In 2005, Zhu Yanping, who had been the director of Taiwan's most successful commercial films.
With Wu Zongxian, Wu Mengda, Zeng Zhiwei, Lin Xinru, Xuecun and others in the mainland, he casually filmed "Two Birds with One Stone".
As a result, the box office revenue was 16 million yuan, which was equivalent to hundreds of times the box office of the same type of Chinese films in Taiwan in the same period.
Because as early as 2001, there was no local film in Taiwan that could exceed 200,000 yuan at the box office.
Zhu Yanping smiled happily.
Entering the 21st century, due to the rapid growth of the mainland film market (compound annual growth rate of more than 30% per year) and the rise of mainland capital.
The trend of "gold panning" in the north of the Hong Kong and Taiwan showbiz circles has become more and more obvious, and the most exaggerated time is that TVB once "empty nested", and after seeing The Emperor, they have "fled" -
In 2011, Norma Lin announced the termination of her contract with TVB, Lin Feng in 2014, Hu Xing'er in 2015, and Chen Hao in 2018.
Hong Kong directors are even worse, Xu Ke, Chen Kexin, Liu Weiqiang, Er Dongsheng and others have hardly made pure Hong Kong films in the past decade.
Among the Taiwanese directors, Zhu Yanping can be called the "first person" to go north on Baodao Island.
Zhu Yanping
As early as 2000, Zhu Yanping shifted the focus of his work to the mainland.
Directed by Zhao Wei, who was popular all over the country at that time for "Huan Zhu Gege", and Wu Qilong, who could continue to eat the old book of the Little Tigers in the mainland, starred in "The Heroine Breaks into the Heavens".
In the following 10 years, actor-turned-director Niu Chengze, "Meteor Garden" director Lin Helong, "Leper Hero" director Cai Yuexun and other people have gone north.
Niu Chengze
Even Hou Xiaoxian could not be "exempt from vulgarity", and in 2015, he filmed "Assassin Nie Yinniang" under the operation of mainland capital.
Chen Guofu, a director who was once on a par with Yang Dechang and Hou Xiaoxian, became a producer after he moved to the mainland, such as films that are very familiar to mainland audiences.
"No Thief in the World", "Tangshan Earthquake", "Assembling Number", "Di Renjie Series", "The Sound of the Wind", and "Finding the Dragon" are all from his hands.
In Feng Xiaogang's original words: The real supervision system of mainland films begins with Chen Guofu, who will give very specific opinions on the script.
Chen Guofu
But
Taiwanese directors, who were still "quite popular" in the mainland film market in the first decade of the 21st century, soon fell into collective "anxiety" in the next decade.
Chen Guofu's "Di Renjie" series was pressed the pause button because of losing money.
The films directed by Zhu Yanping after 2010 have hardly made much money, and "Big House Man" starring Xiao Jingteng, Jiang Shuying, Xie Na and Dapeng only received 1.34 million at the box office.
Cheng Weihao's film "Soul Hunting" is estimated to have a box office of 111 million, and it is difficult to return the cost.
Chen Yixian directed the 400 million yuan racing movie "The Storm", which was personally funded and participated by Jay Chou, integrated cross-strait capital, and served as a supervising producer and guest starred.
It is Zhou Dong's big Chinese production that supports his wife Kunling.
As a result, Douban scored 4.5 points, losing nearly 400 million at the box office with 5.029 million.
"The Storm" is also a film starring Kunling in zhou Dong's cameo
In the May Day 2021 show, there is another movie called "Secret Visitor", which was called "Cruel Concentration Camp" before its release.
Because the starring Duan Yihong, Aaron Kwok, in recent years, the works have either played a fierce man who has made a stick to the end, or a hidden ultimate BOSS.
The "origins" of the two children in the film are also cruel:
"Tang Detective" series of "slight smile is very maddening" Si Nuo - Zhang Zifeng.
"The Hidden Corner" "I'm just good at math" Zhu Chaoyang - Rong Zishan.
Therefore, the market is generally optimistic about this film.
Director Chen Zhengdao from Treasure Island Taiwan described his new work as a "new type of soft suspense film".
But the result?
"Secret Visitor" Douban scored 5.7 points, and ended with less than 190 million at the box office in the most important movie slot of the year, May 1.
Word-of-mouth box office double hit.
Many viewers said they were confused after watching it, and finally had to repair the movie-watching experience from the film critics' interpretation articles.
For a theatrical commercial film, failure is written on the face.
Chen Zhengdao is currently a representative figure of Taiwanese directors in the mainland, who has previously made a name for himself with suspense films, and his previous works "Master of Hypnosis" and "Master of Memory" are among the best works in the same type of Chinese films.
But it also did not escape the "decline" and "box office poison" of Taiwanese directors in the mainland market.
Two reasons:
First, in the end, it is still "unsatisfactory".
Compared with mainland directors, Taiwanese directors have a more international vision in their early years and have a deeper understanding of the performance of the local film market under the impact of Hollywood.
Therefore, at the beginning of the 21st century, they imported more entertaining Western-style commercial genre films, which are products that mainland directors can't do well and that mainland audiences urgently need.
Hence the popularity.
However, the market is not static, and the mainland film market has become a national film world from Hollywood domination in the past five or six years.
Look at the top five box office in the mainland today, one water domestic production, four of which are not yet the director's works from the class.
What works are more popular in the market?
Works with an innovative spirit, can generate great empathy with mainland audiences, and form a topic effect.
But this is precisely the weakness of Hong Kong and Taiwan directors, especially Taiwanese directors.
Because they did not grow up in Sisi, the accumulated life experience in the past is not suitable for building empathy with mainland audiences, so it is easy to "detach from reality".
Adapted from a soft science fiction novel, "Soul Hunting" also has the problem of not being able to handle well in reality and in the air
For example, Chen Zhengdao's "Secret Visitor".
Some netizens said bluntly:
"Such an alternate story....."
Yes, the biggest problem with the story alone is not that it doesn't make sense, but that it's too detached from reality, an aristocratic school out of thin air, a society out of thin air.
It is easy to lack power without reality.
Chen Zhengdao said "soft suspense", point solution?
It is not to throw the stimulation elements directly on the audience's face, but to bring the audience a longer aftertaste and thinking through the "audiovisual language" of the film and the story itself.
However, without the emotional bondage of the real space, this aftertaste is very reluctant, or only exists in the director's "delusion".
Some people may say that "Parasite" is not also quite "overhead"?
But "Parasite" hits the pain point of Korean society, exaggeration does not mean unrealistic, on the contrary, its core is very realistic and expressed clearly and strongly in Korean society.
In fact, looking back at the Taiwanese films of the past few years, "Lonely Taste", "Classmate Mai Nasi", "Silent", "Dear Tenant" have a very distinct social reality.
For example, "Dear Tenant" focuses on the transformation of the social adoption system.
"Silent" is based on 164 real campus sexual assault incidents in a school in Tainan from 2004 to 2012.
On the mainland's realistic themes, the scale of the topic selection is difficult for them to grasp, and they are inherently inferior in cognition than mainland directors.
In order to avoid trouble, many times the script will be set up.
This makes Taiwanese directors more inclined to make some commercial films in the mainland.
Second, the tool man under the coercion of capital
Some say one movie ticket, half a capital bureau.
The influence of capital on mainland films in the past 10 years is self-evident.
Compared with mainland directors, most Hong Kong and Taiwan directors have played the role of tool people under this system.
Because they can ensure the completion of production under capital needs.
For example, capital feels that a certain actor and an actress will make money in the hottest themes of the moment, and then it needs a person who can save these "profit elements".
Around 2008, because of Jay Chou's transformation of the film industry, the huge topicality.
Capital urgently needs Chinese blockbusters starring Jay Chou.
Therefore, Zhu Yanping, who understands Taiwanese artists and has rich experience in trading commercial genre films, was photographed.
He directed two films starring Zhou Dong in succession, "The Big Slam Dunk" and "Thorn Ling".
Looking at Chen Zhengdao again, if you open your resume, you will find that Chen Zhengdao, who is famous for making suspense films in the mainland, actually often shoots love films, and even "cross-border" TV series.
For example, remade from the Korean hit movie "Return to 20 Years Old", Lu Han, Yang Zishan, Gui Yalei, Chen Bailin, Zhao Lixin and other major actors are carefully matched by capital.
Coupled with the original story that is not wrong, only an obedient and capable director is needed to land.
Chen Zhengdao's diversity has allowed him to successfully win the position of director.
After 2012, as a popular industry, Tencent, Wanda, and Ali have entered the film.
Under the tools, there are naturally more routines and gimmicks, and less aura and charm.
Because film is an art after all, the more utilitarian it is, the more difficult it is to polish a first-class work.
"Wolf Warrior 2", "Hello, Li Huanying", "Nezha", "The Wandering Earth" Although they all have routines, they also have their own anti-routines.
Surprise the audience and fulfill its box office myth.
Taiwanese directors in the mainland, many times as "tool people", it seems that they do not have the right to speak against the routine.
But really not?
Chen Zhengdao said in an interview:
"Recently, when I returned to Taiwan, someone asked me how to be grounded if I developed in the mainland? I don't think you have to be grounded, first of all, you have to learn to respect the audience here, I am getting better and better with my friends in Beijing, and then I found that everyone pays the same attention to love, to family affection, to fear, and to many things. ”
There's a difference between respecting and figuring out what you like in my comfort zone and what I want to do that you really like.
In order to shoot "Dear", Chen Kexin spent several years to deeply understand the parents who were orphaned, collect information, and match the right actors.
In the end, he won the box office and became the most adaptable Hong Kong director in the mainland market.
"Young You", Zeng Guoxiang has successfully integrated the realistic themes of the mainland and the skillful expression techniques of Hong Kong directors' genre films.
It became one of the most influential works of Chinese film in 2019.
Finally, a sentence comes to mind: the more utilitarian and instrumental rationality, the more difficult it is to make a good movie.
There is not much time left for Taiwanese directors who are working the mainland.
Text/Porco Rosso Watch Movie Editorial Department: The Doctor does not draw silk
(Image from network infringement deleted)