Before commenting on Li Rengang, I think "The Climber" is a successful movie. This is a bottom line.
And before, I have always seen on the Internet that Li Rengang is a bad film director.
Hong Kong directors have the phenomenon of making bad films, but the reason for this badness stems from the lack of creativity. Aside from this lack of creativity, Hong Kong directors have their strengths in the way of mirroring, at least concise and clear. The rhythm is strong and the camera sharp. To use Huang Jianxin's statement, Hong Kong directors have relatively fashionable techniques.
Therefore, after the Hong Kong directors went northward, they took their skills and used them for my use, forming a new phenomenon in Chinese film production.
"The Climber" is such a typical. As a tribute film, after the Hong Kong director joined, he will not think too much in the theme of the theme like the mainland director, too much self-expression, purely showing personality, but will let the film lose the concise and bright nature of going straight to the theme. . Hong Kong directors will not be like this, which ensures that the theme of the film will not be distorted and disabled.
Comparing the movie version of "The Climber" with Alai's original work, we can find that Li Rengang's "Climber" is more politically correct than Alai's original work. Alai's critique of that particular era's insinuation is in Li Rengang's film It's a little bit invisible.
Li Rengang's adaptation of the original script provided by Alai in "The Climber" is drastic. It can be said that the movie version of "The Climber" and Alai's original work are completely different templates. In this adaptation process, the screenwriting team of Shanghai Film also applied the cutting force to cut the original work of Alai, but since Li Rengang marked the title of "screenwriter and director" with great fanfare in "The Climber", it shows that Li Rengang is in " "The Climber" has played a leading role that cannot be ignored in the process from script to movie.
What kind of adaptation kinetic energy did Li Rengang play in The Climber? Is he capable of adapting a movie?
Here, we might as well take a look at the "Hong Men Banquet" directed by Li Rengang in 2011. Perhaps we can see that Li Rengang's three-handed use in this movie marked purely written by him can reflect Li Rengang’s experience from a movie Three aspects have the ability to control with ease, and this kind of ability, we can see that this is the part of the movie version of "The Climber" over the original Alai.
That is to say, Li Rengang used his ability to control the movie to reorganize the story and visual lines of "The Climber", so that the scattered lack of image elements in Alai's original work have the meaning of tension. In the film "The Climber", the film of "The Climber" has a new look.
Therefore, we must not underestimate Li Rengang’s three kinds of skills. At least in "The Climber", Li Rengang handles the chaotic and chaotic phenomenon of the original Alai's work. And this ability, if we are If you can find it in a movie written by Li Rengang alone, it is enough to prove that Li Rengang has his professional and sober cognition and understanding in film operation. Below, let's take "Hongmen Banquet" as an example to see what kind of basic skills Li Rengang has to manipulate movies. Specifically, it is embodied in three aspects:
, the first is the ability to lift plot clues.
A movie must have a main line that runs through. As a director, you must have the ability to carry through the lines of the movie. If you don't have this ability, then the movie is a mixture of loose sand and chicken feathers.
As far as "The Climber" is concerned, Alai's original script lacks a central clue to the entire series. He still writes the script according to the novel writing method, and some parts of it cannot be reflected in the image at all. For example, the image of the "mask man" satirizing the bureaucratic leadership, appeared repeatedly in Alai's original work, and then suddenly disappeared, and then the leadership role was added to the deputy political commissar. According to such a script to make a movie, the audience will be confused. .
Li Rengang's biggest adaptation in "The Climber" is to penetrate a central clue for the whole film. This is the issue of "photographic permit" in the climbing process. Because during the mountaineering in 1960, the camera that took the mountaineering record was thrown away by Fang Wuzhou when he rescued Qu Songlin, thus forming a psychological barrier between Fang Wuzhou and Qu Songlin. This barrier lasted until the second mountaineering. Because of Li Guoliang's sacrifice while climbing as a photographer, the contradictory knot was solved.
In this way, from the movie "The Climber", it is the core event of having to take pictures of climbing to the top of the mountain to organize the conflicts of the story and the disputes between the characters. This is consistent throughout the film, giving the whole film a contextual motivation. We cannot say that this motive is irreproachable and very convincing, but at least it can give the movie a tight plot line. In Alai’s original script, the relationship between the characters is scattered, and there is no core plot chain. . Now this line of contradiction is drawn in the movie version of "The Climber", which runs through the whole film and conforms to the basic laws of a movie.
Li Rengang was well acquainted with this filming rule when he was editing and directing "The Banquet of the Hongmen". Therefore, the whole film has always had a perpetuating concept, which brought up the familiar historical archetype element of "The Banquet of the Hongmen".
In a sense, the subject of "Hongmen Banquet" is equivalent to a tasteless one, which has been overused by movies. The biggest difference in "Hongmen Banquet" edited by Li Rengang is that it instilled a new concept for "Hongmen Banquet", that is, the "Hongmen Banquet" event is not only a node event, but the decisive factor that determines the longer-term historical trend. event.
Undoubtedly, under the lens of Li Rengang, "Hongmen Banquet" has become a destiny of the big man. It not only determines the historical turning point of Liu Bangsheng and Xiang Yu's defeat, but also determines the fate of Liu Bang's good ministers being "cooked" in the future. To achieve this, Li Rengang used "conspiracy" to complete the "Hongmen Banquet" for a more long-term impact. The wit and courage of Liu and Xiang in the "Hongmen Banquet" incident cannot be changed, but Li Rengang's "Hongmen Banquet" gives a broader meaning that Fan Zeng set up a broader "conspiracy" after the "Hongmen Banquet". . This constitutes the core plot chain of Li Rengang's "Hongmen Banquet" and refreshes the old conventional perception of "Hongmen Banquet". Around the "Hongmen Banquet", Zhang Liang assisted Liu Bang and designed a series of divorce schemes to keep Xiang Yu away from Fan Zeng.
After Fan Zeng was rejected, he left behind a trick. This "scheme" or "conspiracy" is the "eye" of the movie designed by Li Rengang, that is, after Fan Zeng knew that his destiny of being abandoned and rejected could not be changed, he stayed In the next "cunning plan", the "poison" was sprayed on Liu Bang's left and right arms: Zhang Liang and Han Xin. Fan Zeng knew that this "tip" would be acquired by Liu Bang sooner or later after Xiang Yu was defeated. Therefore, what he put in this "conspiracy" package was the frame of Zhang Liang and Han Xin, which made Liu Bang mistakenly believe that he was His subordinate ministers had already secretly exchanged music with Xiang Yu.
Fan Zeng’s strategy, as he himself said, is a game of "both lose and lose" and a "painful" strategy. The premise of its establishment is that Xiang Yu, who is his assistant, will lose, and then the "kit" will be won. Liu Bang was intercepted, and after that, the plan came into play and cut off Liu Bang's men one by one. The "poison" of
lies in knowing that his master is powerless and will undoubtedly be defeated. Such a "strategy" can only separate the victor's king and his subjects, so that the king can kill his meritorious officials. This strategy has been unable to reverse the course of history and cannot change the general trend, but it shoots "poison" on the "individuals" in history. It is completely using the opponent's suspicion to complete the attempt of revenge for killing someone with a knife.
This is Li Rengang's "Hongmen Banquet" in the "Hongmen Banquet", extending the "Hongmen Banquet" incident in the struggle between Chu and Han to the problem of the historical orientation of the entire Han Dynasty. Fan Zeng's strategy directly explained why Liu Bang "cooked" and killed his former good minister in the future.
In this way, Li Rengang used his understanding of history to link up the history of the founding of the Han Dynasty, not just limited to the local events in the struggle between Chu and Han, invisibly lifted the "Hongmen Banquet" to the supreme position of history. This incident was used to activate the historical confusion in the early days of the establishment of the Han Dynasty.
In order to achieve the purpose of this prominent theme, Li Rengang put the entire movie "Hong Men Banquet" in Zhang Liang's memory and recounted. In fact, all the historical truths in the film are realized from Zhang Liang's perspective. As a result, the establishment of this perspective effectively avoided historical doubts, and with the help of the limited perspective of a historical figure and the role of self-positioning consideration, the reinterpretation of history was completed. For Li Rengang, Zhang Liang's position has brought about a new kind of "conspiracy" game. This game runs through the entire film, illustrates history and is powerfully persuasive.
availableSee, in "The Banquet of the Hongmen", Li Rengang completed a re-interpretation of history through Zhang Liang’s individual perspective, and injected a core plot chain into the movie, so that the scattered historical elements are gathered on this chain , Has a brilliant color.
The second is the ability to penetrate the emotional clues of the movie.
In "Hongmen Banquet", a triangular relationship is established between Yu Ji, Xiang Yu and Liu Bang, which is another emotional branch line created outside the core plot chain in the film. The setting method of
is similar to Li Rengang in "The Climber". In Alai’s original work, there is no complete emotional chain. In the film, Li Rengang allows Fang Wuzhou and Xu Ying’s emotional cues to continue to climb as time goes by, and has always been the same as the climbing team’s summit route. Frequency and direction. In Alai's original script, Fang Wuzhou and Xu Ying were married a long time ago, and later the emotional dimension could not increase any more, and the film could hardly express such an emotional relationship. Li Rengang made the emotional line a branch line that can be continuously developed in the movie. Although it has been criticized, there are more love clues interspersed with Alai's original work. Relatively speaking, Li Rengang has a lot of convergence, and it also gives the love in the movie. Creativity adds freshness.
In the 1994 movie "Overlord of Western Chu", a woman was also set up between Xiang Yu and Liu Bang, causing the two men to have love entanglements around Lu's pheasant. This has almost become a new convention template for joking historical dramas. "Hongmen Banquet" places a Yuji between Liu Bang and Xiang Yu. As an important role in "Farewell My Concubine", it is not surprising that Yu Ji was involved in the love triangle.
In "Hongmen Banquet", Li Rengang finally let Yu Ji choose to stand on the side of the failed Xiang Yu, completed the identification of the love line in the movie with historical records, and explained the reason for this love through Yu Ji’s words: just It is a belief in each other. This constitutes the inner unity of Xiang Yu and Yu Ji's love. From the first love at first sight to the end of the two people, the sentence "believe" explains the blindness and no reason of love.
At the same time, in Yu Ji's "belief", it corresponds to Liu Bang's "disbelief". When Liu Banggong became famous, he was jealous of the subordinates around him, and the film summarized by Liu Bang's mouth. To understand the essence of "Hongmen Banquet": "Hongmen Banquet is to use all methods to calculate and guess the other party, and the price is to lose your ability and believe in anyone."
Liu Bang's "Believe in Anyone" is opposed to Yu Ji Xiang Yu's confession of "I always believe in others" is fundamentally different. Here, Li Rengang uses "believe" as the key word to unify the image of the characters in the two camps in the movie. Liu Bang's belief is that he lost his own judgment, lost in the confusion of who is in charge of truth and conspiracy. Ji's "belief" is that she sticks to her beliefs from the beginning, dedicates her loyalty, and never strays her.
In this way, the emotional line in "The Climber" also echoes the main plot clues, forming the intertwined main and vice melody in the entire movie, which essentially serves the theme of the entire movie. In this sense, Li Rengang's setting of the movie's emotional side line is not idle.
In "The Climber", Li Guoliang and Black Peony's love clues are also developed around the "camera" of the main line. From the very beginning, Black Peony has a strong interest in photography. Later, Li Guoliang also took a look back at her. In the beautiful moment of a smile, after Li Guoliang sacrificed himself to protect the camera, Hei Mudan got a glimpse of his heart through the photos left by Li Guoliang. The branch line of love clues in the whole movie are also connected back and forth, echoing the theme.
In the original script of Alai, the reason why Li Guoliang and Black Peony are attracted to each other is that Li Guoliang can play the harmonica instead of the camera in the movie. Obviously, Li Rengang’s change to the original has changed the cliché plot in the original script. Pulled to the main line of the movie, and constituted a perfect love progression line. This setting method can be said to be in the same line as the actions in "Hong Men Banquet".
The third is the reproduction ability of movie image effects.
The special effects production in "Hongmen Banquet" was done by the Korean team, which can also explain why the special effects production of "The Climber" was sent to the Korean film special effects team.
"Hongmen Banquet" was shot in 2011, eight years after today, but the domestic special effects technology still has to rely on the support of the Korean team.Seeing that this weak link in film and television production still plagues the production of Chinese films, but from another perspective, Lee Ingang’s handy use of special effects in his films is precisely because of his tacit cooperation with the Korean special effects team for many years. The movie has never been overdue.
In front of the grandeur of the ancient war scenes, "Hongmen Banquet" does bring a powerful visual impact, especially the aerial perspective of the film, which shows the past cold weapon era such as "being embarrassed" and "ambush on all sides" "When a classic scene like "A Cheng Yaojin was killed halfway", it vividly demonstrated the clash of multiple forces head-on and ambushes assault. The sense of the picture looking down from a high altitude turned the battlefield into a sandbox, deducing the previous Few war films have such clear and picturesque images of soldiers and horses and staggered killings. This kind of handy recurrence of war action scenes is exactly the basic skill of Li Rengang's film in the action scenes. This kind of skill of action scenes, which is very familiar with action scenes, should be transformed into the danger of mountaineering in "The Climber" When creating the action, the thrilling passages in "The Climber" endow the movie with the same shocking light and shadow in the visual effects. Although their forms are different, their principles are the same. They are all connected and connected with a set of interactive movements through the lens of a movie, thus producing a strong movement dance.
Therefore, we can see that Li Rengang has mastered these three magic weapons to make movies stand up, and he can deal with the writing and director process of movies of various themes. He has found the law and joined his film production with this law. , So that the films he directed maintain the basic quality. Of course, "Hongmen Banquet" is indeed not a pleasing movie, because the story is too old-fashioned, no matter what freshness the director adds to the movie, it will not change the audience's aesthetic fatigue on this old-style theme, but leave aside the theme of this one. We should still see that Li Rengang has enough basic skills in filmmaking and directing to deal with the basic demands of a mature film. With years of experience in the film industry, Li Rengang has accumulated this experience. The ability to make movies unchanging.
From "Hongmen Banquet" to "The Climber", we will see that there is a common Li Rengang behind this. Recognizing one point will help us to better see the secrets behind the movies, and it can also help us to make our movies get better market returns.
