"A City in a City": Under the fierce financial war, explore the proposition of the times where "I" is going | Talk

Author/Niko

Editor / Zhu Ting

Operations / Biscuits

"I'm going to go back and watch the first episode again. This is KK's heartfelt thoughts when he chatted with Bian Zhihong, the screenwriter of "City in the City", to the end.

seems to be just a simple incident as the beginning, but in fact, the screenwriters have already buried a lot of foreshadowing later. President Dai's words to Zhao Hui, who was still the vice president at that time, almost predicted the various problems that Zhao Hui would encounter in the future.

Originally, kk thought that watching dramas from a media perspective had given him more thought about content creation, but in fact, truly high-quality behind-the-scenes creators often had to do more. Even though the feedback has been good, they are still reflecting on what could have been done better.

Even if they spent more than four years visiting and researching banks, trust funds and other financial institutions, the financial drama "City in the City" wants the audience to see a "human drama" more than a "workplace drama" - the relationship between the characters and the dilemma of the characters in it can still be established and resonate with the audience.

To find such a universal conflict rather than a fabricated dramatic conflict, it is necessary to let the characters have to play a difficult game with the real problems in reality. And the first episode of such a conflict arises, "If you do something and the result is good, but the process is not compliant, do it or not?"

This is the starting point of the "City in the City" series, and it is also a percussion throughout, in the middle-aged generation of bankers represented by Zhao Hui played by Yu Hewei, and the younger generation of bankers represented by Tao Wuji played by Bai Yufan, are giving answers in their own ways.

As the plot progresses, the two character lines are more closely intertwined, which also greatly mobilizes the audience's enthusiasm for watching. As of press time, the popularity of "City in the City" on the iQiyi platform has been rising, and it has now exceeded 9500. In the latest plot, Zhao Hui further "ashes", a sentence of "I don't kill Boren, Boren died because of me" expressed remorse and helplessness, and the auditors, who are also his long-time friend Miao Che, also began to investigate him.

The "grayscale" characters in the play have been favored by the audience. For example, Su Jianren, who once stumbled Zhao Hui and had a romantic love life, was nicknamed "male peacock" and "pure love god of war" by the audience.

The labels refined by these audiences, Bian Zhihong has seen them. But as screenwriters, they don't use words in everyday communication that might narrow down the characters and the story. The three screenwriters never used the word "human design" when they were working in private. "I've always felt that this term is a bit crude for literary and artistic creation. Since you want to use characters, you must treat everyone as a person of flesh and blood. ”

It sounds simple, but it's not easy to do. In the three years of writing the script, the three screenwriters were sometimes crushed by their daughter's illness and the bank's personnel arrangement, doubting Zhao Hui, who had insisted on it for decades, and sometimes they did not dare to tell their fears to those closest to them, because they knew that Tian Xiaohui, who would be questioned and educated by him. The screenwriter and these characters in the play are painful, confused, and contradictory together.

After the exchange with Bian Zhihong, KK looked back and watched the first episode again, and then he deeply felt how the previous grass snake gray line set off a storm later. KK can't help but sigh again: Realist works really need to use such great effort to create, in order to get infinitely close to reality.

1. Tracing "Ashing"

Zhao Hui's "ashing", starting from the original work of "A City in the City", is the core of the whole story.

The story needs to show the oppression of a huge system and the pressure of reality through the struggle of Zhao Hui, a former idealist. When the main creative team adapted, they first respected the core of the original book. "We have always eaten and wiped clean the original work, and when the script is finished, we will look at the original book again to see which good lines can be used. Bian Zhihong said.

Under the pressure of many parties, Zhao Hui, who once insisted on it, and later fell into confusion, had a "tragic grievance". In order for the audience to feel such qualities, the screenwriter needs to write every straw that crushes him in great detail, and he has to press it one by one.

Straw appeared very early. In the second episode, Su Jianren summarized Dai Xing's life, "A wife and a stupid son, a four-bedroom and a living room, what is the strength of this life?" and Zhao Hui is the person who is most like Dai Xing. Bian Zhihong said to kk that when he covered his sick daughter with a quilt, he would also think of this sentence, "What will others say about him in the future? Zhao Hui was repeatedly pulled in such emotions.

The image of "white shirt" repeatedly mentioned by people in the play is also a detail that runs through the original book. Teacher Ouyang told him to keep his white shirt, but Su Jianren would tell him that it was impossible for the white shirt not to fall a little dusty. "He's been facing a dilemma, he's a little bit "ashed" like this. ”

During the writing process, the three screenwriters will face, discuss, and move forward together. "One person may write part of it first, but in the end, it will definitely have to be rewritten by two other people. Maybe it's not as efficient as a person being in charge of a specific part, and it seems that there is a certain amount of "repetitive work", but Bian Zhihong believes that collisions and constant discussions in this process are necessary. "Good furniture must be made with a lot of good materials, and a big piece of wood may be cut out of a nice, small corner. ”

In the process of transforming the text into a film and television drama, the main creative team has made some major structural adjustments while retaining the core of the original work. For example, the role of Tao Wuji was amplified, and at the same time, in order to complete the storyline of this character, the character design of Tian Xiaohui was supplemented. In the game of the uncle circle, Shen Jing, who is Xie Zhiyuan's wife and also from a financial background, is also at the poker table, stirring up the storm in the later stage.

If Tao Wuji, who initially looked up to Zhao Hui, had a mirror relationship with Zhao Hui, then Tian Xiaohui and Tao Wuji were also in a mirror relationship. is also from a family that is not wealthy and has had an "economic crisis", Tian Xiaohui is actually another possibility for Tao Wuji. Through the setting of several groups of control groups, the audience can have a deeper feeling of their difficult situation, which highlights the value of Tao Wuji's insistence on their own choice.

As the plot progressed, Tian Xiaohui and Tao Wuji finally came to the point of breaking up. Many viewers of "City in the City" will complain about Tian Xiaohui on the barrage, thinking that her three views are not correct, and the success along the way is basically using the information provided by her cousin Shen Jing. But Bian Zhihong sometimes wonders, could it be that there are people who haven't had the opportunity to experience temptation yet, "If there is such a relationship, such an opportunity in front of you, do you use it or not? If they can really stick to it, that's really good." ”

The relationship between Tian Xiaohui and Shen Jing is not a simple relationship of mutual use.

The reason why Tian Xiaohui chose to believe her after being deceived by her once was because she learned her story of struggle. In the play, Shen Jing once mentioned, "I was not as good as you when I was working in Singapore." What is not mentioned in the play is that Shen Jing later discovered that there are barriers to women in the entire financial circle. She will consider it carefully after marriage, and choose to retreat to Xie Zhiyuan to help him do some things later.

For Tian Xiaohui, a girl who has dreamed of entering the financial industry since she was a child, Shen Jing's experience and current economic strength have a strong appeal to her, which is the internal motivation for Tian Xiaohui to continue to cooperate with Shen Jing.

In this story with Zhao Hui's "ashification" as the main line, many grayscale characters like Tian Xiaohui and Shen Jing are connected in this way. Only by standing up for such characters can the story not fall into a binary narrative of black and white, and the complex spectrum of human nature and the eternal problem of the difficult balance of the world can really move the audience.

And to stand up for a character, screenwriters, directors, and actors all need to have the same goal and work together. Bian Zhihong also sighed from time to time when chasing the drama: The actors in this drama are really good. The "grayscale" hidden in these words has brought them to life.

During the broadcast of the series, Zhao Hui had some unexpected content out of the circle: "Zhao Hui was lying down" in front of the sofa after drinking. Bian Zhihong also saw an audience comment that this person has a "wooden sexiness". He was pleasantly surprised: this was similar to the "tragic grievances" they had summarized earlier.

"The storm in the hearts of middle-aged people will no longer be stormy waves, but the kind of undercurrent that emerges is a tragic grievance. There are many levels of things that cause Zhao Hui's 'grievances', and everyone's feelings may be different, but from the audience's reaction, it can be seen that everyone is more in love with this middle-aged man with a heavy burden on his shoulders, and it is Yu Hewei's good handling of all aspects of the details that will make everyone feel like this. Bian Zhihong analyzed KK.

Miao Che is a character that Bian Zhihong particularly likes, and what he represents is an ideal, a hope for reality. "He was the one who came back from Wall Street and saw what the ultimate capitalism would be, and then chose to go back to China as an auditor in a bank. And Wang Xiao also has the experience of studying abroad, and he has a very accurate grasp of Miao Che's feelings. ”

2. "You have to get through these"

Once a drama is too close to the era in which they live, the audience can't help but take a magnifying glass to examine the details. What you have experienced can be judged to be "true", and what you have not experienced is "false".

Bian Zhihong also saw some such comments. But in his opinion, "The drama that emphasizes itself as a 'realistic' drama is to face these voices, and as a screenwriter, it can only strengthen the professionalism in the drama." ”

"City in the City" is almost the most difficult work that Bian Zhihong has been a screenwriter for so many years, because "it requires too strong professionalism". These professional contents must first be digested in the screenwriting stage, and then find an easy-to-understand way for the audience to understand, and at the same time, the drama content must be in line with realistic logic.

The screenwriter joined the crew two years before the start of filming, and the director and producer have been preparing since 2019. When screenwriters need to do their homework, they have prepared a lot of interview subjects, presidents, auditors, trusts, securities...... There are people in all segments of the financial industry. In addition to interviews, screenwriters also need to watch more relevant books and videos, dive in stock trading bars, and watch the reactions of stockholders. The crew also has financial consultants, which is convenient for the main creators to ask for advice.

These are necessary homework, but this does not mean that "City within a City" is just to complete the homework of business war dramas, or the genre labels of financial dramas.

Bian Zhihong once combed through the business war dramas at home and abroad, and found that even if the category of "financial theme" is added, even in Hollywood, a place where there are all kinds of mature genre films, the financial movies that have been well-known to the audience over the years are probably "The Big Short" and "The Wolf of Wall Street".

"The dramatic means of this type of film are naturally not attractive enough. Bian Zhihong tried to analyze the reasons, "It would be cool for everyone to earn 1 million in reality, but it is not good for people in the drama to earn 1 million." ”

The solution of "City within a City" is to combine it with other drama genres and use a realistic approach to creation. The goal that the creative team is trying to achieve is that even audiences who are completely unfamiliar with finance can still resonate with the protagonist's story and their value choices in the workplace.

On the one hand, it is to implement the workplace scenes, so that people with workplace experience can resonate with his value choices in the workplace, and on the other hand, it is to make the relationship between the characters real, even if the financial background of the whole drama is erased, they can still be moved by their relationship.

"The relationship between Miao Che and Zhao Hui must not be a financial problem. Bian Zhihong said, for example, "Their relationship is a contradiction between duty and friendship, whether I check you or not, how can I remind you without violating my friendship." I chose this path because of friendship and wanted to escort you, but if I let you go on like this, I will not only destroy you but also destroy me, and my life will be worthless. Such feelings will be found in war movies and police movies. ”

"You have to get through these, you have to remove industry barriers, and in the end, what you see is people's hearts. Bian Zhihong concluded.

What the creator wants to strive to achieve is the essential relationship and the essential fate of the characters. Just as they never talk about "character design", the question of how to balance and match workplace dramas and emotional dramas does not need to be considered in their creation. Everything is a choice in the fate of the characters, and everyone's emotional drama will change in the proportion of their lives.

Although Wu Xiaofei likes Tian Xiaohui, there are more important things for him, so his feelings are relatively weak. But for a person like Su Jianren who was born wealthy and did not have much career ambition, feelings played a huge role in his fate.

In this drama, there are many middle-aged people's emotional lines, most of whom are more restrained and rational, and almost will not give up their autonomy for the people they love. If the direction of progress happens to be the same, it will be the relationship between Xie Zhiyuan and Shen Jing, while Miao Che and his wife Ma Li have a somewhat melancholy meaning.

The part in the play that was "crazy" by netizens was that Ma Li was about to return to the United States, and Miao Che wanted to hug her, so she hugged her daughter first in order to appear less deliberate. Obviously they still care about each other, but they can't be together anymore for various reasons.

Bian Zhihong sighed: "Most of the love of middle-aged people is like this, except for Su Jianren's crazy (laughs)." ”

3. Under the torrent, where is "I" going?

When the main creative team amplified Tao Wuji's story and set the young generation represented by him as a control group with the middle-aged generation represented by Zhao Hui, there was a proposition of the times between the two generations, and there was a clue to the changes of the times.

Between these two generations, there have been developments and changes in the financial industry in the past two or three decades. Zhao Hui's generation has experienced an era of great openness, great development and rapid development of the financial industry. When Tao Wuji's generation stepped onto the stage of history, the proposition of the times they wanted to solve became to strengthen financial supervision and strengthen financial services for entity brokerage.

Changes in the financial industry are the first layer of this story. Before 2018, the banking industry attached importance to large-scale development and innovation, and after 2018, it strengthened supervision, "de-bundling" with real estate, and supported high-tech enterprises and small and micro enterprises. Further down to the second level, not only the financial industry, but the entire social level is changing.

An era of rapid progress has passed, and we have entered deep waters. But what is the answer in this era? Bian Zhihong said frankly that this drama is also his confusion, questioning, and pursuit.

In Bian Zhihong's view, the death of President Dai at the beginning is the end of an era and the beginning of an era. "His philosophy is still 'nine good and one evil', and it is 'many things that are now considered right have also been considered wrong'. When he came to Zhao Hui, he knew that the supervision had begun, but he would still continue his past thinking, and felt that some things could be done in this way, which also led to some changes in his later circumstances, and Tao Wuji inherited these parts of his righteousness. ”

Since 2018, the number of dramas with the background of social changes in the past 20 or even 30 years has increased, and many dramas have gained high popularity and high reputation, such as "Big River", "The World", and "South to North". Their microcosmic life, love, career, life, family...... All of them are affected by the macro changes in society.

Not long ago, at the iQIYI World Conference, Wang Xiaohui, chief content officer of iQIYI, delivered a speech on the topic of "Don't leave me alone to face the wind and sand of the whole world". Wang Xiaohui believes that in the past few years, the mentality of content consumers has undergone major changes, returning to reality and paying attention to themselves has become the mainstream trend of today, and the film and television industry has entered the era of "downward empathy and upward creation".

And a drama like this, which uses the changes of the times as a dark line and strings together the stories of the characters, at the junction of the old and new eras, may be a creative idea of "empathy downward and upward creation". The content of such a series carries a look back and summary of the past, and then through the protagonist's fate, it expresses the creator's expectations for the future, which can resonate with the audience.

Bian Zhihong also observed some changes in the audience's values, which can also be seen from the feelings of some characters in "City within a City".

In his opinion, if a character like Tian Xiaohui appeared in the TV series ten years ago, everyone might be more substituted for her. This will be the image of a striver, she is cooperating with Shen Jing for her own goals, doing some behaviors that seem to be a bit impatient, but the goal is still self-realization. It's just that today, some viewers will ask: Why did Shen Jing lie to you, and you still want to cooperate with her?

Bian Zhihong believes that "empathy downwards and create upwards" is still the big truth, art should come from life and be higher than life. If it comes down to specific practice, it may be that realism can borrow genre creation methods, but if it is only a typed creation method, it is detached from the laws of creation.

He hopes that these dilemmas of the characters in the play can also make people who watch it think about such a thing: being in it, the times are changing, what should I do? Where are the times going, and where should I go?

And all the thinking, action, and pace of progress will eventually bring about a new era.