Chapter 887 887 Challenge the Classics

"When I watched 'Hudson's Eagle,' I thought Hugo Lancaster wouldn't be in an action movie for a long time—because of the shame. But surprisingly, When 'Life and Death' hit the big screen, I had to give Hugo Lancaster a standing ovation, like me, and the 2,000-strong audience at the premiere."

Nicholas-Macron, as always, never forgets to make a comment or two while praising Hugo, which has also become a major feature of him. In this film review called "Action Movie Innovation", Nicholas stands again. reviewed from a very different perspective.

"Action movies, also known as thrilling action movies, are film genres with intense thrilling action and audio-visual tension as the core. The story of the movie can't always escape the fixed pattern. A brave and witty protagonist confronts an unbelievably dangerous situation. After a series of intense and violent fights and gunfights, a triumphant ending is reached. Traditionally, action movies are mainly targeted at male audiences between the ages of fifteen and thirty-five, including fights, stunts, drag racing and In explosive movies, the main line of justice triumphs over evil, and the solution is often to resort to violence.

Generally speaking, action movies tend to be box-office darlings, but they are less likely to be recognized by critics because of their oversimplified story structures and flat character descriptions.

Action movies were pushed to their peak in the 1980s, with the '007' James Bond series, the 'Die Hard' series, the 'Indiana Jones' series, the 'First Blood' series, the 'Terminator' series. The great success has pushed this type of film to the extreme. It has developed from an adventure legend in the classic period to pure violence and audio-visual stimulation. The aesthetics of violence has gradually emerged as the times require. The violence of the film has moved towards gamification, machineization, abstract painting and aestheticization. The infinite and indestructible contemporary hero pushes special effects and stunt actions to a more violent and crazy extreme, which also directly leads to a gradual increase in film production costs, reaching the extreme in 'Terminator 2': the first film in history. Works that have invested more than 100 million yuan.

At the same time, this has also led to more criticism of action movies. Weak storylines, monotonous male heroes, flawed story and character designs, and empty plot mining have made film critics scoff at action movies. If I could sum up the action movies of recent years in one sentence, it would be, 'Bang bang bang, bang bang bang, bang bang bang'. Endless fights, endless explosions, and endless fights make for a movie.

But the emergence of "Life and Death" has opened up a new world for action movies: no explosions, no fights, no special effects, no high investment, and serious storytelling can still create amazing action movies!

In fact, 'speed of life and death' can not be said to be 'innovative', but rather retro. Before action movies went to extremes, the action genre films of the 1960s could still be filmed without high investment. s work. "Life and Death" has used its own actions to remind people: an investment of 28 million US dollars can still make an excellent action movie!

In the history of movies, it is very rare for an action movie like "Speed ​​of Life" that is not optimistic but ushered in crazy praise after the premiere, what's more, this is a "new" work. Director Jane de Bont is only directing a film for the first time, but it is a blockbuster; Sandra Bullock and Leonardo DiCaprio are all newcomers, and together with Hugo, who has risen strongly in the past two years, several The starring's performance is natural but mature, the style is fresh and smooth, and the coordination is perfect; most importantly, the content and skills of this work have made many innovative breakthroughs compared with previous action movies.

The plot structure of the movie is not new, it basically continues the tradition of action movies, there are tense and fierce fights, there are close crises, and there are romances sprouting in the midst of life and death. This is an authentic action movie. But the story of 'Life and Death' offers a whole new perspective on action movies.

The movie features a cramped bus as the main scene, and the time goes on, but the danger can never be ruled out. The bus travels in the downtown area of ​​Los Angeles, the city has blue sky and white clouds, beautiful scenery, everything looks so ordinary and ordinary, and the crowded traffic in the city can be seen everywhere, but all of this may become a reminder for the bus, and the bus has to keep it. Telling the shuttle on the road, there is a shadow of a bomb that may explode at any time looming over everyone's mind.

In ordinary action movies, the soaring speed of the car is often a precursor to excitement, arousing people's adrenaline, and the shuttle of the racing car is the moment of climax; but in this work, the increase of the speed means that The advent of death makes the audience feel more and more nervous, and every change in the speed of the vehicle maintains the danger of bombs, making people gradually reach the extreme of tension.

More importantly, De Bont chose the scene of the story on the bus that can be touched at any time in daily life, and the streets and scenery of the city of Los Angeles are the most important part of the movie, a moment. The background picture of the spectator may be the place where the audience goes to work, and the scene of the traffic jam on a certain street may be the way the audience goes home, which also makes people feel more realistic and heavy. De-Bont firmly grasped the expressiveness of this kind of dispatching of life and death speed, and successfully used this technique on the subway that told the march in the second half of the film, giving an all-round interpretation of speed.

The film closely revolves around the explosion crisis and interprets the expression of speed from different angles. The main line of the story is simple and clear, the plot is compact, and the progress is fast. All the plots serve the main line, and the entire story line is clearly presented. It is a classic 'how to tell an action movie story' tutorial, which is a miracle in movie history!

'Life and death per hour' is the best explanation for the name 'tense and exciting'. The whole movie progresses without any nonsense or any hesitation. It is clear and relaxed. The story is rich enough and exciting enough. At any time, the audience will have the same feeling, and they will be more nervous than when they watch it for the first time, as if they are on the scene again and again.

Throughout the whole movie, there are only a handful of fighting scenes, only a handful of explosion scenes, and even a handful of confrontation scenes, but the tension and excitement of the movie has not weakened at all. On the contrary, it has gradually reached its peak with the advancement of time. From the elevator to the bus to the subway, the climaxes came one after another, leaving the audience with no time to drink water.

The same simple story, the same lone hero, and the same thrilling violence, but 'Life and Death' is presented in a completely different and fresh, concise and vivid way, making the action movie revive its powerful vitality.

"Too simple story framework and flat description of pros and cons", this is the most criticized problem of action movies by film critics, but it has been alleviated in the "speed of life and death".

The simple story structure is supplemented by several story branches. At the same time, the main story line does not give the audience any breathing space. The crisis is thrown out one after another, and the story is over before people can react. It makes the whole story extraordinarily full, and when I recall it again, the story line is clear, but it is full of details.

Simple positive and negative characters, but rely on the actor's own strength to fill in. Although Sandra Bullock who plays Anne has a simple role, she is simple but humorous, full of justice and calm, and the image of a silly big sister, in her role. The performance is very good; Dennis Hopper, who plays Payne, although there is not much room for performance, but the image of the madness is still very clear.

Most importantly, Hugo Lancaster, who played Jack, used his charisma to complete the role, the anger and grief when his teammates died, showing that he valued friendship; the cleverness of dealing with the chaos and conflict inside the bus And neat, showing his rationality in dealing with difficulties; calmness and courage in the face of crisis, showing his control over emergency situations... These countless details can be found in his amber eyes, which is completely unremarkable. Doubt is a huge victory.

The movie "Speed ​​of Life and Death" proves that the limited space can still be filled with content, and the limited time can still be full of details, which undoubtedly opens up a new path for action movies!

Glory to the Dead tried to break the shackles brought by grunge, which triggered a deep discussion on rock, allowing people to appreciate rock and music from different perspectives, and then brought a new atmosphere of rock revival since 1977, driving the whole The boom and bust of the rock scene.

'Pulp Fiction' tried to break the shackles of gangster movies, telling stories from a new perspective and in a different way, and then led to indiscriminate discussions. Opened up a new way of storytelling.

'Life and Death' attempts to break the shackles of action movies and write a whole new chapter on the same story track, making people realize that action movies are not only adrenaline stimulation, but also visual and auditory enjoyment. This popcorn movie truly becomes a treat!

What role did Hugo Lancaster play in this wave of innovation? Be curious. "

Nicholas's film review made people's eyes shine. This time he did not focus on Hugo, but focused on the innovation of the whole film of "Life and Death" and discussed the entire genre film, which undoubtedly caused a wider audience. discussion. At the same time, it can be seen that Nicholas's pursuit of this film is even more conspicuous than his ninety-three points.

After all, although the score of 93 is high, it is still not as vicious as Nicholas's sweeping all types of films. You must know that although Nicholas did not clearly point out, he obviously criticized all the classic action movies before, and will " The speed of life and death" is placed in the position of challenging countless classics!

In the eyes of some caring people, it has even risen to the height of the confrontation between "Speed ​​of Life and Death" and "True Lies" released a few weeks later, which also instantly detonated countless speculations.