The film Classroom for One is based on Zeng Qingping, a teacher from Ningdu No.4 Middle School in Ganzhou, Jiangxi Province, and focuses on Song Wenhua's professionalism and the teacher-student relationship with Tang Mingming, a left-behind child. Someone once said: "Life is his pursuit process and creation process. The meaning of life is not in the final outcome, but in the process of life, when life shows all the contents it seeks and creates, the value and meaning of life will be realized. " Teacher Song Wenhua has always been obsessed with the podium, even if only one student sticks to his teaching post. When he passed on his knowledge to Mingming and watched Mingming enter a better school, his life value was reflected. Rural substitute teachers may be lonely, but everything becomes valuable in order to let children living in the mountains have books to read. A person's classroom theme is full of warmth. Although the fate of rural teachers and left-behind children is somewhat sad, the story between them touches us everywhere. The film played down the tragic experience of Song Wenhua and Mingming, but added a warmth.

The whole film is full of poetry. As Andrei tarkovsky, a Russian filmmaker, thinks, "poetry" is an understanding of the world and a special way to describe reality, which is reflected in the film as "an accurate observation of life". Poetry is an indispensable element in the beauty of this film. The pristine countryside is beautiful and fresh under the lens, and the picture always presents the same aesthetic feeling as poetry. China's poems and traditional Chinese paintings are pursuing the beauty of artistic conception, expressing his feelings in the scenery and through the scenery, which is China's euphemistic expression. In one's class, the director strives to realize his own aesthetic style. God must be fair in some ways. The more economically poor the mountain village, perhaps its scenery is unexpectedly beautiful. There are no cool special effects shots in the movie, but every scene is carefully crafted and washed simply. The scenery of the mountain village under the lens is not as beautiful as hibiscus, and it is naturally carved. A natural and beautiful mountain village is particularly ethereal in the rain, and the story is slowly unfolding here. Castle Peak, neat vegetable fields, white-walled houses in Yamato, winding roads, all simple shots are full of natural aura. Although people here are not rich, they live an idyllic life. Pastoral and intoxicating. Endless green is everywhere, a winding mountain road passes through, and the school is quietly located in the village. Milan Kundera wrote in The Unbearable Lightness of Life: "Pastoral poetry is a picture left in our hearts, like a memory of heaven. Life in heaven is not like a straight line pointing to the unknown, it is not an adventure. It is a circular movement between known things, and its monotony breeds happiness rather than sadness. " It is true that both the persistence of Teacher Song and the bright sunshine are creating hope and value. Although there are many unsatisfactory places in reality, the future must be full of longing and hope. The director told the story in a simple way, without deliberately winning the audience's pity and sympathy, nor did he easily give a way out of the predicament. At the end of the film, Song Wenhua still lost his teacher's identity and became a small migrant worker in a big city, and his eyes that gave up at the school gate also implied some insecurities about the unknown. They all have helplessness and confusion in their hearts. But their hearts are happy.

Color will bring the most intuitive feelings to the audience, but also skillfully render the atmosphere of the whole movie. In one's classroom, the director's use of color is also original. Green is the main color of the whole movie. The color of the mountain village is green, quiet and peaceful. Song Wenhua's career is also full of hope. For most children in mountainous areas, reading is really the only way to change their fate. As teachers, Tao and Li go their own way in obscurity. The profession of teacher has influenced the fate of many people. Just like the red sorghum with red tones and the yellow soil with yellow tones, the green harmony of one's classroom theme is also complementary.

For a slow-paced film with a simple story, the actor's performance is very powerful. Sun and Wang Naixun performed well in the film. Song Wenhua is a typical image of rural substitute teachers in China. He has been teaching and educating people on an obscure platform for many years, and spent most of his life explaining a teacher's life pursuit of silent dedication and selfless dedication. In the film, you can often see him cycling between the village and the school. Vegetable gardens, mountain roads and schools in the rain are particularly clean, which is almost pure in big cities. And the people who live here are very simple. There is a deep teacher-student relationship between Sun and Tang Mingming played by Wang Naixun. Teacher Song taught Mingming from four students to one, but he always taught Mingming meticulously as in the past, which is a teacher's insistence. When he was facing a computer exam, he drew a computer interface on paper, went to an Internet cafe to practice his computer, and finally fainted in the examination room. The audience saw the helpless situation of a rural substitute teacher. How much he loves the podium, how afraid he is of losing his title as a teacher, and how much he wants to become a full-time teacher, but he will still lose his "teacher" status at any time. In Mr. Song's mind, teaching is a sacred profession, so no matter how many students there are in the class, he always insists on the traditional ceremony of standing up, raising the flag and ringing the bell. Teacher Song gave up the opportunity to go to a big city for nothing, and even put down his dignity that he had been dismissed. When it was clear that she couldn't go to school because she had to take care of her grandmother who was sick in bed, Teacher Song actually picked up the blackboard and moved the classroom into Mingming's home. What he has done for Mingming has gone far beyond the scope of the profession of teacher. When the camera falls on a comfortable smile, this smile is not only gratitude, but also incomparable respect for the profession of rural teachers. What rural teachers mean to left-behind children also has a heavy weight in the hearts of the audience.

A good movie can always convey a culture and make the audience re-examine themselves and everything around them. Confucian culture has a long history of influence on China people, and its advocacy of "loyalty, righteousness, courtesy, wisdom and faith" has far-reaching influence. Teacher Song's persistence on the podium for decades is the best interpretation of "loyalty". It is his greatest responsibility to stay in the humble classroom without regrets and bring knowledge to the children in the village. He spent most of his life silently loving his students and work. Teacher Song's monthly salary is not much, but he didn't accept the high-paying job invitation from students. The spirit of being willing to be poor but always sticking to it is the common quality of many China literati. Of course, from the film, we can also see the implicit expression of deep feelings between Teacher Song and Mingming. Before Mingming took part in the running race, Teacher Song accompanied Mingming to practice starting and hitting the line over and over again. Teacher Song won again and again with Mingming. Perhaps that bumpy mountain road is no longer an ordinary mountain road, it is a sprint to the future, but it is also the teacher Song's vision of life. Many philosophies about life and existence are contained in it, which adds a sense of life and weight to the film.

The application of film artistic techniques such as blank space and long shot in one's classroom gives the film a unique aesthetic feeling. The director's use of empty lens can usually achieve the artistic technique of leaving blank. Empty shots often leave enough room for imagination for the audience to integrate their stories into the picture. Just like China's landscape paintings, "emptiness" is just a full narrative. The use of empty lens not only shows the audience a beautiful country, but also leaves room for thinking. The beautiful mountain village scenery is in sharp contrast with the people in trouble. The school is covered with moss and the air is humid. There seems to be a lot of rain in the film, and the story begins with the sound of raindrops. Rain seems to be a sad thing. Indeed, whether it is a substitute teacher in rural areas or a left-behind child, their situation is rather sad. The use of long shots with oriental aesthetics makes the whole story as smooth as a sermon.

Movies are the art of light and shadow. The film is also very particular about the use of light. There is a scene in the story when Teacher Song went to Mingming's house with the blackboard on his back, and the light in the room was dim. When Mingming's grandmother was lying in bed, her face was full of light and her outline was very clear. Every expression in the close-up showed subtle changes in her heart. The whole scene is like an oil painting.

A person's classroom is like a fresh and meaningful poem written by Lance, and its creation has a strong social reality record. His discussion and concern about the phenomenon of substitute teachers and left-behind children in rural areas shows the creator's thinking about ideals and life. There is not much drama conflict, just a slow story. One classroom, two roles, but how much is said about the current situation and situation in rural areas. Although the story of characters is simple, it shows the true meaning of life through ordinary stories. What can impress the audience most in film works is often not how gorgeous and profound, but sincerity. In this work, we don't see any traces of affectation and emotion. The director is just telling a story to the audience sincerely and simply expressing the tension of the story. Perhaps many viewers have left children in their childhood. The director said that this film is a review of his own growth, and many elements and links are some shadows of his previous life. The audience will feel particularly cordial when they see such a theme. As a public welfare film, perhaps its social significance far exceeds its commercial significance, and the hardships of its preparation can be imagined. The director waited for ten years to make this film. Classroom for One pays attention to the real state of modern people, which not only reproduces the living state of rural substitute teachers and left-behind children, but also takes the audience to explore their mental state and needs, and tells their true yearning in a warm way. Obviously, this is not a movie that only stays in the visual perception, but a movie that will make the audience think. Left-behind children and rural teachers are a state of life. When we watch this story quietly, we will not only see this story, but also pay attention to these groups in trouble.

Reflections on the public welfare film "One's Classroom" (II)

Many feature films about "vulnerable groups" have become simple drills for the preset theme of "saving" of "vulnerable groups"; On the contrary, for remote villages, there is another poetic imagination, which may be whipped in the name of "suffering poetics" This makes it more and more difficult to shoot feature films with similar themes. Unless the author can recognize some essence of the problem. Let's look at the film "One's Classroom" shown at the second Zhejiang Youth Film Festival.

In the context of problem drama, nothing can show the essence of education better than children. From the perspective of drama, the problem of "left-behind children" may be the last "pre-modern" drama scene for us to reflect on the essence of education. Nowadays, people are no longer unfamiliar and surprised with left-behind children. It is generally believed that the solution to the problem of left-behind children is subordinate to the improvement of social mechanisms (such as the vigorous construction of "new villages" across urban and rural areas), so it is only temporary. As for their education, that is the second thing. In addition, the perfect and formulaic urban education system also provides people with reproducible answers. In urban education, the "data validity" of many measures soothes people's nerves: the formulaic enrollment rate scheme is so stable and reliable that the roles of parents and teachers become vague and passive, as if education has no dramatic sense of urgency. When people begin to pay attention to left-behind children, their nerves may have been numb for a long time, which makes their attention superficial and farther away from the essence of the problem. There are subtitles at the end of the film One's Classroom, indicating that the film is about left-behind children. But the protagonist of the film is obviously not a child, and the problem of left-behind children is manifested in the experience of an educator. Different from the lens aesthetic strategy of news reports and documentaries (the close-up of "big eyes" of children outside school), children in this film tend to be silent, showing a dramatic reflective character, which is also the drama of this film. In many dramatic actions, the role of children is similar. Children in dramatic actions have a natural "silence" feature, and their existence often points to the reasons for dramatic actions, but they themselves do not need too much participation. Let children create miracles, or let children be independent, which is not suitable for serious subjects. Similar designs are easily reminiscent of religion (for example, the younger brothers and sisters in The Hunter's Night directed by Charles Laughton). Nothing is more touching than the silence of children. We will see in the film that the left-behind children disappear one by one, and finally only one is left. If the director doesn't compromise, the remaining only child will be absent. At this point, there is a cold sensitivity in the humorous style of the film, which makes people think rather than cry. The way it tells a story reminds those sensitive audiences that it may not be "Foot", "Phoenix Piano" or even "None Less", but "Real Gold's Childhood" (Huang Jun, 1989). In the past, "shocking experience" often received unexpected results for the audience, but now "shocking" is often disastrous for the viewing experience. The film "Childhood in Ruijin" may bring the audience a shocking experience that the director tried to avoid, but we still have a lingering fear. There is no need to ask the director if it is because of this "depravity". In short, the director turned the narrative focus to the problem of teachers in the education of left-behind children, showing us the decline and disappearance of a native education environment.

In the film, Jia Xi village is gradually becoming a dead village. The elderly, children and housewives who lack non-agricultural work skills maintain the daily life of this village. There are only a few students left in the primary school in the village, and finally there is only one left. The good news we got from this movie is that some students transferred to schools in county towns or cities in order to receive better education. They are faced with another new problem. ) This makes the situation of Song Wenhua, the only teacher left in the village primary school, awkward, and makes Song Wenhua's insistence seem absurd. Because of Sun's wonderful performance, he may have brought unexpected effects to the author of this film. Song Wenhua is a rural intellectual full of humor, which smacks of Kong Yiji and Jin Fan. He has been a substitute teacher for 36 years, and his salary is pitiful. But he attached great importance to the honor accumulated in 36 years (he admitted that it was a trivial matter, but he thought it was enough honor) and compared himself with Confucius. His wish is to become a full member as soon as possible, and to learn computer "on paper" (can't afford it). But he didn't even learn to type in the end. In the examination room, he was at a loss in front of the computer, basically handed in a blank sheet of paper and collapsed on the ground. So he missed the last chance to become a regular worker and was quickly replaced by a college student and became a farmer. We may regret or laugh at him like his wife, but he has been eliminated by the times and we don't know it yet, but those who really understand what he has done will not think him ridiculous. No matter how many students are left, he rings the bell solemnly as usual, holds the flag-raising ceremony solemnly, and reads the text solemnly and hastily, like a play-he is playing a substitute teacher. The tool for ringing the bell is an old collar used by rural people to lock the door. The nose has been damaged, and the bell is a section of railway track. The broken bricks in the panoramic shot make the flag-raising ceremony look very sad and ironic. But he is not worried about the loss of students and the decline of the countryside. That's the thing above, he can't control it. Even though his detachment is based on acting, we are still surprised at his detachment: his beliefs are inseparable from his privacy, which makes him look clumsy. The new college teacher left after talking about his life ideal. This kind of person looks ridiculous. Song Wenhua finally proved that his method was closer to the essence of education. Song culture defends its beliefs with selfishness, which makes it out of tune with this era of "defending selfishness with faith". This is enough to beat back all the accusations of suffering poetics and let the comedy spirit occupy the film. After the college student teacher slipped away, the superior leader came to beg him to continue to substitute. He insisted that his honor had been damaged. They plan to go to Guangzhou to defect to their daughter and work to make a living. But at the station, he let his wife go alone. Finally, he sent the last student to junior high school and went to Guangzhou to be a city underground pipe repairman. He once again proved his meanness.

We found that from the beginning to the end of the story, an "unidentified" educator was engaged in educational work that only he could be competent for. There are not many external factors in the whole humorous story. We can even say that this is an "overhead" story, similar to a family education scene. But the situation of substitute teachers, and even their stories, really exist in reality. Just as the Iranian film Blackboard is a pure realistic story but gives people a surreal feeling, so is this film. Different from adults, children naturally require a primitive educational environment. Only in children can people generally admit that education has its uncompromising side. If children are likely to fall to the bottom, then educators must return to the role of father (or mother). The group of "left-behind children" will eventually disappear, and the left-behind villages are likely to disappear eventually. In front of them are the original educational environment and those "unidentified" educators. First of all, they refer to the parents of left-behind children-for them and their children, no matter what era, the family is "a classroom for one person". If their identities remain as vague as "Song Wenhua", this "one-person classroom" will eventually disappear. Song Wenhua's story is only the end and echo of this process. The belief of civilization is suspicious and the process of civilization is unstable. The problems of local education will not disappear, nor will the problems of educators. These problems are related to the characteristics of family education, the bearing and preaching spirit of educators, and the essence of education. The process of society is the differentiation and elimination of the three. The film "One's Classroom" caught the tail of this social transformation process and gave us all a piece of advice. It is humorous, and we should realize its meaning. This reminds us once again of the movie "Real Gold's Childhood" released by 1989. At that time, the word "left-behind children" did not exist, and the predicament was only an economic problem, so it was a story close to despair. It shows an educational dilemma that may be destroyed at any time. It contains a story told by a person in class, but it is exactly the opposite: Teacher Wen finally got married; Pingping entered junior high school and walked out of the mountains; But beyond that, all the children have slipped into the abyss of unknown fate. Fate is the ultimate embodiment of indestructible things, which naturally points to tragedy: it was drizzling the day Pingping left the village and entered the school; Dai Li is herding sheep on the opposite ridge. He shouted to Pingping, "Look at my eyesight!" With his favorite slingshot, he made a hole in the flat oil-paper umbrella to bid farewell to Pingping in such a mixed way; Pingping looked at the bar from a distance and took out a piece of paper mat on the umbrella hole. People at the mercy of fate don't need educators. Undoubtedly, as far as drama is concerned, Ruijin's childhood is more powerful. The collective silence of children eventually turned into a terrible dream, and the family became their nightmare. At that time, it was a bitter drama, and now it is probably beyond the imagination and endurance of the audience. But this does not mean that "One's Classroom" is easier to be understood and accepted by the current audience. This is an era of comedy: education is within reach, teaching is full of joy, and charity cares for everything. However, the essence of education problem is not economic problem, and it is impossible to find the answer within the scope of sociology. At this point, although the problems touched by "One's Classroom" are not as shocking as "Ruijin Childhood", they cannot be perfunctory with a simple answer. Faced with these problems, people may prefer to go into shock rather than think. I hope this movie is not a white gadfly.