The new version of "Girls in the Thunderbolt" movie starring "Little K" Kristen Stewart, "Princess Jasmine" Naomi Scott, and "Black Beauty" Ella Balinska is currently in theaters in China.
For Chinese audiences, the most familiar ones in memory may be the two "Charles in the Thunder" movies released in 2000 and 2003. The three protagonists of
, Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, and Liu Yuling were all in their prime. Not only did they disseminate female hormones on the global screens and play their fist, but this version of the movie was also featured on the domestic CCTV6 movie channel. Repeatedly.
However, they are not the earliest "Charlie Boys". The American drama of the same name that was broadcast in 1976 was the original version, claiming that the people who watched it should be very exposed to the age.
76 original series
in recent years has been commonplace to show female stars on the screen and screen, but in the relatively conservative 1970s, letting women form groups to beat villains and let the audience know that fighting crime is never a man’s patent. It's still a thing of the guard.
Over the past 43 years, after reinterpretation of multiple film and television versions, the classic IP "Charlie Angels" has been renovated following the aesthetics of different times, and the cultural significance reflected from the inside has also changed. Now let’s review the historical evolution of Charlie’s Angels and see what kind of story is behind Charlie’s angels.
The first generation angel
"Once upon a time, three girls went to the police school, where each of them was assigned very'dangerous' duties. But I kept them away from all of them, and now they work for me. My name is Charlie. "
Charlie's "dangerous" duty
accompanied by this concise and humorous opening remarks, the first generation of "Charlie's Charlie" turned out on the TV screen. Three beautiful and sexy women work together for a private detective agency, punishing rape, eliminating evil, and upholding justice. They are called "angels." Charlie is their mysterious boss, who only hears his voice without showing his face, and mainly communicates with them by phone. Between Charlie and the angels there is a middleman "Bosley" who is responsible for directing and assisting them on the bright side.
is therefore a literal translation of the title of "Charlie's Angels" (Charlie's Angels), and the 2000 movie version made "Charlie's Angels" a more familiar translation for mainland fans.
The show premiered in the 1970s, during the second wave of the feminist movement in the United States. Many American women, after reading "The Mystery of Women" by Betty Friedan, the "mother of the modern women's liberation movement", no longer settled on being a good wife and mother at home, but bravely stepped out of the house and pursued themselves.
not only has a large number of women employed, but they also emphasize the natural division of labor between the sexes, hoping to eliminate the phenomenon of different pay for equal work between men and women, and deny the view that women are subordinate to men in social relations between the sexes.
In this social background, screenwriters Ivan Gove and Ben Roberts conceived a story about three beautiful and different female private investigators, allowing women to take the lead in traditional male roles. A creative breakthrough. The producer of
first finalized the actress Kate Jackson, who was popular with the audience in another police drama "The Rookies" at the time, and then selected two other "angels" Fira Fose Te and Jacqueline Smith. The latest version of
"Charles in the Thunder" movie has Chinese audiences complaining about no Asian "girls", and when choosing the first three angels, the producer did not even consider the issue of race and skin color, but wanted to choose black hair, blond hair, and red Hair female one each. Finally, Jacqueline Smith, who was selected through the audition, almost lost the election because she was black rather than red. Fortunately, she and the other two had an excellent chemistry.
from left to right: Jacqueline Smith, Fira Fawcett, Kate Jackson
The process of finalizing the title is also quite tortuous. The screenwriters originally envisioned the title of the play as "The Alley Cats". Then the three heroines were named Allison, Lee and Catherine, and the initials were spelled together to form the title of the play. Not only do they live in the alleys, but they also carry whips and chains.
Kate Jackson, the heroine who was given a certain right to speak, disapproved of the title. She happened to see a picture with three in the producer’s office.After a picture of an angel, I thought of the name "Harry's Angel", but it was a bit of a collision with another ABC drama "Harry O" at the time, so it was changed to "Charlie's Angel".
ABC was not optimistic about the show at first, but after the pilot episode was broadcast, it received unexpected praise. In this way, "Charlie's Angel" officially premiered in the United States on September 22, 1976, and finally aired for five seasons, with a total of more than one hundred episodes. The series became popular and the leading actors were also popular.
Angels on the cover of "Time"
Like most crime dramas of that era, most episodes of "Charlie's Angels" follow a fixed structure. When a crime happened, the angels learned the details of the incident, secretly detected and resolved the crime. At the end, always return to the Townsend Detective Agency, and Charlie congratulates them for their excellent work. And most of the events are independent and have nothing to do with subsequent stories.
These five seasons are not the first three heroines from the beginning to the end. There have been several substitutions, but every time an angel quits, a new role will appear to fill her vacancy. Charlie's angels have always maintained a three-person situation. Jacqueline Smith is the only girl who has not quit after five seasons. It can be said that she is very loyal to Charlie.
Since there are female angels, what about males? ABC didn't think about it. The 23rd episode of the 4th season of "Charlie's Angels", which was broadcast in 1980, told the story of "Tony's Boy", and the setting was entirely a sexual transformation of "Charlie's Angels".
Tony's Boys
In this episode, Barbara Stanwick plays Antonia Tony Black, a wealthy widow celebrity who is also Charlie's friend and runs a detective agency herself. There are three handsome male detectives under the banner. They get instructions from Tony and solve crimes in a similar way to the angels. As a result, this approach did not make the audience shine, and later the "Tony's Boy" episode was not released.
There is no doubt that "Charlie's Angel" is a work that reflects female consciousness to a certain extent. At that time, many young female audiences wrote to the creator to express that they were inspired. But at the same time, there are contradictions inside it, because the show does not distribute benefits to men. When performing undercover work, angels will disguise themselves into various roles, often wearing temptations or exposure, such as posing as contestants in beauty contests, maids, female prisoners, or even just wearing bikinis.
So some critics called it Jiggle TV, which is a TV show full of sexual elements that shows breasts and buttocks. And it is quite ironic that John Forsyth, who did not show his face for the voice of Charlie, got the highest salary, which shows the big difference in salary between the sexes at that time.
The second generation of angels
In 1988, Alan Spalling, the producer of the original "Charlie's Angels", was expected to produce a restart series "Angels’ 88".
The number of angels set in the show is 4, and they also opened their own detective agency. They don't work for anyone, they only work for themselves. The angels not only need to face the difficulty of solving the case, but also encounter difficulties in finding the client of the case.
4 angel candidates for "Angel 88"
This new drama took 3 months to find 4 angel candidates in 11 cities, but due to a lot of setbacks, the front was dragged too long and accidentally dragged. By 1989, the name of the TV series was changed to "Angel 89". In the end, the press conferences were all over, but the project was completely pornographic, and it was not broadcast in the end.
Fortunately, on the occasion of the turn of the century in 2000, Leonard Goldberg, the co-producer of the original "Charlie's Angels", timely created the restart movie "Charlie's Angels" (English name is still Charlie's Angels) to completely revitalize this IP!
"American Sweetheart" Drew Barrymore first volunteered to join the project. She not only played the lead role, but also served as the producer. This kind of self-consciousness and right to speak made Barrymore and the first "angel" Kate added to the original series. Jackson has a certain similarity, they are the soul figures who embody the power of women behind this series. When
formed the cast, Barrymore also brought in his friend Cameron Diaz, and invited McG, who has never directed a film and won awards for commercials and MV works, to be the director. Facts proveIt shows that her vision is extremely correct.
The second generation of angels gather
Cameron Diaz plays the sunny and lively Natalie, Drew Barrymore plays the funny and cute Dylan, and Liu Yuling plays the skilled Alex. The collision produced excellent sparks and realized the original idea of the original version-the three angels are women with black hair, blond hair and red hair. John Forsyth continued to voice "Charlie".
's 2000 movie version of "Charlie Bolt" is very fashionable and energetic. Compared with the original version, it is greatly upgraded in comedy and action, bringing the most direct sensory stimulation to the new generation of audiences. The creator of the
film believes that this film should be different from most action movies, and there should be as few gunfights as possible. Only the villain needs to use the gun, and the three "angels" should tear off the criminals. Inspired by The Matrix, the film crew invited Yuan Heping's younger brother, Yuan Xiangren, to serve as the action director and conduct rigorous training for the protagonists for three months. What finally appeared on the screen was an action scene full of Chinese kung fu. The
movie "Charliefellow" collected US$260 million globally, making it the 12th highest film on the box office chart in 2000. Although the box office results are eye-catching, the film has also received some negative reviews. Roger Ebert, a well-known film critic of
, only gave the film a half star (out of four stars). In his opinion, this entertainment film that emphasizes visual stimulation too much is "visual candy for the blind" and " "Charlie Girl" is like a trailer for a video game movie, except that there is neither this game nor this movie." Ebert might not have expected that this commercial film was so successful that it was adapted into a game later, even though the game experience was terrible. When the
movie version of "Girls in the Thunderbolt" was released, it was also dissatisfied by some hardline feminists who believed that the film had a much lower feminist consciousness than the original series. There is nothing wrong with this view. There are a lot of details that materialize women in the plot and service of the film. When performing tasks, angels usually wear sexy costumes and often use beauties to do things. The whole film is full of crisp breasts, long legs, cross-dressing shows, and even some provocative scenes.
children can't hold the
creative arrangement almost entirely to cater to the tastes of male audiences, too much of the sexual charm of the angels, but hard power such as fighting power, ingenuity, tool skills, etc. has become the icing on the cake. Even for some younger male audiences, the film became their sexual enlightenment. While "Charlie Girl" has achieved great commercial success, it greatly dilutes the elements of feminism.
However, "Charlie Angels" in 2000 and the sequel of 2003's "Charlie Angels" really embarked on the international road. The second-generation angels have conquered audiences all over the world, and various imitated works have sprung up. Many countries are eager to have their own "Charlie Girl".
Look only at Chinese-speaking regions, in 2001, "The Detective Girl" (also known as the "Asian version of Charlie") starring Zhong Liti, Lin Xilei, and Wu Chenjun, "Sunset Angel" and "Naked Agent" in 2002, Chen Xiaochun and Ying Caier in 2006 The starring "Devil Angel" has been directly or indirectly affected by "Charlie Girl", these are just some examples.
A new generation of angels
In 2009, ABC began to restart "Charlie Angels", the film version of the producers Drew Barrymore and Leonard Goldberg both participated. In 2011, the new version of "Charlie's Angels" was officially launched, which coincided with the 35th anniversary of the original series "Charlie's Angels". This version of
is written by Al Goff and Miles Miller, the screenwriters of "Smallville". Al Zeng said in an interview that he wanted this edition to avoid artificial and retro. A few angels should be alive, they like to play around, like beautiful clothes, like dealing with all kinds of crimes and punishing bad guys.
2011 The angels who restarted the show
have full ideals and very skinny reality. The charm of this version of the angel is insufficient, and the clumsy acting, chaotic tactics and dull action scenes have attracted a lot of bad reviews. The show was originally booked for a season of 13 episodes, but after the fourth episode was broadcast, the low ratings made ABC decide to cut the show. In the end, only 8 episodes were produced, and the 8th episode was not even broadcast in the United States. It is worth noting that
, In the 2011 version of "Charlie's Angels" black angels have appeared.
's previous movie version of "Charlie Leak" has boosted the emergence of a wave of heroine action movies in Hollywood. Before 2010, there were "Tomb Raider", "Resident Evil", "Kill Bill", and "Underworld". In recent years, there have been "Super Body", "Cold City" and "Cardinals". Female agents, policewomen, female killers... Now the voices of feminists are louder than ever, so in 2015, it is not surprising that Sony put the plan for the latest version of "Charlie Girl" on the agenda.
In 2018, the MeToo movement rose, and women voiced their support for each other, and the influence continues to this day. This year's "Girls in the Thunderbolt" movie also solved the long-standing internal contradictions of the series, and completely raised the banner of "feminism", and the standard bearer was Elizabeth Banks.
Elizabeth Banks
Although Banks, who was born as an actor, has little qualifications as a director, women know women best. She also participated in the film's screenwriting and performance, just like Kate Jackson and Drew Barrymore before, to a large extent control the direction of the angels.
is different from the "three beauties of angels" in the previous version of the movie. The new "Charlie Angels" completely innovated the personality of several angels, basically discarding the previous setting of "all sexy".
Kristen Stewart's "rebellious angel" Sabina has an obvious neutral temperament, full of aggressiveness, and it's easy to dress up as a mature woman. The "Angel of Strength" Jane played by Ella Barinska has a calm and cold personality and is good at fighting. Her long legs of 1.8 meters are stable and hurt when kicking. The "Angel of Wisdom" Elena, played by Naomi Scott, is a harmless, occasionally cute girl with high intelligence. Her role takes the audience to witness the whole process of girls becoming angels.
When the new generation of angels
film was announced, we also invited three European and American music scenes: "Sister A" Ariana Grande, "Malley" Miley Cyrus, and "Sister Thunder" Lana Del Rey The popular queens of China jointly sang the international theme song "Don't call me an angel", marking this edition of the female mark deeper.
's latest "Charlie Angels" no longer deliberately pleases male audiences, and angels no longer act as objects of male desire to stare at, but completely stand on the side of women. At the beginning of the film, director Elizabeth Banks told the audience through the mouth of Sabina, "Women are omnipotent, we can make our own choices." Not only that, Banks also personally. Played as an angel pusher-female "Bosley", not just giving orders like the previous Bosley, but cooperating with the angels.
Judging from the repercussions of the current film releases, it is unlikely that the new version of "Charlie Leak" will surpass the original drama version and the previous version of the movie. However, its appearance is still meaningful. Through the evolution of "Charlie's Angel" to the present and the controversy it has endured, we can not only see the changes in culture and fashion, but also witness the iterative renewal of female power.
What memories and feelings do you have about "Charlie Girl"? Welcome to leave a message to share～
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