An interesting phenomenon in the 2018 Oscar nomination list is that among the five candidates competing for best actress, their roles share a common label: rebel .
Ronan's "Miss Bird" is a rebellion of adolescence, "Sister Cohen"'s "Three Billboards" is a rebellion against the judicial system, and "Harley Quinn"'s "I, Queen of Flowers" is a rebellion against the unspoken rules of sports competition , "Aunt May" The Washington Post is a political rebellion.
"The Shape of Water" starring Sally Hawkins is the film that the sea will focus on today. It is also a story about rebellion, but in a more obscure form.
The Shape of Water leads the nomination list for the 90th Academy Awards with 13 nominations. Before that, the film also won the Venice Golden Lion Award and the Golden Globe Award for Best Director.
The story of the film is set in the Cold War era, and the heroine Alisha works in a laboratory of the US government as a cleaning lady.
One day, a murloc was secretly transported from the laboratory. Scientists performed various experiments on the murloc, while Alyssa communicated with the murloc while cleaning up, and gradually fell in love with the murloc.
Murloc's appearance is terrifying and quite aggressive, and it is impossible for normal people to fall in love with this kind of creature. But Alyssa is also a weirdo. She is mute, but she has an optimistic attitude. She is eager to communicate, and has curiosity and sympathy for the "others" who are also on the fringes of society.
Most of the film's scenes take place at night, and Aliza's life is only two points and one line, either in a closed laboratory or in a dilapidated and gloomy old apartment.
But in such a simple and boring life, Alicia still enjoys herself. She will learn to dance with her neighbors on TV shows, enjoy sex alone, dress up delicately before going out, and have a positive and optimistic attitude towards life, as if she is out of tune with the surrounding environment.
Sally Hawkins, who plays Alyssa, is not beautiful in appearance, but her smile is particularly warm, and her introverted personality makes people want to protect, so that she can still deduce that kind of girly feeling in her 40s.
Sally Hawkins also played an overly optimistic character in "Careless" before: an old aunt with a girlish heart. The film made her the actress in Berlin and won the Golden Globe for Best Actress.
"The Shape of Water" is an adult fairy tale, and one of the characteristics of fairy tales is that black and white are clear, good people are good people, and bad people are bad people.
This kind of film is usually not propped up by the character's image and character, but creates a sharp binary opposition and starts thinking from it. Director Guillermo del Toro's previous work, Pan's Labyrinth, is similar in style, about a teenage girl's confrontation with her fascist stepfather.
The Oscar-nominated "Three Billboards" is a counter-example, deliberately blurring the boundaries of good and evil, and each character is full of tension. Therefore, the Oscar's best actress, "Sister Cohen" has a better chance of winning.
In "The Shape of Water", the villain is Richard, the chief of the laboratory, his purpose is to dissect the murloc, and Alicia must find a way to rescue the murloc.
The character of Richard represents totalitarianism. He is brutal and controlling, and even covers his wife's mouth when he is having sex. To him, a mute who can't express his opinion is the best toy.
Alyssa's aphasia symbolizes the confinement of the environment to nature , and she is later able to sing aloud to express her resistance to this confinement.
In the busy laboratory, the "general-sir-soldier" hierarchy is clear, and the cleaners are just little people who have no sense of existence. If it wasn't for the murlocs, Alyssa might have been a cleaner in human society for the rest of her life.
Under this system, the relationship between people is utilitarian, and you must be useful in order to have the value of existence.
A mute like Alyssa, along with her gay neighbors and fellow black workers, struggles on the fringes of society and belongs to the group of people who are "aphasic" in society.
Director Guillermo del Toro, who is Mexican, says when people talk about "Making America Great Again," if you're an "Anglo-Saxon," America was cool in the past, but other people don't Thinking so, this murloc seems to represent everyone else.
The cross-species romance between Alisha and the fish-man is itself a kind of rebellion against totalitarianism: those in power ask you to be a mute, or a "screw", while the protagonist chooses to secede from human society.
Although the real world will not allow "screw" to have free will, the director still gave the film a fairy tale romantic ending.
Alyssa and the murlocs are hunted down by Richard, so they flee to the sea, embracing each other in the water. When the murloc kissed Alisha, Alisha's neck grew gills.
Water has a very important meaning in the film, and the narrator clarifies the image of water with a love poem: water is freedom, water is joy, and water is love.
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