Death is a complex concept in the Chinese concept. We are so secretive about it, and few people talk about it.
So, will a movie describing the funeral have a box office in the country?
Last December, the 81st Academy Award-winning 4K version of the best foreign language film " Decorator " was released for the first time in China, and its final box office was 66.227 million. The box office of the Hollywood movie "007: No Time to Die" released on the same day was 414 million.
From the perspective of type, lineup and production level, the two obviously cannot be compared together, but as a form of entertainment, the audience is obviously unwilling to watch a heavy video describing death in the cinema.
, and recently directed by Liu Jiangjiang and starring Zhu Yilong , a funeral-themed movie originally scheduled for the Qingming Festival, was delayed to be released during the summer season. The cumulative box office exceeded 800 million in 10 days, and the total number of viewers exceeded 19.98 million.
The answer is in the video: only let the audience see the "life" surrounded by fireworks, without touching too much "death".
Stills of the movie "Big Events in Life". Photo/The official microblog of "The Great Events of Life"
The urban warmth behind the five funerals
Strictly speaking, "The Great Events of Life" is not a typical funeral theme film, but brings funeral elements into a warm urban story. This story is full of contradictions, conflicts and comedy elements, which ultimately resonates with the audience.
Director Liu Jiangjiang is obsessed with funeral themes. His grandfather is a carpenter. He occasionally helps the villagers make coffins and organizes funerals. The memories of following his grandfather to attend the funeral since childhood impressed him.
This experience also gave him a life experience that ordinary filmmakers never had in the process of shaping stories and characters, adding a lot of points to the authenticity of the profession of funeralist in the film.
The plot of "The Big Events in Life" is not complicated. The protagonist Mo Sanmei, played by Zhu Yilong, was released from prison and took over his father's funeral shop. During a funeral, he met the little girl Wu Xiaowen (played by Yang En) and then Mo Sanmei obtained custody of Wu Xiaowen by chance. The film presents the process of the two from being bothered to being redeemed by each other. The meticulous emotions presented in it are very touching, and many viewers even expressed their willingness to "swer" the video.
Actor Zhu Yilong's buzz cut, gold chain, floral shirt and big shorts in the film are clearly different from his clean, upright and handsome idol roles in the past.
was filmed in Wuhan, and the use of Wuhan dialect also added a city atmosphere to the characters. The audience saw Zhu Yilong, who "erases the star feeling", made progress and requirements in shaping characters.
But when the whole film is full of warmth, the plot twist seems stiff and hasty, and it is not uncommon to "sensationalize for the sake of sensationality".
For example, the sensational passage of "Mo Sanmei chases the car on a rainy night", although compared with Mo Sanmei's previous operation of returning Wu Xiaowen to his biological mother without telling her partner, it can clearly express that Mo Sanmei's feelings for Wu Xiaowen have changed, but it still seems deliberate.
The whole article presents five funerals, namely Xiaowen's grandmother's death, middle-aged couple's death, the elderly holding a living funeral, Mo Sanmei's ex-girlfriend's death in a car accident, and Mo Sanmei's father's death.
The audience can still see the cotton wool in their mouths and noses after careful observation of these contoured bodies, but overall, the funeral master's technique is relatively complete, which is more realistic.
's description of these five funerals is wrapped in the shell of the funeral theme. The core is the emotional changes of Mo Sanmei and Wu Xiaowen. The audience saw the final "life", achieved "reconciliation" and "healing", without further exploration of 's view of life and death and values.
Stills of the movie "Big Events in Life". Photo/The official microblog of "The Great Events of Life"
Smile with tears and with smile with tears
Funeral theme is called a subject with great limitations by many filmmakers.The result of the limitations of
is that the box office is uncontrollable. In the current film market, cases of failure in box office and reputation are not uncommon, which makes filmmakers more cautious and conservative in handling subject matter and content.
In fact, it is not uncommon to think about life and death in the international film industry. War movies such as " Save the Private Ryan ", romance movies such as "Titanic", and comedy movies such as "A man named Ovey decides to die", all of which make the audience think about death.
Even Pixar's animation work " Dream Journey to " touches on the core topic of life and death. "If no one remembers you in the world of living people, you will disappear from this world. This is called ultimate death."
Japan and South Korea, which have the same cultural traditions as China, describe death in movies in two ways. The former is used to using a casual way to give life decent and dignity, while the latter likes to reveal social real problems through repeated deaths.
Since the 1990s, domestic directors have dealt with funeral themes about life and death, and almost all of them have chosen " Black Humor ".
1993 released. The film " Filial Son and Grandson Serve " directed by Chen Peisi and Zeng Jianfeng tells the story of the second little girl who was afraid of being cremated by Chen Erxiao after her death and her uncle who used fake death to hold a big funeral. "Fake death" has a natural sense of humor, and Chen Peisi, Zhao Lirong, , Ding Jiali, Wei Zongwan, also contributed his superb acting skills. The scene of "fake death" was once again used by Feng Xiaogang in the movie " Big Name " in 2001. Director Taylor asked Youyou (played by Ge You) to hold a comedy funeral for him, resulting in a series of ridiculous stories.
Stills of the movie "Big Name"
2007 The movie " Falling Leaves Return to the Roots " starring Zhao Benshan is also a story of transporting the bodies of workers to be buried in the hometown, wrapped in the shell of comedy. To this day, the robber episode played by Guo Degang in "Fallen Leaves Return to the Roots" has also triggered a second-generation craze on social media.
Under the grand proposition of life and death, the conventional operation of domestic movies is to escape and not face it, and to be accustomed to wrapping life and death in the black humorous skin to convey one's own personality expression, rather than facing life and death directly and interpreting life and death.
What Chen Peisi wants to express is the separation of tradition and modernity in the process of urban-rural integration, as well as the irony of the Chinese people's pursuit of face.
What Feng Xiaogang wants to express may be more abundant. Art products implanted in advertisements, disrespect for intellectual property rights, and commercial hype were all stuffed into that fake funeral.
"Is it the patient crazy or the doctor crazy?" That joke can still arouse people's thoughts today.
"Fallen Leaves Return to the Roots" is even more obscure. Lao Zhao, who has experienced the "9981 Difficulties" along the way, finally returned to the coworker's hometown with the cremated ashes, but it has been demolished there. The messaging of the coworker's son is left on the broken door panel, "Dad, we have moved..."
Stills of the movie "Fallen Leaves Return to the Roots"
When "smile with tears" becomes our standard for comedy "high-end or not", "smile with smile" seems to have become the standard for funeral themes.
is subject to the limitations of subject matter and review. Personal expressions and thoughts that are more or less added to the absurd funeral arranged by senior directors are all missing in "The Great Events in Life".
The extension of "The Great Events in Life" not only did not take a step forward, but even took back the tentative leg, as if afraid that taking another step forward would affect the box office.
So in "The Great Events in Life", it is filled with emotions like "come the audience, let's cry together", and life and death cannot be seen as a "big event".
Time, place and people and
The box office sales of "Big Events in Life" have once again made "special themes + warmth" a way to break through the domestic drama films. Compared with the big productions and big casts that once bought the audience, emotional resonance seems to be the only way to succeed in domestic drama films in recent times. From " My Sister ", to " Send You a Little Red Flower " and "Big Events in Life", this is the path.
is unwilling to think too much when entering the cinema, and it has also become the main demand of current audiences. "The Big Events in Life" is also the right audience's needs and preferences.
Want to see the fireworks and give the full frame of the streets of Wuhan; want to see the true love of the world, and give you the story of the release of people after prison to raise orphans; hope that fresh meat will transform, shaved your hair and carry a golden chain Zhu Yilong; pay attention to special industries being discriminated against, creating a new word "people who grow stars". It has to be said that the director is too smart.
, which is scheduled to be released on the Qingming Festival, was dragged to the summer festival, which also allowed "The Great Events of Life" to verify the truth that the truth is that the misfortune of the loss is wrong. Nowadays, besides the "big dinosaur" sent by Hollywood (" Jurassic Park 3"), there is no match for "doing all your strength" in "promotion" has also made "big event in life" a "big event".
When people have experienced more than two years of epidemic life, it is not difficult to understand that movies will have such routines. "Mutual support, understanding, and help each other, and ultimately achieve reconciliation with others and reconciliation with yourself." The emotions these viewers feel from the film are exactly what people lack and desire in their lives over the past two years.
From this perspective, "The Great Events in Life" has done it. Just as director Liu Jiangjiang said in an interview, "The funeral of Chinese people is to heal the living."
Perhaps, for life and death, Chinese people do not need much heavy interpretation, but more importantly, healing.
And at the moment, what needs to be cured is obviously not just life and death.
Author: Ji'anbing
