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©️Mirror Entertainment

Text丨Benbenqi

Sneeze and fall into the neon lights of the 21st century.

Li Yang's first feature film, Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century, has received rave reviews since its preview, and is predicted to be a hit in the summer. According to Maoyan Professional Edition data, the total box office of previews and pre-sales exceeded 40 million on August 1, one day before the film was released, and the cumulative combined box office has now exceeded 80 million. After its release, Douban scored 7.7 points, ranking first among the films released in the 2024 summer season.

"Abstract", "crazy", "explosive"... the audience was caught off guard by the film's fresh expression, but as the number of moviegoers increased, discussions about the two-pronged trend of "new trend" and "old fashioned" began to emerge.

"Safe Escape from the 21st Century" stands out in the current cinema with its unique sense of form. This "hallucinogenic" feeling is like falling into a dream. But beyond the virtuality, the film seems to be telling a very old proposition, and the relationship between the new and the old has become a common focus inside and outside the film. In the film, the gains and losses that individuals must go through in their growth depict the sad background of this colorful heroic story; outside the film, the propositions and narratives concerned under the form are considered a bit old-fashioned.

"Safe Escape from the 21st Century" is strange and simple, fresh and old-fashioned. The unique form of the film makes it an "easter egg" in the current Chinese film market, but obviously, this distinctive author's film cannot connect to the "brain waves" of every audience. Perhaps, this is an illusion experiment that does not require everyone to participate.

Cross-dimensional flying style

"Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" is not a film that falls to the ground. It is very free, like a balloon with its mouth opened, running around in the narrative line. The description of "eating Yunnan mushrooms" points out the unrestrained and unexpected nature of this film. What is most praised about it is the abnormality, the abnormality of the characters, settings, and visuals, and this abnormality actually refers to the unconventionality of the film style.

The story of the movie sounds simple: three teenagers from Planet K discover that they can travel through their souls to their own bodies 20 years later, and embark on a fantastic adventure as they travel back and forth between 1999 and 2019. Not only do they have to face the collapse of their imagination of adult life, but they also face a huge conspiracy that could destroy the world, and they have nothing but "clear stupidity" and imaginary brute force.

The three protagonists of the film, Wang Zha, Wang Chengyong, and Bubble, have different personalities, but they all share the characteristics of being immature, rebellious, and "single-minded", just like the protagonists in a boy's comic with a cold sense of humor. Wang Zha has a strong sense of justice, Wang Chengyong has high martial arts skills, and Bubble is a stupid-looking fat boy. After growing up, some of the three are still immature, some have lost a lot, and some have unexpected changes, but the common point is that they seem to be unhappy.

Based on the setting of the story, the director has a lot of imagination, and uses "clear stupidity" as the characteristic point to collide with many funny plots. You will see that the film interprets what it means to have "water in the brain" and what it means to be "addicted to games and hurt your body". Shared bicycles have also become a tacit laugh point for the audience. "Useless montage" and other funny designs that break the fourth wall and do not follow the routine highlight the neuroticism of the film and enhance the fun of watching.

In addition to the dense "stalks", the director's techniques and thinking in expressing the film are also very distinctive. He incorporates a strong sense of animation, which is detached and neurotic, into the technical processing of picture composition, special effects processing, sound and picture relationship, and shot editing.

The fusion of animation elements is implemented in specific scenes and actors' performances, breaking the wall between the virtual fantasy world and the real world, such as the dynamic line processing of the tail of a car when it jumps off a cliff and the distinctive portrayal of muscle lines in action scenes. This real and illusory 2.5-dimensional sense of vision constitutes the visual feature of this film, which is lively, exaggerated and nonsensical.

The film editing also incorporates a variety of techniques such as collage and ghost animal, with a crisp and dreamy rhythm. The audience rotates through the perspectives of the three teenagers 20 years ago and now, as if entering a game that switches timelines at will. This treatment enhances the stimulation of the visual senses and creates a special and novel effect. The fun of the form can also fully mobilize the audience's emotional or sensory response.

The addition of elements such as animation and mashup deconstructs the traditional visual expression, creating multiple visual expressions and forming a surreal film style, which gives the story a colorful coat of imagination. This refreshing sense of form allows people to see the vitality of film expression, which is a very different treatment in the current domestic film market, and the audience is happy to see such new things.

Absurd background: the theme of growth and loss

The change of times is like a dream, and individuals often react half a beat slower to time. The 18-year-old soul has to learn to face the rules of adults in the body of 20 years later. When Wang Zha said "I don't like the world after growing up, I only like you", the audience probably felt that in addition to the bizarre performance techniques, the focus of this seemingly absurd story is actually a simple question about growth and loss, about youth, and about the changes of the times.

To make mass consumer content that people will pay for, it is not enough to be novel in form, but also to fit the experience shared by many people. In essence, "Safe Escape from the 21st Century" is actually more like a youth film. The collision between the passion of youth and the helplessness of adulthood reveals a sad background. The film expresses it in a playful way, which can arouse the emotional empathy of many viewers.

"Is this what I thought growing up is like?" Perhaps in many boring moments when people talk about growing up, they have fantasized about a brave and reckless alter ego who doesn't have to worry about anything, with no constraints and no burdens.

In the black and white tones of growing up, Wang Zha in the movie is full of colors. He is a character like a flash light, pure, and seems out of place in the black transaction. He has the most colors in the adult world. When he jumped from the office building, the colorful cables in his hand pulled out many computers, and then exploded into fireworks.

But in the setting of the Mosby Ring, just like the indestructible bicycle and the lottery number that will never win, fate seems to have written an unchangeable ending. Even if you can go back to the body of 99 years old, what was destined to happen in 19 years will still happen, and what was destined to be lost will still be lost, just like a popular saying on the Internet: "When you are 30 years old or older, stop and look back, and find a bullet from 10 years ago hit you right between your eyebrows."

The audience will like the cry of "don't grow up", the sense of satisfaction of organizing the workplace, and some rebellious behaviors. Although there are gaps between generations, youth as a necessary process for every generation can arouse empathy.

In addition, the film features a large number of memory symbols from the 1980s and 1990s: snow screen, DVDs, and games and animations of the time. The protagonist returns to the summer of 1999, running on the street, and everyone's soul has disappeared. He rushes into the image of "I Love My Family" and snatches the 16-player Street Fighter. The director's personal complex is transformed into a nostalgic element, connecting to the public's emotional memory.

When the camera moves from the steel plant in 1999 to the high-rise building in 2019, the broken ladder 20 years ago seems to foreshadow the inevitability of some loss. The emotions and imagination of youth flow in everyone's body. Facing the many uncertainties of the present, the nostalgia for the carefree and free days in the past may help people find the anchor point of the present. It is for this reason that the personalized emotions and expressions of the film have gained collective empathy and been widely spread in the Internet age.

Film by the author of "Brainwave"

It can be said that "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" is a combination of science fiction, comedy, and youth film. It cannot be classified into a specific genre, but is a very unique author's film. Because of this, it shows a strong personal style, but it is also limited to personal expression at some levels of narrative.

During the preview of the film, many viewers thought it was very similar to "Space Exploration Editorial Department". The reason why everyone made such an analogy was probably because of the surprise of the film. In addition to feature films, this type of film carries the author's imagination and is full of the author's personality and expression. "Space Exploration Editorial Department" is more inclined to "literary + cinematic", while "Safe Escape from the 21st Century" is characterized by the fusion of fantasy and animation elements. The author attributes of the two are not the same.

The film reflects the director's own knowledge structure and scene settings. As a post-80s generation, Li Yang placed many symbols in the film with personal characteristics of memory space, and the imagination of the characters is also in his mind. From "The Adventures of Li Xianji" to "Bad Future", Li Yang's films mostly use collage, combination, music and animation appropriation as a form of creative method, and the grotesque and surprising style is also continued.

The 2009 animated short film "The Adventures of Li Xianji" tells the story of a patient who is said to suffer from time difference. He sits in front of a PS machine and tries to play a game that he can't pass. In order to find his girlfriend and cure the disease, he embarks on a fantasy adventure. In the end, Li Xianji travels through the box of time and opens one door after another that leads to nowhere. The 2015 micro-film "Bad Future" tells the absurd love story between the protagonist, who is a meteorite from outer space and has two bodies that can be switched at will, and his lover Zheng Xiaoyan.

These films have unrealistic fantasies and an obsession with the environment of the post-80s generation. "Science fiction" is just a carrier used to describe imagination. The surreal expression conveys the thinking of the proposition of time and the eternal loss in life. "Time only rushes past us", such a theme is presented in "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" as the protagonist travels between the past and the future, tastes disappointment and surprise, and wants to grasp something that is destined to be lost.

In addition to the gorgeous visual structure, the film's personal expression also has certain flaws. In addition to the story outline, the limited narrative capacity and the flat character setting narrow the dramatic tension, and the expansion of the core of the story is also insufficient. The setting of the time travel in 2024 does not seem so amazing. The setting of female characters is also symbolic like a game console. The cheerful school beauty will fall into the quagmire of life and become the trigger point of the conflict between the protagonists. The super cool female reporter will do stupid things for a long-distance boyfriend...

"Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" is a good interpretation of the idea that "film is the art of dream-making". The brand-new form shows Li Yang's personal characteristics, but it is ultimately more inclined to the director's personal dreams and fantasies. Some people cheered and some people were indifferent, which are all normal feedback.

Original by Mirror Entertainment (ID: jingxiangyuler)

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