大地的女儿1991

“This must be the most desolate place on earth.” is uttered in this ethnographic trailblazer from Julie Dash, and the said place is Igbo Landing, on St. Simons Island off the Georgia coast, where lives Gullah islanders, an African-American people distinctively preserves its African traditions and origins.

The story of DAUGHTERS OF THE DUST takes place in the turn of the 20th century, and pivots around the Peazant Clan when the family is facing an impending separation as most of them decide to pursue a new, modern life northward in the mainland, whereas the elderly matriarch Nana (Cora Lee Day), refuses to leave the island where she is born and raised. Weaving its non-linear narrative with a voice-over of the unborn child (Warren), whose dubious parentage is a scathing testimony of Gullah people’s sufferance to the injustice and oppression (although they are not explictly presented here), strewing flashback, spectacular shots of its unique topography, myths (water-walking), rituals (baptism) and supernaturalism (a young girl’s ghost or a surreal shot in the graveyard) intermittently along the way, yet, on a less favorable note, its banally synthesized accidental music (save for some tribal rhythm) fails to leaven the narrative as the icing on the cake, often irritatingly takes us away from its spatio-temporal environs.

It is a shade daunting for a first-time viewer to suss the whole picture of who is who and their familial relations immediately, but it is rewardingly the women’s voices are predominantly heard through a handful of strong characters.Cora Lee Day’s Nana, an obstinate heathen refuses to evangelism but cleaves to memories and mementos of the past in her own superstitious mindset, is a stunning exemplar of what energy and impact those underemployed dark-skinned thespians can generate if they are granted a platform, she is electrifying as the old guard battling mortality and being forgotten, subsists a wisp of spiritual tenacity that becomes her lifeline.Barbarao plays Yellow Mary, one of Nana’s many granddaughters, the black sheep practicing the oldest profession, returns for the last supper with her same-sex lover Trula (Hoosier), is at loggerheads with Haagar (Moore), Nana’s intractable granddaughter-in-law, who aims to sever her family entirely from the backwater, represents the aggressive side of the polarity. Finally, Alva Rogers as Eula, mother of the unborn child and wife of Nana’s great grandson Eli (Anderson), staggeringly performs a quasi-possessed plea of understanding and unification in the climax, conjuring up a most theatrical moment in this otherwise self-reflective, desultory essay honoring Gullah culture and underlining the inexorable generational shift and a muted understanding thereof.

An oddity disinterred from oblivion, and forever enshrinedas the first feature film directed by an African-American woman distributed theatrically in the United States, Dash's ethereal debut enters that year's Sundance and is recognized for its otherworldly cinematography, but its groundbreaking genesis doesn’t parlay into a successive big screen career for Dash, who is relegated to small screen works mostly and his second theatrical film FUNNY VALENTINES arrives in 1999, and that’s it, does she deserve another chance? For shizzle!

#BFI #Sight and Sound Greatest Films of All Time 2022 故事完成度很高，视听呈现的诗意风格也高度统一，整部电影以打破时间界限讲述发生在这片土地上的故事。开始看觉得会是一个关于“土地”的故事，开场就是一个航拍搭配搭配独白，像极了《我是古巴》的开场，随后又感觉是种族，是女性，是信仰，是家庭，最后发现还是把一切回归到了人，回归到了根。

视觉上，由于涉及到过去现在和未来，影片大量采用抽帧的处理方式，时不时还会搭配升降格，让整部电影的神秘色彩非常强，缓慢的推拉焦使用的也比较频繁，用于体现角色内心状态，构图上也会帮助叙事，比如特写的人物处于画面边缘也很好的利用画面讲故事。光影上在结尾的处理印象很深，大量的光线介入让画面神圣感比较强。当然整部影片给我印象最深的仍是那几处画面的呈现，水面站人那场戏，利用反射把人物，木像和周围景色完全融为一体，呈现出一幅油画般质感的绝美画面。沙滩伞下的戏，也是很好的利用构图呈现出破伞之下的三人那独特的魅力。

听觉上，想起了去年看的《女人们的谈话》，不知道是否对这部作品有借鉴，采用了完全相同的叙事模式，借用“未来人”的画外音结合“现在”的讲述者的台词让故事叙述者与故事之间的关联性变得模糊，从而让影片的宿命感更强，整体还是比较喜欢这样的呈现，结合视觉上的抽帧和故事上的非线性叙事让影片整体风格统一度很高。

角色上，其实很难像到如此众多的角色呈现还能做到每个角色都带有极强的力量。尤其是结尾时把一切回归后，在与开场呼应让影片达到了一个非常完美的闭环。

不喜欢的点，首先是视觉上大量的使用浅焦镜头，虽然在大多数时候对与焦段的把握都可以让观众非常好的把注意力集中，但是几次虚焦或焦点在错误的位置还是让观众从整体的诗意中抽离了出来。其次是配乐的使用，大量的民族乐器让影片整体感觉都非常厚重，但是有时候偏流行甚至带有一些中国民族风格的配乐还是让我不会出戏。