I often see people discussing why Shanghai is called the Magic City. Some people say that it is because the Japanese writer Muramatsu Sofeng called Shanghai the Magic City in his novel. Others say that it is because Shanghai, from a Feng Shui perspective, is full of aura.
My feeling is that the city of Shanghai is inherently magical, ever-changing and unfathomable.
As we all know, many Shanghai-themed movies use period music, such as "Night in Shanghai" and "Rose Blooms Everywhere". I have always felt that it is important to use period music in movies related to Shanghai. A lazy approach.
▲Several collections of period songs that I have collected.
This movie is different. Screenwriter and director Cheng Er found some master musicians and wrote some songs that fit the movie perfectly. The song I've been playing on repeat these days is the episode "Take Me Back to Shanghai" from this movie, composed by Shigeru Umebayashi, lyrics by Anna Rice, and sung by John Hughes and Se Downes.
The Shanghai in this song is like this:
Liberty swathes this city of shades
The city of shadows is shrouded in freedom
< p> Like gloves on the wings of a birdLike a bird with bound wings
The silken smoke of the words you spoke
The past words are like smoke wisps Fog
Still rises where you lay
Still rises where you lay
Take me to ShangHai
Take me back Shanghai
Take me to ShangHai
Take me back to Shanghai
To the town where I belong
Back to the place of my heart Towards
The pathways were red, the lanterns alive
I still remember the bright lights on the road and the lights coming on
Diamonds adrift in the sky
The night sky There are diamonds shining
You're standing here when I close my eyes
I close my eyes and look at you here
This slumber leaves me blind< /p>
In just a moment, Huang Liang Meng woke up and his eyes were blinded
Take me to ShangHai
Take me back to Shanghai
Take me to ShangHai
Take me back to Shanghai
To the town where I belong
Back to where my heart is
The night was mine to set alight< /p>
That night was lit by me
Every cord and every chain
Every rope and every chain
Your hands were ice within the fire
Your hands are like ice to fire
And it burned like poison rain
Like poison rain setting a prairie fire
The blood in these veins, the streets that it stains
The mottled streets are dripping with blood
Fevers unbroken by death
Death cannot calm the enthusiasm
Their shadows ride on this ruby ??tide
And the waves that toss my breath
And the waves that toss my breath
p>
Take me to ShangHai
Take me back to Shanghai
Take me to ShangHai
Take me back to Shanghai
To the town where I belong
Return to where my heart is
The title of this song is called "Take Me Back to Shanghai", the word "back" is particularly intriguing. . What we want to return is not the physical Shanghai, but the Shanghai that has entered the modern urban myth.
This song also reminds me of many gloomy songs, such as Nick Cave's "Where the Wild Roses Bloom" and the theme song of the American TV series "True Detective". They all sing about lust, Death, and the unpredictable fate, the way men and women sing duet also makes this song appear dark and gorgeous.
This kind of song is particularly easy for people to get stuck in. Therefore, I would like to remind everyone that this song can be repeated, but don’t repeat it for too long.
Of course, what makes this song seem so telling is the movie behind it. "The Death of Romance" is really star-studded. This film is written and directed by Cheng Er, Ge You, Zhang Ziyi, Tadanobu Asano, Du Chun, Gillian Chung, Ni Dahong, Zhao Baogang, Yuan Quan, Yan Ni, Han Geng, Huo Siyan, Du Jiang , Wang Chuanjun, Lu Xing, Chung Hanliang, Ma Xiaowei and other starring actors. Judging from the lineup alone, it is very suitable to be placed in the New Year's Eve film. Therefore, many news reports list this film as a "New Year's Eve film".
But judging from the temperament of the movie, this is probably a not lively movie. It is a heterochromatic movie that is different from most Chinese movies. It is also a movie that rewrites our understanding of... A movie about impressions of Shanghai.
?There are really a vast number of movies and TV shows set in Shanghai, from the early "Road Angel", "A River of Spring Water Flows East", "Eight Thousand Miles of Clouds and Moon" ", "Ten Thousand Houses of Lights", "Crows and Sparrows", and later "Shanghai Night", "Shake, Shake, Shake to Grandma Bridge", "A Date at Dusk", "Red Roses and White Roses", "Jasmine" "Open", "Song of Everlasting Regret", "Shanghai Nights", "Beautiful Shanghai", "Lust, Caution," and even the TV series "Love is Deep in the Rain", "A River of Spring Flows East", "Love in the Thousand Years 2" under the moonlight exchange". "Shanghai" is always the protagonist and a frequent visitor under the camera.
The Shanghai in these movies is gentle and beautiful, the ultimate in secular life, but Shanghai may have another side, which is the side shown in the movie "The Demise of Romance" and also the side of "Take Me Back". The side shown in "Shanghai".
Shanghai in the 1940s, which is as ever-changing as a monster, was actually only sixty or seventy years ago. In modern society, in just sixty or seventy years, the appearance of a city has become like a mystery. Thinking of this, I deeply understood the words in the Buddhist scriptures, life is a dream and a bubble, like dew and lightning.