Movie Master

Since the interview with Tom Cruise, Lance has made some adjustments to the script. In the past, he has devoted almost all his energy to this matter.

The core of the theme of "Murder with a Borrowing Knife" is very profound. The story shows the sorrow of fate and the decline of morality in the modern city, and finally highlights the insignificance of human beings and the coldness of society. Lance hopes to dig out this theme, and even go deeper, take a step closer to the sinful society shown in "City of God", and conduct more dialectical thinking.

If you want to achieve this goal, character setting is only the first step. Lance must also reset a main line of thought, combining the character's dialogue, actions, and story twists and accidents. This is a very test. The work of script skills.

"Yes, I noticed." Peter still had a gentle face, as if the elders were caring about the work and study of the younger generation, and he was very kind, "But I don't quite understand why you changed the ending. If you change the ending according to the story Max rescued Annie, and then Vincent was abandoned in the subway and disappeared into the bustling metropolis, this is undoubtedly a good choice." Peter turned his head and looked at Shirley, He looked at Wade and Brad again, and seemed to be asking for everyone's opinions.

Sure enough, everyone focused their attention on Lance, and the invisible pressure poured heavily on Lance's shoulders, making him breathless for a moment.

Not only was Lance not timid, but he spread his shoulders slightly, let his straight back lean forward slightly, and said confidently and calmly, "Because I hope to further show the indifference and cruelty of society through this script, and dig deeper into it." The deep meaning contained in the story." Lance's voice was neither too fast nor too slow, neither humble nor overbearing, and his steady and powerful voice unconsciously grasped the attention of others.

"I borrowed from Akutagawa Ryunosuke's 'Rashomon'. Do you understand this story?" Lance looked at the three audiences in front of him. The expressions of the three did not change at all, and they seemed to understand the story. Lance also has no intention of explaining further, if they really pretend to understand, it will be beneficial to him, "I just hope to show the philosophical truth in the story of 'Rashomon' through 'Murder with a Borrowing Knife' .Everyone interprets the world from their own standpoint, from their own perspective, and from their own interests, so that the truth is buried, morality is abandoned, and order is disrupted.”

Regardless of whether they really understand "Rashomon" or not, at this moment, they are all looking at Lance seriously, the unhurried tone makes people slowly immersed in it, and the thoughts in their minds begin to follow Lance to think together. "For example, Vincent in the movie, he thinks that in this world, people die every second, and the people he killed are just one of them. Diseases are also robbing lives, so he doesn't think there is anything wrong; another example is the gangsters in the movie, they think that profit is the most important thing, so they do everything for profit, and what they do is similar to that of Wall Street or ordinary people. Blue-collar is no different, it's just a different way of getting the benefits."

Brad looked at Lance's blue eyes, the deep and quiet light shone with wisdom, and he could faintly see a hint of cunning and evil. His plain words seemed to be talking about the script of "Murder with a Borrowing Knife" That's all, but it always makes people feel vaguely inappropriate—as if Lance's words meant something, satirizing Paramount's behavior today, in fact, it is no different from Vincent and the gangsters, just standing on his own standpoint , do whatever you want.

Brad wasn't sure if he got it wrong, but Peter obviously didn't think about it, and he said directly, "This is pure shit/shit! It's just people's quibbling in order to protect their own interests That's all!"

"Yes, that's what I mean." Lance nodded his chin with a smile, and said in a cheerful tone. From the corner of his vision, he could see Shirley's expression. His eyes were unpredictable, and it was obvious that his heart was very turbulent. "It's like the Iraq war. Usually, under one banner, it is actually for another purpose. This is a politician, isn’t it? He uses some high-sounding excuses to cover up his real purpose, but still uses morality and law to wrap it up, and lives for granted and dignifiedly. .”

Brad didn't need to turn his head, he could feel Shirley's eyes fluctuate, the eyes almost condensed into a sharp blade, wishing to dismember Lance. But Lance was not timid at all. Instead, he showed a puzzled look, and looked at Shirley boldly and directly, as if he didn't understand what happened at all. Everything he said was closely related to the script of "killing people with a borrowed knife". On the contrary, Xue Li was caught off guard, and she had no choice but to play on herself, so she could only pull out a smile and whitewash the peace.

Such a simple action by Lance almost made Brad laugh out loud without holding back.

Lance was so good that he was so good. He opened his eyes wide and looked at Shirley, as if saying, "Do you have any questions?" Shirley had to raise her chin with a smile, and said, "I think this is a good idea." The theme is interesting, so is that the core idea of ​​the script?"

"Yes, this is what I want to express. In the face of self-interest, whether it is illegal or harmful to their interests, this will become their stepping stone. People's values ​​​​have become extremely fragile, and it is taken for granted that the interests of others are to satisfy It is the medium of one’s own material and spirit. In a broad sense, most of the evil deeds of human beings can be said to be egoism based on certain reasons, confounding black and white, confusing right and wrong, and committing all kinds of evil.” Lance accepted it as soon as he saw it, and changed the topic again Pulling back to "Borrowing Knife Killing" and "Rashomon", "It seems that the main characters in the story, Vincent, gangsters, dirty police/police, stained witnesses... everyone is like this. This is also the whole story. The root cause of society's gradual degeneration into Sin City."

"Indifference, everyone is indifferent to others; selfishness, everyone thinks only of their own interests; alienation, everyone lives in their own world. So, when an old man dies on the subway, it takes six hours to Someone will find out; therefore, when criminals have enough money and power, they can escape the law. Gloomy, damp, withered, cruel, dilapidated Rashomon, this is the degeneration and transformation of human nature in modern society."

After Lance's words were finished, Peter fell into deep thought, while Brad and Shirley were thoughtful, but a little absent-minded. Obviously, Lance's words contained too much information, and the follow-up effects caused by them also Completely different - the inevitable result of different positions, different types of work, and different professions.

"However, you haven't said why you changed the ending and the structure of the second half of the story." It was Wade who spoke, and he didn't intend to continue thinking about the content of Lance's words. These metaphysical things are important to Wade. To say it is actually nonsense.

Lance was not annoyed, instead he moved his position forward, then raised his two hands, placing his left hand up and his right hand up and down, and then raised his left hand, "This is Vincent , "He compared his right hand again, "This is Max. In the story, Vincent obviously represents evil and indifference, while Max represents justice and warmth. According to Hollywood's fixed model, justice prevails A wicked happy ending is nice. But I set the two characters up differently."

This is also the fine-tuning of the two characters after Lance and Tom talked, which plays a vital role in deepening the script.

"Vincent is calm on the outside, but flustered on the inside." This represents the status quo of society. It looks calm on the surface, but the undercurrent under the sea level has never stopped raging. "Max is chaotic on the outside, but calm on the inside. , "This represents the state of people. They usually seem to be indifferent to everything, but in fact they have a clear understanding of the bottom line of morality and the definition of justice in their hearts, and they just don't want to burst out." In the first half of the story, Vincent suppressed Max with violence, but in the second half Max used his calmness to finish off Vincent."

While speaking, Lance's left hand started to go down, his right hand started to go up, and finally collided with each other, vivid and vivid, but the connotation was far from that simple, "So, this led to three different versions of the ending of the story .”

Lance raised his left hand, "Vincent won in the end. He killed Anne and Max at the same time, killing the last hope. But the ending of this version is too dark and too desperate. The philosophical meaning is also too rough. I also thought about it, Vincent finally let Max out, but... it still deviates from the overall style of the work." Vincent chose to forgive Max's words, which means evil After all, there will still be a day of goodness. This intention is good, but Max's personality will appear incomplete-justice lingering under the claws of evil?

Then Lance raised his right hand again, "Max won the final victory," Brad nodded vigorously, this is also the original ending of the screenwriter Stuart Beatty, "This is too simple and rude, weakening the core of the story itself , and the aftertaste is too short, almost tantamount to wasting all the previous foreshadowing." It also makes the metaphor of "Rashomon" irrelevant.

Lance put his hands together, and then put them down, "Finally, I considered the third ending. Max and Vincent died together, but Annie, whom Max tried his best to protect, survived, and Annie will continue justice to the end "Annie is the prosecutor in the story, she holds all the evidence against the gangsters in her hands, and she is also the most core witness.

In fact, Lance has also thought about this ending for a long time, which also means that Max, who represents justice, still extinguished the evil plan at the last moment, but this ray of hope is still too thin. In fact, it is similar to "City of God". Hope always exists, but whether it is Pao or Max, they are too weak to change the whole society.

In a cold and evil society, kindness and justice always exist, but there is no way to change the status quo just by relying on one or two lonely heroes. This is also the core idea throughout the two works of "City of God" and "Murder with a Borrowing Knife".

This also echoes "Rashomon": the darkness and depravity of society are not formed in a day, and similarly, the justice and hope of society cannot be returned in a day.