Author| Film Lady (Headline Signed Author)
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In 2013, Er Dongsheng completed a special film.
Big names such as Wu Yanzu, Yuan Yongyi, Feng Delun, Mak Zhaohui, Zhuang Wenqiang, Fang Zhongxin, Xu Anhua, etc. have all come to make cameo appearances for him in "small roles".
When promoting, Liang Chaowei, Shu Qi, lin Qingxia wrote articles, Huang Bo and Zhou Xun contributed trailers, and even Andy Lau, who had not seen the film, wrote a handwritten letter expressing support.
Er Dongsheng said: "The character accumulated by his 40 years of experience in the industry has exploded at this moment. ”
What exactly is it that uses such a big battle?
In fact, to say that great is also great, to say that ordinary is also ordinary, it is a film shot by Er Dongsheng on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of entering the industry - "I am a passerby".
In 2012, in order to shoot "The Sword of the Three Young Masters", he ran to Hengdian to study 3D production with Xu Kexue, and accidentally paid attention to the group of "horizontal drift".
The so-called "horizontal drift" is actually an actor who does group performances in Hengdian Film and Television City.
Er Dongsheng, who has always paid attention to reality, became curious about this group and decided to postpone "The Sword of the Three Young Masters" and make a movie about them first.
After making the decision, he spent 4 months interviewing more than 300 extras, making more than 500,000 written records and more than 1,200 hours of video footage.
In the choice of actors, he boldly used newcomers, all the lead actors directly used "horizontal drift", and the shooting was also their own story.
After three years of pre-preparation and post-production, "I Am a Passerby" was finally completed.
It is not only a movie about group acting, but also an epic of small people.
It endorses the dreams and confusion of young people, persistence and abandonment, pain and trials.
No matter what line or industry, there is no shortage of passers-by, so I believe that every ordinary person will find his own emotions in this work.
The film takes the career and emotional experience of Wan Guopeng, a young man from the northeast, as the main line, and tells the dream story of the Hengdian group performers.
Wan Guopeng was born in the snow town of northeast China, he is not as bold as most northeast people, but shy and shy.
He had a dream of being an actor since he was a child, and in order to realize his dream, he came to Hengdian from home with 1,000 yuan.
However, the road to becoming an actor is not so easy.
Although the stars are very glamorous, the group performances are very miserable.
Every morning at four o'clock, they gather like cabbage to be picked in the actors' commune of Hengdian Film and Television City, waiting to be selected.
To have a job is lucky, if there is a lens, there are lines, it is a great fortune.
In their day-to-day group acting careers, they are just migrant workers in the show business circle, waiting, persevering, and suffering.
The salaries of well-known actors for hundreds of thousands of episodes have nothing to do with them.
They don't know when they will lose their income, and even if they live in a dirty house, they may be evicted by the landlord at any time, and there is no guarantee for their lives.
Although they have dreams in their hearts, most people have a lofty goal of becoming "Wang Baoqiang's second", but while they have dreams, their lives are hopeless, and they inevitably fall into anxiety and confusion.
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Shen Kai, who has been helping Zhang Guopeng in the film, is an old "drifter".
In order to help him realize his dreams, his wife Xu Xiaoqin accompanied him to do group performances in Hengdian; worried that his life was not guaranteed, he pooled his money to run a small restaurant.
After many years of familying and getting older, Xiaoqin's heart is eager to be stable, but Shen Kai clings to the illusory dream, unwilling to go backwards, and there is no hope for the forward.
Later, Xiaoqin became pregnant and wanted to give birth to a child, she felt that pursuing her dream did not mean giving up her life; Shen Kai insisted that she beat the child off, in his view, giving birth to a child is to destroy his life.
After a fierce quarrel between the two, the wounded Xiaoqin decided to leave the child, divorced Shen Kai, and returned to her hometown.
When Xiaoqin left, Shen Kai happened to receive a role with a lot of drama, for him, this is the career turnaround that he finally waited for after many years of persistence, as long as he plays well, there will be more opportunities in the future.
But his wife's departure seemed to suck away his soul, and on the set of the filming, he kept forgetting words.
Shouting cards again and again has made his state worse and worse, which not only seriously affects the process of the crew, but also affects the schedule of the starring actors.
In the end, he lost the role, and with it, the hope he had been longing for.
Unable to withstand the double whammy of life and career, he collapsed, went crazy...
Shen Kai used his entire youth to chase dreams, and finally chased after his family, and he was also delirious.
Although "not crazy devil, not alive", but if only crazy devils are left, is the persistence of the past still valuable?
Wei Xing was in a different situation: he first tasted the happiness he got, but he was surrounded by the loss of no longer getting it.
Because he made a male number one in a micro-film, he not only had to increase his price, but also could no longer watch the work of group acting.
He put his posture too high, could not find a job, life can only rely on his girlfriend Lin Chen to maintain, the two are so difficult that they do not even have the money to rent a better room.
Obviously, life needs money, but his eyes are high and he can't move, and he knows that life can't go backwards, so angry that his girlfriend wants to break up.
Compared with Shen Kai and Wei Xing, Wang Zhao has the innate advantage of "red" - handsome.
Every day, he looked at Gu Tianle's poster and said, "When you are old, the film world will be mine." ”
But for a long time as a group actor, he has become an old fritter, lazy and slippery in the crew, as soon as his clothes are changed, he will find a place to sleep.
He didn't know what it meant to do this kind of walking, running, jumping, standing, and standing every day.
No matter how big the dream is, it seems to exist only in the dream and has nothing to do with him.
Also because of laziness, when the famous director was casting, he was secretly sleeping and lost the opportunity to change his situation.
Although the film shoots a group of people who seem to have no hope in life, Er Dongsheng still embeds the power of dreams in it.
The male protagonist, Wan Guopeng, has always maintained his love for performance, and after experiencing twists and turns, he not only got love, but also got the opportunity to go to Beijing for training and study.
Wang Zhao also finally realized that passive response was only a waste of life, and with the encouragement of his partners, he began to work hard.
The climax of the film is a solo dance by Arthur Yifan.
Inspirational lyrics, powerful beats, with the beauty of life bursting out after hardships, no lines, no monologue, but enough to make people tear up.
Artemisia Yifan is dark and thin, and her appearance is not proud.
When the beautiful dance is fused with the ordinary girl, it is the shock of the dream to us.
For this dance performance, Arthur Yifan trained for 10 months
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Many "horizontal drifters" said that the reason why they came to Hengdian was "because of Wang Baoqiang".
Er Dongsheng was worried that after the release of "I Am Passerby A", someone would watch the movie and have the idea of "I want to be a star", and specially prepared a documentary of "I Am a Passerby A".
Although the film has filmed the "horizontal drift" of life dilemmas, the documentary shows a more comprehensive and cruel.
Qin Peijun in the film has always been the most optimistic one.
Someone asked him if he thought he would succeed?
He replied, "I've succeeded. I've had landslides in coal mines, and it's good to be alive under the sun. ”
This is not a chicken soup line written by the screenwriter, but Qin Peijun's own life perception.
Qin Peijun came from the mountains of Shaanxi Province, lost his mother at the age of five, lost his father at the age of nine, became an orphan and leaned on digging things in the mountains to sell money to eat, and at the age of 13 he went to work in a brick factory.
Later, he went to dig coal and experienced a landslide.
The line "It's good to live in the sun" is exactly what he said during the interview.
Qin Peijun was in his hometown in Shaanxi
Shen Kai, who went crazy because of his wife's divorce and forgetting words in the movie, is 30 years old.
He went to Hengdian to chase his dreams without his wife and daughter, and he was under great pressure to support his family.
When filming the forgotten word clip, Er Dongsheng kept tossing him in order to shoot his real reaction, one moment lifting him to the side and scolding him, the next moment glaring at him twice, pushing him, and later finding that he could still remember the words, he let the assistant change the words on the spot.
Over and over again to embarrass him, in fact, the fool can see what is going on.
But Shen Kai, who was highly concentrated in spirit, began to be unable to distinguish between filming and reality, and he began to stutter and forget words.
Unconsciously, he completed one of the most acclaimed scenes of "I Am a Passerby".
But after the scene was filmed, his mentality collapsed, and he returned to the dormitory, crying a handful of tears.
Xu Xiaoqin, who plays Shen Kai's wife, worked as a beauty consultant before going to Hengdian, sold mobile phones, and worked in supermarkets and cafes.
She gave herself five years, hoping to earn money by acting and give her parents a pension.
However, for her, even if she does not seek fame and only wants to make money, it is so difficult to achieve.
In addition to the young people in the film, in the documentary "I Am a Passerby", there is also a "horizontal drifting" couple, the two have a daughter, and the wife is pregnant again.
"Horizontal drifting" did not change their fate, they are still poor, the couple with their children every day to drive a broken car through Hengdian, living conditions are quite miserable.
In fact, the reason why these "horizontal drifts" are floating in Hengdian is more for survival.
For most of them, even if they get out of Hengdian, they have no better way out.
They are generally young, have low education, and do not know how to perform.
They have been playing passers-by, the masses, and they look very unhappy, but if they are really given a heavyweight role, they simply cannot control it.
In order to shoot "I Am a Passerby", Er Dongsheng specially trained the 21 selected people, and even so, we can still clearly feel the jerkiness of their performance from the film.
Therefore, among the 300,000 "horizontal drifts" in Hengdian, it is almost impossible for someone to counterattack like their target Wang Baoqiang.
If so, does their attachment still make sense?
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One of the most criticized features of "I Am a Passerby" is that there are too many chicken soup lines.
If you talk about hard work, persistence, and success, they open their mouths and come.
In fact, this is not deliberate, but the daily life of the "drifters".
Perhaps, in the days when hope has not come, this is the greatest consolation they can have.
After the end of "I Am a Passerby A", Er Dongsheng accepted these group performances into the "Sword of the Three Young Masters" crew.
Some of them play small roles, some on the spot, some with photography.
Later, most people disappeared into the sea of people.
The lead actor Wan Guopeng is probably the luckiest one.
With "I Am a Passerby", he has received some affirmations and some honors.
Since then, he has been walking on the path of the actor.
In "Tomorrow's War" starring Gu Tianle Liu Qingyun, "Originally You Are Still Here" starring Yang Zishan and Han Dongjun, and "Ping Pong" starring Bai Jingting Xu Weizhou, he has starred, and he has also been the male protagonist in the web drama "You Think Too Much".
The heroine Wang Ting is also an actress, and with the role of Li Qian in "Passing the Future", she also won the Most Media Attention Newcomer Actress Award at the 21st Shanghai International Film Festival in 2018.
In addition, Shen Kai, Xu Xiaoqin, Lin Chen, and Wei Xing are also on the road of persistence, but they are still playing the role of scraps.
And this is already the leader in the "horizontal drift".
For their success or failure, persistence or abandonment, perhaps we are not qualified to evaluate.
After all, who is not yet a passerby?
Like them, we have to go through the trials of life.
As for how tomorrow will be, there seems to be no solution except persistence.
What if the dream comes true?
But when you insist on chasing dreams, in addition to wanting the moon, don't forget to look at sixpence a few times.
Because living is king.
(The picture originated from the Internet, invaded and deleted)
About the Author: @Movie Lady, independent film critic, headline number signed author. Write about film and television, but also write about the love and hate of the entertainment industry.