1. "KIDS RETURN" or "Bad Boy Sky"?
"Bad Boys Sky" - the translation itself is extremely misleading. Whether it is the title "Kids Return" that appears in the movie, or its Japanese name "キッズ·リターン", there is no meaning of bad children and the sky. The title of the film bluntly points out that what the film wants to show is the return of the children.
However, it is interesting to try to interpret the word "bad boy" from the perspective of Chinese translation. The reason for this translation is not difficult to understand. After all, the protagonist in the film has always been on the fringes of society, excluded from "formal and excellent" school education, and ultimately did not achieve success in the secular sense. The above three states, in traditional social concepts, are condensed into one definition, that is, bad.
However, this practice of defining children as "bad" seems to be precisely what the film wants to satirize. Through the plot and camera language, the film expresses the attitudes and practices of the surrounding characters towards "bad boys". When children are defined as "bad," it means they are segregated and ignored by mainstream society.
Remember this classic shot? At the beginning and end of the film, the same camera position, the same composition. The window, from the lower left corner to the upper right corner, turns into a sloping wall, cutting through the whole picture. At one end, the "good boy" is in the classroom, and at the other end, is the playground for the "bad boy" Xinzhi and Pony. Classrooms and playgrounds, classrooms and rooftops—closed and open spaces, on the surface, are different physical spaces for two groups of people, but in fact they are also different social spaces.
The gaze of the "good boy" looking at the "bad boy" seems to be the only connection between the two independent spaces. However, this gaze is forbidden. In the next shot, the teacher said earnestly, they are idiots, don't let them affect you, you need to treat them as things that don't exist. Then, this beam of eyes was withdrawn from the playground, from the aliens, and turned back to the blackboard, to the teacher who symbolized the mainstream and normality.
What being separated means, the most terrifying, may not be suppressed and disciplined, but directly ignored. To be treated as non-existent means to be deprived of all opportunities to build relationships with mainstream social groups. But people always need warmth, love, and affirmation. No matter how bad children are, they are still human. Who else can they turn to for care at this time? Is it to oppress others to gain self-affirmation, or to win the attention of others through boxing, or to gain respect in the underworld? Naturally possible.
Are children born bad children, or are they defined as "bad children" and then gradually pushed by division and indifference to become "bad children", or the labels of "good" and "bad" themselves permeate mainstream society Prejudice against marginalized groups. That's not the central theme of the movie, and it doesn't give us concrete answers. However, this kind of perspective rebels against conventional concepts, and reveals the inner concern for the suppressed individual, which is what is always moving in Kitano's films.
2. Kids: Children as Identity
Since the film does not emphasize bad boys, what exactly does it tell? Quite simply, the return of the children. What are children? I keep thinking about this while watching the movie. How to judge whether a person is a child, in the mainstream concept, either depends on the age, that is, eighteen years old as the line, or the environment to which they belong, that is, the students in the school. In this perspective, the child is a static, fixed identity. So what about regression? Only when something has existed and has left, it returns when it reappears.
From this interpretation of the film, it seems that the main part of the film, that is, the memories of the boyhood, can indeed be interpreted as the transformation of Xinzhi and Xiaoma and other young girls from children to adults, that is, the departure of children. As mentioned above, the film's performance of the space within the screen makes the isolated space a footnote of different community identities. In the same way, the film also uses the change of the characters in the space to symbolize the change of time and the transformation of the character's identity.
The turning point is the moment when Colt and Xinzhi completely leave the campus space one after another. Pony leaves early, and the camera closes up the empty seats when he chooses to join the underworld entirely. The departure of Xinzhi is more of a farewell. In the long-range view, he rides through the playground for the last time and circles in the middle. Then the middle shot shows his eyes looking back at the campus, and the picture cuts back to the distant view. He left school. Then the camera cuts to the rooftop where he and the pony often go, and there is only a rolled blanket that says "Air Bullet". The camera emphasizes the departure of the characters in the space, and thus emphasizes that they have left the campus space and are no longer students or children.
Before this node, the film focuses on the expectations of the children. For the underworld, boxing, love, cross talk, for everything, and for an infinite number of possible futures. This also seems to be determined by age, after all, the younger the age, the longer the future and the more possibilities. The fewer things you experience, the less scruples you have, the less you have fixed opinions, and everything seems to be able to be changed or repeated. This also seems to be determined by the sinister level of the environment. After all, the farce on campus is nothing more than the humiliation of being beaten and the embarrassment of not being able to enter the adult theater.
After this juncture, the film turns to the shattering and withering of children's expectations in the adult world. From the experiences of the people they saw, such as the retirement of the eagle, the ramen boy took the blame. Until they finally experienced the sinister society, experienced frame-up, jealousy, hatred, and oppression. In the end, they were traumatized, physically disabled, and some even lost their lives permanently.
If the child is understood as an identity and an appendix of age, it seems that this film is reduced to an ordinary melodrama. From campus to society, from childishness to maturity, from hope to despair, everything is a cycle. A generation will eventually grow old, but there will always be someone young. This is just a repetition of old-fashioned truths.
But if you understand it this way, where is the "return" in the children's return? After all, after the memory is over, from Xinzhi and Xiaoma's decadent demeanor, messy stubble, and embarrassed posture, it can be seen that they are neither children in the sense of age, nor students in the sense of identity.
So, how exactly does the child return in the film?
3. Kids Return: The kids are back
To answer this question, we might as well change the way of thinking and give up thinking of the child as a certain identity, and give up the storyline as the existence and departure of the child. It might be a good idea to revisit some of the film's situations using the music as a clue.
In fact, the most exciting piece of music at the beginning and end is called "Kids Return" - the kids are back. This piece of music appears five times in the film.
The first and second appearances are at the beginning of the film. Xinzhi rides the pony, and the camera follows them, trying to capture the traces of them speeding by, and the surrounding scenery is blurred. The posture of the two people at this time is especially interesting. The pony sat there, his body extremely slack, leaning back from time to time, his hair fluttering back with the wind, and there was no fear in his eyes. Xinzhi was slightly possessed, all his strength was put on the bike, and he stared straight ahead.
On the playground, accompanied by the music, the two of them laughed wantonly and rode their bikes in a completely different manner, one standing upside down and the other sitting upright. The pony red dress is especially eye-catching against the overall dark background color. And once the camera cuts to the enclosed space of the classroom, the music instantly becomes smaller, the expressions of the people in the camera become numb, and even the colors of everyone's clothes turn dark.
Rebellious, comfortable, relaxed, alternative, galloping forward regardless of the danger, ignoring the surrounding to go its own way.
Later, the pony was beaten by the boxer, and he was depressed for a day, and did not come to class. When Xinzhi finished class, he was pleasantly surprised to see the pony beckoning to him outside the barbed wire. At this time, for the third time, the music sounded. Xinzhi rides and follows the pony, who runs and shouts, "That guy is a boxer, isn't it? I'll make him look good." Once again, the camera captures their rapid movement, passing buildings one by one. of shadows, across the bridge, until the pony stands and the movement of the camera stops. The pony was waving his fists into the air, and the old homeless man beside him smiled (looked like Takeshi Kitano himself), and also waving his fists together, as if fighting the whole world.
The fourth time the music played, Shinji was standing in the ring and was punched in the stomach again and again, and when he looked like he was going to be unable to parry, he slammed his punches into the face. The camera cuts, he was hit to the ground, got up from the ground, threw his fists, and knocked down the enemy again.
Not convinced, not admit defeat, put on a confrontational stance.
I try to sum up the feelings in words, or describe the plot in sentences, but, of course, language is ineffective. And when the music plays, when I really see every look and movement of the boy, every fight and gallop, my memory and perception of the child and youth are fully awakened.
In an instant, the film makes the concept of "child" transcend the static identity, and then transform into a dynamic situation, feeling, power, bursting into a momentary emotion, which blows at the face.
But if there are only these few plots, will the film still be so moving? Will not. If the "child" is about the belief and strength of resistance, fighting, relaxation, and willfulness, it is an instant after all. In most of the moments, what the film spares no effort in expressing is what consumes this power - the cruelty of society, the mediocrity of everyday life, and the passing of time.
The film's narrative is as simple as Kitano's other films. He does not follow the traditional cliché of the classic Hollywood narrative, and constructs the background and experience of the characters through a unified "motivation-response". Instead, it directly expresses the detailed actions and demeanor of the characters in their natural state through different forms. However, from the diverse characters, the film captures their common state with extreme precision, that is, the state of being consumed by life.
Not just failure, failure is society's verdict on the outcome of an event. Instead, it is the transformation of the whole society that has been extended to people for a long time, but it has been integrated into every detail of life. Transformed to the point where they adapt to discipline, internalize the rules, and eventually become numb.
The most terrifying thing is that the superposition of failure and grinding, the eternal passage of youth, seems to make the belief full of infinite possibilities in the future, and the blood of rebellion against the world, in the eyes of adults, disappear with the identity of the child and become a kind of Ridiculously sad. Just as there are people who continue to be champions after Xinzhi quits the boxing club, the same people come to chat up after her husband's death. Youth incarnates into the curse of reincarnation, and no matter how good hopes and beliefs are, sooner or later, they will become the yellow flowers of yesterday.
The child disappeared, not the identity of the child disappeared. It is the child, as an emotion, a belief, the most authentic resistance, independence, never fear, full of expectations, and finally suppressed and consumed, so that in our body, in our blood, it becomes None.
Xinzhi and Xiaoma seemed to be the same. When they rode their bikes back to the campus, from the space outside the school back to the school, I didn't feel any child's breath. The pony said, "Nothing has changed." But the consistency of the space and the changes in the characters only made me feel sad, as if reminding me how life and vitality they were once, but now they are different.
until.
Until the last time the music played faintly again. Until Xinzhi, who was no longer young, raised his head high and shouted, "Hey! Does anyone still read books for idiots!"
He smiled shyly and asked:
"Pony, are you saying our lives are over?"
The pony laughed too and patted him with the other arm.
"Idiot! Our lives have only just begun."
After that, they both laughed happily.
The movie used more than 100 minutes to show their high spirits and failure in the past, but it only took ten seconds to complete the child's return.
At this moment, the child, as an emotion and a belief, revives from their blood, from a state of repression and weariness. Carrying rebellion, freedom, relaxation, and alternative, it reproduces the picture of galloping forward regardless of the danger, and awakens the memory of ignoring the surroundings. It transcends identity, crosses waste, ignores mediocrity, and bursts out of the screen again desperately. In the face of sadness and cruelty, in the face of the inability of time to come back, it is not convinced, it does not admit defeat, it assumes a confrontational attitude.
Only then did we understand the true meaning of "Kids Return" and why "Bad Boys' Sky" ignored the inappropriateness of the keyword Return. Because a child does not refer to an identity that fades, but to the emotions and powers that each of us originally possesses but is gradually worn away. Takeshi Kitano uses music to drive emotions, emphasizes the demeanor and gestures of the characters' details, which disintegrates the traditional movie's way of telling the audience "You must keep a young mind!" through twisting plots, but directly awakens the memories and perceptions of our youth. , on adults, gives us a moment when the kids are back.
"Pony, are you saying our lives are over?"
"Idiot! Our lives have only just begun."
At that moment I knew that the children were back.
View more about Kids Return reviews
