An old incident of more than 30 years ago that was recently pulled out has once again made Zhang Yimou the center of discussion - the 1985 incident in which Zhang Yimou was captured by aliens.
Zhang Yimou was once captured by aliens? Who can believe that the plot of a science fiction film actually happened to a well-known big director.
In Zhang Yimou's interview, Zhang Yimou was very sure of this.
At that time, Zhang Yimou had not yet made his famous work "Red Sorghum", and could only give Chen Kaige, who already had a representative work, to assist in the film "The Great Parade", as a classmate of Chen Kaige Film Academy's 78th grade, in which he worked as a photographer.
At that time, the crew went to Hubei to shoot, the station was near the Yingshan airport, that night, the shooting equipment transported from Beijing arrived, Zhang Yimou and the staff of the photography team took a jeep, from the railway station to transport the machine back to the crew's residence, and it was almost dawn when it was transported.
There is a large iron gate in the crew station, which needs to be pulled open before the car can drive in. Chen Liguo of the production department got out of the car and pulled the door first, and suddenly, he ran back in panic and said, "Yimou, flying saucer!" ”
Zhang Yimou listened, frightened, immediately jumped off the jeep, looked up at the sky, the weather was very good that night, there was no other reference in the air, only a glowing object.
Zhang Yimou's description is: If the moon is a washbasin, it is a large object like a washing basin, like the large white iron basin we used to bathe when we were children—it hovers obliquely in the air at a 45-degree angle and does not move, while the band of light that surrounds it slowly rotates.
Zhang Yimou was convinced at that moment that it was a flying saucer: "As long as you see it, you know that it cannot be a misjudgment, because there is no object similar to it in our experience." It's exactly the same as the pictures published in Discovery Magazine. ”
But when a group of people excitedly discussed this historic moment, Zhang Yimou, a photographer, instinctively wanted to pick up the camera in his hand to make a record. Just when Zhang Yimou's hand was just raised, he suddenly lost consciousness.
During the unconscious time, what did Zhang Yimou experience? No one knows.
Captured by aliens? Or is it temporary amnesia?
In just a few minutes, there was an eerie scene in the sky: the beam of the flying saucer converged inwards, gradually disappearing, and a pink mushroom cloud like a nuclear explosion appeared.
In short, after seeing the flying saucer, Zhang Yimou took a long time to gradually wake up, and he gradually realized that people around him were carrying equipment.
At that time, there were 7 people who witnessed this process: there were people in the production department, there were also Zhang Yimou's photography assistants, Zhang Yimou could still remember the names of several of them, such as producer Chen Liguo, photographer Wang Jichao, in addition to four or five people in the photography team, of course, there was also the director of "The Great Parade" at that time, Chen Kaige.
What can be confirmed is that no one had drunk alcohol at that time, let alone any drug hallucinations, and many people witnessed this scene. The next day, the crew discussed the matter in the restaurant, which caused a lot of topics for a while, which led to strange talk.
In 18 years, when Chen Kaige was promoting "Taoist Descending the Mountain", when a reporter asked him to verify this bizarre thing, he accepted an interview with a reporter and confirmed that he was indeed present at that time.
Reporter: I would like to ask you about a strange rumor, there are two theories about Zhang Yimou being arrested by UFOs, one is that Zhang Yimou was arrested for 5 minutes on the set of "Yellow Land", and his memory was washed away; the other is that it happened before the start of the "Great Parade". It just so happens that you are both directors of these two films, is this rumor true?
Chen Kaige: (silence for 5 seconds) The night of that incident... Actually, I was there.
Reporter: Is it "Yellow Land" or "The Great Parade"?
Chen Kaige: "The Great Military Parade".
Reporter: Have you seen UFOs with your own eyes?
Chen Kaige: (shaking his head) I can only say that I don't know.
It sounds absurd, but the directors who have seen UFO are not only Zhang Yimou and Chen Kaige.
As early as the promotion of his surreal work "Yangtze River Seven", the king of comedy, Zhou Xingchi, has revealed many times in programs such as "Lu Yu Has a Date" and "Kangxi Lai" that he has seen "UFOs" twice.
The first time, when he was filming in Hong Kong, an unknown object in the shape of a disc floated in the sky. The host Lu Yu laughed at the mistake of the moon for a flying saucer.
But he was very determined, and even gave the example of his second vacation in Hawaii when he encountered a flying saucer, trying to prove that he "will not admit mistakes."
Coincidentally, director Jia Zhangke, who is known as the king of literary and art films, has said more than once that he has seen flying saucers.
Whether it is in the chat between "Thirteen Invitations" and Xu Zhiyuan, or in the promotion of "Children of jianghu", the matter of "seeing the flying saucer" is Jia Zhangke's favorite experience.
Compared with Zhou Xingchi's vague words, his description seems to be more vivid: "On the way back to Shanxi, before I left Beijing, I saw that kind of flying body, it was rotating itself, and then there was a parabola flying in the distance, it was obvious that the thing was rotating, it was rotating itself, I felt very strange." ”
Unfortunately, the two directors who create unlimited value by taking charge of the camera have neither the video materials taken as evidence, nor the remarks are published during the promotion of the film. Relatively speaking, compared with Zhang Yimou's bizarre experience, the credibility is still worse.
Before being captured by aliens, Zhang Yimou was an ordinary photographer who was probably destined to honestly rely on photography for a living all his life.
And since he bumped into a flying saucer and was captured by aliens in the presence of his friends, his life has also begun to shine like a light.
The year he met the flying saucer, Zhang Yimou was 35 years old, and he did not know Gong Li, who had many entanglements in the future, let alone an internationally renowned director. He's just a photographer who just graduated from college at the age of 32.
At that time, he was still complacent about successfully entering the Guangxi Film Studio, and even dropped his hukou to Nanning, Guangxi.
Why did I delay until I was 32 years old before I was admitted to college, and I was still happy? This really does not complain that Zhang Yimou's ability is not good, but more to blame in that era - "his composition is not good."
Everyone thought he was a farmer's child, but he wasn't.
His grandfather was the county magistrate of Zaoshui County, Shaanxi Province; his father was a Kuomintang quartermaster who worked in the Shaanxi Provincial Agriculture and Forestry Bureau after liberation; and Uncle Dabo was a senior student in the Biology Department of Northwest University. When Zhang Yimou was two years old, her mother was admitted to the Clinical Medicine Department of Xi'an Medical University.
According to the current vision, Zhang Yimou was born in a typical Kochi family.
However, this does not mean that he had a happy childhood.
Zhang Yimou was only one year old, and his mother went to college. He was first brought by his aunt for a while, and then he has been living with his grandmother. After his mother graduated from college, her work was very tense, and coupled with the birth of the second and third brothers, her mother rarely took care of him.
As he grew older, Zhang Yimou's second brother was found to be highly myopic and unable to find a job, and later had to set up stalls on the local streets to repair bicycles.
The third brother fell ill when he was a child, and the high fever led to deafness, which led to the inability to live independently until now.
He could not personally take care of his two younger brothers, not to mention, he was sent to the countryside for three years at that time.
It was not until 1977 that China resumed the college entrance examination.
Zhang Yimou, 28, applied for the Beijing Film Academy and wanted to study photography. During a business trip, Zhang Yimou and his co-workers secretly went to Beijing and showed the carefully prepared works to the teachers of the photography department one by one. Veteran photographers recognized Zhang Yimou's talent, but at that time, the age limit of the photography department was under 25 years old, and Zhang Yimou was rejected.
Helpless, Zhang Yimou could only return to Xianyang first. At this time, Zhang Yimou's wife Xiao Hua, who was married when he was in the queue, introduced him to his capable Beijing brother-in-law, and finally transferred the photographic work to the desk of Huang Zhen, minister of culture.
After seeing Zhang Yimou's works, Minister Huang felt a love for talents and personally gave instructions to Nortel. In this way, Zhang Yimou knocked on nortel's door.
In 1979, Zhang Yimou and his lover Xiao Hua were able to repair the right results, and the two held a simple wedding. In the same year, he was admitted to the Photography Department of the Beijing Film Academy, and after graduation, he was assigned to guangxi film studio as a photographer.
Success, from UFOs, or strength?
Zhang Yimou's life, I thought that I would look at the end of this life in this step-by-step manner.
Until this strange 1985 year arrived.
This year, after meeting the UFO, Zhang Yimou accepted Wu Tianming's invitation, and the two decided to co-produce "Old Well". The male protagonist chose to choose and did not land, and finally Wu Tianming simply let Zhang Yimou play by himself.
As a result, it was such a temporary change of roles, but Zhang Yimou, who was born in photography, took a Tokyo Film Festival film emperor at will.
The following year, Wu Tianming invested in Zhang Yimou's directorial debut, "Red Sorghum". The impact of this film is not only for Zhang Yimou's team, but also for the entire Chinese film circle.
The screenwriter is the future Nobel Prize winner Mo Yan, the director is Zhang Yimou, and the protagonists are Jiang Wen and Gong Li, and this film is already destined to be extraordinary before filming has even begun.
The time is right. So in 1988, as soon as "Red Sorghum" was released, it won the Golden Bear Award at the Berlin Film Festival. It was the first golden bear in Chinese cinema, and Zhang Yimou became famous.
Immediately after, Zhang Yimou, who focused on the media lens, was immediately "stripped naked", and his underground relationship with Gong Li was exposed.
In order to avoid the limelight, Zhang Yimou and Gong Li went to Hong Kong to co-produce "Ancient and Modern Wars of Qin Figurines", and in the play, they had a double-stay and double-flying addiction.
Soon, Zhang Yimou divorced Xiao Hua and began to formally pat gong li. Becoming a pair in reality with the heroine in their own play is something that many film directors dream of.
Then, Zhang Yimou made several masterpieces in just 6 or 7 years, and quickly became the representative of the fifth generation of Chinese directors.
Many people joked that Zhang Yimou must have been controlled by aliens. Some people say that Zhang Yimou's current achievements are also thanks to the ufo who "opened the light" for him in those years.
But in fact, behind the success, it is still the persistence of night and day.
When filming "Old Well", Zhang Yimou did not eat a mouthful of food for 3 consecutive days in order to shoot the feeling of dying after being buried at the bottom of the well. Getting the Tokyo Film Festival film emperor can really be said to be what he bought with his life.
When filming "Red Sorghum", Zhang Yimou led the team to Gaomi to select scenes. Only when I arrived in Gaomi did I find that the sorghum was almost finished, and there was no suitable sorghum land throughout the country. Unlike some directors today, it is over. But he was not, there was no sorghum, he planted it himself.
But another new problem arose - this extra budget, so that he did not have the money to find a sorghum, for a while it was really called every day should not be, called the ground is not working. But he was still not overwhelmed by the difficulties in front of him. Instead, choose to run into problems and solve them.
To this end, Zhang Yimou went from place to place, begging for people, and finally Wu Tianming gathered 40,000 pieces to plant sorghum for him, so that he had those classic shots that shocked film and television.
Today's Zhang Yimou has the strongest international momentum and the most proud works in his favorite field, which is inseparable from his efforts and endless efforts behind him.
At the age of 70, Zhang Yimou can't keep shooting like this.
You see the new film "Solid as a Rock", there is a saying in the poem called "Pu Wei is as tough as silk, and the rock has no transfer", Zhang Yimou's attitude towards the movie is like a rock without transfer.
Learn, forge ahead, subvert and innovate.
This is a cycle that belongs only to Zhang Yimou.
As Zhang Yimou said: Light and shadow intertwine for a lifetime, why ask for a second in this life. But if the sunset is infinitely good, why worry about the near dusk?