What are the characteristics of Stephen Chow movies from 1995 to 1999?

1995—— 1999: Deconstruction and rebellion? King of comedy?

Of the four stages I sorted out about Stephen Chow, the most complicated and meaningful one should be his third stage. In the five years from 1995 to 1999, compared with nearly 20 films in the first two stages, Stephen Chow also released 1 1 works, and more importantly, two films, A Chinese Odyssey, A Night of Soul, The Gourmet and king of comedy.

After the second stage of the nonsense carnival, we saw the deconstruction after the carnival. This mode of post-modern discourse reached its acme in two films, A Chinese Odyssey, from 65438 to 0995. Perhaps as creators, Liu Zhenwei and Stephen Chow did not foresee the foresight of A Chinese Odyssey. When they were creating, they still followed the Hong Kong style, gagged, unreasonable and even added various tricks, but this time the object was The Journey to the West, which we China people are most familiar with.

Linking the Monkey King with "love" is the biggest subversion of the classics in A Chinese Odyssey, because in The Journey to the West, what we can find is bizarre imagination, the struggle between ghosts and gods, and the purpose of Buddhism. If we want to intercede, we can barely think of Pig Bajie, not to mention that the word "desire" should be more suitable for Pig Bajie than "love", that is to say, Journey to the West and.

Taking this "insulator" as the most important story theme of the film is not so much an unexpected refutation as a "journey to the west" of this era. In the last episode of Moonlight Box, the reincarnated the Monkey King became the supreme treasure 500 years later and fell in love with Bai Jingjing. However, in the next episode of Romance, when the Supreme Treasure went back 500 years to find his beloved Bai Jingjing, he fell in love with Xia Zixian. Can this kind of empathy only show that the Supreme Treasure is an unselfish person?

No, because time and space have changed, people have naturally changed. No love is eternal, because love is the mutual love between a man and a woman in a time and space. At that time, when the space shifts, people's emotions will not stay. Therefore, 20-year-old couples are clingy, 30-year-old couples are noisy and impetuous, 40-year-old middle-aged couples are as light as water, 50-year-old partners are calm and quiet, and 60-year-old wives love each other. The love between the Supreme Treasure and the Supreme Treasure has not changed, but people have changed. Can the love attached to people remain the same?

An interesting phenomenon is the structure of the Tang Priest, Master Guanyin and other authoritative classes. In A Chinese Odyssey, the Tang Priest was always annoyed, while Guanyin was always cold. One represents the chatter of missionaries, and the other symbolizes the ruthlessness of the authoritative class. More intense than the novel The Journey to the West or the mainland TV series The Journey to the West, the movie A Chinese Odyssey made the Monkey King rebel not only for herself, but also for her. Zhou's performances always use the absurdity of little people to mock the hypocrisy of big people, which is just in line with the symbolic connotation of the Monkey King. The mortal treasure is the real the Monkey King, and the Monkey King with a hairy face and a thunderous mouth is a tragic dog.

Classics can be deconstructed and are everywhere in A Chinese Odyssey, but love is absent in this deconstruction, authority can be destroyed, but emotion must be eternal. In Zhou's comedies, the only thing that can be supported by citizens' psychology is everyone's love. Here, the authority that has always been praised is ridiculed, but the love that every mortal can have is precious. Perhaps the significance of A Chinese Odyssey lies not in the extraordinary comedy, but in the eternal tragedy.

In the same year, Stephen Chow and Liu Zhenwei co-produced a horror comedy "Night of the Soul" again, which can be said to be different from all the films in Stephen Chow. It is not a complete comedy, nor a complete horror film. To tell the truth, I prefer to call it a philosophical film to eliminate fear.

Night of the Soul tells the story between a patient in a mental hospital and a security guard in a residential building. This film constantly imitates movies and animations, such as Black Boy Not Too Cold and Doraemon. , combined with the classic ghost genre of Hong Kong movies, makes this story full of attraction, but its value lies in the mental illness and ghost-catching master created by Stephen Chow.

There is something wrong with this sentence, that is, genius is only one step away from madness. A philosopher and a madman should be one step away, at least in the night of the soul. The anti-authority in A Chinese Odyssey reappeared, but this time it was transformed into "sweeping away superstition".

People's fear of the unknown is based on two points: one is the unknown, and the other is the belief. The unknown is not terrible. The terrible thing is that the unknown is out of control. People feel most secure at home, because the family is the most familiar and can guarantee their control. In this field, people are faced with what is known. However, unknown people or things can make people lose control. Once this happens, and they are convinced of this out-of-control thing, they will have serious fears. The message conveyed in "Night of the Mind" is disdain for this "unknown".

Stephen Chow plays the ghost master not because of his high mana, but because he has yin and yang eyes, so he can see things that ordinary people don't know. This is Nick Cheung's second play in "The Exorcist of Totti" directed by 20 15.

"Night of the Soul" is an impromptu performance prepared by Liu Zhenwei for his friend Stephen Chow after the box office fiasco of A Chinese Odyssey. However, this performance is extremely wonderful, and the cult-like images, coupled with Stephen Chow's nagging, make this film a masterpiece. Since then, Stephen Chow has never made a similar attempt.

1996 Gourmet is the first film produced by Xinghui Company in Stephen Chow, and it is well funded. In addition, he played the villain role in Zhou's comedy for the first time, making this film about food and kung fu another masterpiece of Zhou.

As I said last time, Stephen Chow has a "Young Master Trilogy": "The Great Star Master" ranks last, martial arts champion Su Qier ranks second, and "Gourmet" should undoubtedly rank first, not only because of the presentation of this film, but also because this film has a great connection with Stephen Chow's mentality and living conditions at the moment. By 1996, Stephen Chow has made a name for himself. He is a top entertainment star in Hongkong and even in Asia. Although A Chinese Odyssey failed at the box office, the word "Stephen Chow" still has a strong box office appeal, so Stephen Chow's heart will naturally swell at this time, and he will naturally change his behavior after the expansion. People's emotions are always externalized into their own behaviors. For an actor who can control the film production, his films at this time undoubtedly show his inner contradictions, not to mention that he is one of the directors of The Best.

The story of "Gourmet" develops in three stages: its power is extremely powerful, and it falls to the bottom, which is a rescue. In fact, this old story is not brilliant. Cleverly, Stephen Chow burned love, food and kung fu in an entertaining situation, which was delicious and beautiful. There are too many stars, the martial arts champion Su Tai is decent, and the god of food is passionate. Playing Buddhism and Zen is not only unobtrusive, but also quite cultural. This is a rich presentation of the public mentality.

The last masterpiece of this stage is king of comedy at the end of the century. In fact, according to my own opinion, the plot of this film is not rigorous, even incomplete to some extent, a bit like a collage of jokes, more like a walk-on daydream, but full of bitterness and pain, which shows the joys and sorrows of small people. This movie was a gift from Stephen Chow more than ten years ago, and it was also a memorial to the future. From then on, he will bid farewell to the 90-year-old Hong Kong comedy, which will soon be a big production in the new century.

For the role of Yin Tianchou, many people think that he is really "vengeful". He can't play dead bodies well on the set, but he insists on tossing out all kinds of dead bodies. What can I do except scold a walk-on who can't "do a good job"?

However, people who toss and turn often have hard work. Such people may not be safe, but they can always win by surprise. Stephen Chow finally arranged for Yin Tianchou to become a police undercover to test his "acting skills" in the crisis. This surreal plot is actually making fun of the relationship between "actors/undercover". Although there are performances everywhere in life, there are also crises everywhere. "king of comedy" is Zhou's satire on himself, but "The King of Tragedy" may be what he really wants to express.

In this topic, I avoid talking about the other six films, not because other films don't talk about value, but because the five films mentioned above have historical value, and some films at this stage are actually suspected of being copied twice. For example, "One-stop Transportation" copied the role and theme of "King of Destruction"; Counting dead grass has the setting of death judge; Agent provocateur is a costume comedy, but it has the same spoof as Domestic Lingling Lacquer. Not to mention "King of Thousands 2000" is a response to Stephen Chow's famous film "Gambling Saint".

When Zhou started to raise funds and set up a company, it became a symbol of Hong Kong movies. With the disappearance of Hong Kong films, Hong Kong filmmakers went northward collectively, and Stephen Chow began to cooperate with international capital to seize the land of the mainland film market. In the last episode of this issue, I will interpret the infinite scenery of Stephen Chow at the beginning of 2 1 century.

Movies at this stage (1 1):

1995:

Moonlight Box of a Chinese Odyssey —— Directed by Liu Zhenwei

The Wedding of the Great Sage of a Chinese Odyssey directed by Liu Zhenwei and Jiang Yuecheng.

Magic Stars-directed by Ye Weimin

Night of the Soul-Directed by Liu Zhenwei

1996:

The Secret Agent of Ouchi-Directed by Stephen Chow and Gu Dezhao

Food-Directed by Stephen Chow and Li Lichi.

1997:

Counting Dead Grass-Directed by Ma Weihao

97 Families Have Happy Events —— Director Zhang Jianting