Chen Jianbin's second self-directed and self-acting work, "The Eleventh Time", was released on April 2, which tells the story of Ma Fuli, a party in a murder case thirty years ago, who tried everything to prevent the drama troupe from putting his story on the stage for the sake of his reputation and happiness in the second half of his life, and tried his best to overturn the case for himself. As soon as the film was released, it quickly received praise from the majority of fans.
The protagonist's stubborn and stubborn pursuit in the film, the absurdity and bitterness of repeatedly encountering walls in the "labyrinth" of society, and the thousands of faces of all beings presented through the eyes of the protagonist remind the author of Chen Jianbin's Virgo - "A Spoon".
origin
Chen Jianbin once talked about his original intention when creating this debut in an interview, he prepared for the Virgo of "A Spoon" for many years, during which he has been looking through various novels, scripts, movies, and writing the beginnings of many scripts. In repeated attempts, I hope to find an appropriate breakthrough for the character relationships, plot conflicts and story atmosphere that have been brewing in my heart for a long time.
Finally, God pointed out a bright exit for Chen Dao, who was running in the dark tunnel of creation—by chance, he saw the novella "Running Moonlight" by Hebei writer Hu Xuewen, and found the story he wanted at once.
First of all, the name of the novel is very interesting. "Running Moonlight", the English word for Moonlight is Luna, and the crazy, stupid lunacy, have a common etymology, which obviously implies from the title that the work has an inseparable relationship with stupidity.
The main plot of the novel is almost exactly the same as the movie: one day the protagonist Song He met a fool in the town, and he couldn't drive away and couldn't get rid of it. Song He tried every means to send the fool away, but the welfare home refused to accept the fool on the pretext of sound limbs and good health, and the public security bureau said that it had not received a report of missing people and refused to accept it.
Song He had no choice but to use a stupid method - posting notices everywhere to find people, which actually worked. Soon, someone claimed the fool. But after the fool was taken away, several waves of his family came one after another, looking for him. Song He, who was unable to argue with a hundred mouths, realized that he was caught in a deception, and he had no way to ask for help, and became a "fool" in the eyes of everyone.
Of course, as a Virgo, Director Chen still used his personal connections in the show business circle for many years, and the people who invited him to play with him were old friends who had cooperated many times:
Wang Xuebing, who once played with himself in his twenties, the two once played two small guards on the same stage in the TV series "Plum Blossom Branding"; his own wife Jiang Qinqin, the two fell in love because of "Qiao Family Compound", and many rival scenes made the cooperation between the two pure; the only actor he did not know was the junior Jin Shijia, but he contributed his most brilliant role on the big screen "Spoon" under the tutelage and guidance of Chen Jianbin.
In this way, Chen Dao dragged his own group of people to Jingtai County, Gansu Province, where the environment was harsh and the conditions were harsh, and like a group of "spoons", he began a pilgrimage to the peak of art.
Good drama
What impresses the film most is its "semi-documentary" style, which is, in Chen Dao's own words, a "street capture" video style, that is, an accidental immediacy of the film and the filmed person when neither the shooter nor the filmed person is ready.
All the scenes filmed in the small county town in the film are the most natural and everyday state. The character's performance in it is similar to an "immersive drama", except for the microphone that has been receiving in the hidden place of the clothes, the rest is all based on the instinct of the actor. Walking, buying, talking, sitting, all words and deeds need to be naturally integrated into the surrounding reality environment, without deviating from the predetermined track of the script.
At the same time, in the actor's styling and makeup, Director Chen also deliberately strives to be close to the real state of life, and strives to avoid the effect of "star flow".
So we can see that in the play, in order to play the "spoon" in the story, Jin Shijia resisted the temptation of food during the New Year and lost twenty pounds, and he suddenly had the appearance of a street wanderer with skin and bones and sunken cheeks. Coupled with a thick, swollen beard and dirt-covered makeup, many viewers exclaimed, even if the camera was put on his face, they could not recognize this as zhanbo in "Love Apartment".
The other actor who plays the "big head brother" in the film, Wang Xuebing, is even more so, the whole movie is stunned that there is no positive face, even if the front shot is given, it is also with black sunglasses that cover most of the face.
But this did not affect Wang Xuebing's play in the slightest. A large number of rear-sided shots are used in the film to shoot the "big head brother" in the driver's seat, which creates a mysterious sense of his "big brother" who has been in the society for many years with wide connections and hard connections.
This is even more so with the white and beautiful Jiang Qinqin, in order to play a good role in the film as a rural woman in northern Shaanxi, her makeup always has two large red spots on her face. The green turban, the big red jacket, and the flower sleeves are the only costumes she can wear on the set. There is also one detail worth noting.
The accent of RaTiaozi in the film is Northern Shaanxi dialect, and chen dao, as a Hui who was born and raised in Xinjiang, should not be difficult to master. However, the accent of Jin Zhizicao, played by Jiang Qinqin, is Mandarin with a Sichuan-Yu flavor, which may be a hint that she is married from the southwest region (which also happens to make The Chongqing jiang Qinqin's lines not too difficult).
Chen Jianbin said in an interview that he is the soul of the whole movie. This is not because he shoulders the two burdens of the director and the protagonist, which is the absolute authority of the crew, but he is too familiar with the role he plays, "Pulling the Strip", and the psychological changes of the Pulling strip are closely related to the direction of the entire plot.
Therefore, when performing, Director Chen's requirements for all actors are to be sure to match their own performance rhythm. There is no so-called equality in artistic creation, and creation without distinction between priority and backwardness must be mediocre production.
In addition, what impressed the author the most was the primitive and rough natural environment of the Shaanxi-Gansu Gobi that appeared as an important scene in the film. The story takes place in late winter and early spring, and although the temperature has warmed slightly, the night on the dam is still terriblely cold, and there is still a thick layer of snow in the tunnels and mountain shade.
As far as the horizon can see, all you can see is a stubble of thatched thatched grass left by the herders with sickles, scattered on the ravines and dams, a closed, conservative, and barbaric atmosphere comes to the face, this world is also the most important stage of the film, and the pulling strips and "spoons" have staged countless chase scenes here.
A pair of "spoon" brothers who persist in moving forward on the loess of the high sky.
Highlights
Director Chen said that in addition to wanting to tell a good story when he made a movie, he also had a higher pursuit, that is, "literary". The so-called "literary" is metaphor and deep meaning. After telling the story of a kind, ignorant, upright, nested Northwest farmer who is forced into the corner of his life by a "spoon", what else can we offer to the audience who is eager for more?
If you want to dig deeper, you must first find an entry point, and the starting point of this film has been placed in the most obvious position by the director - "spoon". Who is the fool in the film, and what does he have to do with us audiences?
First of all, the most obvious superficial image, the fool is the down-and-out beggar played by Jin Shijia who lives on the street and follows the strip home. He has only one line in the whole article, that is, "Mom". I still remember the scene where the fool first broke into the home of the ramenzi, and the others covered their faces with tall horses and long hair, and suddenly scared the golden branches half to death. He was also not afraid of hot hands, and when he lifted the lid of the pot, he reached out and took the food inside to eat.
Pulling the strip and hitting the stick, the fool used the pot lid to block the trend, and shouted "Mom! At this moment, the psychological defense line of the two mouths against the fool has actually been loosened. Because their only son was sentenced to 6 years in prison, the couple had been immersed in the pain of "losing their son" for too long, and no one had taught Jinzhizi "mother" for too long.
So everything that followed became logical, pulling a note for fear of the fool freezing to death, so he let him sleep in the sheepfold, and later worked tirelessly to find a place for him to live, and after asking for no door, he was allowed to stay at home, so that he could have a companion.
Until the fool's "relatives" learned of his news through the search notice and came to pick him up, pulling a note and thinking that things should have passed like this.
The fools in the film are like those dog skin plasters at the bottom of society. They understand the hardships of survival but are hesitant to work hard and only want to be attached to others.
Their principle of handling things is very simple, "if you have milk, you are a mother", so it is not surprising that you face the "mother" called out by the golden branches. For the middle class like the stripe, this is a kind of exploitation from the bottom, and the place where the fools are attached is their unprincipled, bottomless "kindness".
Secondly, the pulling strip is also a fool with a deeper personality and richer layers in the film. He also has his own goal of hard work - to help his son reduce his sentence. Therefore, he tried his best to pool money to appease the "big brother" who was higher than him, and let him help him unblock the relationship. But since you want to take the "shortcut", you must have the heart to take risks.
It didn't work out, and the puller wanted to get the money back. This is a big taboo of "spending money to do things". In the eyes of the big brother who was harassed by him "five times", the pulling strip is another fool who does not understand the rules of the upper game.
Pulling a strip is like a spoon just for a mouthful of rice, stubborn, straight, but also helplessly attached to the upper relationship of the big head brother.
When the puller is deeply trapped in the trap, confused by the repeated harassment of the "idiot's family", he once again finds the big head brother to think about him to ask a philosophical question - what is the use of the fool? This can drive the big head brother crazy, pull the strip this is a cross-level petition ah ~ he only belongs to the contradiction between himself and the lower level, to the upper level, this "ascension strike" makes the big head brother directly crazy, he pocketed fifty thousand yuan and forced it into the strip and has since broken off the contact with him.
Pulling the strip is not good for the relationship with the upper layer, and it is also exploited by the lower layer because of the benevolence of the woman. So he is a "double fool" in the middle.
Finally, when talking about his creative intentions, Chen Dao also said that the fools in the film are also in everyone's heart, but they are also the least willing to admit and face a certain aspect of the personality: that is, because of their own selfish interests and the servile blood of the powerful.