tearjerker director

Chapter 734 The most optimistic attitude and the most desperate reality

Zhou Qingquan, deputy editor-in-chief of Huaguo's "Film Weekly", wrote in a film review sent back to China from the Berlin Film Festival:

""Life is Beautiful" directed by Li Yi.

It can be said that the first half and the second half of this movie seem to be two different movies, how happy the front is, and how tragic the back is.

I believe everyone remembers the clip of Guido chasing Dora.

It really is that there are surprises everywhere in life, and every encounter is a carefully arranged romance!
But what about in practice?

What really made Dora fall in love with Guido crazily, and Guido was able to chase Dora not only because he was smart, but more importantly, he regarded Dora as his princess.

Not only did he say so, but he also did so.

Pursuing a favorite girl, using all kinds of surprises and romance, in my opinion, is not the most unique charm of Guido, but the most touching thing is his consistent attitude, whether he is before marriage or in marriage. After that, they always treated Dora as a princess.

We are usually in the process of falling in love, and many people say that before we get married, we are a princess, on the wedding day, we are a queen, when we are pregnant, we are a concubine, and after giving birth, we are reduced to a maid!

But Guido always regards Dora as his princess!
After having Joshua after marriage, he still will not forget this point, giving surprises and romance to his princess in his daily life.

I really did it, let her be a princess at any time, and she can have surprises and romance at any time!
This is his most valuable!
He wrote "Good morning, princess" on the cake, took Dora away on horseback, laid a carpet for Dora, talked to her on the radio in the concentration camp, and sang to her... These behaviors are very romantic.It can be said that Guido's love for Dora is consistent and has never changed.

Even at the last moment, the most touching thing is that Guido went to find Dora, was found, and was shot.

What's more cruel is that the war ended the next day.

I think many people may wonder after watching the movie: If Guido hadn't gone to find Dora, would they have been able to reunite as a family the next day?Was Guido's death meaningless?

But just because we think from the perspective of normal people, we think that the first thing to do is to ensure our own safety. Normal people will not take the risk of being shot to find their wives like Guido, and they will not spend a lot of money. Zhou Zhang weaves a white lie for his son, and he will not be like Dora who is obviously not a Jew and will take the initiative to be imprisoned in a concentration camp...

It is precisely because normal people would not do such things that the actions of Guido and Dora are even more touching, because they did what people have no courage to do.

Dora is willing to stay with her family in the way of entering a concentration camp, and Guido is willing to risk his life to say "Good morning, princess" on the radio and play a song to her, which shows their sincerity.

The movie does not directly use bloody and terrifying shots to reflect the tragedy of the concentration camp, but compares it with the happy life of the Guido family in the first half.Instead, it shows how happier their previous lives were in a straightforward way. I think this can highlight how painful the life in the concentration camp is.

The more humorous and interesting the tone of the film, the more it can highlight the sadness of the ending.

If there is no peace, how do you know how cruel war is?
Whether the movie "Life is Beautiful" is a tragedy or a comedy, different people have different opinions.But like most people, I still shed tears after watching this movie, no matter how comical its shooting method is, I still cried.For the game played by father and son, for the performance when father walked through the box at the end, for the tank that came slowly at the end.

Regarding "Life is Beautiful", the first reaction of many viewers is that the father's love in the film is very touching.

Indeed, fatherly love is one of the very important elements in the film, but it is not the main theme of the film.

In my opinion, fatherly love can only be regarded as the second major theme of the film. The real theme of the film is actually anti-war and anti-discrimination.

Guido's application to open a bookstore has been unsuccessful because of the racial discrimination policy implemented by Mussolini, and the Jews did not do anything smoothly.

Besides, the school principal tells the students that they are the noblest race in the world.

Shops that prohibit Jews from entering can be seen everywhere on the street.

Of course, the cruelest thing is the Holocaust of Jews. The movie does not show these heartfelt atrocities intuitively, but it shows the atrocities of the Holocaust through more thought-provoking and horrifying details.

The first one is the girl who kept the cat sitting next to Guido and his son when they were taken away. When the cat reappeared, its owner was no longer there.

The movie didn't sell miserably by shooting the girl being killed, but used some details to suggest that she was killed.

Through the dialogue, the audience is told that the police let the old people and children go to the bath, but actually let them enter the gas chamber.

In the second half, there is a scene where Dora has a conversation with a female prisoner.

Female prisoner: "This female soldier became vicious as soon as he came. The female soldier at the door was quite good when he first came, but then he became the most vicious."

Dora: "At least she didn't make the old people and children work."

Female prisoner: "Those who don't need to work must die."

When I saw this, I felt chills all over my body.

The pile of clothes of the victims, and the cat, allude to this.

There are many more details like this.

In the concentration camp, the doctor told Guido that his veterinarian friend tested him a riddle: fat, fat, ugly, timid and yellow. You ask me who I am, and I answer: quack quack.

The doctor said he didn't know whether the answer was a duck or a platypus, and that the platypus didn't make a quack quack.

Maybe people with different attitudes towards doctors will have different interpretations, but through the foreshadowing, I am more willing to believe that he wants to save people.

So the doctor had something in his words. He used the different calls of ducks and platypus to express the difference in language between Italians and Germans.

At this point, in the restaurant, Joshua accidentally said "thank you" in Italian, which aroused the suspicion of the Germans, and I artificially echoed the doctor's riddle.Joshua couldn't guarantee that he would keep silent, which made the doctor find it much more difficult to help them escape than he imagined.

I prefer to believe that the doctor did think about helping Guido's family escape before this, but in the end he gave up.

Guido is a very smart person. He understood the meaning he wanted to express from the doctor's riddle, so he left sadly.

In fact, the doctor also has his difficulties. If he fails to help Guido's family escape, he will not end well.

It's not that the doctor doesn't want to help, but in the final analysis, the police are too cruel. Not only will the Jews not be spared, but even those who have helped the Jews will die miserably.

Details, still details, the riddles in the film appear several times, but each time is not random, but echoes the theme of the whole film.

There is another segment that is also impressive.

Outside the gas chamber, the German female officer fell, and Guido's uncle asked her concerned: Did you get hurt?

This detail is not very eye-catching, and many people may have overlooked it, but it actually has a profound meaning in my opinion.

The female officer had just come out of the gas chamber. She had done this kind of thing many times, and she knew what would happen to the people inside. That's why she lost her mind and fell when she was walking.

But the Jews were kept in the dark. They didn't know that they were going to the gas chamber, thinking that they were really just taking a bath.

Guido's uncle is a big gangster in the hotel, so he expressed his concern to the female officer who fell down out of professional habits. eyes.

The director did not use bloody and horrible shots to express the horror of war, did not shoot close-ups in the gas chamber, did not shoot the tragic scenes of the victims, the whole film only had a flash of corpses everywhere, and even Guido was killed. There is only sound and no picture in the shooting.

Doing so will not weaken the power of the film, but it will better reflect the director's respect for life.

The film reflects the suffering experienced by the victims through plots, details, and metaphors, which can make you feel more empathetic than scaring you with horror scenes.

So I think what the film wants to express is not only to praise the father's love, but more importantly, to use Guido's sacrifice and the experience of the whole family to make people realize the cruelty of war and the horror of genocide.

Guido used a beautiful lie to make his son in hell think he was in heaven. This story is very touching.

But after watching this movie, we will hope that there will be peace in the world, that there will be no more wars and discrimination, and that fathers don't need to deceive their children with white lies, because they are already in heaven. "

(End of this chapter)