Wen | Yu Qi
Edit | Xiang Rong
Produced by | Tencent News Lichun Studio
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The finals of "Director Ask for Advice", which was launched on January 7, won the honor of "Value Director of the Year".
Two months ago, the first episode aired. Zeng's parents opened the barrage and immediately called to reassure her not to be afraid of being scolded. "Some people scold you not to care, there is controversy to have heat, and there is heat to have the right to speak." This is the first large-scale exposure of Zeng Zhi, she knows the pressure of walking from behind the scenes to the front of the stage, and also knows that "as a new director, I need red".
In the winter of 2021, the new director suddenly received more attention, and two S+-level variety shows that focused on the ecology of this group were launched one after another. If they did not participate in the show, the names of Zeng Zhi, Wang Yichun and Chan Ninghuang would not be known to the public in a short period of time, and they would continue to experience the general plight of the new director group.
But in the show, the pressure of money and the market is much less, and it only needs to be creative and accept comments from viewers and professionals - this is a relatively idealized creative environment. Because outside of the show, newcomer directors must bear more: balance personal expression and market orientation; to find money in the market to socialize with partners; and to be cautious when there is an opportunity to cooperate, so as not to fall into the copyright lawsuit and fail to break free.
Beyond the public eye, there are many potential newcomers who are trying to get ahead. Their current lives shape their understanding of the film, their creative radius, and even how long they have been with the film. And these newcomer directors also largely determine what kind of films Chinese audiences can see in the not too distant future.
01 Bad luck
Convincing a director to come from behind the scenes to the front of the stage is actually not difficult.
Of course, concerns exist. Channing Huang worries that he can't speak, is not good at self-presentation, and has a stupid mouth. Zeng Zhi was afraid that his emotional intelligence was low, and his likes and dislikes hung on his face, which was too black. Wang Yichun, who joined temporarily a week before the program was recorded, was worried that the variety show had a written script, and she only came to accompany the run as a candidate.
There are still a lot of discomforts. These people who are used to staying behind the scenes, suddenly have to face the camera, face the real-time feedback of the audience and the fierce debate of film critics, and always need a psychological construction process. The first live recording, Channing Huang sweated a liter on the stage, the microphone picked up and put down several times, stumbling and unable to say a complete self-introduction. That feeling, he said, "was like entering a haunted house where the escape room was." The audience also found his embarrassment, and sent a barrage saying, "Dude, if he says one more word, he may faint on the spot." ”
Channing Huang was incoherent when he first rejected the actress
Fear is fear, and realistic considerations overwhelm everything. Being able to shoot short films and show off their talents on the show is an important opportunity in their careers.
In the short film, Wang Yichun asked the director of the film through the mouth of the audience, "You have not produced a new film for six years, are you quitting the film world?" The sentence pointed to her personally. Six years ago, she won the Best Director Award at the FIRST Film Festival for her debut film "What's in the Dark", which was an inspirational story of a "desperate housewife who uses the film to find herself" in the media coverage at the time.
Wang Yichun in the show always wears a dark blue newsboy hat, fine bangs pressed in front of the forehead, with upper frame glasses, very literary and artistic. But the reality is that after she got married, she left the workplace and became a full-time housewife, and her daily social circle is nothing more than all kinds of mothers and nannies she encounters in the community and in early education classes.
She wrote her first script intermittently for ten years, and with the support of her family, she paid 3 million yuan to make a movie. The film tells the story of a serial rape and murder of a young girl in the family area of an aircraft factory in Henan in the 1990s, which was evaluated by Jiang Wen as "rare so calm, so bad, so absurd." As a result, she became a high-profile and up-and-coming director, and her activities expanded to international film festivals in Berlin, Sydney and Singapore.
But soon, she fell into a long silence. In the show, Wang Yichun's preliminary short film "Archimedes' Dinner" has a pot lid little boy named Mao Huhu. This is the minor protagonist of her second feature film, Kidnapping Maohu. "Kidnapping Mao Hu" seems to have a good start, and in 2018, it won the most valuable investment project in the venture capital unit of the Shanghai Film Festival, and became the only project selected in the venture capital unit of the 2019 Berlin International Film Festival in China.
But it has not yet been released.
What went wrong? Wang Yichun kept reflecting. Catching up with the changes in the creative environment, and catching up with the epidemic, the industry has no money, and the company that once wanted to cooperate is anti-water, "When I regret it, in order to clear the responsibility for all kinds of denigration against you, not only to get back the money, but also to beat a rake, give them free work for more than a year, and paste more than 1.5 million." This kind of thing has caught up. She said to Your Circle.
She sometimes wonders, am I alone so unlucky?
"Bad luck" is a joke about him by many people who know channing huang's experience. His first work, "Egg Yolk Man", was originally a custom drama of LeTV, and the special effects were done halfway through, and "LeEco collapsed". Later, an agreement was reached with Youku, "the chapter was immediately stamped on the contract, and the result was a high-level change" - the bribery case of Yang Weidong, the former president of Youku, was exposed, and the issuance plan was shelved again. Wait until 2019, "Egg Yolk Man" is online, at this time, it has been 4 years since he began to make this work.
"Egg Yolk Man" is also a story related to "bad luck": Li Zhiyuan, a student of Di Si University, was regarded as a girlfriend by his favorite goddess and suffered from cancer. After that, he was invaded by magical creatures and embarked on a counterattack journey
Channing Huang is 33 years old, slightly fat, and every time he is anxious and sleepy, he is always used to holding a handful of hair on the back of his head with his hand and constantly circling it. He is not willing to over-exaggerate these experiences in the show, nor is he willing to create an "unlucky person", "After all, there are many directors who are more unlucky than me, and they encounter things that are worse than me." But he still projected part of the reality into the work "Oscar Best Short": the big-name actors who interfered in the creation, the creation of data constraints, and the self-doubt when the director was slow to get out of the way, in the film, the director crouched on the set in frustration, chanting "I'm thirty years old, I can't even make a short film."
In 2012, when studying animation at the USC Film Academy, Channing Huang's documentary assignment "Why Chinese Boys Can't Bubble American Girls" became popular on the Internet, with more than 1 million hits in 3 days. Later, a platform gave him a bonus of 3,000 yuan, which was the first time he made money by making films.
When he returned to China after graduating in 2013, Channing Huang was full of spirits, and several film companies threw olive branches. It was a period of rapid development of the mainland film market, with hot money pouring in and the scale of the industry rising steadily. According to public data, in 2013, the film and television industry ranked first with a total financing scale of nearly 2.8 billion yuan, and some people predicted that "2014 is the film and television year of China's capital market".
Talented newcomer directors are potential stocks in the eyes of investors. "It's quite easy from financing to shooting, everyone is robbing you, and I don't know why they are robbing." Channing Huang recalled.
Also in 2014, Zeng Gift, who walked out of the Beijing Film Academy, brought his high-scoring graduation work "Mingyue's Summer Diary" to the attention of the industry, and investors lined up to meet and talk about cooperation. She recalled the atmosphere of "Your Circle" as "as if all opportunities were open. I feel that the future must be very good, and I can do everything. ”
When the spring breeze was triumphant, Jiang Shixiong, a retired professor at Nortel, told her, "We must learn to face the climax, and we will definitely face the trough in the future."
02 Brakes
I didn't expect the trough to come so soon. After 2016, the film market entered a "brake period", and box office growth fell from 47% in 2015 to 14%.
The bubble receded, the changes in the market were real and felt, capital began to tilt towards the head project endorsed by the big director, and the projects of young directors were cut one after another, and it was difficult. Channing Huang has tried to adapt foreign high-scoring IP and participated in various projects, but there are no results.
Coming to "Director Ask for Advice" is Channing Huang's first filming after six years of squatting at home. The free time of degna, a classmate who had been given a little shorter, was four years, and she lamented in the show that "the hand is a little raw".
As the director of the professional film appreciation group of this show, Yang Chao also sighed that such an excellent group of directors is still in the bottleneck period, and it is reasonable to say that "they are young and should be faster." "Since he was admitted to the directing department of the Beijing Film Academy in 1993, Yang Chao has been in the industry for more than 20 years, and he has deeply felt the market ebb and flow in recent years, leaving fewer opportunities for newcomer directors to grow and experience." If you can't come up with a script that can hit the market orientation in time, you can't hit it several times, and it will be difficult to connect with capital. His analysis of "Your Circle".
In 2016, together with Wen Muye, Lu Yang and others, he became the first batch of young directors signed by Ning Hao's "Bad Monkey 72 Change Film Project". At that time, among the ten newcomer directors, her film progressed the fastest, and the first feature film "Yunshui" had been established. Zeng Zhi once cried because of nervousness, and Ning Hao comforted him: "Isn't it just to make a movie?" The films you make now are always in preparation for the next one. ”
"Yunshui" was released at the festival in 2018. In the following three years, zeng gifts did not wait for the "next part". The projects she likes, the books that have been affirmed, the market may not like, and some projects are abandoned halfway through. The reason for asking is always "too literary, there is a problem with the selection of materials, and the box office will not be too good."
In recent years, newcomer directors have become accustomed to pinning their hopes on venture capital conferences at major film festivals. There, the opinions of professional judges dictate the fate of the film. This mechanism of "industry selection" cares for and encourages the personal expression of directors, and has also caused the prevalence of homogeneous literary and art films, and the theme and expression are increasingly deviating from the market.
From industry recognition to market buying, there are often huge differences in standards – whether a second feature film can succeed may be a sign of whether a director has really gone mainstream. "The main number of young directors should not focus on art films," Yang Chao said, "but on genre films." "To put it bluntly, a film is the work of a director, and it is a product that needs to be paid for.
Has given non-exclusive genre films. She has won many professional awards, her technique is blameless, and her reputation is not bad, but she has been characterized as only "female, niche, slow, literary" themes. I wanted to fight for more opportunities, but I was blocked out by the producer with "too literary and artistic".
After being rejected more, she also figured out some truths: "It may not be that your expression is not sincere or that your expression is not done well, it may just be that what you say is not cared about." She strives to find a connection with the audience, often crouching in the comments section of the video website to analyze the audience's preferences, trying to summarize some of the experiences from users.
She often teased herself, "Debuted for 7 years, returned to be a newcomer director." The label "newcomer" is like an umbrella that seems to be able to resolve those moments of embarrassment, embarrassment, and hardship. Channing Huang felt, "Anyway, as long as the works I made before are not special cattle, I will say that I am a newcomer director." Wang Yichun said more directly, "The so-called newcomer director, isn't it that you are not famous?" ”
Without fame, lack of opportunities, and away from the market, it is naturally impossible to support yourself by filming. Ask an unsuccessful director what he's been doing lately, and the answer is definitely "writing a script." He once said it was "a particularly uncomfortable passage," but it was, "Yes, I'm writing a script." ”
Yang Chao observed that after the rise of video websites, there are many directing students who go to shoot online dramas and network universities after graduation; a small number of them are shooting advertisements, and only a small number of them are insisting on making movies and writing scripts, waiting to be selected by venture capital.
The process of incubation of film projects is often timed in years, and there is no income in the process, and new directors can only make a living in other ways. Many people have part-time jobs, some work as screenwriters in film and television companies, take on some small jobs; if they can photography or art, they will go to other groups to help. These jobs take up a lot of time and energy, and being able to persist in creating at the same time often requires a strong self-drive.
03 Money
Money is of course important.
Referring to the success criteria of the director, Channing Huang's first reaction was, "To be able to make money." It is not necessarily to make a lot of money, but it must always cover the money spent on making movies. Now, his daily expenses are partly on the income from script development and partly on family support.
According to the "2019-2020 China Film and Television Industry Young Creators Ecological Survey Report", 33% of newcomer directors start their debuts, and the main sources of funding are deposits and fundraising from relatives and friends. After launch, 50% of projects died due to financial problems.
When Xin Yukun filmed the first feature film "Labyrinth of Hearts" in 2013, producer Ren Jiangzhou, in order to raise money, returned to his hometown to find a distant cousin who opened a marble mine, a companion who had gone to Thailand for a business investigation, and a classmate who participated in the cultural and creative president class of the National Development and Reform Commission for help. He sat in the fast food restaurant from morning to night, texting one by one to borrow money, 20,000, 100,000, 200,000, little by little to make up the film shooting funds.
The money is not easy to come by, so it is even more necessary to break the flowers - if you can't afford to hire professional actors, you can use vegetarians, or even directly find your family. Cameos are also a common way to save costs, and when Wang Yichun filmed "What's in the Black Place", the recording team boss made a cameo appearance as the obscene uncle who sold popsicles in the film. She herself has repeatedly walked in front of the camera, and when the actors can't knock down, she is mentally prepared to play the heroine herself.
Her two feature films are self-funded, "not afraid to offend people, this industry barrier is tight, I am equivalent to spending some money to break through this barrier to a small mouth, to win an opportunity for expression." ”
You can't just have money.
Wang Yichun is a halfway monk, has no network resources accumulated in professional colleges, and "two eyes and one black" when he enters the industry. The script can still be completed by itself, but when it comes to the set, "the use of light, angles and so on can only talk about feelings." A crew of hundreds of people, she can only form a team can only "keep trying luck", keep trying and making mistakes, keep being cheated, and keep paying tuition. But in the show, with the help of the top producers in the industry, she just needs to focus on the creation.
This is the most idealized director's job, which she calls "managed filming": the head variety show backed by the platform, equipped with a ready-made team, and naturally with traffic and attention; the actors are talked about by the program team to talk about the salary and schedule, without the director to worry. The problems of marketing, operations, publicity and team are solved, which is equivalent to reducing the pressure on the director by more than half.
Not even money is a problem. Fight with the show's producers for a shooting budget, which is a meeting, two phone calls, and a few pushes and pulls. Occasionally, there will be seniors who cherish talents to send subsidies out of their own pockets - when filming the second phase of the short film "The Observer", Channing Huang's budget exceeded and brushed his credit card, Chen Zhixi knew about it and immediately helped him fill the overexpended expenses, and Li Chengru transferred 60,000 yuan to show support.
But the reality is far more brutal than the show. Over the years, Yang Chao has witnessed a large number of newcomer directors with different forms and barbaric growth. Newly graduated film school students, it is especially difficult to save the crew and make short films, so they have formed their own small rivers and lakes. In Pingyao, in FIRST, among the students who graduated from major film festivals and major art colleges, there is a relatively loose group of people who can find all kinds of people who can help. Before entering the market, these people will use relatively cheap costs and the most basic equipment to complete the project, while working part-time and insisting, waiting for the affirmation of the venture capital award, and an opportunity to connect with Bó Lè, the platform, and the market.
Even if they have masterpieces and enter the mainstream vision, directors more often have to go to the market to find money and socialize. This is a capability that many creators do not have, so it has gradually developed into another elimination mechanism: the likable gradual occupation of resources, and the introverted one is getting farther and farther away from opportunity.
04 A profession
The day he met Channing Huang, he was in the computer room to produce the last short film. He hid in the couch with the computer in his hand, unconsciously wandering when chatting. "I'm talking to you while I'm thinking about what to do with this film." What used to take at least a month or two to process similar clips is now compressed to a few days. In his past experience, advancing a project may be a year or two away, and there will be no results. But in the three months he was on the show, he made four short films of different types. The sense of emptiness that has not been produced for a long time has been swept away by the fast-paced variety show competition.
Pressure can sometimes inspire additional creative inspiration. Three days before the filming of the second stage, Wang Yichun temporarily decided to change the script. At this time, the actors have been finalized, the props have been out of the warehouse, and the scenery survey is completed, and the shooting is almost started. But considering that the existing story does not fit the theme setting of "brain hole", she gritted her teeth and decided to tear it down and start over.
The final product is "The Sound of Music", which received the highest score in the second stage, a family story told from the perspective of a cockroach. Wang Yichun thinks that he is a person who is easy to procrastinate, usually sitting in front of the desk for a day, brushing his mobile phone, watching movies, and then writing a few strokes casually, rubbing it, and a few months of confusion will pass. But now, "I seem to have found a more suitable way of working." ”
Before deciding to become a director, I had tried many directions. She was shortlisted for the New Concept Competition in high school, but did not participate in the rematch because she was not sure whether she wanted to make a living in writing in the future; she also studied vocal music for six years, but she was not sure whether she wanted to be a singer. She's learned a lot, but none of them seemed enough to connect with others. Sometimes, she wants to share her feelings with people at a certain moment, but she can't write in words, can't express her voice — until one day she discovers that making movies can be done.
"It seems that this is the only profession I have been up to the longest." Once said.
In each interview, Wang Yichun constantly explains why a housewife suddenly decided to become a director. "Isn't that normal, and I don't want to dig up the dung?" She said it wasn't such a big decision, and making a film was like giving herself a career, a chance to express herself, "but it was a little late, a little older, and not energetic enough." Unlike other newcomer directors, Wang Yichun has to face the shortcomings brought about by age and experience. Some time ago, she watched a video on the set of "Chosin Lake" and lamented director Xu Ke's precise control of the scene scheduling, when to fire the cannon, the range, the time point, everything is under his control.
People who have experienced the beating of reality are often able to distinguish between the scale of thinking and professionalism, and distinguish the boundaries between dreams and work. The director is a job, and doing this work has both the highlight moments of the creator's self-expression and the trivialities and troubles behind the work. Yang Chao also mentioned that the young directors who have graduated in recent years are more realistic and have a stronger perception of the environment. Even if they are involved in the film and television industry, they can look at this work with a more peaceful and professional mentality, and few people pursue some kind of "sense of mission" like the previous generation.
After the four-month high-intensity recording of "Director Please Advise", Wang Yichun and the post-production of "Kidnapping Mao Hu" must be completed. Channing Huang's "Egg Yolk Man" and "Everybody Loves Charles" feature films are advancing, and he fully demonstrates his potential as a genre film director in the show, and there are already top sci-fi IPs offering him invitations. As for the "Value Director of the Year" has been gifted, as early as the first round of short film "Love" screening, there are many love film projects to her to extend an olive branch.
Zeng Zhi once joked that he only wanted to make three movies in his life. The first film was made to complete the self-certification of the director's identity. The second part is to prove that you are a good director. But what are the criteria for a good director? Defined by whom? Can an honor prove it? Can awards or box office prove it? She doesn't have the answer yet.
As for the third part, it is a personal creation that does not want anything. But that was the previous idea. Now she has no plans, and she is willing to keep shooting for the foreseeable future. "I'm a director, I need to be on the scene, I need to work all the time, that's my value."
(Source: Tencent News)
* Some images are from the internet