This National Day, what kind of war film will Chen Kaige bring?

"The ears of wheat are ripe and ready to be harvested, and the plane is coming, blowing up".

This is a cutscene in Chen Kaige's new film "Volunteers: Heroic Attack".

In just a few minutes, ears of wheat and cannonballs bring the conflict between war and peace to life. This is a poetry unique to Chen Kaige, just like the peach blossoms blooming in "The Legend of the Demon Cat", and the drama children who draw strips like reeds in "Farewell My Concubine", it seems to be an empty mirror, but it lays the poetic temperament of the movie in a few shots.

The grand poetry often comes from the exquisite details, and in order to film this scene well, the crew planted two stubbles of wheat.

The first stubble, before the shooting, suddenly suffered heavy rain, the wheat was crushed, and months of hard work were destroyed.

In this regard, Chen Kaige just said lightly, plant again next year, shoot again next year, other than that, there is no way. So this year, in order to shoot this scene, which lasted only two days, the crew planted a second stubble.

Such an extravagant beating method is actually not an isolated case under Chen Kai's singer. In 1997, he built the "King of Qin Palace" in Hengdian in order to shoot "Jing Ke's Assassination of the King of Qin"; In 2001, he built the "Zhao Orphan City" in Xiangshan for the filming of "Orphan of Zhao"; It took six years to build Tangcheng for the filming of "The Legend of the Demon Cat"... Chen Kaige, who built a city for a play and refined in details, was even once laughed at as a "real estate director". Today, director Chen Kaige is seventy years old, and this youthful spirit of excellence is still the same as before.

"The Legend of the Demon Cat" stills

Moreover, this filming practice of building a city for a film is not just a luxury, it is a practical practice for Director Chen to build infrastructure for the film industry. 80% of the filming bases of Chinese films, from the Beijing street of "Farewell My Concubine", the Shanghai Chetun Film and Television Base of "Wind and Moon", to Hengdian, Xiangshan, and Xiangyang Film and Television City were all started because of Chen Kaige and have been used to this day. In the film and television base led by Chen Kaige, countless Chinese film masterpieces such as "Casting a Name", "Kung Fu" and "Color Ring" have been born.

And the movie "Volunteers: Heroic Attack" is also a triumphant song commemorating the victory of the war 70 years ago. As a commemorative work marking the 70th anniversary of the victory of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, its significance is self-evident.

Seventy years ago, China, which had just been founded, on the one hand, was in ruins after many years of war, and on the other hand, the two great powers of the United States and the Soviet Union were watching the tiger; the war between the two Koreas seemed to be just a struggle for the land of projectiles; in fact, the two major countries of the United States and the Soviet Union coveted China's independence and sovereignty. The victory or defeat of the Korean Peninsula will change the pattern of the entire East Asia, and the world's eyes will also turn to the newly founded New China.

This is also why, in the midst of controversy, the country's leader resolutely decided to send volunteers, not afraid of the disparity in national strength, and with all his strength, won this tough battle.

From another level, the filming of "Volunteers: Heroic Attack" is also like Chen Kaige's "back water battle". The long shooting cycle, the large volume of the project, and the efforts of thousands of people on their shoulders are stressful for any creator. Not to mention that as one of the leading figures of Chinese films, the audience's expectations for him are actually extraordinary.

To see the "epic of war", so it can't just be "cold and sudden"; It depends on the "director's aesthetic", so the picture must be top-notch... Under the natural label of the main theme, whether Chen Kaige can still retain his personal characteristics has been first seen in the information gradually released by "Volunteers: Heroic Attack".

In order to fully show history, the script of "Volunteers: Heroes Attack" alone was polished for 3 years, and the preparation period was one and a half years. The film tells the whole process of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea from the decision to go to war to the signing of the cessation treaty. In terms of time, the film comprehensively restores the major key battles of the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, and from the perspective, the film has both a high-level perspective and a political game between Chairman Mao Zedong and Stalin negotiations at the beginning of the founding of the People's Republic of China; The New China delegation made its debut at the United Nations, and China won international respect; There is also a civilian perspective, showing the historical scene of the people of the whole country supporting the front line and enthusiastically donating money and materials.

How to combine the full field of view and the small viewing angle? How to tell the history of your home country with personal stories?

Director Chen Kaige is extremely good at narratives that combine personal destiny with grand historical settings.

Whether it is the use of a rural teacher in "The Child King" to metaphorically describe the fate of the entire Chinese nation, or the tragic and joyful life of Cheng Dieyi with several historical events in "Farewell My Concubine", or the sadness of thousands of years that artists have endured in "Mei Lanfang" with a pair of paper shackles, seemingly complicated information and thoughts, he can always use concrete characters and plots to express them poetically and spiritually.

Chen Kaige's movies are always thick and colorful, always more freehand than narrative, it can be imagined that this "Volunteers: Heroic Attack" about the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea should also be a majestic epic movie.

The adjustment of actors is also one of Chen Kaige's strengths, he can often shoot the most unique side of actors, many actors have left representative roles of their acting careers in his films, even small roles in the film can become classics.

Whether it is Jiang Wenli in "Farewell My Concubine", or Xin Baiqing, Zhang Yuqi, Liu Haoran in "The Legend of the Demon Cat"... What the audience sees is not the actors themselves, but the prostitutes who were forced to give away children in the old times, and the characters such as Li Bai, the cat demon, and the white crane boy in the heyday of the Tang Dynasty.

The starring Xin Baiqing, Zhu Yilong, Zhang Zifeng of this movie are all actors with very personal characteristics, which makes people look forward to what kind of sparks their cooperation with Chen Kaige can make, and the joining of actors such as Zhang Ziyi and Zhang Songwen also makes the whole movie star-studded.

As a director, Chen Kaige's most unique and irreplaceable strength in the Chinese film industry is the expression of poetry.

In "Farewell My Concubine", the children in the drama class practiced their singing "Fighting the Mountains and Conquering the World" was edited by him to the sense of the times from spring to autumn, the scene of the teenager turning into a white crane flying away in "The Legend of the Demon Cat" is shocking, and in "Wuji", the scene of the princess and slaves chasing in the golden birdcage is full of visual imagination.

This poetry has gone beyond the logic of the story, beyond beauty itself. From the posters and materials of "Volunteers: Heroic Attack", you can already see the poetic temperament of the movie. The four colorful four seasons show the heroic spirit of the volunteer army's march in four seasons, reminiscent of Chairman Mao's poem "Stepping on the green mountains and not getting old, the horse roaring and the sun is like blood, and the battlefield is fragrant with wild flowers." Aoxue Lamei smiled, and Frost Road Yunhuazhang. “

The idealistic temperament of the director himself is also very consistent with that era, in which there was an idealistic atmosphere in the game between major powers, the decision-making of the leadership, the heroic struggle of the volunteer generals and the support of the domestic people.

Although the material hardship is serious, the people of the whole country have a sense of faith in uniting as one, for the motherland that was born at the beginning, and for the "good days" that are coming in everyone's hearts.

At present, this film has been scheduled for National Day, and it is expected that Chen Kaige can tell a different epic film with his unique poetic style, hoping that the director can tell this battle for the founding of the country to a new height, so that the audience can see the beauty of revolutionary romanticism.