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On June 5, 1984, in Beijing, Hong Kong director Li Hanxiang walked into the home of a mysterious woman.
His sudden arrival, the purpose is simple -
I want to be able to find first-hand information about a film I'm going to make, and this woman is crucial.
After several long conversations, the woman was touched by Li Hanxiang's sincerity, and the end head agreed with Li Hanxiang's idea, and entrusted him with the agency rights and interests of all the information and works of her husband and her husband.
This woman is not simple, she is the wife of the last emperor "Puyi", Li Shuxian, and at this time Li Hanxiang is preparing to make a biopic about Puyi.
After receiving Li Shuxian's approval, Li Hanxiang rushed to the northeast without stopping, visited Puyi's former concubine Li Yuqin, and obtained many first-hand information from Li Baoqin that Puyi was little known about.
The use of these materials has laid the foundation for the film to better restore the original historical appearance...
In 1985, the film officially began filming, called "Fire Dragon" (Note: Why is it called "Fire Dragon", Pico later explained)
In terms of cast, Li Hanxiang's beloved apprentice Liang Jiahui played the male lead, playing Puyi after the transformation of New China in the film.
The heroine Li Shuxian, Li Hanxiang originally wanted To let Liu Xiaoqing play, but I am afraid that the image and temperament are different, so in the end I chose Pan Hong, who is more suitable.
Pan Hong is 4 years older than Liang Jiahui, and Li Shuxian is actually 19 years younger than Puyi, but in the film, she relies on the excellent acting skills and makeup of the two to make up for this deficiency.
Empress Wanrong and Li Yuqin, the Fugui, were played by Li Hanxiang's two daughters, Li Dianlang and Li Dianxin.
In order to maximize the pursuit of authenticity, under the continuous efforts of Li Hanxiang, the two addresses that appear in the film can be selected to be filmed at the original site where Puyi lived and operated before his death.
The two addresses are —)
His former residence was No. 40, Dongguanying Hutong, Xicheng District, Beijing, and his work place was the compound of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.
The film describes Puyi's experience in the first half of his life, and leaves all the ink and color on the second half of Puyi's life.
In 1945, after Japan's surrender, Puyi was reformed as a war criminal at the Fushun War Criminals Management Center.
In the summer of 1955, Li Yuqin, a rich man who had once been Puyi, came to the management office and met Puyi, who had been away for 10 years.
She did not have much affection for Puyi, and divorced Puyi two years later.
In December 1959, Puyi was pardoned, and the following year he returned to Beijing with a letter of introduction from the Beijing Civil Affairs Bureau, where he found a job at the Botanical Garden of the Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and lived as an ordinary worker.
Later, under the guidance of his friends Sha Zengxi and Zhou Zhenqiang, Puyi met Li Shuxian, a nurse at Jingshan Clinic.
Puyi confessed that when he was in the palace before, he did not understand what kind of relationship should be between husband and wife, and his wife was a decoration for him, and he never knew what love was, until he met Li Shuxian, he did not know the existence of true feelings in the world.
In 1962, Puyi and Li Shuxian married, and in October 1967, Puyi died of kidney cancer, which experienced 5 years in between, but it was the sweetest time in his life.
Therefore, the film uses heavy brush and ink to portray the hardships of life and the changes of the situation that the two have experienced together in the past 5 years.
In the five years after marriage, as the last emperor, although he has been transformed over the years, Puyi's body still has many personality characteristics that are different from ordinary people.
He is timid, cowardly, autistic, withdrawn, poorly self-reliant, needs to be taken care of by others, and what is worse, although he likes children very much and often plays with them, he has lost his fertility.
Li Shuxian and Puyi got along for a long time, and gradually found themselves becoming Puyi's nanny, returning home from work every day, and having to take on heavy housework, and increasingly unable to support it.
Therefore, Li Shuxian often feels very wronged, and when he is angry, he even thinks about divorcing him and leaving.
In order to save this relationship, Puyi also made a lot of efforts, he began to learn to wash and cook, took the initiative to share the housework for Li Shuxian, although he was busy at the beginning, but also slowly got started, which made Li Shuxian also very moved.
Although the two people did not have children, but the life together is also very happy, Puyi will take Li Shuxian to the Forbidden City to play, pointing to the buildings, such as several family treasures to tell his previous stories in the palace.
During the movement, Li Yuqin, who lived in the northeast, was affected, but Puyi was spared because of the key protection.
Puyi's body was deteriorating, and in the last years, in order not to let Li Yuqin be affected by the identity of the imperial family, he wrote a letter to the relevant departments in the northeast and cleared the relationship between the two.
Although he was a confused emperor in the first half of his life, and he also ruthlessly ordered the second concubine of the palace maid around him to kill the illegitimate daughter of Empress Wanrong, Puyi in the second half of his life has always lived in pain and self-blame.
But the appearance of Li Shuxian brought warmth and vitality to the last 5 years of Puyi's life, transforming him from an emperor distorted by identity and power into a normal person with flesh and blood and feelings.
In the film, like the "Western Empress" trilogy, it focuses on the power struggle of the feudal dynasty, but it is as close as possible to the truth, and Puyi is represented and shaped as an ordinary person, which is the cleverness of director Li Hanxiang.
Although the film is only 92 minutes long, the length and scale are far lower than Bernardo Bertolucci's 219-minute "The Last Emperor", but "Fire Dragon" has its own special meaning.
He let us see a more "human" Puyi after the reform of the big era, although he was downcast and cowardly, but in this era, he had a self.
Leung Ka Fai's amazing performance also made him the first Hong Kong actor to bring Puyi to life. Before filming began, he flipped through tens of thousands of copies
Information, professionalism is admirable.
Compared with the latecomer Zun Long, his version, he played the unknown side of Puyi's life, more grounded.
Zun Long
The subtitle of the title of "Fire Dragon" is very long, called "The Last Emperor - The Second Half of the Life of Ai Xinjue Luo Puyi", but why is it called "Fire Dragon"?
In fact, it is very simple and rude, because the feudal emperor is called "dragon", Puyi died on October 17, 1967, after which the body chose to be cremated, becoming the only "fire dragon" in Chinese history.
Text/Pippi Film Editorial Department: Bloody Dan Heart
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