A different ending might be better!

The most exciting part of "Detective" unexpectedly comes from the portrayal of the role of the detective's wife. Although this person has nothing to do with the development of the main line of the case, he was very cleverly used by the director as a distinctive suspense element. Lin Xilei's two identity confirmations (once she was found to be fictitious, the other time she was found alive) brought satisfaction to the audience even more than the climax at the end of the film. And the role of "scorpion beauty", which echoes in traditional black films, falls on a number of female supporting roles. The detective was asked by He Jiaan to go back to the police station to handle the case, and one of his colleagues sneered at him. In the eyes of the detective, this person's words and deeds became the unreasonable scolding of a shrew; in Gao Zhiwei's seven personalities, women were used to express "insidious and cunning"; The carrier of the personality that instigated him to do "evil" was still a woman. But what's interesting is that these women generally only showed femme fatality, but did not show the slightest beauty. I wonder how feminists will feel after seeing this? Ha ha.

However, the director does not seem to be very confident in the audience's comprehension ability (or in his own expression ability?), so some "featured plots" were added in later dialogues. For example, He Jiaan told Gao Zhiwei in the car that a detective can see through the evil in other people's hearts. When asked what he saw in him, He Jiaan replied that he was a cowardly boy. Personally, I think such a supplement destroys the overall restraint and subtlety of the film. In this regard, To Qifeng still has to learn from the Coen brothers!

It is a bit puzzling that Gao Zhiwei can change the numbering process of the gun so easily. Although fans can make excuses without affecting the theme, but at the same time they have to admit that if this plot cannot be justified, there will be no follow-up plot development. And Gao Zhiwei's motive for killing He Zhian is a little vague.

At the end, the stalemate in which the four people faced off with guns is too stylized. And the breakup that followed seemed a bit far-fetched. However, the idea of ​​He Jiaan's new personality after the injury is the genius of the film. It is a good representation of his logical psychological changes under sudden dilemmas.

However, in addition to admiration, it is necessary to express a slightly different opinion. In the previous paragraph, He Jiaan's motive for borrowing a gun from her girlfriend is obviously more than the fear and cowardice of fifteen or sixteen-year-olds, and it belongs to the desperate "evil" born out of nervousness and anxiety! Therefore, if the superpower of the detective is a perspective of the "evil" of people's fait accompli, he should have discovered He Jiaan's new change in human nature before the four faced off with guns. Like discovering his "weakness" when he drove to meet it. In other words, the film director thought about the evolution of He Jiaan's "evil", but ignored the detective's keen insight into such changes, which they emphasized in most of the film's passages. Therefore, although the ending is sufficiently dark and profound, it lacks the powerful dramatic effect of Lin Xilei's identity change. And it seems a bit clichéd.

Also, the set design of the glass wall in the finale is clearly a nod to Orson Welles' noir classic "Miss Shanghai." A similar homage appeared in Woody Allen's "Manhattan Murders." But Wells's original intention seems to be to use the mirror to metaphorize the complexity of human nature. The single-character, multi-person modeling method in this film has already served this purpose. Is it a bit superfluous to wrap it in a mirror?

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