Why thrillers are popular with audiences
2024-08-20
한어Русский языкEnglishFrançaisIndonesianSanskrit日本語DeutschPortuguêsΕλληνικάespañolItalianoSuomalainenLatina
Author: Liu Zongzhi
A classic return
"In the vast universe, no one can hear your screams" - although 45 years have passed, this line from "Alien" can still easily arouse the hidden fear in people's hearts. As the pioneering work of the series, "Alien" was directed by the famous filmmaker Ridley Scott. It was released in May 1979 and became a hit. It won the Oscar for Best Visual Effects and the total box office exceeded 100 million US dollars. Since then, many sequels have been launched.
The new film in the "Alien" series, "Alien: Reaper", was released last weekend. The story takes place between "Alien" and "Alien 2", expanding the story line of the entire series. According to the data of Lighthouse Professional Edition, the box office of the film exceeded 200 million yuan in the first weekend of its release. Its outstanding performance once again proved the commercial value of thrillers and brought this type of film back into the audience's field of vision.
The latest "Alien: Taken" is directed by Fede Alvarez and produced by "veteran" Ridley Scott. The film is set between the first "Alien" in 1979 and the sequel "Alien 2" in 1986. It revolves around a group of young and brave space explorers. They escape the dull life of an alien mining colony and accidentally encounter the most terrifying life form in the universe, the alien, while adventuring to explore an abandoned space station. In the narrow, dark and dangerous space station, the prelude to the battle royale has been ruthlessly opened, and humans have once again become the target of the alien creatures. Shrouded in endless darkness and the threat of death, can the space explorers sense the chill of unknown creatures lurking in every heartbeat? What kind of trust challenges and moral struggles will they face in this thrilling chase? When one companion after another is cruelly devoured and there is no one to turn to for help, can they find a glimmer of hope in this space carnage? It is worth mentioning that this film is rated R in North America, and the introduction poster also has the reminder "It is recommended that underage viewers choose to watch with caution", which shows how large the scale is and how heavy the taste is.
On August 16, Alien: Reaper was released simultaneously in North America and China. Relevant data shows that Alien: Reaper replaced Love, So Far as the new North American single-day box office champion after its premiere on the 16th, and topped the latest North American weekend box office rankings with a box office of about 41.5 million US dollars in the first weekend. Including markets outside North America, the total box office of the film is now about 108 million US dollars. The film's box office in China has also easily exceeded 200 million yuan, breaking many records such as the single-day box office of horror films in Chinese film history and the cumulative box office of horror films in the past five years. The film has received high scores and praises on relevant rating websites at home and abroad. Some fans said that this is an "original and pure 'Alien' movie that inherits the essence of the series."
Alien Evolution
"Alien", "Alien: Covenant" and "Alien: Prometheus" were all created by Ridley Scott. As the father of "Alien", he endowed the series with a weird parasitic reproduction mode and a cold-blooded hunter image, making it stand out from many screen monsters and become an immortal classic horror symbol in the minds of science fiction fans. "Alien" released in 1979 and "Alien: Covenant" released in 2017 are consistent in the depth of content. The latter not only echoes the former in terms of content interpretation, but also presents deep space fear, claustrophobic space, body horror, etc., and more importantly, inherits and continues his profound thinking, maintaining the consistent creative depth and level of the series of films.
Alien 2, released in 1986, was directed by James Cameron. The "alien" in his perspective pays more attention to the plot than the previous one. The overall plot tone of the film is greater than the horror tone, which makes the film full of the heroic style of rescue and annihilation. Compared with Alien and Alien 2, Alien 3, released in 1991, shows a distinct literary and artistic atmosphere, which is closely related to the participation of director David Fincher. He plays the personal creative characteristics of cross-cutting, weakening the alien creatures while giving the film more literary and artistic colors, thus completing the change of the series of films from horror to drama and literature. The creation of Alien: Covenant heralds the return of terror. The details such as colonial spacecraft, UI interface, hologram, and space suit realistically and credibly present the design sense of future industry. Coupled with the reasonable application of motion capture technology, the fear presented makes the audience feel more empathetic.
Compared with other works of the same type, the fear brought by the "Alien" series is more primitive and pure. The setting of the "monster" combines the weird appearance of multiple elements such as art, religion, and horror. Its brutal and cold-blooded reproduction and existence mode express the indifference of the universe and the chaos of time and space. In addition to the alien "aliens", another unique element of the "Alien" series of films is its space "spaceship". Unlike the jungle of "Predator", the park of "Jurassic Park" or the space of "Star Wars", most of the plots of the "Alien" series of stories take place in the "spaceship" traveling in the universe. This closed scene setting full of unknown and mysterious feelings, to a certain extent, sets off the film's ethereal, lonely and gloomy and cold horror atmosphere.
The "Alien" series cleverly combines elements such as strange space environment, claustrophobic spaceship space, terrifying "alien" monsters and thrilling conspiracy suspense. It not only caters to the audience's viewing needs for horror, science fiction, suspense and excitement, but also affects the style of many subsequent science fiction horror films and spawned a series of imitations.
Thriller Production
Science fiction thrillers have both the imaginative elements of science fiction films and the horror style of thrillers. They can not only stimulate the audience's visual experience, but also mobilize their imagination. Therefore, they play an important role in Hollywood genre films. Many films often create visual spectacles to make the audience feel terrified. For example, the "sensory deprivation" thriller "Silent Hill" visually upgrades the audience's sense of fear by creating two visual scenes, "surface world" and "inner world" with different distances from the real world. When showing horror, "A Quiet Place" often uses immersive interactive effects to enhance the physical connection between the audience and the movie, eliminate the sense of distance between the movie and the audience, and transform the audience from watching the movie to experiencing the behavior.
In the first film of the "Alien" series, Ridley Scott's "Alien", the crew was ordered to change the route to investigate the truth of the crew members on the original planet IV426 becoming fossils. At this time, the audience can expect that the seven crew members on the "Nostromo" will be in danger, but they don't know what the specific danger will be, and how many of them will follow the footsteps of the fossilized people. As the narrative unfolds, the audience knows that the local aliens will absorb people's faces, spit out a terrible and highly corrosive acid, and use human bodies as hosts to grow in people's bodies and finally kill the hosts. At this time, the audience feels fear. After Ripley discovered the company's conspiracy, she was isolated and helpless, and realized that people were more terrible than the aliens themselves, which also made the audience feel a strong sense of panic. Science fiction thrillers provide such an emotional experience for the audience through narrative, audio-visual, etc. The audience projects their self-consciousness onto the protagonist, as if they are also in the danger of the protagonist. (Liu Zongzhi)
Source: Qilu Evening News
