Source: Beijing Evening News
After the end of the vigorous Spring Festival, the total box office ranking of Chinese film history has undergone new changes. As of March 7, Jia Ling's directorial debut "Hello, Li Huanying" has been ranked second in the total box office of Chinese film history with a box office of 5.09 billion yuan, second only to "Wolf Warrior 2". Another 2021 Spring Festival film, Detective Chinatown 3, became the fifth on the list. According to the data provided by Maoyan Professional Edition, the top ten films in the history of domestic films at the box office are "Wolf Warrior 2", "Hello, Li Huanying", "Nezha's Devil Boy Descending", "Wandering Earth", "Detective Chinatown 3", "Red Sea Action", "Detective Chinatown 2", "Mermaid", "My Motherland and Me", and "Eight Hundred". Netizens found that in the newly released top ten domestic films box office list, eight of them are from cross-border directors.
● Box office top ten only Guan Hu is a class
In addition to the film "My Motherland and Me" created by the seven directors collectively, among the top ten domestic film box office films, only Guan Hu, the director of "Eight Hundred", is a graduate of the directing department of the Beijing Film Academy and belongs to the science class, while the directors of the other eight films belong to cross-border directors, some of them are transformed from actors to directors, some have been immersed on the set for several years, and some even rely on "self-taught talents".
Wu Jing, the director of "Wolf Warrior 2", who ranked first, learned martial arts from an early age and graduated from Beijing Sport University. After starring in the kung fu comedy "Kung Fu Kid Breaks through the Love Pass" in 1995, he became a well-known kung fu student with many film and television works such as "Tai Chi Grandmaster" and "Little Li Flying Knife". In 2008, Wu Jing began to transform into a director, with many years of experience as a kung fu actor, he naturally put the theme on action movies, "Wolf's Teeth" and "Wolf Warrior" steadily, step by step, and then there was the phenomenon-level work "Wolf Warrior 2" that came out of nowhere in 2017. The film's ultra-high box office of 5.69 billion yuan not only ranks first in the history of Chinese films so far, But Wu Jing has also developed a military action film genre that belongs to Chinese, completing a gorgeous turn from a kung fu boy to a national tough guy.
Dumpling, the director of "Nezha's Devil Boy Descending", went to college at West China Medical University, because he liked animation since he was a child, and made the decision to "abandon medicine and follow literature" when he graduated. Dumplings began to do animation all by themselves, the 16-minute debut "Hit, Hit a Big Watermelon" did three years and eight months, and the later "Nezha's Devil Boy Descending" that made him a blockbuster took five years, and the script alone changed 66 versions.
Not to mention Jia Ling, the director of "Hello, Li Huanying", was a cross-talk actor that the audience liked before becoming a director. Jia Ling graduated from the Central Academy of Drama majoring in cross-talk performance, under the tutelage of Feng Gong.
Before filming "The Wandering Earth", Guo Fan also had a tortuous experience in the industry. Although he had a dream of film directing since he was a child, he was not admitted to the Beijing Film Academy in the college entrance examination, and finally had to go to Hainan University to study law. After graduation, Guo Fan still couldn't let go of his film dreams, so he chose "curve from the shadow", first spelled out a certain reputation in the television circle, and then was admitted to the graduate school of the Management Department of the Beijing Film Academy.
Chen Sicheng, the director of "Detective Chinatown 3", graduated from the Central Academy of Drama with a major in acting, first became an actor with a certain degree of popularity, and then transformed into a director.
"Red Sea Action" director Lin Chaoxian is an inspirational figure who has been tapped out of the Hong Kong film set. He began working on the set in 1984 as an assistant and as an assistant director, studying while working until 1997, when he had his first chance as a director.
The struggle story of "Mermaid" director Stephen Chow is well known to the audience. He was only a mass actor in the crew running the dragon set at the beginning, and then entered the TVB TV artist training class to study, after graduation, he worked as a children's program host, filmed TV series, slowly acted from a supporting role to a protagonist, and after becoming a comedy star with great box office appeal, he finally sat in the director's chair and made classic comedies such as "Domestic Lingling Paint", "The King of Comedy", "Kung Fu" and so on.
●Sino-foreign cross-border successes abound
In fact, cross-border directors are a very common phenomenon in the industry.
From the perspective of the scope of world film history, cross-border directors have existed as early as the era of silent films. For example, the master of comedy, Charlie Chaplin, who was originally a stage actor, gradually became involved in the behind-the-scenes work of the film from 1914 when he participated in the comedy short film "Making a Living", and in the same year launched the first work of his directorial career, "Twenty Minutes of Love".
Regardless of the film industry at home and abroad, there are many directors who are not from the class. For example, Hollywood ghost director Quentin Tarantino, who was first a video store clerk, the amount of reading during this period laid the foundation for his later collage-style film style; Clint Eastwood, who is still filming in the front line at the age of 91, belongs to the actor-turned director; New Wave standard-bearer Jean-Luc Godard, who first worked as a film critic to judge movies, felt that he was not addicted to making his own films; Lee Cangdong, the director of Korean literary and art films, was first a writer who wrote novels, and then entered the film industry to make movies...
However, these cross-border directors have a premise: before becoming directors, they all engaged in film-related majors, such as actors, film critics, or at least the art and media industries, such as television, literature, art, etc., and then switched to directing.
Before the marketization of Chinese films, only major studios could make films, and the directors were also from the top directors of major art colleges. After the marketization of Chinese films, on the one hand, the industry needs a large number of directors to create more works; on the other hand, practitioners with the dream of directing have more opportunities. In the past, when I was an actor and an artist, I wanted to shoot my own story, but I just had the capital willing, so I shot it off.
"With the professional progress of China's film industry, professional assistant directors, executive directors, storyboarders and other positions have begun to appear, and directors have the support of professional teams, which technically paves the way for cross-border directors." Film scholar Gan Jianyu analyzed, "Many cross-border directors are already celebrities in a certain field before becoming directors, such as actors and writers, and they have accumulated a lot of resources. Some have a large number of fans, and the drama has a certain box office guarantee before filming; some have a strong network advantage, and when the director is accompanied by friends in the industry. Capital is also willing to choose such a celebrity as a director. ”
● Is it possible for anyone to be a director?
For cross-border directors, most audiences are more open-minded. They believe that heroes do not ask about provenance, as long as they are dedicated, professionally qualified, and able to make quality works, everyone can be a director. Netizen "Jaws 0529" said that the existence of cross-border directors is like the "catfish effect", which can inject fresh blood into the film world. "Cross-border directors often have different perspectives and different competitiveness, and you can't underestimate them."
Wang Changtian, president of Light Pictures, also embraces cross-border directors. He believes that for Chinese films that are continuing to grow at a high speed, the lack of directing talent is a huge constraint, "so we are now encouraging many actors to be directors." ”
However, there is no diamond diamond, do not take the porcelain work, the director as the most core gatekeeper of the quality of a film, need to have a unique creativity, outstanding talent, comprehensive industry knowledge, diligent and tenacious quality, if their own ability is insufficient but hard to sit in the director's chair, not only may lead to "disaster" works, the goodwill accumulated in the audience's hearts will also face overturning. The cross-border directorial works of Guo Degang, Xiao Shenyang, He Jiong, Gao Xiaosong, Wu Kequn, Song Xiaobao and others have all been tragically complained about by the audience. Netizens "biting hedgehogs" said bluntly: "Professional things are best done by professional people, and it is difficult to strengthen themselves, which not only loses their reputation, but also suppresses many truly talented young directors." ”
Rao Shuguang, president of the China Film Critics Association, said that in the current environment, everyone can become a "famous director", the key lies in how much you are willing to pay for the film, whether you can have the professional ability and artistic wisdom of the film. At the same time, he also proposed that the success of cross-border directors is unpredictable in most cases, so the construction of Chinese film talents cannot put hope on occasional cross-border directors, but needs to build a perfect, scientific and differentiated film talent training and use system as soon as possible. "Many first-line film companies have reported that practitioners who have received systematic film and television and art higher education are 'good-looking' but not 'easy to use', so we may have to explore a new model of school education, practical education and 'set' education to meet the requirements of China's film development in the new era."
What do cross-border directors want to do, Jia Ling's previous answer is worthy of reference for all those who have a director's dream. She said: "I think anyone can be a director, as long as you can bear the burden of being a director. In the past, the audience could watch me for free, and now the audience has to spend money to go into the cinema to see me, if my movie is not filmed well, he will see my variety show in the future and feel 'Oh, I don't want to see this woman, she let me spend money to watch a bad movie, and I won't watch it in the future'. As long as you are mentally prepared for this, you can be a director. (Reporter Yuan Yun'er)