The main points of this article:
1. I support and love "White Snake: The Origin", and recommend interested friends to watch it in the theater.
2. Light-chasing animation is a very excellent domestic animation company. I have been paying attention to light-chasing animation since "Little Night Tour", and I think its technical strength and creativity are remarkable, but I feel that the level of its drama is still there. A lot of room for improvement.
3. There is no conflict between "co-production" and "original", which are two dimensions.
4. "Original" and "plagiarism" are opposites, but there are two situations between them, "derivative (fan)" and "adaptation"; not "original" does not necessarily mean "plagiarism".
5. "White Snake: The Origin" is an original plot derivative work based on the folklore "The Legend of the White Snake", not an "entirely original" work in the strict sense. That's not to say it's "plagiarized," or that it's bad, just that it could be better.
The description is expanded below.
1 "Following" light chasing animation
Recently, I have continued to update some small film review videos at station B. At first, I felt that I was very good. Later, I found that no one watched except for the group of relatives and friends (mainly my sister and my father), and even if the playback volume did not exceed three digits, I gave up. With the heart of becoming an internet celebrity, I just want to persist for a while to exercise myself. Because there is no pressure, the selection criteria of these film reviews are basically based on my personal preferences, focusing on new theatrical films, occasionally interspersed with some new non-theatrical films.
I like watching cartoons very much, and I have always paid attention to domestic cartoons and animations. When "Little Night Tour" appeared in 2014, it was an internet celebrity short film belonging to the domestic animation industry, and it surprised many people, including me. After in-depth understanding, I got to know its production company, Light Chasing Animation. At that time, in the domestic animation industry, only young Xiangyang, such as Pleasant Goat, could be sold in movie theaters. Young Xiang's "Kuiba" was very popular for three films in a row. The sudden appearance of a light-following animation that seems to have money, ideas and strength naturally makes me very much looking forward to it.
After the 2015 summer file "The Return of the Great Sage" made everyone regain their confidence in the domestic animation market, on January 1, 2016, "Little Door God" was released. Judging from the trailers and other materials released in the early stage, this original story has a blend of traditional culture and modern life, interesting imagination and realistic thinking, coupled with strong technical strength as the backing, the appearance is amazing. However, after the work was released, the public praise was mixed, and the box office results were not satisfactory.
I also went to the cinema for the first time to watch "Little Door God". Personally, I think the animation technology of the film is undoubtedly excellent, and the core creative point of the plot "the modern life of the door god and the adventure of pursuing the glory of the past" is also very interesting, but the completion of the play and the narrative of the film are really interesting. It's a lot of problems. To put it bluntly, there is a good idea and the ability to do it well, but unfortunately, the story is not told well.
2 "Following" "White Snake: Origin"
The "feature" of chasing light continued in the later "A Tang Adventure" and "Cat and Peach Blossom Land". Every film has good technology and good ideas, but it is not good at speaking, and coupled with the lack of publicity, the box office of chasing the light has been declining all the way. Time soon came to 2018. In September, "White Snake: The Origin" announced the final release and released the first trailer, which rekindled my enthusiasm for chasing light. However, as the set date approached, everyone did not wait for the film to be released, but instead waited for the news of the withdrawal. This news hit the first wave of followers a bit hard. Although the filmmaker soon announced the specific date for the change, at least for me, it was a little bit more apprehensive about the quality of the film.
Luckily, I caught up with a screening and saw the movie before its official release date. The look and feel of the finished film is amazing, so I updated the latest film review video to my homepage of station B as soon as possible. The content of this film review is mainly: the history of chasing light, the new atmosphere of "White Snake: Origin", the film's shortcomings in the play, and the animation technology of chasing light.
The story gets a bit magical here. On the homepage of my station B, which has only 4 fans, the number of movie review videos for "White Snake: The Origin" has soared since it was uploaded, and it quickly exceeded 100, and it even exceeded 1,000 three days later. This is a very happy thing for me: firstly, something made with heart finally won the audience; secondly, the popularity of this movie I like seems to be very good, and it is hopeful that it will win a win-win situation at the box office.
However, with the amount of playback, there are many voices in the video comment area of "White Snake: Origin": a group of people who call themselves "white water/tap water", they don't discuss my video itself, just copy and paste to support the recommendation "White Snake: Although it looks a bit annoying, it can understand the enthusiasm of fans; the other kind should be watching my video seriously at the end, because they are all emphasizing "this film is the whole original".
In my film review video, the last sentence is "I hope I can see all original domestic animations in my lifetime, and I can also reach the level of this film." This is actually a very high praise, I don’t know why it became a place for everyone to crusade. As a little UP master who has never seen the world, I thought about it for a long time and felt that I should explain this problem well.
The contradiction in this question is mainly focused on the misunderstanding of "original". I understand everyone's care for a domestic animation that has finally appeared and is above the standard, and I also know that many people think that "unoriginal" is a very serious derogatory term. But in fact, non-"original" does not mean "plagiarism", and there are still "derivatives (fans)" and "adaptation" between them. In my opinion, "White Snake: Origin" is a "derivative" work defined by strict standards, so I don't think it is "entirely original".
3 "Original" and "Derivative"
Originality: For a story, if the six narrative elements of "time, place, character, cause, process, and result" have no similarities with other works, it is basically an original work.
Derivatives: On the basis of existing stories, using one of the six elements with clear characteristics can be considered as derivative works. For example, "Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons" and most of the movies on the theme of "Journey to the West" are actually derivative works of "Journey to the West", because they all use the fixed character setting and relationship of the four-person group of Buddhist scriptures, and the background setting of learning from the West. And the general story direction and so on. The same is true for "White Snake: Origin", which uses the white snake and green snake character in "The Legend of the White Snake" and the core character relationship of White Snake's love for Xu Xian, so it is regarded as a derivative.
Original and derivative are sometimes not so strictly demarcated, because the main storylines of "Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons" and "White Snake: Origin" listed above are actually "original". That is to say, in the six elements of narrative, except for the use of old "characters", the other five elements, the above two films have achieved "new"; even their characters are "new" to some extent, because They all reasonably unearth new personalities of old characters.
But they are still not "original" in the strict sense, because if a person does not know the original stories of "Journey to the West" and "The Legend of the White Snake" in advance, can he fully understand the connotations of these two films? Taking "White Snake: The Origin" as an example, if you don't know the poignant love between Bai Niangzi and Xu Xian, are Xiaobai and Xu Xuan's "love at first sight" and "unswerving death" in this film too rough, casual and hasty? If you don't know that Bai Niangzi and Xiaoqing's sisters are deeply in love, is it too incredible that Xiaoqing's dedication to Xiaobai's "deep love" in this film? After such scrutiny, we will find that the moving of the plot of "White Snake: The Origin" is actually based on our understanding of a series of works such as "The Legend of the White Snake", "The Legend of the New White Snake" and "Green Snake". Our default position is to treat it as a "prequel", and we are so moved when we know we are watching "Originality".
In addition to the plot, in terms of picture and sound, "White Snake: Origin" is not "all original". Again, this is not to say that this film is plagiarism, but that the film is full of tributes to the original classic works, whether it is the shape of the green snake and the white snake, or the familiar music that plays from time to time, and the plot of the final "Broken Bridge Encounter". The content of these tributes is obviously "derivative", not "original".
To sum up, I think "White Snake: Origin" is an original plot derivative work based on the folklore "White Snake".
4 "Adaptation" and "Plagiarism"
However, if "White Snake: Origins" is sent to the Oscars for best screenplay, it should declare "Best Original Screenplay", not "Best Adapted Screenplay." This involves the third concept "adaptation".
Adaptation: It is the transformation of the original work from one form into another. For example, adapting a novel into a movie, adapting a comic into an animation, adapting an animation into a game, etc. Adaptation emphasizes the change of form.
In other words, if it is opposed to "adaptation", then the conceptual category of "original" will be narrowed, and it will become a situation that only emphasizes the form. In this relatively simple context, "White Snake: Origin" is original.
A more serious case is "plagiarism". Plagiarism generally emphasizes the legality of copyright. When a work completely copies the six narrative elements of another work, it can generally be considered plagiarism. Plagiarism is a very shameful act, and it is a very serious charge to say that a work is plagiarized.
Referring to the situation of "adaptation", if it is opposed to "plagiarism", the conceptual scope of "original" will be narrowed at this time, and it will become a situation that only emphasizes the legality of copyright. In this context, White Snake: Origin is of course also original.
Therefore, I used a vague concept of "entirely original" in the comments, trying to avoid the different meanings of the concept of "original" in different contexts, but unfortunately I did not make it clear.
5 Finally, talk about co-production
There is also a viewer who left a message under the film review of "White Snake: Origin", thinking that "Warner, the co-producer, is only investing and not interfering in creation, so this film is completely original." I explained it to him and he understood, but I still want to expand on it here.
First of all, "co-production" and "original" are not opposites. Original is a creative concept, and co-production is a business concept. There is no opposite relationship between them. For example, "The Megalodon" is a co-production film. Although it is relatively average, it is indeed an original film; for example, "The Last Emperor" is also a co-production film, and the filming is very good, but its script refers to Pu Yi's "My Movie". "The First Half of My Life", so it declared for the best adapted screenplay at the Oscars and finally won the award, which can be regarded as an adapted film (but it is more interesting that "The Last Emperor" declared for the best original screenplay in another award, which can be seen as "original" The concept does exist).
Secondly, the audience may have equate "all original" and "Chinese original". Referring to the above, the concept of originality is still narrowed in a specific context. However, there are still pots that I didn't explain clearly, oops~
6 Last but not least, it could be better
Finally, I still recommend the movie "White Snake: Origin" to everyone. Like "The Return of the Great Sage", it has reached a very excellent level within the category of derivative works. This makes me full of hope for Chinese animators. I think we can look forward to our own, real original animations, not derivatives or adaptations, but real originals. I believe that "White Snake: Origin" is the right effort in this direction. This is the first step towards excellent originality. I also believe that the road in the future can be better and better, and we already have better capabilities. come on!
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