The film Keep You Safe： Warm Heroism in Intertextual Narration

Original title: Keep You Safe: Warm heroism in intertextual narration

As a unique cultural phenomenon in human society, rumors map the power structure in a specific period and intervene in the operation of real society with virtual emotional shocks. The sinologist Kong Lifei’s "Calling the Soul" tells the operating mechanism of traditional social rumors; The director dissects the rumor production mode in the network age through intertextual narration that spans the cyberspace and the real society, and praises the warmth of ordinary people with heroic romantic narration.

Rumors of Intertextuality: Ethical Dilemma in Dual Narration

Wei Ping-an, the hero of the movie "Keep You Safe", lives by selling cemeteries and is down and out. His client, Han Lu, was slandered after his death. Wei Ping ‘an sees rough roads, but he also falls into new rumors. At the beginning of "Keep You Safe", the core conflict of the whole film was directly presented to the audience. Rumors that are constantly fermenting in cyberspace eventually overflow the virtual world, changing the real fate of the dead, and also holding Wei Pingan, a cemetery agent, pushing his career to the edge of a dangerous cliff.

The victims of online "yellow rumors" are the dead who can’t prove their innocence, and there are no relatives who defend the dead. They have also taken a stand by while connecting orphanages with millions of donations. Although the rumors that are hard to match will soon be "sealed by the coffin" due to the lack of discourse confrontation, and will soon be forgotten, the Internet memory mechanism of "flying geese and leaving a sound" can completely change the life image of rumor victims. It is precisely this that stimulated Wei Pingan, who could have stayed out of it. He jumped into the whirlpool of "yellow ballads" at the risk of his life, trying hard to distinguish right from wrong and to compete with the huge and secret network power.

Once involved in this grand "yellow rumor" carnival, Wei Ping-an is like a lantern bearer in the "dark forest law", replacing the late Han Lu as a new prey of online rumors — — Not only is his relationship with Han Lu distorted, but even his just "criminal record" that he was jailed for standing up for his friends will become a new rumor that cannot be said.

The intertextuality between Wei Ping-an and Wei Ping-an is the reality rumor impact that Wei Ping-an’s daughter Wei Mo faced. If Wei Mo-li, who witnessed the truth, wants to expose rumors, he will be reviled by rumor makers like Wei Ping-an and become a new "back-pot man" and "scapegoat".

The similar experience of Wei’s father and daughter directly points to the ethical dilemma in the operation of rumors. In the anonymous field of the internet, rumors are only the entrance to the carnival of words and imagination, and also the outlet for netizens to vent their pressure. The existence of rumors satisfies the spiritual pleasure of rumor producers, disseminators and onlookers. Once someone wants to deprive this pleasure, he will sacrifice himself to become a new "plaything". Internet rumors use this kind of "person-to-person" pyramid scheme to ensure their vitality and value, and also deter the intervention of rumors. In real life, rumors, through the words and physical threats of rumor makers, shield the opponents of rumors from the rumor field and are ready to swallow up the rumors at any time. Whether in virtual space or in real life, rumors are burdened with heavy mental pressure and suffer in the ideological struggle of watching and intervening.

As the film says: "When you open your mouth and say that a woman is a lady, whether she is or not, she is already." The production of rumors does not require cost, but to compete with rumors, it requires the rumors to constantly consume themselves until they fall into an ethical dilemma of self-doubt. Compared with the film directed in 2012, the breakthrough of "Keep You Safe" is to shift the focus from the victim of rumors to the rumor-maker, and to show the chain destructive power of rumors more integrally with the structure of intertextual narration, so that the audience has a deeper understanding and vigilance against rumors in the Internet age.

Romantic warmth: heroism in daily fireworks

Wei Ping-an is an elderly citizen with no special skills, who lives by selling graves in the cemetery with the help of his former friends. But it is such a humble little person who has shouldered the banner of fighting against the "yellow rumors" on the Internet without hesitation. After losing the battle for the right to speak in cyberspace, Wei Ping-an struggled with General Feng and Chairman Wolongshan, who were eager to move their graves, to gain time. On the other hand, he "hacked" Chairman Jin, the key person in the rumor spreading chain, and finally tracked down the clues of the rumor maker. Then, it was a thrilling adventure of "riding a thousand miles". After spending a lot of time, money and energy, Wei Ping-an ended the rumor with "one-man fighting".

Walking in the same direction as Wei Ping’s rumor-dispelling trip is the spiritual growth process of Wei Li, a female middle school student, from hesitation to firmness. She was bullied on campus because of rumors. Instead of falling into depression as her parents feared, she quickly revived with blood based on the belief of "doing what you think is right", which provided a firm value support for Wei Pingan, who is thousands of miles away.

In the process of breaking the two rumors, we did not focus on social organizations and schools as representatives of power discourse, but shaped little people like Wei’s father and daughter into civilian heroes against rumors. In this rumor war, as heroes, they have no weapons to rely on, only the warmth of caring for kindness in their hearts. The film’s display of Wei Ping ‘an and Wei’s inner tenacity is actually to pin the hope of dispelling rumors and stopping rumors on the audience and every ordinary person in real life.

The production and dissemination of rumors are based on people. To eradicate rumors, we must eradicate the psychological mechanism of producing rumors and spreading rumors. In the process of Han Lu’s "yellow ballads", "Mr. Perfect 421" certainly played a fundamental role, but the pursuit of self-exposure by a large number of netizens eventually turned this insignificant snowflake, which was originally submerged in the information ocean, into a snowball that crushed the real world. In the comparative narrative of spreading rumors and dispelling rumors, the film actually raises a sharp question: which producer or disseminator played a greater role in making rumors "rumors"?

At the end of the story, the late Han Lu arranged fireworks for Wei Ping ‘an in the form of a will. Naturally, this splendid fireworks is not a thank you to Wei Pingan for defending his reputation, but a thank you for the warmth he has always kept in his heart. In the fireworks all over the sky, Han Lu’s warmth to the world and Wei Ping’s warmth to Han Lu met across time and space. The heroic portrayal of Wei’s father and daughter in the film also declares a distinct value position: "Rumors stop at the wise" does not require everyone to be observant, as long as the warmth in their hearts is not lost in the information carnival, everyone can become a hero in the fireworks world.

In the "information cocoon" of the Internet and big data, the production and dissemination of rumors are easier and faster than at any time in history, and the difficulty of dispelling rumors has reached the peak of history. Everyone can be a gossip, and naturally they can also be rumors. "Keep you safe" uses a warm heroic narrative to praise the Wei father and daughter who "don’t believe in rumors and don’t preach them"; With the warmth of heroism, I look forward to everyone who is not afraid of "tempering". (Author: Associate Professor Du Xiaojie, School of Journalism and Communication, Nanning Normal University)