The protagonists in Gan and Shaw exude a distinctive quality and sparkle throughout the film. Through the shaping of the protagonist, the theme of the entire film is revealed. On the whole, there is a shadow of American heroism, but the protagonist does not save the world independently, but profoundly affects the people around him and even the audience with his personal actions. "Gan" is about the persistence and pursuit of pure ideals, "Xiao" is about always holding on to hope and chasing freedom.
The producers have given the protagonist a strange behavior that ordinary people seem to do. For example, in "Gan", Gump ran from the east coast to the west coast and then ran back to the east coast. In "Shaw", Andy likes to study geography and carving stones. Originally, these behaviors are very common behaviors in daily life, but the protagonists in the movie have achieved them to a level that few ordinary people can achieve. Maybe this is because the director deliberately emphasized the reason. The reason why the director wants to emphasize this point, and has mentioned it more than once, is the necessity of its existence. The usual and unusual movements are a powerful expression of the theme. For example, Gump's long-distance running is a concrete manifestation of the pursuit of spiritual ideals. Andy studies geography and prepares a hammer, which hints at the plot of digging a hole to escape later.
Of course, there are differences between the two. Although there are narration parts in the movie to connect the plot and explain the screen, "Gan" is described from the first-person perspective of Gump, and "Xiao" is based on the perspective of Red and Andy's friends. Both of these choices have their ingenuity: "Gan", in the first person, can naturally show the psychological activities of the protagonist, and express his pure heart due to mild mental retardation. Although "Xiao" cannot directly express Andy's inner changes, it hides the real main line behind it very well. When Andy bought a hammer from Red, it was Red's doubts that dispelled the audience's thought that Andy would use this to escape from prison. But who knows, Andy did just that, and planned it for 20 years. When the director told the audience a deeper theme, the audience realized that they had been deceived. It's as stupid as the prison guards who are in front of the female star pictorial and don't know that there is a big hole behind the pictorial when the prison guards round the room. But the audience readily accepted the "scam".
In "Gan", the protagonist is defined as a person with mild weakness, which reflects the delicacy of the producer. So people laugh at Gump who bullied him when he was young, but he is such a person who reveals the pity and ugliness of normal people. Gump was lucky in his life, and he was lucky enough to experience a lot of great things. Several major political events in history are shown in a slideshow, short and crucial. The president was assassinated, the president resigned, black people were banned from school, the Vietnam War, anti-war marches... Fortunately, Gump has gone through all of this, strung together these histories. He represents the memories of people in an era, and also represents or reflects a type of people with historical characteristics, or people who stick to their dreams, or the so-called "destroyed generation".
Contrary to Gump's heavenly encounter, Andy entered a life of hell. Andy used his tax evasion, money laundering and other abilities to trade with the prison guards and the warden in exchange for the improvement of the inmates' welfare. In addition to thinking of everyone, he has always believed in his pursuit of hope. Since the legal way to die with the thief, he can only rely on himself to achieve redemption. Passing through the foul-smelling dung water pipeline, the pursuit is the freedom at the end.
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