This Spring Festival, "Manjiang Red" is particularly red.
The movie "Manjiang Hong" performed well in the Spring Festival file, and an important part of the reason why this seemingly traditional film can stand out in various genres is its endless reversals and accurate control of the audience's emotional switch. Looking at the works of the Chinese teacher in the past two years, it is not difficult to find that "narrative density" has become one of the key words. And the implementation and consolidation of this style is inseparable from the contribution of a meticulous trader after the opening, that is, the original script author and screenwriter Chen Yu.
Chen Yu's vision is fluid, but he has a certain ultimate pursuit of storytelling. With questions, we approached Chen Yu and tried to understand the reasons for the success of the script "Manjiang Hong", the reason why Zhang Yimou was "old and strong", and the reason why they collaborated three times.
After ending the first collaboration between "Rock Solid" and Zhang Yimou, Chen Yu returned to his work until one day when the phone rang, and he received another invitation from the director. Zhang Yimou told Chen Yu that an experiential ancient building had been built on the outskirts of Taiyuan, with a city wall and deep alleys, and wanted to invite him to take a trip and conceive an original story in this space.
Writing a script for Zhang Yimou is not quite the same as a conventional screenwriting work, Chen Yu believes that he has two parts of responsibility: the first is the direction, as the original creator, he needs to find the angle and height of the story, and intercept the course and side of the character's life; What follows is the actual writing, which uses rigorous theatrical principles to shape the character structure.
Specific to the creation of "Manjiang Hong", Chen Yu's first task is to stroll in the deep house.
What kind of story do you want to write? The factors he considers involve reality, psychology, aesthetics, commerciality and so on. Space faintly conveyed the answer to him: a group of people, to do something here, this matter should be extreme, difficult to ascend to the sky, they also have fierce emotions, and they don't even plan to go back alive, just to get things done. What possibilities will arise in such a situation? With the starting act, Yue Fei's "Manjiang Hong" naturally came to Chen Yu's eyes. This is the first word that Chen Yu would recite in its entirety as a child, and for him, "Manjiang Hong" means defeating two older brothers in a family poetry competition and winning a bag of chocolate; and the temperament and romance that comes from the book Xiangmendi.
But how can the intellectual atmosphere be reconciled with the emotional needs of the masses? This is also the difficulty that Chen Yu and Zhang Yimou spent a lot of time overcoming in the polishing story stage. History is always complicated and has thousands of faces, and Zhang Yimou faced a similar choice when shooting other works, 20 years later, the target changed from Qin Shi Huang to Qin Juniper, "Should I kill or not"? killing, not in line with the gang's highest operational tasks and spiritual pursuits; Without killing, the audience cannot be happy with revenge, and the accumulated emotions cannot be relieved. In the end, they found an understanding, which not only saw blood, helped the audience express emotions, but also evoked the existence of this poem after all, more than private feelings and even the theme of life and death.
Once the direction and tonality are determined, it is time to plan a detailed plot. Chen Yu began to measure in the field in the ancient building group, is it feasible to walk from here and there, and how long will it take? What kind of story will happen when you get there, and will it be connected to the previous content? As early as the initial stage, the unfolding of the story of "Manjiang Hong" is inseparable from the appearance of the geography. This creative process can be called "mapping screenwriting".
The method of measuring the pattern of a text by footsteps is cumbersome, but it has brought unexpected results. After abandoning the original planned shooting method of "one shot to the end", Zhang Yimou still encouraged the whole group, saying that they left a very good "legacy". The so-called heritage refers to the sense of compactness and the sense of rhythm that remains in the play after removing the visual concept of one mirror to the end.
In fact, the reason why Zhang Yimou chose to cooperate with Chen Yu three times is directly related to his ability to compress and advance the plot. And the tempering of this ability is inseparable from the training method that Chen Yu learned from his doctoral supervisor and passed on to his students: minimalist composition - a bench representing a park on the stage. There is a person from the east and west, and they go from being stranger to each other, to establishing character relationships, promoting, developing, and constantly ascending, running through 15 minutes, with ups and downs in between, and cannot let the audience be bored.
He always believes that the real drama arises from restrictions and persecution, and from the collision of character relationships. In "Man Jiang Hong", it is the change in the relationship between Zhang Da and Sun Jun. The so-called film creator is actually engaged in the career of an emotional engineer, studying the internal operation law of emotions, and the method is concrete and scientific. Chen Yu will draw a huge and sophisticated mechanical diagram for each of his scripts, the core of which is to control the accumulation, blocking, and release of narrative power. His creations never rely on God's mercy inspiration, but on diligent and solid construction and balance.
On the third day of the Lunar New Year, the third day of the release of "Manjiang Hong", after lunch, Chen Yu saw that Zhang Yimou had begun to arrange the work behind. Chen Yu felt a little helpless and persuaded the director, let's relax? But for Zhang Yimou, even if he relaxed, he actually met with his partners and talked about work. Yesterday afternoon, they gathered in the director's studio to discuss the follow-up plan.
"It is no exaggeration to say that among all the people I have met in the entire film and television industry, his diligence ranks first."
In the script creation stage, including on the shooting site, Zhang Yimou will have repeated discussions with the actors, and he encourages and even forces the actors to exert their creativity, especially in the film, there are many people like Shen Teng, Yue Yunpeng, Wei Xiang who walk out of the comedy stage, and do not need them to interpret according to the lines on the script verbatim, according to the performance method they are usually accustomed to, hoping to get some new creations and surprises in them.
They worked hard to fulfill the director's expectations, and in the end, it turned out that they did.
In Chen Yu's view, "Manjiang Hong" is not a synthesis of suspense and comedy genres, suspense is the foundation, comedy is the added element, just in line with the atmosphere of the Spring Festival file, so that the audience can get a richer emotional experience, but also balance the film's slaughter and dark temperament. If you want to move the audience, sometimes you need to lay out some reverse emotions, specific to "Manjiang Hong", the laughter and scolding of the little people in the first half is to allow people to have an effective psychological connection with these little people, under this premise, the subsequent reversals, and even towards a tragic ending, will really shock people.
"Manjiang Hong" cannot be defined by joy and sadness, "Because human emotions are very complex, it may be difficult for the audience to accept such a bitter drama as "Mother Loves Me Again" back then, how to mobilize and touch the audience, or to accurately understand their emotional operation process." Of course, if it is stagnant, it will not be possible, creators should constantly explore the internal laws of human emotions, so to speak, we are film creators. ”
In addition to enriching the emotional diversity of the work, choosing a comedian can indeed bring a lot of fun to the intense work during the filming process. Especially when Shen Teng plays against everyone, it is often difficult for the opponent actors to control the laughing scene, and Shen Teng even hesitates to "face the wall" for this: "Am I so funny?" No wonder Zhang Yi said in an interview that to make a "Manjiang Red", there is no need to buy tickets for Happy Twist and Deyun Society.
Among the actors, Yi Yangqianxi is a relatively unique existence, and Sun Jun, who he plays, is a relatively serious character in the movie, and he himself is also the first time to cooperate with director Zhang Yimou. Chen Yu will observe Yi Yangqianxi on the set and find that his state is an actor who is constantly rushing to the acting school, and he is very suitable for Sun Jun. Since Sun Jun was a military general, Zhang Yimou felt that he should have the mark of having been on the battlefield on his body, so he considered designing a scar on Sun Jun's face. When communicating this idea with Yi Yangqianxi, he not only accepted it gladly, saying to the director: How to do it, but also very happy to see that there will be a breakthrough in his styling, and there is no burden.
"He has something in his eyes, he thinks, and he has strong psychological feelings. You can clearly feel that he rarely speaks, but he listens carefully to what other people are saying and absorbs important information, so I think he can take on a more psychological role, like Sun Jun, who has an arc transformation, he performs very well, and I am quite happy that he can join this film. Chen Yu commented on Yi Yangqianxi.
In the movie, there is an important image that resonates with many audiences - the cherry that Zhang Da gave to Mai Ji Yaoqin. Although there are not many female characters in the film, they are an indispensable part of the entire story, especially the emotional line between Zhang Da and Yaoqin, which adds a warm atmosphere to the film.
Since the story takes place in a military camp, there are already few women in it, and how to make the female characters in the film reasonably exist has also become a problem in this specific creative natural setting. But Zhang Yimou and Chen Yu both believe that there must be female characters in this "death squad", because since ancient times, the feelings of home and country not only belong to men, but also apply to women, and the presentation of heroes in history is often more singing and crying, and the addition of the role of Yaoqin has become a vital part of this shocking plan.
Zhang Da has a line in the movie: "Yaoqin completed this with his own life, do you think I can still survive?" Zhang Da was not without pain or hesitation, but Yaoqin's power inspired him and prompted him to keep going. At the same time, in the tragic and harsh environment of the barracks, the female power transmitted by Yaoqin is indispensable, especially the cherry. When Yaoqin raised the cherry and looked at the daylight, at that moment, the yearning of all sentient beings for a simple and beautiful life had a more concrete display.
"That shot was very beautiful, this is our simple Chinese, life is to pursue a stable life, but for the sake of righteousness, willing to give life in exchange for the happiness of more people, so this line actually pinned on me a lot of emotional sustenance."
When it first started, the "Manjiang Hong" team wanted to make the film a family-friendly movie.
The so-called "family fun" does not only mean to make all audiences laugh, but to allow people of all ages to reach a consensus with their values and preferences when watching this movie, which is more like a "meeting of values and aesthetic fun".
From the perspective of values, many parents hope that their children can memorize "Manjiang Red" after watching the film, and the children are also very cooperative, and even some audiences spontaneously stand up and chant after the movie, which shows that the public has a high degree of recognition for the spread of traditional culture and the presentation of the spirit of loyalty in the movie; From an aesthetic point of view, whether it is young people, or middle-aged and elderly people, everyone has a soft spot for ups and downs of the story, which is an element that a good commercial movie should have.
"Of course, the basis of these consensuses for us Chinese is cultural genes. Although the mainstream values may change from generation to generation, our generation is still in the same vein as the people of 800 years ago, and that is something etched in our blood. This is what Chen Yu firmly believes.
The success of "Manjiang Red" in this Spring Festival file has given a necessary stimulant for the creators of genre films and original stories. Regarding the creation of genre films, Chen Yu has a set of "big tree theory" summed up, and he hopes to use this dialogue to share and communicate with more filmmakers:
At the text level, it should first be a genre film, which is the "root of the tree", which must meet the psychological expectations of this type of audience, and at the same time conform to the creative laws of genre films; Secondly, "the branches of the big tree" are personal expressions, whether it is the way of telling the story or the form of the film, it should have personal characteristics. For example, Christopher Nolan, although he is an author of mainstream commercial films, each of his films has its own personality; Finally, "the canopy of the big tree" is an insight and thinking about social issues, the story should be aimed at certain social pain points, with certain emotional attributes, these three combined into one, is the current mainstream commercial film test standard, Chen Yu himself is also in accordance with such standards to practice.
The bustle and hustle and bustle of the Spring Festival file will eventually dissipate, but the valuable creative experience left by the film can be continuously refined and passed on, just like the characters in the transition scene of "Full River Red", the characters are walking in the mansion with the tense drumbeat, and people who love movies never stop easily.
This is the charm of film, and it is also the responsibility and belief of filmmakers.
Written by: Twenty-two Island Lord, Captain Nonsense
Editor: Zhu Fan
Design: Xiao B