portrayal of Dan and Drey? At the demarcation point, lucidity and chaos, perk and fall, forward and backward, only this thin as a line, without any physical quality separation? The most impactful scene in the movie is the one where Dan and Drey, the mentor and apprentice, meet in the car hotel room. One was a white addict who called to buy drugs at a crazy sex party, and the other was a black girl who finally went to the sea to help a drug dealer in the community to become a "courier". The two suddenly appeared on occasions that were unprepared and seemingly predestined. Face to face. Dan, who had received the drugs, sat on the floor at the entrance of the bathroom, and Drey, who had received the money, walked to the door of the room. The two doors divided the screen into two parts, with the faces of the two people on one side. They stared at each other, watching each other. The picture pauses here. In this scene, the sense of confrontation as if looking at a mirror and the feeling of being "accomplices" with each other makes the boundaries clear and blurred.
The middle point is unstable, it is full of fierce contradictions. When the contradiction reaches its peak, those who sway at this midpoint have to decide which side they want to fall to. After that night, the two wandering people stepped across the center line and headed towards the direction they finally chose.
Fortunately, it is a bright and clean future.
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