But these changes are just the tip of the iceberg. Fundamentally, Miike's remake changed the temperament of the original Cut Belly.
First of all, at the beginning and end of "Cut the Belly" there is the "Jing Yi Jia Jue Shu", which is equivalent to the official history. "Jing Yi Jia Jue Shu" gives the opening statement of facts and the final conclusion. This is the beginning and the end of the movie, from beginning to end. All the narratives are in line with the decency of the shogunate and the shogunate. But is the story really written in black and white? This is the big question mark that the movie throws up. The first and the last are the high-sounding official history, and the middle is the truth under the pile of old papers. This sense of contrast fits with the theme of the samurai's resistance to the shogunate system. At the moment when the official text is closed at the end of the play, it boils down to the absurdity and nothingness of history, which is very interesting. depth. "One Life" removes this clue with a stroke of the pen, and the whole story focuses more on the "experience" of the loner.
Still talking about the structure of the film, in "Cut of the Belly", Tsuyun Hanshiro sat in the atrium, looking back on his life, Yu Jia Lao kept urging him to cut his abdomen, and he was skillfully guided over and over again, so the audience saw the fortification of Hiroshima. , the family declined until the tragedy happened, and the amazing facts of this period were gradually revealed, realizing that this person was not a good person, and he must have a plan. The node of each narrative is that the old Yu family loses patience and murderousness gradually sees, Jin Yunchengzhu is in a hurry and condescending, and the battle between the two makes the atmosphere more and more tense. This kind of narrative is compact and well-defined. In the remake of "One Life", Jin Yun eloquently explained the ins and outs of the story, and even enlarged the slightly lengthy part of the original work, which seemed to be more in line with the romantic needs of this era. I really admire Jing Yi The patience of a family warrior could actually listen to this ronin's nagging for so long.
Speaking of which, I have to mention the change of the character of Yu Jia Lao. In "Cut the Belly", Rentaro of the Three Kingdoms plays the old city of the royal family. Never be soft-hearted. However, the old Yu family, who was in the middle of the "One Life", was much kinder. He saw Qian Qianyan's tragic situation of begging for his daughter and he couldn't bear to personally intervene for him. After he told Jinyun Hanshiro the story of begging for a daughter, he did not test the other party's intention, but sincerely persuaded the other party to leave. He did not order the execution of the disgraced retainers (for they had consciously killed themselves), nor did he order the revision of the history books to cover up. The most unacceptable thing to me is that he actually gave money when he ordered someone to return the body of the begging woman, which completely ruined the role.
The change in the old man of the family is ultimately a change in the theme. It must be admitted that in the era of Shinobu Hashimoto and Kobayashi, the class consciousness was very strong, and the "Kufu" they created had a strict opposition between good and evil. But does this mean that in this mediocre era, the villain of a classic should be polished into a helpless old man? Originally just an ordinary retainer, Hikokuro Alisata assumed the functions of many villains. In this way, the sense of personal confrontation with the system was greatly weakened. Similarly, Qianqianyan's self-inflicted guilt cut his belly in "Cut the Belly", but in "One Life", he died of illness. This intention is obvious.
Under these traumatic changes, perhaps Takashi Miike successfully catered to the tastes of this era. In contrast, the rest of the differences are not so important. The decisive battle between Jin Yun (Nakadai Tatsuya) and Alisata (Tanba Tetsuro) in "Kiyu", Jinyun's final abdominal incision, including the ancient sound of Nakadai Tatsuya, is in "Kiichi". It's gone in One Life. Toru Takemitsu's soundtrack is similar to the storyteller's awakening wood. Most of the time, he fell into silence, and the whole audience was shocked when it sounded, which played an important role in the strict narrative structure of "Kyoto". Ryuichi Sakamoto's score for "One Life" is more like ordinary movie music, and far from his personal best.
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