Jia Ling said, "It hurts." If it doesn't hurt so much, if it doesn't hurt so much, most people tend to stay put. Most of the changes will not happen at a smooth moment, there must be an external force on your body, a blow that makes you unbearable pain.
When a new self is born, an old self dies at the same time. It wasn't until the flashback later that I learned that Le Ying had killed herself once, but she survived, and this part of the survival was carved one by one, carving a new self.
The first half of the movie "Hot and Hot" is not a light-hearted and hilarious comedy story.
Le Ying, who has been lying flat at home for many years, sleeps in addition to eating every day, and the whole person is depressed and unable to speak.
Almost everything that happened to her later hit her again and again until it broke her.
Something like this: "My boyfriend got married, and the bride was not me, but my best friend, and asked me to be a bridesmaid." ”
Her sister took the house in her name and pressed her to the ground and beat her.
Her new boyfriend dislikes her, refuses to admit their relationship, and abuses her in front of her colleagues.
The only distant cousin who gave her kindness turned out to just want to use her to get a career promotion, and she didn't hesitate to push her to the forefront of cyberbullying.
One of the very well handled scenes in the movie, Le Ying came back from the TV station and climbed the stairs in a long skirt, the kind of standing staircase that can be seen from the outside. It was late in the night, the whole building was in darkness, and wherever she went, the lights of the stairs came on, and she went up in circles, one by one, and at last the lights of a certain room came on, the windows opened, the wind poured in, the curtains were blown up, and her screams of pain came from the room.
What Le Ying experienced on this night, it is not shown in the movie, and the next day she went to the health club and said to the boss, I want to participate in a boxing match.
It wasn't until the end of the movie, when Le Ying fell in the boxing ring, that she told the story of that night through flashbacks. It turned out that Le Ying really jumped from that window, but she was blessed that she was not injured, she said that it hurts, in fact, it is not only physical pain, but also mental pain.
People have to change because it hurts so much.
Regardless of the cold winter and heat, Le Ying never gave up her sports training, not only lost weight, but also trained a body of tendon meat.
At the end, she participated in the boxing match as she wished, the opponent was a professional boxer, Le Ying was beaten very badly, when the coach said don't fight when it's over, she said "not over" again and again, and persevered until the end. For Le Ying, she can stand here and finish this fight, she can hit the other person with a punch, and she has won.
In the first half of the movie, in fact, the viewing experience is very average, because it is not a comedy that can make people laugh easily, it is actually very sad, and it is a story that happened to a girl who almost gave up her life. What happened to her was actually very miserable, and the laughter constituted by this made people a little unable to laugh.
She will not refuse, she always gives 100% sincerely in the relationship, but she is taken for granted by the other party, not cherished, and is a soft bun character that is kneaded by others.
She is always soft-spoken, weak, very kind and gentle a girl, and the people around her step on her boundaries again and again. The younger sister can rob her house with confidence, the best friend can rob her boyfriend, and the distant cousin can use her and hurt her at the expense of malicious editing.
She silently endured these injuries, kindness without a bottom line, until one day, the last straw that broke the camel's camel also crushed the little psychological space she had left.
Le Ying didn't take revenge on anyone, not even a bad word. She instead started focusing on herself, her sports, her boxing, and she wanted to win so badly.
Le Ying changed, the change happened that night, the movie did not directly give what she was thinking about that night, only through the picture and the camera, showing her mood and behavior that day. But she must have had a very deep reflection, and it was this extremely painful reflection that caused her to break the old self, the old self died, the new self began to be shaped, and her focus was no longer on others, but on herself, desperately trying to win for herself.
At the end of the movie, Le Ying has undergone a reshaping of her image, she has become a girl with beautiful abdominal muscles, she still speaks softly, but she has a sense of power, when her ex-boyfriend asks her out to eat, she will say "I don't like to eat bullfrogs", "another day", "depending on the mood".
For others, it may be common for them to directly talk about their preferences and feelings, but for Le Ying, this is too rare, how much she has gone through to get to this point.
In this desperate process of winning for herself, Le Ying, who was weak and powerless in the past, regained her sense of strength, and more importantly, she learned to love herself and respect her feelings.
In 2024, I am very touched to be able to see a female director in the cinema with a film narrative that integrates sincere personal experience. This is also the only film in this year's Spring Festival file that made me cry, because it does cut into a certain kind of intimate and common experience in some places.
It may not be so perfect, but on the whole, it is such a sincere work, a work made by a female director with 100% hard work, with a distinct personal character, the knife that touches the depths of people's hearts is both precise and powerful, and the attitude and concept of life conveyed in it are also very positive and easy to resonate, so it can move people's hearts very much.
Predictably, Jia Ling once again copied her box office myth.
The movie is hot and piping hot