Reporter Lin Yiru/Taipei News
The whole drama of "Hua Lantern Chu Shang" is divided into a trilogy with a total of 24 episodes, and the main creative team invited Admiralty screenwriter Du Zhengzhe and the film director Lian Yiqi to spend four years preparing the script and spending tens of millions of dollars on live shooting. Selected for the 2021 Golden Horse Film Festival Mystery Field, the world premiere was held on November 22, lucky audiences can preemptively see the first two episodes on the big screen, chief producer and actress Lin Xinru, director Lian Yiqi, and Admiralty screenwriter Du Zhengzhe were invited to participate in the screening, Lin Xinru said: "It is a great honor and happiness that "The First Light" can become the first film collection of the Golden Horse Mystery Field, and I am also looking forward to watching the film with you in front of the big screen."
Lin Xin, the chief producer and heroine of "The First Light", has a breakthrough performance. (Photo: Courtesy of Netflix and BaiYu Digital)
Lin Xinru has been conceiving the story of "The Beginning of the Lantern" after the production of "16 Summers" that year, and in the past six or seven years, it has slowly gone from the prototype to the finished product step by step, and there has been a blank period in the middle, until four years ago, when the complete story and pre-work were officially launched, to the shooting, and now it is about to be broadcast, at first did not think that it would be on the international platform, and now hopes that the global audience can see this work.
Lin Xinru plays the hotel mother Sang. (Photo: Courtesy of Netflix and BaiYu Digital)
Admiralty screenwriter Du Zhengzhe said: "'The Beginning of the Lantern' is a subject that has not been tried in the past, the challenge is very large, in addition to the suspense that the genre drama should have, I want to let the audience see the life of 1988 in the play, six young ladies and six lives, each paragraph must be wonderful and beautiful, it is the most difficult to write and the most wonderful part of this play." Director Lian Yiqi said: "Little Du Ge's script is very rich in content, coupled with the large number of episodes and actors this time, there is a feeling of eating and eating full, which is very satisfying." Lian Yiqi, whose work spans films and albums, believes that the biggest gain is to learn more shooting skills, "The production team and staff in the shooting and post-production are very strong, and I feel as if I have become a little more powerful."
"The First Up of the Lights" director Lian Yiqi. (Photo: Courtesy of Netflix and BaiYu Digital)
Actress Lin Xinru and Admiralty screenwriter Du Zhengzhe, director Lian Yiqi are working together again, as an actor, Lin Xinru feels that the greatest sense of security also comes from the two, she said: "Xiao Du is a screenwriter who knows me very well, a good friend, he knows that I want to do more impossible challenges, so I spent a lot of effort on the script, and I am also very careful in all the character design; Xiao Lian has also been challenging the limits of my performance, he hopes that I can break through myself, break the original framework, and become a new Luo Yunong." Director Lian Yiqi, who is busy with post-production work, said with a smile: "From shooting and editing to post-dimming, I have been staring at the ladies who are like "light" in the play, and I seem to have looked at my wife's time, and I have not looked at my heart for as long as I have."
Du Zhengzhe (middle), the screenwriter of "The First Rise of the Lantern". (Photo: Courtesy of Netflix and BaiYu Digital)
Assembling the strong and powerful Kashi, Lin Xinru led by Yang Youning, Yang Jinhua, Feng Xiaoyue, Zhang Xuanrui, Guo Xuefu, Liu Pinyan, Xie Xinying, Xie Qiongnuan, Zhang Guangchen, Xiu Jiekai, Kaga Michijiu, Jiang Yirong and others. The story describes the "light" Japanese-style hotel led by Luo Yunong (Lin Xinru) and Su Qingyi (Yang Jinhua), two mothers, Sang, where the ladies share happiness and hardship and play every scene, they meet their own love, and they are suspicious in the colorful passages, but they are also involved in a criminal case of a bottomless nameless corpse. On November 26, Netflix launched exclusively worldwide.