Chinese Film Name:cao mu ren jian; English Film Name: Dwelling by the West Lake,Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains 2：Qiantang River
《Dwelling by the West Lake》, the story of Wu Tiehua who mistakenly enters a pyramid scheme due to her thirst for success, and her son, He Mulian, who only saves his mother despite the danger, is more intense in terms of overall material emotions and conflicts, such as the classic passage of the monologue in which Jiang Qinqin is reluctant to admit that she is deeply trapped in the pyramid scheme.
From shouting to waking up step by step to save his mother
The character played by Wu Lei in the film is called He Meilian, and the name “Meilian” is taken from the mythological story “Meilian saves his mother”, which is the source of inspiration for the film.
In the mythological story, Meilian’s mother went to the hungry ghosts because of greed, while Mossflower in the film, thirsty for the new identity of “independent and confident new woman”, mistakenly enters a pyramid scheme under the temptation of huge monetary benefits; Meilian begs for his mother, and Meilian takes the risk of entering a pyramid scheme in a desperate attempt to awaken his mother’s insane and twisted soul under mental manipulation.
Based on the story of “Meilian saving his mother”, director Gu Xiaogang found the theme of his film to be “wake up”. From Wu Taihua’s “shouting to wake up” to Meilian’s “shouting to wake up his mother”, from “shouting” to “waking up” is also the process by which Meilian wakes up Wu Taihua step by step. From “shouting” to “waking up” is also the process by which Meilian wakes up Wu Tahua step by step.
In the marketing organisation, accompanied by the shouts of “Taihua, Taihua, Taihua”, Wu Taihua was brainwashed and surrounded by the stage, transformed from a tea picker coming out of the mountains into a suited and dressed with exquisite make-up, success of the science of the output, shouting, “I’m now an independent, confident and successful woman! “I am now an independent, confident and successful woman. In the face of the unfamiliar and completely different mother, as a son, Meilian is in agony and despair, and tries his best to wake her up.
After the pyramid scheme case is solved, Mossflower loses herself after learning the truth about the pyramid scheme and cannot eat, and Meilian has been staying with her unceasingly and feeding her, and all the details of this inability to eat are contrasted with the allusion.
At the end of the film, Meilian takes his mother back to the mountains to be baptised by the mountains. In his journey of finding himself in life, Meilian also suffers a lot of physical hair and skin pains in silence, just like Meilian in the mythological story. In the end, he succeeds in rescuing Wu Taifa out of the mud, just like Meilian in the story of Meilian’s rescue of his mother, who dragged her out of “hell”.
Companionship and love are good medicine
One of the highlights of the film is the shocking pyramid scheme scene, which is so real that it makes people’s heart tremble.
According to reports, director Gu Xiaogang and his staff took the risk of backtracking, and went undercover in the MLM organisation, taking months to collect materials. The scenes in the film, such as “sitting on the bus”, “psychological games” and “the total spread of money”, all originated from his and his colleagues’ in-depth investigation into the MLM organisation. The scenes in the film, such as “sitting in a bus”, “psychological games” and “spreading money on the chief”, all originated from the real experience of him and his colleagues in the front line of the pyramid scheme.
When Gu Xiaogang returned to the creation of the film after his personal experience with pyramid schemes, he placed himself in the perspective of the pyramid scheme organisers to conceptualise and design the main narrative line of the film “pyramid scheme” to bring the audience the most immersive and realistic feeling.
In the end, “platform in the morning, make money early, early realisation of our life dream”, “can go crazy, not resigned”, in these brainwashing lines and fake scenes, the director will be the ugly truth of pyramid schemes bloody presented.
Back to the film Meilian save mother’s love on the main line, Wu Taihua and Meilian are very kind, each other is also very considerate of each other, their relationship is a very traditional and typical Asian family mother and son to get along with the model, Taihua encountered a pyramid scheme was brainwashed want to make money, the original motivation in fact, also based on the love of the son.
It is because in the eye lotus after graduation is about to enter the next stage of life, as a mother of the moss flower began to worry about her son “to get married, the house dowry” problem, out of the want to give her son a better life, only to be convinced by his friends to seek opportunities to make money.
When she was the marketing organisation spirit of control step by step in-depth, the eye lotus saw that a room of foot paste, combined with his previous work experience, he knew that moss flower has been in the marketing road can not turn back, they want to intervene but no way back to heaven.
Become “independent and confident Wu Tohua” is like a spiritual opium, has deeply brainwashed the mother, but also for the mother to bring an extraordinary sense of achievement, sobbing tears shouting “Mom you wake up,” the identity of Megumi Lian as a son of a human being, it is difficult for him to refute Tohua’s line of “I’ll live once for myself, should I or shouldn’t I”.
As a re-interpretation of “Meilian saves his mother” in a modern context, 《Dwelling by the West Lake》 continues to show Meilian’s arduous expression of saving his mother under the kernel of the traditional story of “saving”, but it will also be In the traditional story “Rescue”, “Grass and Wood” continues to show “Meilian’s” hard work to rescue her mother, but also puts more emphasis on “Wake Up”, to wake up her mother, Wu Taifa, from the illusory marketing and the confused reality.
Emotion has always been a two-way street. Whether it is He Mulian’s rescue of Wu Tahua from the abyss, or Wu Tahua’s desire to bring a better life to her son, their love and endeavour for each other, and their eventual search for themselves and rebuilding of their self-worth, they all portrayed a touching contemporary family relationship.
In the aftermath of the storm, a mother and her son support each other and grow up together, and it also outlines the possibility of family relationships in contemporary East Asia. The film raises the question of what children can do to save their parents when they are stuck in the mire, giving the answer that “companionship and love are the best medicine”, while also giving the audience more room for reflection.
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