The movie "Removing the Three Evils Around the Week" was released for a week and achieved more than 2200 million box office, 81 point on Douban. The limelight is strong, sweeping away the residual temperature of the Spring Festival stalls. It is worth noting that the film has rarely opened up the male viewing market, with Maoyan word-of-mouth male ratings accounting for more than 60% and Tiger Pounce scoring 96, all of which illustrate the fanatical love of male audiences.
Along with the high heat, the film has also received some controversy, and some plots are considered to be "male condensation" and "objectification of women", revealing the shortcomings of "straight male movies".
The term "straight male movie" is not new, and the "Wolf Warrior" series, which created the "5 billion club", was once given the same name, and received the same doubts.
But on the premise that the core of the story is good enough, such works are often flawed, and the "Wolf Warrior" series goes without saying, and the same is true for "Removing the Three Evils Around the Corner".
Wolf Warrior 2 (Source: Douban) In "Removing the Three Evils Around the World", "large-scale" and "strong plot" are just narrative expressions, and the real theme is still growth.
From the desire for attention and recognition, to the establishment of a view of right and wrong, from evil to right, to truly find and realize self-worth, the protagonist Chen Guilin has a complete and positive growth line. Such a growth line, ** in the extreme setting of "murderers are killing", forming a strong hedge.
"Straight men" are common, but "around" is not common. Some people say that straight male movies are "too much", but it does bring more male audiences into the theater and also promotes the diversified development of the film market.
The growth of a "straight man".
The "sense of hedging" of "Removing the Three Evils Around" is undoubtedly a rare highlight in the film market in recent years, and it is also the key to its popularity as a "straight male movie".
In the context of recent years, in addition to representing orientation, straight men are more synonymous with low emotional intelligence, poor aesthetics, and immaturity. The context of the use of "straight man" has gradually developed from a joke to a satire.
The so-called straight male movies usually have the following characteristics: the main perspective of the story and the arc of the characters fall on the men, showing the psychological transformation of men in the predicament; Women play a supporting role in it, and there is a more or less emotional connection with the male protagonist, but they are rarely looked at and respected.
Through "hedging", "Removing the Three Evils Everywhere" accurately hits the emotional appeal of men in their growth.
Eliminate the three evils everywhere (source: Weibo) The first thing is to pay attention to it.
In the film, Chen Guilin's family only has his grandmother, and his parents are not mentioned. Obviously, Chen Guilin did not get the attention and care he deserved in the early days of growth. In order to be noticed and seen, coupled with no one to guide him correctly, he will inevitably go astray, step into the underworld, and choose to find a sense of existence in the most primitive way.
This kind of behavior is similar to a little boy who is naughty and mischievous in order to attract attention, but it is placed in the special context of the movie, and it will be amplified in an extreme way.
At the beginning of the film, Chen Guilin's biological age has reached the ** stage, but his psychological age is still in the juvenile stage. Whether it is bombing a casino, shooting a gang boss, or sniping the first and second criminals in the later stage, they are essentially gaining attention, and the cancer rhetoric of black doctor Guiqing is just an opportunity.
The second is the desire to conquer and compete.
Adolescence is also a period of hormonal explosion in men, and the aggression that has nowhere to be placed will be externalized into a desire for conquest and competition, which is extremely violent. to goodness, you can capture the evil dragon and kill the fierce tiger; To evil, he will also turn into an evil dragon and a fierce tiger.
Chen Guilin in the early part of the film is naturally the latter, and in the middle and late stages, he gradually becomes the former. In the process, the black doctor Guiqing, Chen Gray, and Xiaomei all had an important influence on him.
Compared with the black doctor Guiqing and Xiaomei, Chen Ash exists as a "competitor". In the long time of chasing me and running away, Chen Ash's behavior will also imperceptibly affect Chen Guilin. On the one hand, it is the pursuit of life without regard for life, so that the "teenager" Chen Guilin feels the powerful driving force of justice; On the other hand, it is good first, even if he wants to catch Chen Guilin again, Chen Shen will first confirm the safety of his companions.
At the end of the film, the two people sympathize with each other, Chen Guilin took the initiative to find Chen Ash to surrender, and Chen Ash "took care" of Chen Guilin before the execution, all of which were the result of mutual influence.
Eliminate the three evils everywhere (Source: Weibo) The third is to be responded to and relied on, which is closely related to Xiaomei in the movie.
In the growth stage, subjective behavior can only continue with response and feedback. After Chen Guilin rescued Xiaomei, he realized that there was a response to doing good, and he was truly seen his value, showing the part that can be relied on and relied on. Two people have an emotional connection, and this emotion can be love or friendship.
Some netizens said that Xiaomei's role can be changed to a boy, but if this is the case, the romantic atmosphere will be much weaker, and the richness of the film will be reduced. After all, learning to get along with women is a necessary topic for men's growth.
To some extent, Chen Guilin and Xiaomei share the same predicament, both longing for freedom. For Chen Guilin, he has gained attention from the underworld, and he has also created shackles for himself, and he is always in struggle and being hunted down. And Xiaomei has lived under the control of "Aberdeen" for a long time and is also imprisoned. Chen Guilin did not let Xiaomei repeat her mother's fate, gave her freedom, and also wanted to make herself free.
Eliminate the three evils everywhere (source: Weibo) Finally, it is a hero complex of punishing evil and promoting good.
Chen Guilin's killing of Aberdeen was only for himself, and killing Lin Luhe was not only for himself, but also for the element of "removing harm" for others, and killing unawakened believers can be interpreted as a pure "altruistic" act.
So far, from pure for himself to pure for others, Chen Guilin has completely completed the growth from a teenager to a **, and at the same time realized the male hero complex on another level.
Among them, in addition to realizing the beauty of doing good, there is also a very important node, that is, being able to distinguish between hypocrisy and true evil.
Emotions are the most beautiful experience in life, and true kindness can generate positive emotional connections. Lin Luhe guided Chen Guilin to abandon the watch given by his grandmother, this kind of behavior that makes people give up precious emotions must be hypocrisy, or even extremely vicious. Chen Guilin saw this and saw that the other party despised the life of the "little boy", so he had the "highlight" moment later.
Eliminate the Three Evils Around (Source: Douban) In the film, Chen Guilin introduced himself three times, each time at a key node in the story. For the first time, I wasn't a minion; Second time, you don't know me? The third time, I was who I was. This last time is the most confident and charming.
The controversy of the "straight man".
It is worth mentioning that judging from the feedback from major platforms, "Removing the Three Evils Around the Week" is not only very popular with male audiences, but also highly praised by female audiences. This once again proves that excellent "straight male movies" are both men and women.
According to the protagonist's character and story context, "straight male movies" can be roughly divided into two categories, one is action, war and gangster-themed works, focusing on the externalization of hormones. Usually excellent "straight man movies" are born here.
In order to show the flow and tension of hormones, such films will design strong plots with a strong sense of conflict. With the life-and-death fight of fists and fists, and the wisdom of life and death, the vitality of aggression can be embodied in a concrete way.
In addition to hormones, the emotional "purity" of such films is also very moving. Because in the context of life or death, whether it is brotherhood, comradeship, or love, it completely abandons external factors such as interests, highlighting a sincere and fiery word of "righteousness", making the four words of love and righteousness more precious.
The foreign "Expendables" series and "Fast and Furious" series, as well as the domestic films such as "The True Color of Heroes" and "Crazy Boy" series in the early years, to today's "Wolf Warrior" series and "Three Evils Everywhere" are all successful works of this kind of movie. All of them are a bumper harvest at the box office and word of mouth.
The other category is urban emotional works, focusing on the internalization of hormones. Different from hormone externalization movies, this kind of work will show the "weakness" or "inadequacy" of men, and portray men from a richer perspective.
Moreover, the age range of the protagonist also puts the spiritual world of middle-aged and elderly men on the stage, and uses their experiences as a microcosm to depict a cross-section of society.
For example, the "If You Are Honest, Do Not Disturb" series, through the perspective of Qin Fen, a "middle-aged returnee man", uses relaxed and humorous words to reflect the middle-aged man's pursuit of love and desire, and to reflect the thinking of contemporary people on human nature and love.
In "Lao Paoer", the film uses a stubborn, stubborn, and sticking to traditional morality "** Lake" to present the conceptual collision of the old and new generations, as well as the strong image of "* Lake" still having to straighten its waist and constantly explore the value of life under the current impact.
Lao Paoer" (Source: Douban) It's just that the values and humor of middle-aged men often sit on the label of straight men. Most of the "straight male movies" mainly depict male demands, so it is inevitable that they will be controversial to varying degrees in terms of content and lens expression, and most of them are expressed by female characters.
In "Removing the Three Evils Around the World", the scene of Xiaomei naked and handcuffed is considered to be a "male gaze", which has a demeaning meaning of demeaning women, and the related plot is also seen as "saving the wind and dust" to satisfy men's desire to control women; In "Lao Pao'er", the "trembling" scenes of Feng Xiaogang and Xu Qing, as well as Xu Qing's attitude of not seeking fame, are seen as old men showing off their superiority, greasy and disrespectful to women; "Flying Life 2" was directly criticized because there was no female character in the whole film.
Flying Life 2 (Source: Weibo) In recent years, "straight male movies" have also had well-received female expressions, and the two heroines of the "Wolf Warrior" series are strong, tenacious and very feminine characters, which play an important role in the plot line and emotional line. And like "Flying Life 2", if the director can't shoot women, all men may also be a good choice.
For "straight male movies", controversy is actually a good thing. And in the plot of expressing men's love and desire, the creators still need to think a lot.
The market needs "straight man movies".
Looking at the film market in the past ten years, it is easy to see a phenomenon, that is, women have become the mainstream consumer group in the film market. In line with the demands of users, female movies on the market are not uncommon, on the contrary, there are relatively few "straight male movies" recommended by male audiences, except for Hong Kong-made police and gangster films, large-scale productions oriented to the whole people, realistic works and Hollywood movies, there are very few movies that can really arouse the resonance of male groups.
In this case, once there is a "straight male movie" in the market that meets the expectations of male audiences, they will appear to watch movies intensively, and quickly increase the revenue data of the current film market. But when the film is released, this group of audiences will quickly "scatter" and will not walk into the theater next time.
In this regard, if high-quality films can continue to appear in the market and stick male audiences to theaters, then the overall development of the film market will also go to a big level. In view of the limited number of overseas works, "straight male movies" are bound to be a major subdivision of domestic films.
Eliminate the Three Evils Around (Source: Weibo) From the perspective of the production port, the strong plot favored by "straight male movies" can also help the industrialization of domestic films and the innovation of genre works.
For the former, it is reflected in audio-visual sound effects, scene design, post-production special effects and other hardware. For the latter, "Removing the Three Evils in the Week" is based on "The World Speaks New Language: Self-Reform", which provides new inspiration for content creation, and can make creators think about how to use the story base of classic ancient books to put on the shell of genre films to create both humanistic heritage and plot highlights and works.
There are only two genders in the world, men and women, and when we pay attention to women's demands, men's growth and spiritual demands also need to be paid attention to, and they need to be presented by the image medium of film. The classic "straight man movie" is enough to be a mirror image and guide for the behavior of straight men in an era. And in the new era, a new "straight man movie" is also needed.
At the beginning of March, "Removing the Three Evils Around the World" laid a good new starting point for the film market, and also established a new reputation for "straight male movies". I look forward to the influence of this film, there will be more related excellent works of the same genre, just like when I was growing up.