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"That was my lost youth. I remember running in the sunset."This line from the comedy skit series "Never Expected That" has been a famous Internet meme for many years.

If it is accompanied by exciting music and the figure of a young man running wildly in the sunset, nine out of ten people who see it will smile knowingly and understand that this is obviously a satire on those clichéd, hot-blooded, and second-year film and television works.

But what if there is a movie in 2024 that can make people feel like crying instead of laughing at such a cliché? That’s the movie “Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century” which was just released on August 3.

Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century

In 2009, director Li Yang became an internet sensation with an animated short film titled "The Adventures of Li Xianji".

But more than a decade later, Guo Fan, who co-directed the live-action feature version of "The Adventures of Li Xianji" with him, has now become a trend-setting figure in the Chinese-language film industry. However, this once "young and outstanding pilot" has been rarely seen on the big screen except for one or two short films.

At that time, some people on the Internet were indignant and felt that Guo Fan had picked Li Yang's peaches, but there were also people who expressed different opinions, saying that if you have watched "The Wandering Earth", you will know that this is a movie that Li Yang definitely cannot make.

"The Adventures of Li Xianji" was once praised as the most amazing domestic animation in 2009.

Now, thanks to this movie "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century", Li Yang's fans can finally hold their heads high and say the same thing -Such a creative masterpiece cannot be produced by any current "box office director" let alone Guo Fan.

The reason why they can't be filmed may be because they are not crazy enough - a sneeze can lead to traveling through time and space, a box of game cards can transform oneself into a devil muscle man, a group of crows can destroy the entire human society... These settings that will make your jaw hit the floor in the next second after just one look are daily occurrences for Li Yang.

In fact, "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" can be seen as a patchwork of settings from Li Yang's previous works.: The game master/multiple time and space in "The Adventures of Li Xianji", the organ trafficking/different paths of good and evil in "Bad Future"...

Of course, there is also his consistent theme - if we could have one more time, two more times... N more choices, would we be able to catch up again, the person who is destined to be lost by us?

Leslie Cheung sang in his song, "I wish I hadn't grown up, and could find a partner based on my intuition." To make a rough and simple classification, Li Yang should probably be classified as a director who "didn't grow up."

But unlike the "Zhongyong"s that are emerging one after another in the current Chinese-language film industry, it's not that he can't grow, but that he doesn't want to.

In essence, he should be what Jung called the "eternal youth".——Always shining, full of vigor, with the pure dreams of a child, and the courage to do something even though it is impossible. But at the same time, they will instinctively resist change and refuse to grow, until they are killed by growth.

Director Li Yang on the set

And, the most fatal point is that the eternal youth is destined to never enter into a real intimate relationship. What they pursue is just a perfect "goddess" illusion, not a real concrete individual. When they see the true side of the other person, it is often the moment when the fantasy is shattered.

So, no matter how many times they try, their pursuit is doomed to fail - how can you catch a fantasy bubble?The most moving tragedy in Li Yang's films is given by this doomed failure.

This kind of wishful and idealized expectation of intimacy, which is actually entirely based on narcissism, also makes Li Yang's film naturally have a major shortcoming -What he sings about is destined to be just the "love" in his imagination.

But even so, we are still moved by the fantasy of this young boy who walks back and forth on the line between absurdity and fantasy; even if we know that the future will no longer be able to get better, we will still feel a sudden sadness when the girl opens the window and shouts to the distant other side, "Don't be bad!"

For adults who have long been accustomed to bowing their heads and scraping their heads, who would not be willing to shout "I want to go back" when facing the ferocious time train speeding towards them?

So, even though this is a movie with clear advantages and disadvantages, even compared with the previous masterpieces such as "Sucker Punch", "Scott Pilgrim", "Ready Player One" and "The Blink of an Eye", which also featured the collage and mixture of (former) pop culture,"Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" is not mature enough in technique, its structure is not sophisticated, and it does not have the kind of all-encompassing demeanor, but the Y-generation style in its bones is not necessarily weaker than others.

“too young, too simple, and always naive”, translated into English, may be the once popular internet phrase “a kind of clear stupidity of youth”.

I wish there was a little more clarity and a little more stupidity in our cinemas.

I also hope that every young person from the 20th century can evacuate safely from the 21st century.