On October 22, 2021, the annual spy drama "The Front Runner", directed by Gong Zhaohui and starring Zhang Luyi, was broadcast on Beijing Satellite TV, and now the broadcast has come to an end, and the market reputation has been responding well.
This drama not only the male protagonist Zhang Lu has always been a popular domestic power actor, the male supporting and other supporting roles also have a certain rating appeal, especially Nie Yuan as a special male number two in the play and Zhang Luyi can be called a double male, this drama is said to be a double protagonist is not too much. Han Xue and Guo Xiaoting starred in the modern revolution-themed TV series starring Cao Weiyu, Huo Qing, Zheng Luoqian, Lu Gongzhen, Du Gonghai, Wang Cong, Zhao Yang, Zhang Fan, etc
"Forerunner" has a total of 40 episodes, spanning from 1931 to 1938, covering a very critical 7 years in modern history. Watching "The Forerunner" also needs to use the historical background of the time as a basis to better understand the ideas that the screenwriter wants to express.
First, the background of the era in 1931, the starting year of the plot, is mainly as follows:
1. The Communist Party of China has been established for ten years, and it is already the fourth year after the "April 12 Counter-Revolutionary Coup";
2. In March of the same year, Gu Shunzhang, the head of the CCP's special branch, defected, which is also part of the prototype of Pei Ruhai in the play, and Gu Shunzhang was called the most dangerous traitor because he had a list of many underground personnel;
3. On September 18 of the same year, Japan made the "918 Incident" and comprehensively occupied the three northeastern provinces;
4. In November of the same year, Chiang Kai-shek, the "captain of the transport brigade", proposed that the outside must be preceded by the inside;
It can be seen from the above that the importance of underground work is becoming more and more important, and "The Forerunner" is precisely the beginning of the story after Pei Ruhai's destruction of the Shanghai underground organization in the play, writing a story of Chinese people resisting reactionary forces and foreign invaders.
The story of "The Forerunner" ends in 1938, and the background of the times at this time is as follows:
1. Shanghai fell in November 1937;
2. In December 1937, the murderous Japanese invaders carried out the Nanjing Massacre that shocked China and foreign countries, and more than 300,000 Chinese compatriots died in the massacre of the invaders. The massacre lasted until February 1938;
3. In January of the same year, the New Fourth Army was established;
4. In the same year, Taierzhuang will be victorious, but it is also in that year that Xuzhou, Hefei, Wuhan and Guangzhou fell;
5. Zhang Guotao defected in the same year;
6. In May of the same year, Mao Zedong gave a speech on "On Protracted War";
7. In December of the same year, Wang Jingwei openly surrendered to the enemy and committed treason;
At this time, it has already entered the period of all-out war of resistance, and due to Wang Jingwei's treason and surrender to the enemy, the underground work in central cities such as Shanghai has become more complicated, and the story of "The Forerunner" has made a non-ending ending here, although the liquidation of traitors within the party has been completed, but the comrades in the party still have to face more complex and cruel underground struggles in the future, which also gives the audience a space for imagination.
Understanding the historical background of the play "The Forerunner", we can better understand the action logic and goals of the underground party of the COMMUNIST Party represented by Ma Tianmu in the story, and the entire story line has achieved logical self-consistency. The story of "The Forerunner" is strictly a double protagonist, with Zhang Tianmu played by Zhang Luyi and Tang Xianping played by Nie Yuan as the co-male protagonist, and there is no female protagonist in the strict sense of the play. However, with the efforts of the team behind "Latent" and "Patriot", such a setting does not make the storyline missing, but more reasonable, unlike many other similar films that have to join a heroine who talks about love with the male protagonist in such an environment, so that its serious underground work is divorced from reality.
The main actors in the "Walker" drama are all acting online, and in the storyline, they do not blindly adopt a preachy way to create a tall character's thinking and way of acting. Instead, it uses the personal experience of the people in the play to promote the development of the storyline, and uses the personal feelings of the people in the play to show the national righteousness that needs to be expressed. Although the story twists and turns many times, the main storyline is interlocked without any sense of violation. From these stories, we can see the spirit of the Communists who persevered and sacrificed their lives to fight for the cause of national liberation, and also truly felt the cruel and complicated struggle at that time, lamenting that the current life was not easy to come by, and on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China, such a high-level production is also a good commemoration.
The story of The Forerunner is divided into three main parts:
The first part is centered on the CCP, the Kuomintang and the French Concession jointly competing for "Document Zero", and the purpose of this part in the play is to introduce the main characters in the play and let everyone have a basic understanding of them. "Zero file" is not a file in the usual sense, in the setting is very unexpected but reasonable, here is no spoiler, we still have to see it for themselves;
The second part takes the underground struggle in Shanghai before the Kuomintang-Communist cooperation as the core, focuses on the enmity between the two protagonists, and makes an overdos to the last part. In this part, the audience can understand in detail the personal history of the two protagonists before, as well as the position and personality of everyone at this stage, and the various supporting actresses in this part of the plot have also made a full display;
The third part of the storyline to the five parties: the CCP, the Kuomintang, Wang Pseudo, the Japanese Kou, the French Concession to compete for the "confession" as the core of the development, as the last part of the "Forerunner", most of the storyline is concentrated here, here not only the protagonist Ma Tianmu in the play was misunderstood by his comrades at the same time, framed by Wang Fei and the Japanese, and hunted down by the Kuomintang, there is also Han Xue breaking through himself to play a Japanese female agent to give many viewers a huge surprise.
The plot of the play not only has the tension and intensity of the main plot, but also some small humor and details to see, such as the French Concession sheriff Chen Hengli because he is a policeman in the French Concession, so he has been learning French, his learning method is to listen to French records while learning, the result is that the protagonist Ma Tianmu found that not only the inferior records used, the most important thing is that the records are Italian, no wonder Chen Hengli has not been able to learn French, this small plot is quite interesting. There are many similar small plots and details like this in the whole drama of "The Forerunner", and it is easy to win the audience's favor in terms of perception.
The main actors of "The Forerunner" have a strong appeal to the ratings, and the male number one Zhang Luyi has let everyone see his superb acting skills in the highly acclaimed "Red" drama, and this time the performance in the "Forerunner" drama is more natural, giving people the feeling of being tailor-made for Zhang Luyi's male number one role. Another male protagonist, Nie Yuan, is also a first-line male star expected by the audience, and this time the double protagonist setting, Nie Yuan's performance is also remarkable.
At present, the ratings of "The Forerunner" ranked third in the TV series of the same period, and the audience reputation is very good, if you are a drama or like Zhang Luyi and Nie Yuan, this drama is worth watching. In addition, the choice of screen filters in this drama is also a highlight, this black and dark filter better sets off the era and story background, and the picture looks very comfortable and three-dimensional.