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One day in 1982, Andy Lau, who was still running dragon sets next to big celebrities such as the fourth brother (Xie Xian) and Fa Ge (Zhou Runfa), got an opportunity to play the male one for the new work "Caiyun Song" to be launched by New Art City.
He was able to get this opportunity because of the promotion of Teddy Robin, the big man of the new art city. However, despite the support of the big guys, the bigger big guy in new art city, Mai Jia, did not buy it. Because he had found someone to measure Andy Lau's words, the result was calculated that Andy Lau's name was incompatible with The New Art City, and three paintings were missing! What to do?
The master's suggestion was to let Andy Lau change his name to "Liu Dehua", for such a suggestion, Andy Lau himself felt that it was too metaphysical, so he resolutely rejected the master's proposal to change his name.
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Just as the two sides were at a stalemate over the matter, the noble Teddy Robin mediated from it. In the end, Andy Lau successfully participated in his film debut "Caiyun Song". However, the original male character became a supporting role with fake teeth, and his name was also erased from the poster of "Caiyun Song".
But to the surprise of Mai Jia and others, such a change still failed to affect the "discord". After the film was released, the box office was dismal and only earned 3 million Hong Kong dollars, far lower than the films produced by New Art City in the same year, such as "Best Partner", "Difficult Brother" (16 million), "Little Fear" (13 million) and so on.
The box office results of such a film with high hopes made Mai Jia more firm in his "eight-character superstition theory", and at the same time, Hua Tsai, who just wanted to do something in the film industry, was completely "removed" by the new art city company that was just popular in the film industry, and the two sides have never cooperated in making any drama since then.
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Coincidentally, like Hua Tsai's encounter, the same "removed" by New Art City is a screenwriter of "Caiyun Qu". However, compared with Andy Lau's "removal" because of the metaphysics of the name Shaosanhua, the unjust screenwriter was directly fired by the boss of New Art City, because the boss felt that his business level and ability were too poor.
When the screenwriter wrote the script of "Caiyun Qu", he was urged by the leaders of New Art City because the speed of writing was too slow, and after writing the book "Caiyun Qu", he could not write a complete script for several months, which made Huang Baiming, the owner of New Art City, very confused.
So I approached him and asked why, and the screenwriter explained:
"I want to hide, not see anyone, calmly come up with a wonderful bridge, write a great script."
Hearing such an explanation, Huang Baiming immediately retorted:
Bro, I'm a screenwriter too! I spent at most a week writing "Best Partner", and you wasted months of time and couldn't write a word! You'll have to turn in a script in two weeks!
A month later, the screenwriter finally pulled out a script. Unfortunately, because the writing was too slow and the script did not conform to the trend, the screenwriter finally failed to keep his job and was quickly fired by New Art City.
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In this way, two young people who have just entered the film industry, because of their own reasons, are eventually "abandoned" by the upstart new art city in the film industry. Without such an opportunity, they are likely to disappear.
Fortunately, however, they persevered enough that when they said goodbye, they collided with each other's achievements into a classic movie. Because of this film, Andy Lau was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for the first time, and the screenwriter who was fired was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director for the first time.
At this point, many people may have guessed that the screenwriter who was fired was called Wong Kar-wai, and the movie he and Andy Lau achieved with each other was exactly what Dousha wanted to talk about today, "Carmen in Mong Kok".
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Behind the scenes of Hong Kong films, pay tribute to the classics, hello everyone, I am Dousha.
In 1982, after being fired by New Art City, Wong Kar-wai was worried about his livelihood. At this time, Chen Xunqi threw an olive branch and invited him to work at his Yongjia Film Company. With this opportunity, Wong Kar-wai no longer struggled to write a "great script", but officially announced that he would serve the capital market and write 8 comedy-themed scripts in a row within 4 years.
Although each one was not a big hit at the box office, Wong Kar-wai has built up fame in the industry with these works. Thanks to these fames, in 1987, Tam Ka Ming, the representative of the "Hong Kong New Wave" films, found him.
At that time, because of the success of "The True Colors of Heroes", the Hong Kong film industry was popular with gangster movies. In order to follow the market trend, Tam Kar-ming approached Wong Kar-wai and invited him to help him write a gangster-themed movie.
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Favored by a famous director, Wong Kar-wai was hesitant to write any story at first. By chance, he saw a social news story about two underage teenagers in Hong Kong who were hired by gangsters to kill people, and after collecting the money, they first reveled for a night, and then the next morning they began to kill people. Such news inspired Wong Kar-wai, and then he wrote three books in one breath, starting with two teenagers. Tell the story of a pair of gangster brothers in adolescence, youth and middle age.
After watching the story, Tan Jiaming only adopted the last one and made it into the movie "The Last Victory". It tells the story of a gangster brother who asked the unruly little brother to help take care of his two women before he went to prison, but the little brother developed feelings for one of the women.
Although such a movie has a high story to watch, under the market trend of "gun battle films", the lack of "The Last Victory" of the hot gun battle is ultimately unsatisfactory at the box office. However, although it was not a big hit at the box office, the film received recognition from the Academy Awards nomination for Best Film. With such recognition and the strong recommendation of his good friend Liu Zhenwei, Wong Kar-wai was invited to join Deng Guangrong's "Shadow Master" film company.
After that, he first helped Deng Guangrong write "Jianghu Dragon and Tiger Fight" starring him and Fa Ge, and then he and Liu Zhenwei cooperated in "Fierce Ghost Mission". Both films grossed over 10 million at the box office, which allowed Wong Kar-wai to gain the trust of his boss, Deng Guangrong, and thus have the opportunity to direct a film independently.
After having such an opportunity, Wong Kar-wai originally planned to shoot the story of Jin Chengwu and Lin Qingxia in "Chongqing Forest". But because the boss Deng Guangrong invited a popular student for the movie, and the other company required the movie to be a popular gangster film. To this end, Wong Kar-wai can only temporarily give up filming "Chongqing Forest", temporarily find the gangster trilogy written earlier, choose the second part of it, and revise and improve it, and finally have the script outline of "Carmen in Mong Kok".
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And once you have the script, the next step is to select the actors. Due to the consideration of shooting costs, and because Wong Kar-wai is a first-time director and has not yet been able to prove his big hits, the film finally selected three newcomer actors with certain fame but little box office appeal as the protagonists.
They are Andy Lau, Jacky Cheung and Maggie Cheung!
Among them, Andy Lau is a popular student invited by Deng Guangrong mentioned earlier. After he was "abandoned" by New Art City because of "Caiyun Song", in order to have the opportunity to perform, he ignored the ban of the Taiwan market and participated in "Running to the Fury Sea" directed by Director Xu Anhua. Because of this movie, Andy Lau has a box office work of more than 10 million, and also received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Newcomer Actor. Such a starting point is much higher than when Zhou Runfa entered the film industry, and if he can continue to develop the film industry, he will definitely have a bright future.
Unfortunately, he later signed a contract with TVB, and in the case of the company restricting artists from going out to take over the drama, Andy Lau failed to continue to produce in the film industry. Later, because of the contract problem, Andy Lau was hidden by TVB and wasted a period of time. By the time he was freed from the snow of TVB and fought in the film world, Fa Ge was already a "fairy hair", and Andy Lau could only start all over again.
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Fortunately, he has gained fans in the TV drama industry, and also in the song industry, because their popularity has always been the top in the circle. Thanks to this, he was invited to participate in "Carmen of Mong Kok", coincidentally reunited with Wong Kar-wai, who was also "abandoned" by New Art City that year...
Because of his story and because of his tuning of his acting skills, Andy Lau won the Academy Award for Best Actor nomination for the first time with "Carmen in Mong Kok", and his acting skills were widely recognized in the industry.
It's just a pity that Andy Lau's TV drama acting method at that time was still there, and he often acted too hard when acting. Like his kiss scene with Maggie Cheung, because it was too hard, he once broke the other party's teeth during filming. Probably because of this acting method, when Wong Kar-wai cooperated with him in the next "Ah Fei Zheng Biography", the original male one's role was finally cut into a male supporting role.
Since then, Wong Kar-wai seems to be more fond of the delicate acting of Zhang Guorong and Liang Chaowei, and has never cooperated with Andy Lau again.
Andy Lau's side because of the development of multi-habitat, his star aura is too dazzling, and the progress of acting skills has been ignored. To get the Academy Awards and the recognition of fans again, he had to wait 10 years later to meet Du Qifeng's "Dark War".
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Compared with The slow enlightenment of Andy Lau's acting skills, Maggie Cheung can be said to have opened all the way after performing "Carmen in Mong Kok"!
Before participating in this movie, she has been debuting for five years, and there are many high-grossing works, the most well-known to the audience is her and Jackie Chan's two "Police Stories". With these films, Maggie Cheung gained audience popularity, but the industry did not recognize it, and most people felt that she was just a "vase".
Until she participated in "Carmen in Mong Kok" this time, Wong Kar-wai adjusted her acting skills, so that Maggie Cheung began to know how to express the heart of the character.
Like her farewell scene with Andy Lau, before filming began, Wong Kar-wai told her that "when you are sad, you must first hold back and cannot cry." Inspired by this, Maggie Cheung contributed such a layered performance. In Maggie Cheung's delicate and spiritual performance, and the fairy tale tragedy of her love with Hua Ge, it became a scar on the hearts of all of us in those years.
Perhaps in Wong Kar-wai's jianghu, love is like a fable that is about to be separated, and in the desire to say and stop hiding countless hearts, the most selfish ending of love and being loved is nothing more than a person still guarding the phone, but a person is already in the end of the world.
Throughout the decades of Hong Kong cinema, the only one who can make the jianghu so sensational is Wong Kar-wai alone!
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It is precisely with such a layered performance that Maggie Cheung was nominated for the Best Actress of the Academy Awards for the first time, and her acting skills began to be recognized by the industry, and since then she has also opened the opening and hanging performance of winning awards in the two major awards of the Golden Statue and the Golden Horse.
"Carmen in Mong Kok" for Maggie Cheung can be said to be a double turning point in her acting skills and career, and she herself later described the impact of "Carmen in Mong Kok" on her:
Before Wong Kar-wai, being an actor meant reacting to me, shouting for no reason, crying like a child. When I made "Carmen in Mong Kok", I needed to find the depth of my feelings, and from this point on, I opened my mind and decided to make movies my career.
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Like Maggie Cheung, there is another person who has opened up because of this play, and even became one of the most important turning points in his acting career. He is in the film to play the heart is higher than the sky and the fate is thinner than the paper Jacky Cheung!
Before participating in this movie, Jacky Cheung was experiencing a double low point in career and life. Affected by the "Tan Zhang Competition", fans in the Hong Kong music scene began to unconsciously take sides, which led to a smaller development space for newcomers like Jacky Cheung, and record sales went all the way down. Under such pressure, Jacky Cheung began to buy drunk and sad, and because he often bought drunk, his girlfriend Luo Meiwei proposed to him to break up.
Under the double trough, Jacky Cheung began to drink excessively, and the media image plummeted and even very negative, but fortunately he soon became sober!
In order to change the bad status quo, Jacky Cheung began to quit drinking and pursue Luo Meiwei again, at the same time he also frantically took over the role in the film circle, in order to survive in the entertainment industry first. With such an idea, Jacky Cheung had the opportunity to participate in "Carmen in Mong Kok". Because of his participation, Wong Kar-wai was a bit "bad-hearted" to mix Jacky Cheung's experience with Brother Wu Fei.
Like the scene where he made a big fuss about the wedding banquet in the play, it is actually an allusion to the stupid things that Jacky Cheung did during his low period. In addition, because Wong Kar-wai does not want to repeat the "heroic" gangster film like "The True Colors of Heroes". Therefore, his "anti-heroic" expression is more handed over to "Brother Black Fly" to complete.
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So Jacky Cheung's role leads the story, and the performance space is relatively larger!
Because of this arrangement, Jacky Cheung not only dedicated a classic meme for fans, but also had a richer and more delicate performance than Andy Lau.
Because of this performance, Jacky Cheung won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for the first time, and his acting skills began to be recognized by the industry, and there were more scenes.
Because of taking on more scenes, Jacky Cheung gradually got rid of the negative image, and his singing career also began to improve. At the same time, her girlfriend Luo Meiwei also returned to her shortly after, and has been working together ever since.
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Writing here, DouSha suddenly remembered the dialogue between the black fly and Hua Ge in the film: I would rather be a hero for a day than a black fly for a lifetime.
Perhaps each of us has had such a period in our lives, eager to be recognized by others, eager to become strong and eager to be admired by society. It is precisely because of this desire that there will be fanaticism and heartache for pursuing dreams.
So after receiving the settlement fee, the black fly picked up the dignity that had been trampled on the ground by others, and then generously died without hesitation. At that moment, he was like a cluster of fireworks blooming in the air, but everyone knew that the brilliance of that moment could not become eternal.
Although the black fly did not even make a hero for a day, the superb acting skills of Xueyou Brother were remembered by everyone. Even if his name of singing god later resounded throughout the entertainment industry, even if he laughed at himself as a neurotic who loved to sing. But no one has ever forgotten that there is an uncrowned film emperor who can play a small person called Jacky Cheung.
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"Carmen Mong Kok" is Wong Kar-wai's first independent film, because the script has long been conceived, so he shot it quite smoothly. However, because of his unruly personality, Wong Kar-wai did not make the film like a mainstream gangster film, describing the vendetta and brotherhood of the jianghu in a large way, and the protagonist was far from the pride of "little brother".
This is different from the mainstream trend of the treatment, not surprisingly failed to get a big hit box office, and finally only earned 11 million Hong Kong dollars. However, because the production cost is not high, such box office performance is still profitable for the company.
Based on this, the boss Deng Guangrong gave Wong Kar Wai the opportunity to direct a movie (Forrest Gump). This time, Wong Kar-wai seized the opportunity to put on "sunglasses".
Since then, he has been like a fortune teller in the old society, making it impossible to tell whether he is a master or a liar...
I'm Dousha, follow me and take you to learn more about the behind-the-scenes stories of classic Hong Kong films!