Under the cold winter of film and television, Hengdian group performances are facing the situation of more monks and less porridge, and now on the horizontal drift square, you can see the horizontal drift that is being broadcast live everywhere. The picture shows the stills of the cross-drifting movie "I am a passerby". (Infographic/Figure)
On June 2, 2020, hengbu square in Hengdian Town, Dongyang City, Zhejiang Province, was hung with the slogan "Taobao Live", and a promotional video was played on a loop on the big screen, typing out a line of big characters: "The Hope of the Whole Village of Hengbu Village - Taobao Live". On the same day, eight Taobao live anchor agencies held recruitment activities in the square, bringing more than 500 jobs, and the average daily salary was three times that of ordinary extras. Hengfu Village also posted the "Notice on Building the First Village of Taobao Live Broadcast Hengdian", saying that it hoped that Hengfu artists would enthusiastically apply for employment and actively develop a second career other than acting.
Nearly a month later, southern weekend reporters came to the "horizontal drift" square, and the slogan of "Taobao Live" was gone. Jin Xinlun, secretary of the Hengbu Village branch, told Southern Weekend that Taobao Live Village did not do it. Since the horizontal drift artists generally do not have special talents, more than 500 live broadcast posts have really recruited only a few people.
The direct reason for the transformation of the first village of Hengdian group performance into Taobao Live Broadcast Village is that the crew has been sharply reduced due to the impact of the epidemic, and there is no drama to shoot in the group performance. In fact, for the horizontal drifters, doing live broadcasts and shooting short videos is not a new thing, and many horizontal drifters have begun to try this aspect in addition to running group performances. Because of the rise of self-media, more and more group actors have embarked on a new road to pursue their dreams, imagining that they will one day change from a "background board" that no one cares about to an Internet celebrity.
<h3>"It's all a living prop."</h3>
"Everyone who comes to Hengdian has a story, either they are in debt or they can't stay at home. People move to live, trees move to death, and it may be better to change the environment. Wu Ming, the live broadcaster of Hengdian, told the Southern Weekend reporter. There are 100,000 group performances in Hengdian, and a considerable number of them come with film and television dreams.
Before coming to Hengdian, Chen Yifeng had done sales in his hometown of Zunyi, Guizhou, and had driven a truck, with a monthly income of 10,000 yuan. When he came to Hengdian, his initial income was only one or two thousand. In an interview, he took a pack of cigarettes in his hand and told Southern Weekend that the poorest time in his life was now, and he had just asked his friend to borrow 20 yuan to buy a pack of cigarettes.
But Hengdian still has endless appeal to Chen Yifeng. When he first arrived in Hengdian and walked to Wansheng South Street, the "Net Red Street" at night, the performers in strange costumes jumped and jumped, and the atmosphere of the studio subverted his world view, and he felt that he belonged to this industry and must be integrated with them. After more than a month of group performances, one day in July, the sun in Hengdian was like fire, Chen Yifeng stood in line as a group actor wearing thick armor, and more than ten minutes later, he saw a young group actor with heat stroke and fell, and the tears came down instantly. From that moment on, Chen Yifeng had no feeling about the profession of group acting. "It's so painful, it's a living prop." Chen Yifeng said. When doing group performances, he did not dare to send a circle of friends, and he felt that in the eyes of the public, group performances were very low-level jobs.
"If you have been doing group performances, there must be a problem, but if you have not done group performances, it is also a problem." To say that doing group performances is 'shameful', it also depends on the length of time. Chen Yifeng said.
Chen Yifeng happened to meet a young female director from the Central Academy of Drama, and when he heard the professional terminology quoted by the other party when chatting, he studied directing with her for three months. After that, he spent a year studying film primer such as "Knowing Movies" and felt that he should be the "savior" of Chinese film and television. The reality is that now his two big online movies have not yet been reviewed, he has just sold a script, and after the income income date, the money has not yet arrived.
Yokozuna Also transformed from group performances to do "net big movies" and short videos, in his impression, although Hengdian has been overstaffed, people do not refuse, but most of the cross-drift is dry for a while and then leave. If there are people around you who want to come to Hengdian to do group performances, Ju Erzhao's suggestion is that the holiday experience type comes casually, and if he runs group performances for a long time for the purpose of making money, he will be persuaded to quit. "Group performances of 100 yuan a day are like grabbing red envelopes, more than 100 people send 20 red envelopes, you think, you have to see who has the fastest hand."
When doing group performances, he rarely surrounds the stars like others, and he is numb to seeing stars. "I just thought, let others chase me, not me chase others."
Although the film and television practitioners in Hengdian have always been overstaffed, most of the "horizontal drifting" has not stayed long, and this group is very mobile. The picture shows the stills of the movie "I Am a Passerby". (Infographic/Figure)
<h3>"Shoot your own work"</h3>
"They don't see hope because they don't do live streaming." Speaking of those who left the "horizontal drift", Ju Erzhao said. In 2017, Ju Erzhao was still a full-time group actor, and he did live broadcasting during the break. After that, he dabbled in network movies and served as a producer of a network big movie. At the end of May 2020, Ju Erzhao set up a team to mainly shoot sitcoms for manufacturers. When southern weekend reporters met him, he was filming a series of short dramas in a fried goods store in Hengdian, mainly filming equipment, a mobile phone and an occasional use of a blackout board.
Ju Erzhao's transformation is forced by the situation, Hengdian group performance monks more porridge, there are one or two lines of group performance is called "special", the general income is 270-280 yuan a day. However, male special actors are required to be more than one meter tall and seventy-eight or more, and it is not the turn of Ju Erzhao. Filming "NetDa" and being a producer made Ju Erzhao feel that he was a controller, "The things you shoot are your own works, and whenever you say it, it will sound good." If you do group acting for three years and say that you have shown a little face in a TV series, it doesn't have much effect. ”
Today's horizontal drift square, everywhere you can see the "horizontal drift" that is being broadcast live, some singing on the side of the road, some sitting on the square and chatting with fans.
Since the media broadcaster Wuming Dragon Boat Festival officially began live broadcasting the day before, in addition to live broadcasting, he has been shooting short videos for more than half a month. Wu Ming showed the Southern Weekend reporter his income record of shooting videos for half a month, with a daily income of 40 to 50 to 100 yuan, a cumulative income of more than 1400 yuan, and a playback volume of more than 2.6 million. The theme of Wuming's video is mainly the daily life of Hengdian, claiming to be taking the "serious route". He has a friend who has made videos for half a year, and has only earned less than two hundred yuan in total, and he thinks that the other party will not borrow the topic to play.
In Wuming's view, there is no threshold for doing self-media, only a mobile phone is needed, and even post-editing can be completed with mobile phone software. He has three or four mobile phones and tablets at home, a charging treasure to carry with him, and a stabilizer "claw" in his bag. After Wu Ming's own live broadcast ended, he recorded a video of a certain broadcaster being broadcast live, commented a few words, and then transmitted it to his account, which became a new video material. Wu Ming told southern weekend reporters that this is not a violation.
Li Zheng, a post-90s young man who drifted across, filmed a one-month sitcom video in ju's team, and the account currently has only more than a thousand fans. He admitted to Southern Weekend that the team members were looking for it on an ad hoc basis and that the things they shot were "very low." After a month, his summary is that if he does it himself, he must find the most core personnel, that is, actors.
Li Zheng took his first video as early as 2017 and gained more than 10,000 fans on Douyin overnight. The video is about a teenager in a "dream showbiz" pretending to be drunk and threatening to one day become the next Oscar-winning director. The video went viral, and there were many people who wanted to shoot privately. At that time, Li Zheng did not want to run his own Douyin account, but thought about making movies, and three years later, his Douyin account is still more than 10,000 fans. Now Li Zheng wants to be a self-media, he realizes that there is no particularly capable friend in the circle he is currently living in, and the self-media is a springboard to meet better people here.
Chen Yifeng is also aware of hindsight. When he first came to Hengdian in 2017, he saw a poster of the Hengdian Actors Guild, which proudly declared that since the establishment of Hengdian Film and TELEVISION City, millions of group performances have been sent to the crew. What he thought at that time was: There is not a single Wang Baoqiang out of millions of people, and he is certainly no better than those millions of people, and he must find another way out. At that time, Chen Yifeng heard about the "Kuaishou" App in Hengdian, but he felt that the Internet celebrities and Duanzi hands were still a bit "low", and he still wanted to pursue online movies and cinema movies.
Nowadays, Chen Yifeng realizes that the era of being recognized by people through running group performances has passed, and the current group performances should be discovered on Kuaishou or Douyin. "Most group performers are waiting for an opportunity." Li Zheng said. Chen Yifeng jokingly added: "It's okay, decades will soon pass, you can wait a little longer." Anyway, I firmly believe that opportunities are never waiting to come out. If you really have a brain, you should go and shoot a short video. ”
Chen Yifeng told the Southern Weekend reporter that he was going to go to yiwu's internet celebrity live broadcast first village to see, and then began to do self-media. He wants to enter a better circle, let's talk about an idea, have money to invest, and make a strong contribution.
Hengdian group performed Wuming transformed from the media, and the first popular video was an actor in Hengdian who looked like Ma Yun. (Photo/Photo courtesy of the interviewee)
<h3>The secret of the "Hengdian God"</h3>
In Hengdian, there is a category of people who are the object of self-media competition, and they are called "big gods". Wu Ming told the Southern Weekend reporter that there are "big gods" in two places throughout China, one is Shenzhen Sanhe, and the other is Hengdian. In the presentation of self-media, the "big god" of Hengdian usually has the following characteristics: delicious and lazy, getting by, bragging, having personality defects and even suspected mental illness, and living a tramp-like life.
During the live broadcast in Hengdrift Square, Wu Ming chatted with the broadcaster Uncle Gao, and the third brother of the "big god" who was unknown to everyone in Hengdian was beaten again. Wu Ming introduced to the Southern Weekend reporter that the third brother is a small old man in his sixties in Hengdian, who sometimes runs and runs group performances. All the self-media in Hengdian like to tease the third brother and make traffic with him. In The Narration of Wu Ming, the third brother is a typical "big god". Because of the beating, the third brother has become a hot figure in the horizontal drift circle in the past two days. The specific reason is that two days ago, the third brother was tricked into going to Shenzhen, and the other party wanted to sign a contract with him to shoot a short video. In the presence of netizens, the other party paid the salary to the third brother, but then returned the money - without the permission of the other party, the third brother answered a phone, and the other party accused the third brother of disobedience and beat him. It is not the first time that the third brother who is arguing with people has been beaten.
Asked how to contact the third brother, Wu Ming said that he could not contact him now because he was too busy and the heat was too high. "You shoot him for three minutes, and he can ask you for fifty thousand." You just give money, you can shoot anything, don't give money, 'you roll'. The tall uncle next to him added that the third brother borrowed him a hundred yuan five years ago and has not yet repaid it.
"Now that he is doing live broadcasting, he has made some money and cocked his tail, and then went to Shanghai and Shenzhen, and as a result, he has entered the den of thieves." The bureau set up by the people, he went in, and he still felt quite beautiful. Saying that his family was originally from Hong Kong, bullshit, his family is Shangrao in Jiangxi. Uncle Gao told the Southern Weekend reporter that the third brother had stayed in the foot washing room, run through the crew leader, done group performances, had no children, no daughters and no families, because of the rise of self-media, it became the focus of attention.
Wu Ming photographed a lot of such "big gods", he said, Hengdian's self-media are you shooting me, I shoot you, each other through the shooting of each other to earn traffic, each other to enjoy the feeling of everyone's attention.
Uncle Gao is also a "big god", and he sits in the horizontal drift square every day with a cushion to do live broadcasts for several hours. Previously, he had been living a precarious life. Uncle Gao has alcoholic liver, has lost the ability to work, can not run the group performance, when the weather is sunny, in the cross-drift square to give people a haircut, cut a six yuan at a time. In 2019, Uncle Gao went to work at the Xiangshan Film and Television Base in Ningbo for three months, where he provided food and housing, and after returning to Hengdian at the end of December, he never went to film again. When he wasn't filming, he lived by eating his old books. When it was cold, he stayed overnight in the Internet bar, and slept in the riverside park when it was not cold. Later, a friend helped him rent a house and paid the rent for two months until now.
Now someone has helped him open a live broadcast number, and he has a net income of one or two hundred yuan per day. Wu Ming took a lot of videos of Uncle Gao, and his fans donated money and materials to Uncle Gao through him, and the Dragon Boat Festival also sent zongzi. From June 15, he can pay his own rent.
Wu Ming told the Southern Weekend reporter that Uncle Gao was divorced and had a son in Shenzhen, but the father and son had no contact, and the son looked down on him and felt that his father had humiliated himself. In 2012, Uncle Gao went to Shenzhen to work, thinking that if he met his son at which intersection, it would mean that the father and son still had a fate to meet. At that time, he lived in Xintian Village, where the rent was cheapest, and went to Futian in the city center every day to sit for two and a half hours waiting for his son, but he did not wait. Later, he returned to his hometown in the northeast, his house was occupied by the second brother, he could only go online at night to pack the night, he left the northeast again, when the car passed Jinhua, he suddenly thought that Hengdian Film and Television City was in Jinhua, he could make movies. So I temporarily decided to get off the bus and come to Hengdian.
In Hengdian, there are two periods of time when you can meet the "big god" intensively, one is the noon of Hengdri Square, and the other is the night of Wansheng South Street. The "great gods" are either snubbed, or hyped up, or sympathized with. In the era of self-media, the "big god" has become a tool for bloggers to monetize their traffic in the name of being cared for and received. Zhu Tianren, who has been a martial artist in Hengdian for five years, told Southern Weekend that a while ago there was an old lady in Hengdian who was very popular on douyin, and no matter who took the vibrato, she was dancing awkwardly with music next to her. "She became an Internet celebrity that she didn't know, and her income was not high, and she still lived like that all day, and there was not a meal." Zhu Tianren said.
On the first day of coming to Hengdian, Zhu Tianren met a "big god". That day he met a man in costume on a sidewalk, and at first he thought that the man was filming in the crew, but after staying in Hengdian for a long time, he realized that there was usually no crew passing by on that road. When the two met again, they added WeChat to each other, and later the other party endlessly sent Zhu Tianren his own script, sharing his strange experience and videos he made, sometimes claiming to be a great immortal who had cultivated the Tao, and sometimes saying that his arms were numb and he had become crippled.
Speaking of Hengdian's abundance of "great gods", Zhu Tianren's explanation is that such a person can survive in Hengdian and will be drowned by the public's saliva in other places.
Director Jian Gang is quite dismissive of the so-called Hengdian "big god". "What a god, it's a bunch of slackers." He told Southern Weekend with a smile. In his impression, in Hengdian, there are not many people who do things in a down-to-earth manner, and there are countless people who are whimsical and complain about huaicai every day.
Although he has been "drifting" in Hengdian for nine years, Jian Gang denies that he is a "drifter". He believes that the word "horizontal drift" has a pejorative meaning, which can be equated with "lazy", especially those who are good at eating and lazy, and people like him who have gone from group acting to network film directors and have done various types of work in the film and television industry cannot be regarded as "horizontal drift".
In Jian Gang's eyes, 99% of the local movies on the market are "spoof movies", "in addition to the hype is the star effect, many directors sitting in front of the monitor do not understand movies at all"; and investors are mostly "faint jun", and the money is deceived by people who do "spoof movies". Jian Gang believes that there are too many bad movies now, and the short video has been completed.
Nowadays, Hengdian's self-media earn traffic by shooting each other and seek new ways out of group performances. The picture shows the stills of the movie "I Am a Passerby". (Infographic/Figure)
<h3>"It is impossible to go back to work</h3>."
"There are only two kinds of people who are suitable for Hengdian, one is to live one day at a time, and the other is to just want to make money, no principle and no bottom line." Zhu Tianren told Southern Weekend reporters.
When Zhu Tianren first did martial arts, one day after finishing work, he saw the pay slip of the extras, which said 190 yuan, and his salary for this day was 160 yuan. He felt puzzled, in his opinion, the group performance was just standing and "lying corpse", while Wu xing wanted to rush to the front and wrestle, but the income was not as good as the group performance. Later, he learned that in fact, the martial arts on that day could get a salary of about 600 yuan. His low salary is because he entered the crew through an intermediary, and most of the salary was taken away by the intermediary before it was paid to him.
After five years in Hengdian, despite registering a small company specializing in dragon and lion dances, Zhu Tianren still had no car, no house and no girlfriend. Zhu Tianren told the Southern Weekend reporter that in the "horizontal drift", the single sticks of thirty or forty years old can be seen everywhere, and girls can talk to them, but finding a husband is another matter, and no one will look at people like him who have nothing. He feels that his failure is that "there are too many principled things on him", and "those who do not talk about principles only for money" can come to Hengdian for a year or two to have both garages.
Zhu Tianren, who had just turned thirty, did not want to do martial arts much anymore, and this line of food was youth rice, and as he grew older, he did not fall too much. Some of the martial arts he knew did specific acrobatic projects, only doing work twice a month, and their income added up to five or six thousand yuan.
Before he clearly left home, Zhu Tianren felt that staying in Hengdian was a good choice. He mentioned the Internet buzzword "Part-time work is impossible, it is impossible to work in this life", and felt that this sentence is in line with a lot of "horizontal drift" mentality. Doing martial arts in Hengdian is hard and dangerous, and you can't make much money, but your daily life will not be repeated. Therefore, many people have stayed in Hengdian for a long time, and it is difficult to return to the factory to live that kind of step-by-step life.
Wu Ming is now focusing on live broadcasting and video shooting, but he still wants to run scenes. "I am now experiencing life, running scenes, moving props and lights by the crew, as long as I can make money, I will do anything." Wu Ming has plans to settle in Hengdian with his wife.
When southern weekend reporters met director Jane Gang, he was sitting idly on Wansheng Street. Because the epidemic has cut off his income, he can only live on the old food now. Jian Gang does not call Coming to Hengdian "pursuing dreams", he feels that he came here to survive, because he can't survive in a place like the factory. He has been to many factories to work, even if he is very hard, but he will make mistakes, at most a week to be fired. He firmly believes that his personality is suitable for film and television: "Filming is a thing that is originally destructive. The good can make it bad, and the bad can make it good, suitable for people with a happy personality. ”
In Hengdian for three years, although there was no Wang Baoqiang here, Chen Yifeng still thought that Hengdian was a place to chase dreams. "I feel that my dream will never be broken in this life, as long as my head is there, this dream will still be there." If I can survive on this line of work, I am willing to work for the rest of my life. Chen Yifeng said.
When asked about his talent, he confidently said, "I should be invincible." I haven't met an opponent in my life. Before playing League of Legends, I couldn't even find a double-row teammate. If I had crossed the Yangtze River, I might have to swim alone. ”
Some time ago, Li Zheng heard that a photographer who was not from a science class was self-taught and now earns four or five thousand yuan a day in Hengdian. Since then, Li Zheng, who was once addicted to computer games, has hardly touched games. He began to reflect that he was also chasing his dreams, but he did not succeed, that must be his problem, the key is that he is too lazy. "We are not born so strong, but personal qualities can be made up for." In the interview, he held in his hand a book for training eloquence, which he had given when he bought the guqin. He likes the ancient style, and now he regularly goes to a friend every week to learn the piano, "Learning the piano is the pursuit of personal quality, the gentleman's six arts." ”
What movies to make in the future, Li Zheng only has a general idea. "The film itself is a story, and I want to tell more stories. I can make movies that not only fulfill my dreams, but also realize the dreams of others. ”
Southern Weekend reporter Shen Hexi