Overall, I am not very satisfied with the film, although it has maintained a certain level. It's definitely an improvement over "Tangshan Earthquake", but it's not good enough, especially compared to the early stage of the film's publicity campaign, it's a bit unreal.
Personally think that the shortcomings are roughly the following four aspects (the article uses some other films as examples for comparison, it is only for reference, and there is no excessive praise or criticism).
1. Lack of further thinking about human nature and life, insufficient observation of values, or, in layman's terms, insufficient depth.
There were three reasons for the disaster in 1942: one was natural disaster, the other was man-made disaster, and the third was war. But when disaster strikes, how will human beings deal with it? Giving food can certainly save the body, but the salvation of the spiritual home is also indispensable.
I have no religious belief in the Chinese nation. Although Buddhism has been spreading diligently in China for 2,000 years, ordinary people who eat fast and recite Buddha’s prayers are nothing more than seeking more children, more happiness, and peace in their homes. This is still different from religious believers in the strict sense. . In "1942", there is Father Xiao An played by Zhang Hanyu, who is quite happy among the disaster victims. In addition to pleasing the Western audience, the setting of this character is also estimated to convey the issue of human redemption and belonging in the face of disaster. Because in the face of such great suffering, people with a little thinking ability will not be able to withstand the torture: Since life is so fragile, what is the meaning of human existence between heaven and earth? In the midst of starvation and cold, people die in groups like ants. Everything you have: family, hometown, property, future and even body are dissipated in the wind, so what is the difference between living and dying? In this world, is there anything that can make the deceased leave with peace of mind (the unrepentant person sent to the funeral by Father Xiao An in the film), and let the living find a reason to live (Zhang Guoli finally finds a little girl who is as helpless as himself) )?
It can be felt that the film is trying to touch these thoughts, but unfortunately it is only fleeting. When Father Xiao An found out that God could not save the hunger, he collapsed directly, and the film retracted his pursuit of God, leaving only a funny version of the hymn accompanied by the erhu. Actually, I'm a little curious, why is it the priest, not the monk, who has undertaken this kind of thinking? Compared with the "Amitabha Buddha" recited by Zhang Fang's mother, Father Xiao'an's hymns and crosses are very unreliable and ungrounded, and they feel very inconsistent in Henan in 1942.
Because there is really no support, the film finally puts the spiritual destination on family ethics. This is the foundation of Chinese society for two thousand years. People are used to pinning their hopes on the composition of the family and the continuation of blood. As long as these two exist, then there is hope in life. This is different from "Saving Private Ryan". Although saving Ryan is also to allow a family to "have a descendant" and preserve the bloodline, Spielberg mixed a lot of human nature, humanity and the meaning of survival in it. Discussion, the characters in the film are constantly questioning the value of life, rather than simply a tool of war to execute orders from superiors. However, in "1942", neither Zhang Hanyu's Father Ann nor Adrian's Bai Xiude can compare the spiritual power of Tom Hanks' Lieutenant Miller, and neither can provide enough , spiritual support.
Given that the film is so weak in deep thinking, even if Tom Hanks himself replaces Adrian or Tim Robbins today, it is estimated that it is just as powerless.
Second, the characters are flattened. The characters in the play are basically what they appear at first glance, lacking in variety and richness, and all the character settings have not been separated from the inherent image.
For example, Chiang Kai-shek, a leader who ignores the fire and water of the people, plays with power and stifles the freedom of the press; Jiang Dingwen, a man who can't fight, only retreats, and is above the people's soldiers and bandits; Bai Xiude, a leader from the free world The uncrowned king, the spokesperson for democracy, the defender of Western human rights... Basically, what you think of a bad leader, a bad general, and a good foreigner is what it should be, what it is, and there is no breakthrough.
Of course people are complex. For example, there was a German officer in Schindler's List who played with a Jewish girl, and later he suffered because he really fell in love with her. Although duties and education tell him that she is inferior, human emotions are not so easy to control, so he will struggle. On the other hand, if we can assume that Chiang Kai-shek is such a person: he really, really knew that people starved to death in Henan, and many people, as a leader, he also felt the same, and suffered inwardly, but he was also a leader. Leader, but he must sacrifice these people to protect other people. However, the media scolded him, foreigners also criticized him, no one understood his difficulties and distress, and it is not easy to be a leader of a big country... Here is an addition, the recently exposed "Diary of Chiang Kai-shek" provides evidence: Chiang was an anti-Japanese, but I knew that I couldn't beat it, so I had many bad strategies, such as "exchanging space for time" or something, including throwing the burden of Henan on the Japanese. The diaries also revealed that Jiang was under too much pressure during the Anti-Japanese War. He tried to commit suicide twice, and later survived the difficulty by praying constantly. (Look, God is still very useful, at least saving Chairman Chiang. However, since it may still be unacceptable for the Chinese film system to whitewash a Kuomintang opposition leader, so I will ignore the above words.)
In addition It is Li Peiji played by Li Xuejian, a good cadre like Jiao Yulu. This tragic figure who was born out of nowhere makes people wonder how he got into the officialdom to this day? Since you can become a provincial official, you must already be familiar with all kinds of officialdom. Why do you even need the secretary to remind you to do things like this? Such honest, upright, simple and lovely officials may have existed in the early days of the liberation of the Republic, but in the Nationalist government more than half a century ago, I am afraid that there is no second one. Li Peiji's role in the film is not small. As an important character, he should have some stories about him, that is, to "have drama", but in the end, except for the fact that he kept begging for the people's life, nothing else happened, which is inexplicable. Come from the ground and walk away quietly, like Jiang Dingwen, Bai Xiude, and Father Xiao An, silently escaping into the mist of history, only to convey certain concepts, the characters are conceptualized, and the setting is too taken for granted.
For this character, we can also make a hypothesis: an old and slick officialdom expert, finally caught the opportunity to be promoted to a provincial official, and found that what Lao Jiang threw was a hot potato. Before he had time to be happy, he discovered fell into the fire pit. But after going deep into the local area and contacting the victims, the sight of mourning everywhere touched his heart of compassion, and he finally decided to truly fulfill the post of governor and use all the means of officialdom to ask for the victims' lives, but he was always unable to do so, and in desperation, he was suspended from office and left. ——If there is such a turning point in the fate of the characters, will it be a little better than the current Governor Li, who is destined to be the master of the sky as soon as he appears? Let's all have opinions.
For another example, everything can be a little more complicated: for example, the old owner's grain truck was not lost in the Japanese air raid, and the daughter-in-law's bell was not stolen by the Kuomintang soldiers and bandits, but by the victims themselves; if the victims of the disaster turned to the Japanese, not only Chiang Kai-shek The words in his mouth actually happened. For example, Shuanzhu really wanted to put on a Japanese military uniform to find his woman. Then, what would the film look like?
The answer may also be very simple, probably that the film cannot pass the review. So, uh, for this reason, I believe it's not the fault of Director Feng and screenwriter Liu.
The clues are too messy, there are too many levels, the focus is too complicated, and everything is wanted to be expressed, but nothing is explained clearly.
A major event can be narrated from many angles, such as World War II, such as Auschwitz. After more than half a century, there are still new films coming out, and there are many excellent ones. How many shots were taken of the Normandy landings alone? When filming concentration camps, there are "Schindler's List", "Life is Beautiful", and even "The Reader". Looking at the leopard in the tube, you can see the big from the small. Conversely, if someone wants to make a panorama epic about Auschwitz today, it's probably going to be thankless. With so much to show, how can it be explained clearly in just two or three hours?
Now Feng Xiaogang and Liu Zhenyun are doing just such a thing. They want to tell everyone what happened in Naga, Henan in 1942. Although they worked very hard, they shot everything from ordinary people to leaders of a country. After all, movies are not history textbooks. The public who want to know the facts can go to the history books. The mission of filmmakers is to narrate artistically, not just to visualize history. What a foreign reporter saw and heard in China in 1942, the mental journey of a village priest in the face of the famine, the predicament and helplessness of a local official in the process of disaster relief, the twists and turns of a feudal landlord who lost his family and fell into extreme poverty in a year of famine Bizarrely, a peasant family was forced to sell their sons and daughters while fleeing, the husband died unexpectedly, and the wife sold the tragic situation as a prostitute. Every angle of the above is enough to make an excellent movie. But now they've been integrated together, squeezed into a cramped space where everyone can't stretch their fists well.
All the stories are pointed to the end, and all the characters are just conceptual carriers rather than living flesh and blood. For example, Bai Xiude, his character, experience, and ending have not been explained at all. Why did he come to China? Why do you insist on lifting the cover of the Henan catastrophe? Was it his personal intention, or was it at the behest of Time magazine? Was he fighting alone, or were there other foreign journalists doing the same at the time? All of this, if it goes on, it will be interesting. It is a pity that his existence is only to provide one of many perspectives, and the purpose is to reflect the position of some insightful people in the West, which is equivalent to the "related link" added at the end of the article.
Of course, I also understand that the hunger and thirst caused by the long-term constraints on the subject matter has caused Chinese directors to have too many things to say and express. All of them want to eat a big fat man in one bite. , it turned out to be a mishmash. So, let's take it easy, take your time, I hope that Director Feng's film is just the beginning and can guide others to go further and dig deeper into this subject. After all, this is a huge disaster in the history of the nation, and it can’t be described repeatedly. More than N versions of Chu and Han’s hegemony can be shot in just a few years. This great famine in 1942 has only just been reclaimed. Virgin land, it is worth digging deeper.
4. Exaggerated sensationalism. This is what Feng Dao is best at. It has been criticized for a long time. Although this film has been restrained a lot, it is inevitable to fall into the cliché of excessive sensationalism.
As far as exaggerated sensationalism is concerned, the most powerful ones are Aunt Liu Xuehua and Ma Jintao in the poor rock film. They burst into tears at every turn. Aunt Ni Ping is a leader in the mainland. She often dominates the CCTV screen and makes affectionate confessions. In fact, it's not that the stories she told are not touching, but when I saw her tears welling up in her eyes, I immediately didn't want to cry, I just wanted to laugh. Mrs. Feng Xu Fan has a tendency to come from behind. She met Director Feng because of the filming of comedy. In fact, she was quite successful in comedy in her early years, but she was reluctant to act in tragedy (it is reasonable to say that she is the Queen of the Golden Horse and her acting skills have been recognized, so perhaps this should not be evaluated, but personally I still feel that her performance in "Tangshan" is far inferior to that of Feng in the early days. Brilliant in his comedy).
In terms of personal preference, I don't like to deal with tragedies like this, although I have to admit that the tears of Aunt Liu, Uncle Ma and Aunt Ni are still very lethal to some audiences. Because the film directed by Ang Lee is also being released recently, so I will use it for comparison. For example, in the famous "Brokeback Mountain", the feelings have been kept from the beginning to the end, until the two shirts put together in the wardrobe finally appeared, Heath Ledger wept, but the audience's tears were more turbulent than the protagonist. The so-called tragedy is probably like this. After crying, people are still shrouded in a low mood for a long time. Maybe weeping, maybe we want to cry without tears, but at least our hearts have been deeply touched. Tragedy is powerful and can point directly to the heart, not just for actors to vent in front of the camera.
Back to Nineteen Forty-two. According to the introduction, this drama has been well received (indeed, compared to "Tangshan Earthquake", Sister Xu really restrained a lot this time), it is said that Feng Dao and his wife also bickered about this. But in many places, the traces of sensationalism are still very obvious. For example, the scene of Huazhi’s remarriage and being sold outside Luoyang City. Although the detailed picture of changing cotton trousers is beautifully photographed, it is procrastinated, and the scene is sensational but does not narrate. The performances of several male protagonists are better (compared to Uncle Ma Jintao, they must be much better), but Zhang Guoli and his son's performance from beginning to end is telling one meaning: miserable, miserable, look at how miserable I am... ... Li Xuejian is also always a bitter look, and at a glance he can see that he is a good and unfortunate man.
I don't mean to criticize the actors here. To a large extent, it is related to the plot arrangement and the director's handling. Feng Daolai is keen to add soap opera-style sensationalism to the tragedy, instead of adding the world's major events lightly as before. Comedy jokes. So, the effect will definitely be different.
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