In the just-concluded National Day file, the live-action movie "Pipilu and Rusisi's Canned Villain" has won many praises from parents and children with its imaginative fairy tale plot and thought-provoking educational core, standing out from the five children's films released in the National Day file and becoming the box office champion of children's films during the period. The film is also the first time that the works of "Fairy Tale King" Zheng Yuanjie have been adapted into a long film. As of 8:00 a.m. on October 9, the box office of the film has exceeded 45 million yuan.
Looking back at the original intention of preparing for this children's film, the film director and screenwriter Yu Fei xiaoyan originally stemmed from the love of a father. In the summer of 2018, he took the second-grade children out to play, "children as big as them, watching movies is already a way of life, but the younger cartoons, they don't watch, love movies for adults, war movies are not suitable for them, it is very embarrassing, to the cinema did not pick the film." At that time, Yu Fei thought, first, this is a market gap, and second, he should make a movie for such a big child, such as "Thunderbolt Babe" and "The Atmosphere Disappears" that he once watched when he was a child.
The film retains the main characters and ideas of the original novel. Pipilu and Rusisi are twin siblings, Rusisi excels, pippiru is mischievous. One day, Rusisi found a strange can in his home, in which five little people only the height of matchsticks appeared, and Rusisi named them Doctor, Artist, Singer, Diplomat, and Captain. After meeting five canned villains, the siblings embark on a series of fantastic adventures...
The first half of the film is modified on the basis of the original work, and the last hour has more original plots. In this regard, Yu Fei believes that the audience is more concerned about not the changes to the original work, but more want a good movie. For example, the original work mainly explores the problem of "excellent students" and "backward students", but such a concept has long been outdated in current education. "Now our children go to school, the teachers are called baby, girl, which teacher dares to say that you are a 'bad child' and a 'backward student'?" However, good grades and poor grades are the most concerned issues for teachers and parents today. Today's teachers are very concerned about all children and hope that they can get into good middle schools and good universities. Yu Fei recalled that his child did not do well in one exam, and he said: "We like you so much, why don't you study hard?" As a result, the child asked: "If the grades are not good, do you still like me?" All of a sudden, Yu Fei was stunned. This sentence was written into the movie, asked by the parents from the mouth of Rusisi, and became a tear point for many children when watching the movie. The movie throws out the question of grades, but does not answer positively at the end, but just wants to say to children and parents: grades are important, but there are other important qualities to cherish.
Although the theme is closer to the present, the film is nostalgic in terms of art style, whether it is the layout of Lusisi's home or the costumes and props of the characters, they are full of the atmosphere of the 1980s. This is also a sense of overhead created by Yu Fei deliberately using retro style. "Because if you put this story in the present, then some of the contradictions and conflicts in the original book are not valid, and the first thing Pippiru and his mother resist is electronic products such as mobile phones and iPads, which is very strange." The second is the problem of realism, the closer to people's current lives, people do not believe it. If Rusisi is holding an iPad in his hand and a canned villain suddenly pops up next to him, it is not very credible. ”
Most of the young actors in the film were still in the first and second grades of primary school when shooting, and when shooting, they couldn't even recognize the words on the script, and they had to look up the dictionary one by one and note the pinyin to read the script. After the actors were finalized, the first thing Yu Fei did was to make demonstration recordings of the lines of each young actor, asking them to speak these lines in the rhythm, accent and logic used for fly reading, "Because some children can't speak clearly, so they must first read the lines to the extent that I read them, and then read the script together." ”
When performing officially, because it involves a large number of special effects of canned villains, many times it is a non-physical performance. In the confrontation between Lusisi, Pippiru and the five canned villains, Yu Fei needs to remember all their positions, movements, and eye contact behind the monitor, and also stare at their eyes and whether their movements are in place. "Children's emotional reactions are also particularly important, such as opening a can and finding that there is no meat and can't stop laughing, so you have to think of a real laugh." Later, they will also improve their performances. For example, there are a few scenes that are actually reversed, because the mood of the young actors is better than the positive effect. Sometimes the actor's performance is fast-paced, and we can make up for it by adding or subtracting frames. Yu Fei said that at least the performances of these small actors are all true feelings.