"This world...
has always been, crazy!" The curtain of
came down and the lights came on. At the end of
, there is a list of production staff, and the song "Big Man (It’s Okay)" that I’ve heard countless times before the movie is released.
Unexpectedly, no one in the audience got up and left early.
just sat in his seat, quietly recollecting the movie.
set the hand of time back to the cold winter three years ago. In the era when animated films were generally considered to be "only children can watch", "Your Name" rarely set off a movie-watching boom. The box office of
was 576 million, breaking the record for Japanese imported movies that year. It also played a great role in the subsequent introduction of Japanese animation films. During that period of time, almost every movie with youth and love elements would bring "Your Name" to promote it.
Three years later, Xin Haicheng returned with "The Weather Child."
I bought a ticket for the evening. After coming out, the sky was already dark. Coincidentally, as soon as I walked out of the cinema, a light rain suddenly began to fall in the sky.
The raindrops fell on my shoulder, a bit cold. Pedestrians on the road took up their umbrellas and walked on the street.
recalling the plot of the movie just now, I suddenly smiled bitterly:
Xin Haicheng, or Xin Haicheng.
Rain, weather, and fireworks
takes rain as one of the main elements. This is not the first time in Xin Haicheng's works.
In 2013, Xin Haicheng's fifth work "The Garden of Words and Leaves" tells a story about rain and love.
After six years, when Xin Haicheng draws the shape of the rain again, we will obviously find that the texture, color, and clarity have greatly improved.
Left: The Son of the Weather, right: The Court of Words
Compared with the breeze and drizzle in the Court of Words, the rain in the Son of Weather is more intense. In
, the raining scene takes up a lot of space. This also makes the drawing of raindrops particularly important. In order to achieve the performance effect of raindrops in different scenes, the production team devoted nearly a year to research the shapes of raindrops in various scenes. From ripples and springbacks to coloring and shadowing. Almost every drop of rain bears the hard work of the production team for several years. This makes the raindrops we see have a strong visual impact and performance effect.
is not just raindrops, the improvement on the screen is all-round. Makoto Shinkai has always been good at painting large scenes, from the Shinjuku Gyoen in "The Garden of Words", to the small town and meteors in the sky in "Your Name", to the top of Genting in "The Child of the Weather", Tokyo Full picture. The mature use of technology, painting style and color is visible to the naked eye.
On the screen, Xin Haicheng has never disappointed.
The world in his works is like the world that everyone has imagined. The wonderful world above the top of the cloud, the magnificent sky and the sea, the dazzling fireworks show...
is the unique "taste of Xin Haicheng" ". It’s the beauty that can’t be forgotten as long as you have seen it once.
And like Xin Haicheng's picture, RADWIMPS music never disappoints.
This is the second time RADWIMPS has acted as a soundtrack for a film, and the first time is "Your Name". The first time
heard the original soundtrack music of "Weather Children", it was before the movie was released on the mainland. At that time, I listened to the entire album from beginning to end. Although the high quality level continued as before, it was not as good as the previous "Your Name".
However, this thought disappeared when I saw the movie.
In the middle of the movie, there is a scene where the heroine Yangna climbs to the top floor of a skyscraper to pray for a sunny scene. RADWIMPS used a piano + violin prelude in the BGM in that segment. Then when the sky was about to clear, the female vocal part was perfectly inserted.
sun shines on wearingOn the face of the girl in the kimono, the camera slowly opened up, giving you a sweeping view of Tokyo. Countless people looked at the sky with long-lost smiles.
At that moment, it seemed that all the beauty in the world was fixed here.
What a warm power that is.
teenager, it's time to grow up
has a book that appeared twice in the movie. And for fear that the audience did not pay attention to the general, every time they appeared, they gave a big close-up. The name of the book
is "The Catcher in the Rye" .
If you have read this book, you will surely smile at it. Because the story of "Sons of the Weather" is somewhat similar to "The Catcher in the Rye". At the beginning of the
movie, Fan Gao left the island where he had lived since childhood and got on a boat to Tokyo. According to his monologue and his later explanation of Yang Nai, the reason he gave for leaving the island was:
"...living in my hometown is too depressing, can't breathe. "
This is actually A very vague sentence. I thought this would be a foreshadowing. At that time, I was expecting that Fan Gao would leave the island with a specific reason, but until the end of the film, the film did not give a clear statement.
However, after I finished reading the novel, this question was answered. In the novel,
has two side descriptions of the island of Fangao’s life:
"This is a small ceremony of the island's high school, which is only for our ten graduates."
"The whole school has only 30 students." Students from left to right."
From the two side descriptions, it is not difficult to see that the small island where Fan Gao lives is in a state of extreme backwardness and poverty. The entire island is sparsely populated, even poorer than the guard town in "Your Name".
As for the reason for escaping from the island, there is one more important thing:
"After being beaten by my father one day, I stepped on my bicycle desperately, trying to eliminate the pain. That day, it was raining on the island, and the clouds cracked. Setting a few lights, I wanted to leave this place, I wanted to enter those lights. So I pedaled desperately along the road by the sea to catch up. The moment I felt to catch up, there was already a cliff on the shore, and the sun moved to the other side of the sea. Go.
I had decided to go to those lights at that time-
and you are at the end."
This is Fan Gao's dream after he fell asleep in the hotel. In connection with the last paragraph, the reason why Fan Gao ran away from home is naturally obvious:
is dissatisfied with the status quo because of the poverty of the island itself. Coupled with his resistance and rebellion to his family, he made the move to run away from home.
However, things are not that simple, because in addition to poverty and domestic violence, there is also an internal reason:
sails to escape reality.
He does not accept the "reality" of spending a lifetime on the island. He longed for the light that would guide him forward. so he escaped. Escape to that fantasy Tokyo. It is the most prosperous place in Japan, feasting and busy. Has everything he dreams of.
However, the sail height in "fantasy" cannot survive in Tokyo of "real" . He does not have an ID card and is not old enough to have a place to work. If he wants to live, he must face reality.
If there is no "realistic" Keisuke Suga, no matter how hard he struggles, he can only go home in the end. Go back to the place where the air is depressed until you graduate from high school.
In K&A's work, Fangao gradually accepted reality. In the novel, when Fan Gao just started working at K&A, there is a section of Natsumi’s description of Fan Gao:
"He is so innocent, so undefended. What's more exaggerated is every sentence, every thing, and every scene. It will move him."
After working in the editorial department for a while, Fan Gao gradually became realistic. inAfter Natsumi and Fan Gao discovered the fish in the sky, Fan Gao's first reaction was no longer in a "fantasy" state: this thing is really interesting and fun.
is "realistic": writing this report may make money.
This also made Natsumi vomit: "You are about to become an adult as boring as Kei."
The "real" Tokyo assimilated Fan Gao. No one can live in the real world with "illusions". This is a dark line in the children of the weather. In the back, this dark line has a greater effect.
GUN&GIRL
controversy about this gun. It has not stopped since the beginning of the movie. The appearance of the
gun is very abrupt in "The Weather Children". At the very beginning, I thought that a huge underworld force would be involved behind this gun, and Fan Gao would use this gun to fight the underworld forces-but the facts proved I was wrong. Because in addition to being scary, this gun is almost a display in the whole film.
So, what exactly does Xin Haicheng really want to express through guns?
To answer this question, you have to start with the role of the gun.
First of all, what is the role of the gun? I think
is the "key".
The "key" to resolve conflicts. The plot of
needs to create conflicts so that it does not appear boring. After has a conflict, the story must have a sufficient "burst point", that is, an element that can maximize the audience's attention to resolve the conflict.
In web texts, this element is called "gold finger". Generally speaking, it is a unique ability of the protagonist and possesses a strong "power" that can help the protagonist to overcome difficulties. In
"Weather Children", Yang Nai must take on the responsibility of making money to support her family because her parents have died.
For this reason, she was almost taken away by the gangster and became a waitress. After Fan Gao saw this scene, he chose to stand up and protect Yang Cai. There are many ways for
to resolve this "conflict". Even I can make up a lot of things randomly: running halfway to hide, being helped by passers-by, running to a crowded place and being afraid to act rashly, etc.
However, this way of resolving conflicts has no impact. is also "not interesting enough". So, how can we make this method of conflict resolution impactful?
Xin Haicheng thought of the gun.
This dangerous product that seems to have nothing to do with the theme of the children of the weather. The addition of the
gun can really make the plot burst, and it also has enough impact. But on the contrary, this way of resolving conflicts will also make the audience feel very abrupt.
looked back and looked at the meaning of the gun.
In the cognition of ordinary people, the appearance of gun means "violence" and "deprivation".
In "Weather Children", it means "guard".
protect the one you love.
is afraid that the way is wrong.
In the whole film, the gunfire rang twice.
for the first time, in order to protect positive vegetables.
the second time, in order to save Yang Na. The two shots of
were fired for Yang Nai.
And because of these two gunshots, many people will hate Fan Gao after watching the movie—because he looks too "calm". Obviously there is a better solution, but it messes things up. Lead to bad results in the end.
However, Fan Gao is not calm, immature, often impulsive, and will not consider the consequences of things. This is the truest portrayal of an adolescent boy.
Xin Haicheng tries to create a protagonist who is not perfect and even has many flaws. As he said in the interview:
"...this time, I want to draw the story I want to paint."
and Fan Gao is the protagonist in his ideal.
In order to see the person he loves, no matter what the way, good or bad, he will go to her at all costs.
He lacks thinking and is irrational. Anxious, reckless.
He is destined to receive a lot of controversy.
And this kind of controversy is the core reason for the polarization of the ratings of the weather son: If you can resonate with the desperate idea of love, you will like the weather son. On the contrary, you will find it simply boring.
Xin Haicheng vividly portrays the most beautiful part of youth, but at the same time expresses the craziest and rebellious part.
This is the unique charm of Xin Haicheng's works.
The two ends of the balance: Yangna and Tokyo
There is another place that has been greatly controversial. is Fan Gao who sacrificed Tokyo to make it sunny all day in order to save Yangna.
Many people complained on Douban: What is the difference between this selfish behavior of and the heroine in Big Fish and Begonia.
Why does Fan Gao's behavior arouse public outrage? Isn’t it romantic to sacrifice the entire Tokyo to save your important people? The answer to
is simple: sacrifices the interests of most people because of the other end of the balance.
In many literary works, when the male protagonist encounters this kind of "tram problem", the balance between the two ends of the balance becomes extremely important. If the end of
that you want to save is much heavier than the other end, the audience will not be able to feel that the chosen person is making a sacrifice. For example, in a martial arts novel, the heroine is seriously injured and dying. At this time, the hero only needs to lose one-tenth of his skill to the heroine to save the heroine.
At this time, because the "cost" of sacrifice is too small, the audience will not feel that the male protagonist has made much sacrifice, but will only think that this is what should be done.
But what if we increase the price a little bit more?
is the same as above, the heroine is seriously injured and dying. But at this time, the male protagonist needs to trade his life for his life, and exchange his own life for the female protagonist's life-doesn't it seem so touching?
The balance in the son of weather is indeed approximately balanced: Tokyo does not have the life of sunny days and sunna, and it is really difficult to judge which is more important. But why do some viewers dislike this? The reason for
is that Tokyo is owned by everyone, not Fangao’s “private property”.
Go back to the example just now. It is the male protagonist's own decision to exchange life for life. He chose this way without harming anyone's interests, and naturally no one will raise objections to this. The reason why Fan Gao's choice is disgusted by people is precisely because he chose to sacrifice everyone's interests and make others in Tokyo suffer.
This is like the Golden Wheel Master tying Guo Xiang to the roof, and Guo Jing immediately opened the gate of the city and surrendered when he saw it. It was absurd.
And as mentioned above, because the role of Fan Gao is not well shaped, most people cannot substitute themselves into Fan Gao when watching movies, but just look at it from the perspective of the audience. At this time, the hero's decision was not understood by most people, and it became a normal thing.
Many people criticized "Weather Children" with the above thoughts. But they just missed a crucial point: the abnormal weather at
was not caused by sun vegetables.
In the middle of the film, there is a plot of Keisuke and Natsumi visiting the owner of the shrine. And in that paragraph, Makoto Shinkai introduced the origin and destiny of Haruna to the audience through the mouth of the owner of the shrine:
"Haruna is connected to the heavens. They accept the sincere wishes of people and send them to the sky."
".. It’s just that, the fate of Haruno in the past has been extremely tragic..." The fate of Haruno is a bit like the story of people sacrificing girls to the river god in ancient times. In an era when technology was still underdeveloped, superstitious witches pushed girls into the river to pray to the river gods to protect them from flooding. And the girl herself did nothing wrong, she was just a victim.
And the rains lasted for days as early as when Haruna was not a Haruno. Regardless of whether Haruna will eventually become a Haruwoman, the rain will still fall. Yang Cai just has a chance to sacrifice herself in exchange for the sky.
just like meAs we have seen, Yang Cai believes that she is responsible for the raging weather, and the meaning of 's existence is erased by the crazy weather. So she chose to sacrifice herself in exchange for the weather.
But Fan Gao does not agree with this. He believes that sun vegetables are more important than weather.
So Fan Gao chose to save Yang Na.
was above the clear sky, and Hoangao shouted to Yangna:
"It doesn't matter if it's never sunny! I need Yangna more than the weather!"
"The weather, let it go to hell!"
Fan Gao found the meaning of Yang Cai.
everything is just as RAD’s lyrics in the theme song of The Weather Sons wrote:
You who appeared in front of me are just like the savior
shines in my heart. Why is the key in my heart held by you
"What I want to say is not just the weather
At the end of the film, Fan Gao returned to his hometown to finish high school. Separated from Yang Cai for three full years. After
returned to Tokyo, Fan Gao first visited two people.
One is Taki's grandma, and the other is Keisuke.
In addition to retelling the past, the two said two interesting lines. The first paragraph of
is Taki's grandmother's supplement to Tokyo's past:
"Until the Edo period not long ago, the area of Tokyo was originally the sea...Tokyo is actually transformed by people and weather bit by bit. "
" So I think it just changed back to its original shape in the end."
As Taki's grandma said, Tokyo was originally an ocean. However, due to the needs of economic development, people fill a large amount of sand into the sea to make land. In just a few decades, the land reclamation area has exceeded 253 square kilometers-which is the size of seven Macaus.
While the economy is developing rapidly, large-scale land reclamation has also caused damage to the environment. As early as December last year, when the Tokyo government once again poured sand into the ancient border area, more than 200,000 people petitioned the government not to reclaim the sea. But no matter how much you protest, it is useless—because the extra land created by reclamation will be used by the US military to build bases. The destruction of
environment attracted Xin Haicheng's attention. This is one of the reasons why he decided to shoot "Children of the Weather". In fact, as early as 2016 in "Your Name", he already expressed his concerns about the environment:
, and if you look at what Keisuke said to Hougao, what Xin Haicheng wants to express is It's even more obvious:
"Because of you? You changed the way the world looks like? What dreams, idiot."
"This world has always been abnormal." The
world is unlikely to be. It can be easily changed by personal strength alone. Caused by a certain big environment that can change the world. The change in weather caused by Fangao's rescue of Yangcai is only an artistic expression, and what Keisuke said is what Shinkai Makoto really wants to express:
When human beings start to destroy nature regardless of the consequences for development, they will definitely be backlashed by nature.
General Comment
This is Xin Haicheng's most distinctive work. He no longer caters to the public blindly, but instead paints the works he wants to paint. It is difficult for you to judge whether this kind of behavior is right or wrong, because from the perspective of market performance, the weather son is successful-more than 10 billion yen in the box office, and squeezed into the top ten Japanese local movies. But in contrast, this is also the worst film among Xin Haicheng's works in recent years. This is true both in China and Japan. Whether
likes this work varies from person to person. But on the whole, the Weather Child is definitely a work worth seeing. Even if you have no sense of its plot, even just looking at the pictures and music is enough to cover the price.
Okay, that's all for this issue of film reviews. I’m Qingzhu, see you next time~
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