Text: Rui Zhiyue
Edited by Rui Zhiyue
In order to let people deeply feel the eventful years of the great man Comrade Mao Zedong again, a new drama "Kunpeng Hitting the Waves" quietly arrived, offering a new gift for the 130th anniversary of Chairman Mao's Christmas.
The launch of this period historical drama is simply a shock, and it swept the ratings champion as soon as it started, which made all the netizens who were looking forward to it excited, and people couldn't wait to see the true face of this drama and feel the heroic demeanor of the protagonist Comrade Mao Zedong.
In particular, the actor of Chairman Mao Zedong this time has caused heated discussions, because the plot focuses on Chairman Mao's youth, the traditional actor Tang Guoqiang is obviously no longer applicable, and the producer decided to use a new generation of "special actors", let us look forward to whether he can really enter the hearts of the audience.
The new generation of "special actors" has become the focus of attention and has become an unknown number, but the series has achieved such amazing popularity after only two episodes, can this young actor really properly restore the demeanor of a great man?
01
as Chairman Mao
In the history of Chinese film and television, the actors who play the image of Chairman Mao are endless, but who can truly restore the essence of this great man and become the "real Chairman Mao" in the eyes of the audience?
When it comes to the special actor who most resembles Chairman Mao, the audience will think of Teacher Gu Yue, as a descendant of martyrs, he has had high respect for Chairman Mao since he was a child.
After being handpicked by Ye Shuai at the age of 41, he became Chairman Mao's special actor, but the problem he faced was that he was middle-aged and had no acting experience.
In order to study both internally and externally, he frequently traveled back and forth between Beijing and Hunan, learning everything about Chairman Xi, and even learned the authentic Hunan dialect and Chairman Mao's wild grass. His performance won the recognition of the chairman's family, and he also won the Hundred Flowers Award in 1990, leaving a strong mark on the image of Chairman Mao in Chinese film history.
With the death of Gu Yue, Tang Guoqiang's version of Mao Zedong gradually became the focus of attention, although the appearance did not particularly look like the chairman, he made up for this small deficiency with excellent acting skills.
But the audience was not completely satisfied with his performance, mainly because he used Mandarin instead of Hunan dialect in the film and television drama, which some people thought was an understandable choice for all audiences to understand.
But some people feel that the accent problem makes people jump the play, which is a failure in his interpretation process, although he has become one of the representative actors of Chairman Mao's image, but it has also been subject to some controversy.
Looking back on Tang Guoqiang's acting career as Chairman Mao, he played the role of the chairman for the first time in 1998's "Long March", which is different from the past, he emphasized the pursuit of "god-likeness" rather than "likeness".
Through the study of the chairman's life and deeds and the spirit of the chairman in calligraphy, he finally completed the unique interpretation of the chairman's image of "fake and true", which won him the recognition of the audience and became the first person to play the image of Chairman Mao.
With the excavation of Chairman Mao's life, the image of young Chairman Mao has attracted more and more attention on the screen, and young actors such as Hou Jingjian and Wang Renjun have played this important historical period in different dramas.
The audience's expectations for the new generation of actors are also getting higher and higher, can they make a breakthrough in shaping the image of a great man and become Chairman Mao in the hearts of the audience?
For the new generation of actors such as Liu Chenglin, Hou Jingjian and Wang Renjun, challenging the image of Chairman Mao is not only about imitating appearance, but also about understanding and conveying the thoughts and emotions of great men.
The audience is looking forward to the performance of these young actors, hoping that they can interpret the image of Chairman Mao in a new way and show different charms.
From the true restoration of Gu Yue to Tang Guoqiang's god-like interpretation, and then to the emergence of the new generation of actors, every actor is contributing to the image of Chairman Mao.
Chairman Mao's legend on the screen is not only a restoration of history, but also a tribute to the spirit of the great man by the actors, let us wait and see how the new generation of actors continue to write their own stories in this legend.
02
Doubts of rookie actors
With the strong debut of "Kunpeng Hitting the Waves", the audience's attention was attracted by a rookie actor Liu Chenglin, because he will play a crucial character in this drama - Chairman Mao.
This news immediately aroused the curiosity of netizens, what kind of actor dares to challenge to play a great man, is this a kind of courage or recklessness?
When it comes to playing the role of Chairman Mao, not only excellent acting skills are required, but also profound cultural heritage, the audience knows that Chairman Mao's image in the long history is deeply rooted in people's hearts, and it is not easy to challenge the image of this great man.
On the screen of "Kunpeng Hitting the Waves", all eyes are focused on Liu Chenglin, how he plays a great man, and whether he can withstand questioning has become the focus of the audience's concern.
The crew is quite demanding on the actors, not only requiring the likeness, but also paying more attention to the look-likeness, which is a difficult challenge for the actors.
Before that, we saw the profound restoration of Chairman Mao's image by old drama bones such as Gu Yue and Tang Guoqiang, but time will not stay in the past, Tang Guoqiang's age is no longer suitable for restoring the image of Chairman Mao in his youth.
As a result, a young actor Liu Chenglin emerged and challenged this world-renowned role with his unique charm, he may still be a newcomer in the eyes of the public, but in this drama, with his outstanding performance, he refreshed the audience.
The young actor is not without a background, although there are not many previous works, but his acting skills are surprisingly good, and in this drama, he will play Chairman Mao's youth.
After graduating from Hunan No. 1 Normal in 1918 to participating in the First Party Congress in 1921, Chairman Mao's mental journey will be restored in his performance, and the problem that Tang Guoqiang cannot be restored at this age will also be solved.
After going through the foreshadowing of Chairman Mao's Gu Yue, Tang Guoqiang and other senior actors, will the new generation of actor Liu Chenglin surpass them and become the leader of the new generation of Chairman Mao's actors? All this will depend on whether his acting skills can meet the audience's expectations.
Chairman Mao once said: "Young people are the hope of the whole society." "Whether Liu Chenglin can become the pride of young actors and show the demeanor of a great man, we can only wait and see.
"Kunpeng Hitting the Waves" has built a stage for the new generation of actor Liu Chenglin to challenge, and whether he can solve this challenge easily, let us witness together.
03
Storyline
The young Chairman Mao was a fledgling with ideals, but he was lost in the darkness of society, and he realized that changing China must start from changing people's minds, so the play used his perspective to get a glimpse of the ugliness of society at that time.
The new governor Zhang Jingyao took office, as a hypocritical businessman to loot the people's wealth, the tea was asked for 100 oceans, he acted recklessly, beheaded the disrespectful shopkeeper, this corrupt official class, the right to speak, military power, became quite a local emperor, unscrupulous, rampant in the township.
When Chairman Mao and his companions visited, they encountered the inferior gentry county master, who was indifferent to the people, and among the bosses and shopkeepers invited by Zhang Jingyao, all of them were rich and rich, and in this contrast, the inferior gentry ignored the life and death of the people, which directly led to the formation of an ignorant third estate.
In this class, Chairman Mao and his companions rescued Chunhua, who was sold as a concubine, but accidentally caused her suicide, Chunhua's mother was not only not grateful, but blamed Chairman Mao, because of his nosy, causing Chunhua to hang herself, ignorant thoughts are deeply rooted, making good deeds become a root of evil.
Just like Lu Xun realized that physical treatment could not save the spirit when he was studying medicine, so he abandoned medicine and followed literature, determined to cure the cancer of society, and the young Mao Zedong also came out of school, with ideals, but groped in the dark.
There are corrupt officials, there are inferior gentry, there are foolish people, the darkness in Hunan is a difficult problem to change China, although the young Chairman Mao is alone, but he has the enthusiasm and fighting spirit to serve the country, he dares to argue with corrupt officials, say no to the inferior gentry, and try to change the thinking of the foolish people.
Young Chairman Mao was a fledgling, without a strong backing behind him, only a passion, he saw the darkness of society, but he chose to act, and did his best to change little by little from a small place.
He is not afraid of corrupt officials, does not yield to inferior gentry, and at the same time strives to change the minds of fools, and his story opens, through the sense of substitution in the society at that time, he finds a new way to open the main melody drama.
The young Chairman Mao grew up in the darkness of society, he saw countless injustices and sufferings, and the darkness of society made his idealism gradually tilt towards realism.
His ideals were contradicted by redemption and tragedy, but he did not stop moving forward, and the pain of society did not make him despair, on the contrary, he was more determined to walk on the path of change.
In the darkness of society, the young Chairman Mao gradually found the entry point of change, which is not only his personal struggle, but also the prelude to the new era, this road of exploration, is destined to be full of ups and downs and twists and turns, but it is this spirit of struggle that has created the growth of a great man.
04
Needs to be improved
The direction of the plot is very good, at the time of filming, Chairman Mao when he was young was just a hot-blooded young man who had just entered the society, he was a flesh-and-blood person, not omnipotent, and when portraying the image of Chairman Mao, he also specially added some flaws in the character of the characters to enrich the image of the characters.
However, Liu Chenglin, as a rookie actor, is still a little jerky in his acting skills, although the young Chairman Mao needs a lot of young vitality and less calmness in his performance, but when the actor is acting, there are still some exaggerations in his actions and expressions.
In some passionate scenes, there is always too much force to be expressed because of high emotions, and there is nothing wrong with the passion of the actors, but the expressions on the faces and the temperament of the actors are very abrupt.
In addition, Liu Chenglin's own characteristics of a traffic star are also very obvious, without his own unique temperament, his face is biased towards a small pointed chin, and he feels like a soft beautiful man.
Although he is also tall and wearing a long shirt, he lacks some of the righteousness of the scholars at that time, and there is no harm if there is no comparison, with Gu Yue and Tang Guoqiang in front of him, it is still difficult to have some place for Chairman Mao to be interpreted by himself.
One thing is better that in the plot, the young Chairman Mao played by Liu Chenglin also has a good side, enriching a more multifaceted image of a person, in the play, Chairman Mao and the surrounding neighbors get along very well, showing a kind and kind side.
When he saw the people displaced and homeless, but he had no ability to help them, in the face of such a situation, he left helpless tears, and that tear showed a dream that became a reality shattered in front of him, so that the audience empathized with it.
The acting skills of newcomer actors may not be as good as those of veteran actors, but the whole drama of "Kunpeng Hitting the Waves" is indeed very serious in casting and plot, and I hope that the future plot can give us more surprises.