Question:
What are the advantages and disadvantages of making film of real life events?
使用真实事件拍电影好处和坏处是什么?
Answer:
Advantages:
1.Making a movie from real life events gives the movie a feeling of being real.
So that, people can relate to that movie, especially if the audience has had the experience of that event. And the movie can achieve an emotional effect in the people that watch it.
2.Making a movie about a real person or a real event in history can arouse peoples interests and curiosity. For example, if Im making a movie about the life and story of JFK, then many people would want to watch it simply because they like the person yet they know very little about him. In this sense, such movies have history textbook values.
3.Because the movie that you make is about things that actually happened, so your story-telling enjoys a high credibility among the audience.
Disadvantages:
1.Since youre making a movie about real event, you want to be true to the original story. And this limits the directors imagination, so the movie may appear like a history textbook, very dry and unbelievably boring.
2.Some events are simply too sensitive and emotional to be made into movies, such as the 911 or the genocide of Jewish people by Hitler. If you do make a movie like this, then many people will be offended and their feelings will be hurt. Nicolas cage starred in a movie called World Trade Center about the 911 Incident. Many movie theaters in New York refused to play it because people didnt like to be reminded of the painful past. So you see, some movies made of real life events will never be well-received / popular. And this is another disadvantage of making a movie based on real life events.
3.People are lazy, when you make a movie about real events that happened in history, then they watch your movie instead of doing what they should do, reading books. So I guess people are deprived of the fun of reading a good book by going to a mediocre movie. If you want to find out about the truth of a person or an event, a movie of only 120 minutes can never be enough.
Question:
How important do you think its for filmmakers to remain true to the original story?
电影人在拍电影的时候忠于原故事重要吗?
Answer:
I dont think its important for filmmakers to remain true to the original story.I mean we should make a clear difference between a film and a documentary.Films are for people to watch to entertain;Documentaries, on the other hand, are for people to watch and be educated.Learning is learning; entertainment is entertainment.If you want to keep true to the original story so that your movie can be a textbook,then dont make a movie, make a program for the Discovery Channel.If you make a movie, dont always try to teach the audience a lesson.Make an exciting movie,and then the box office is high, and more interesting movies will be made. Some real stories are simply not movie materials.Thats why the directors often adapt the stories. With the adapted movie story, the director can show us the montage of a movie.