Martin (John Amplas), a young man who looks around 20-years-old, boards a train in Indianapolis, Indiana for New York. At night, he breaks into a sleeping car and sedates a woman with a syringe full of narcotics. She struggles, but he tells her not to struggle or be upset because she wont feel pain. After a few minutes, the woman falls asleep, and Martin has sex with the unconscious woman. Afterwards, he slices her wrists with a razor blade so he can drink her blood. The woman bleeds to death in her sleep.
In the morning, the train stops in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where Martin disembarks. He is met by Tata Cuda (Lincoln Maazel) an elderly and hostile old man who claims to be his cousin from the Old World. Together, they travel by another train to the town of Braddock, a dying industrial suburb. They walk to Cuda's large house where he shows Martin his living quarters. Cuda then accuses Martin of being an 84-year-old vampire from his old country. He has taken in Martin because he is family, but tells him, "First I will save your soul. Then I shall destroy you." Martin denies being a vampire and implies that Cuda is merely his uncle rather than his cousin. Cuda then puts up strings of garlic on the doors to his and his granddaughter's room, and then holds up a small cross when Martin approaches him. Martin takes away the cross, and even takes a bite of the garlic mocking these attempts by saying bitterly, "There's no real magic... ever". Cuda tells Martin that he can come and go as he pleases. But he also warns Martin that he will kill him if he kills anyone in Braddock. He also tells Martin to stay away from his granddaughter Christine (Christine Forrest), whom arrives home from her job that evening.
Cuda introduces Christine to Martin, but also warns her to stay away from him. But Christine instead strikes up a friendship with Martin who confides in her about his vampire heritage. When Cuda later confirms Martin's claims to be a vampire, Christine, not surprisingly, refuses to believe either one. She thinks that Cuda and the other members of her family have driven Martin to insanity by making him think that he is a vampire. It is never revealed if Martin really is a vampire, or just a shy and lonely youth with troubled issues. Christine is the only person that Martin gets the courage to talk to. When Christine's boyfriend Arthur (Tom Savini) arrives at the house for dinner, Martin stops talking and backs away despite Arthur's attempt at a conversation. Christine later confides in Martin that she hopes to leave Braddock someday with Arthur, even though Martin points out that Arthur treats her badly and is both verbally and physically abusive towards her.
When Christine sees that Martin won't talk to anyone else, she buys him a phone which he installs in his room. Martin begins to repeatingly call a radio talk show where he describes what it's like to be a vampire. He becomes known on the radio as "the Count" to all the listeners. But the patronizing host (Michael Gornick) thinks he's just crazy.
Martin gets a job at Cuda's grocery store of stocking shelves, hauling boxes around, and even gets to be a delivery boy for some of the customers. One of his customers is a certain Abby Santini (Elyane Nadeau), who becomes taken in with Martin. She is a very friendly young woman who is depressed when she tells Martin that her husband is unfaithful. But Martin still does not have the nerve to talk with her, so she is happy to have someone to confide in with her life problems. Martin phones the radio show host to describe his infatuation with the housewife and senses that she wants to have sex with him. When the radio show host asks Martin if it is a sexual problem that he has involving women criticizing him during sex, Martin replies that he has never had sex with a woman who was awake.
One day, Martin travels by train to outside Braddock to look for victims. At a supermarket, he follows a young woman (Sarah Venable) home to her posh suburban house. He sees the woman's husband (Richard Rubenstein) leave for a long business trip, and Martin decides this would be the right time for more feeding. Martin returns to the house after dark and breaks in through the garage door. But it is Martin who gets the surprise when he bursts into her bedroom to find her in bed with her adulterous lover Lewis (Al Levitsky). After a vicious struggle, Martin jabs both of them with hyprodermic needles with narcotics, and waits for the drugs to take affect. He drags the unconscious body of Lewis from the house to a clump of trees across the street where he kills him by shoving a broken tree branch into his neck and drinks his blood. Martin returns to the house where he has sex with the unconscious woman. But out of compassion and pity, he decides to let her live.
Martin begins to have romantic monochrome visions of his vampire past (real or imagined), where he drained blood from a young woman and was chased through the streets of a nameless European town by a torch-lit mob.
During one Sunday at church, Cuda brings home Father Howard (George A. Romero) who asks him about the possibility of exorcism and demon possession. Father Howard calls upon the elderly Father Zulemans (Clifford Forrest, Jr.) over at Cuda's request. Together, Cuda and Zulemans confront Martin his bedroom and attempt to perform an exorcism on him. At this point, Martin remembers (another real or imaginary flashback), in the Old Country of people trying to perform an exorcism on him, and he flees them. Martin then flees from Cuda and Zuelmas as well. A little later that night, Martin terrorizes Cuda in a children's playground when he puts on a Dracula cape and puts false fangs into his mouth to pretend that he really is a vampire.
One day, Martin finally musters the courage to talk with Mrs. Santini during a routine delivery to her house where he tells her that he's aware of her attempts to seduce him and wants now to have sex with her. After having sex for the first time, Mrs. Santini becomes more depressed for she tells Martin that her husband just left her because she discovered that she cannot bear children, and that her desires towards him are based on sex and nothing else. But Martin wants to stay with her and help her move on with her life. Martin tells the radio show host about his affair with the housewife and that he no longer has the urge to attack other women.
Meanwhile, Arthur meets with Cuda and tells him that he wants Christine to leave town with him so they can get married and start a family. But Christine becomes angry at Cuda when he tells Arthur that insanity runs in their family and he shouldn't consider having children with her. Shortly afterwards, Christine packs up and leaves Braddock for New York with Arthur despite Martin telling her that Arthur is abusive towards her. But her mind is made up. Before leaving, Christine tells Martin that she really has no ill feelings towards him and just wants to make a fresh start with her life. She says goodbye to him and promises to write. But Martin knows that with an abusive and possessive man in Christine's life, she probably won't.
Depressed over losing his one true friend, Martin phones the radio show host and tells him that he's getting "shaky" and wants to go out looking for more victims. That night, Martin travels to a rough crime-ridden area of Pittsburgh and attacks two derelicts in a alley, injecting them with narcotics. He kills one of them by silting the bum's wrist and drinking his blood. Martin is about to kill the second one when a police car shows up and gives chase. Martin narrowly escapes during a long chase on foot which leads from the garbage strew streets and through a local store. Martin runs into an old warehouse where a drug deal is going down. A shootout between the two cops and the three thugs begins where all of them are killed, leaving Martin as the sole survivor who casually walks away from the carnage.
One day, Martin finds Mrs. Santini dead in her bathtub, after she had slit her writs with a razor blade. Martin anonymously calls the police to report the body and leaves. He phones the radio show host one final time to say that he really doesn't need friends or people to talk to for he is his own person. But when Cuda learns about Mrs. Santini's suicide, is mistakenly thinks Martin killed her and made it look like a suicide as he's done before. Cuda walks into Martin's room while he is asleep and kills him by hammering a wooden stake through Martin's heart.
Cuda buries Martin's body in his back garden, while over the closing credits various voices from people are heard talking to the radio show host asking the whereabouts of "the Count".
励志片有时候会把观众的视域逼得太窄，比如这部编导在每一个转折点都像打地桩一样对你吼了一句“你要做一头雄狮吗！！？”所以电影到后半段，我耳边只剩下这一句话了，妈的不要做咸鱼啊！妈的顶峰相见啊！少年强则国强啊！道山靓仔啊！老势势啊！澎湃是很澎湃了，但是撸完也就撸完了。无论怎样都是今年最好的一部华语院线。
什么励志呀，分明就是对惨淡现实的反讽，特别是最后奇迹的设定，放在高空摔下昏迷的农民工身上，要么是创作者视角刻奇（但在很多细节可以看出是真诚的创作），要么是在试图用反面书写无数农民工不可能达成的奇迹。女小娟开私家车，问男小娟怎么放弃了梦想，这也不是俗套成功学的体现，而恰恰说明了两人生活鸿沟造成的信息壁垒。要得出这样的结论，势必要剥落影片所有浮于皮毛的套路情节，剥掉笨拙迎合观众的笑料，剥掉伪装的励志题材外衣。性别处理方面，安妮的长评说的没错，舞狮部分包含了incel对雄性气质的追求，女性角色也平头平脸，但男主的名字小娟，实际上就标记着一处反思。他的飞跃，象征了一众被排挤的人的飞跃。
同样珍贵的是，故事的最后，他们的命运没有因此改写。
虽然有高能爆笑的情节，但我实在不喜欢这种，追求梦想的故事。
剧情的可预测性很强，有一些略尬的地方，但第三幕的燃，够4星
这不是我们的《东京教父》吗？热血的故事只是现实主义底子的糖衣，骗大家来吃吃看。
本片是弘扬打工文化的一部力作。男主父母为了打工，宁肯四年时间一次也不回距离广州不到60公里的老家，让亲生儿子成为留守儿童也在所不惜。逼的男主为了引起父母关注不得不参加舞狮活动，展现顾工地大家不顾小家的打工精神。之后男主父亲更是在工地摔成植物人的情况下，也不向打工企业要工伤赔偿，而是由男主放弃舞狮去打工赚钱治病，可谓将任劳任怨的打工文化薪火相传。最后结局彩蛋更是让男主哪怕取得舞狮大赛冠军，也仍然义无反顾的抛下一切，到离家乡更远的上海继续打工，将万事皆空，唯有打工的主题彻底升华了。
绝对少有的国产佳作，彻底击碎了我之前的偏见，作为广告影视半从业者一员，此片的存在让我看到了国产动画的希望
听说广东仔眼睛都长这样...配合人教版教材做意识形态渗透？姓孙的，我祝你后代全长人教版数学书里那样
同样珍贵的是，故事的最后，他们的命运没有因此改写。
作为一名佛山人，对醒狮的熟悉可能是刻在骨子里的连自己都没有察觉。没想看这部电影的，但想看的时间点只有这部，就看了。开场发现是粤语，很惊喜，接下来就是熟悉的鱼塘景色，熟悉的村境，熟悉砖房，熟悉的榕树，熟悉的狮头，鼓点，舞狮步伐，连砖房墙壁上印着的“充气电话”都是熟悉的，所有镜头都是流淌在血液里熟悉的场景。整部电影忍不住一遍一遍的流眼泪，止不住。小时候看表哥练习舞狮，练习打鼓，只知道看热闹，感谢这部电影，突然明白舞狮其实也是一种精神的传承，一种向往更高处的鼓舞。
再来说说电影本身，毫无疑问是国漫又一匹黑马。画风写实接地气，分镜与配乐无敌，虽然剧情是非常典型的“英雄之旅”，但即使猜得到接下来主角会遭遇怎样的冲突，仍然忍不住为其动容，被燃到泪目。
真的很燃。被网爆也真的很惨。但是又有什么能避的过去ZZ呢？和妈妈一起看的这部电影，她说，最大的亮点是他哪怕打工也一直在屋顶上练习，从来没放弃。坚持就是生活的良药，不经历风雨怎能见彩虹？朋友们，加油。
故事内核-表达手法都很周星驰 咸鱼翻身与废材再造 通过用自嘲与无厘头喜剧加以伪装。其实周星驰电影无论胶片、数码 本质上就是特效奇观 通过视听图像构造的虚拟现实在电影内外都搏一把。周星驰和卓别林共享了某种电影技艺的情感力量 都成功地超越了再现内容与表现形式的分离 用感染性的喜剧与动觉affordance撕裂电影世界与观影世界之间的幕布。正如因被撕碎而露出的半人半狮，男主穿着渗血的解放鞋对擎天柱的挑战被木棉花+实体狮子的图像morph虚拟地完成，动画的拟像（尤其是水、叶、及最后那头实体雄狮对摄影图像的极度高仿）突破了动画对自我的设限（无论是日式二维还是美式三维）去挑战媒介本身的擎天柱，狮头与人的分离更避免了人定胜天的虚妄。这个结尾我给五星
本来我还能勉强说服自己是画风独特，结果导演采访里直接“比例基本类似于真人，不完全一样，但非常接近。”给我整不会了。那就是设计水平跟其他高质量作品有差呗，还请多多努力。
所有努力的少年都能收获奇迹
好棒！本土热血动画就该这么搞。配乐非常好。
勉强及格。前两幕的铺垫戏很差，第一有国产动画的通病，人物的动机非常单薄，主角三人组都是别人一句话就过来练舞狮了，如果加上他们周遭沉浸在舞狮传统的环境描画会好些。第二用了大量周星驰式处理，主角三人组反复被欺压，另一方面是主角作为留守青年的逼仄生活，电影在处理无厘头与写实卖惨间的调和时很生涩。第三整体人物塑造套路，怕老婆的师父，嘴硬心软的师母什么的，表现亲情或是励志的台词也偏口号化而无实质内容。最后的舞狮高潮是渲染到位的，某种程度上，这是暗弱的铺垫戏形成的反差效果，但又不仅止于此，支撑这场高潮的还有三个元素，第一是本地音乐的使用，五条人九连真人之类，弥补了一些欠缺的在地质感也接住了角色情绪。第二是堪称优质的动画技术，雾蒙蒙的纵深感，逆光中的毛发细节什么的。第三是主角男生女相、以娟为名的伪娘元素
编剧大概看了一百部少年成长和弱鸡逆袭的片子外加10本《救猫咪》，于是照着套路分毫不差的写了一个，
这是2021年最后的惊喜吗？一部国产动画片，却让一个中年男人在电影院里热血沸腾、热泪盈眶。
Copyright © 2015-2023 All Rights Reserved
