Out of the mix, sooner or later to pay back. Infernal Affairs II
[Why is it that in "Infernal Affairs II", the picture of Hong Kong's return to the motherland should be added, what is the significance? 】
Released on December 12, 2002, Infernal Affairs is known as the rescue work of Hong Kong cinema in the cold winter, and it is also a landmark masterpiece of Hong Kong police films in the new century.
Later, in 2003, a prequel and a sequel were released successively, forming a trilogy series with an average score of nearly 8.6 points on Douban, which was higher than the "Hero's True Colors" series and the "Ghost of a Woman" series.
The story of "Infernal Affairs" mainly takes place in 2002, and the two protagonists of Andy Lau Liang Chaowei began to go undercover in 1991, full of 12 years undercover, two three years and three years.
The story of Infernal Affairs II takes place between 1991 and 2002 and focuses on three time periods: 1991, 1995 and 1997.
The story of "Infernal Affairs 3" is after 2002, focusing on chen Yongren's sacrifice and Liu Jianming's undercover identity being completely exposed, between the two time points.
In "Infernal Affairs II", the most meaningful paragraph is the addition of a shot of Hong Kong's return to the motherland at the end, and the Hong Kong police change their police badges and epaulettes.
Then the new gang boss Han Chen, sadly looking at his wife's photo, turned around and poured into the crowd celebrating the return to greet the arrival of the new century.
The "Infernal Affairs" series is obviously an anti-black and anti-drug police film with undercover as the core, why is it meaningful to add the picture of Hong Kong's return to Hong Kong in "Infernal Affairs II"?
Infernal Affairs II was released in Hong Kong, China on October 1, 2003, and Chinese mainland on November 1, 2003. Between the release of Infernal Affairs and Infernal Affairs II, a big thing happened.
On 29 June 2003, the Mainland and Hong Kong signed the Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement, which allows Hong Kong films to be no longer subject to the restrictions on the amount of films to be introduced, and can now enter the mainland market in the form of co-productions, and a new era of Hong Kong films has come.
Prior to this, Hong Kong films, like other foreign films, were subject to quotas for screening in mainland theaters. At that time, the mainland could also see a lot of Hong Kong films, in fact, the main thing to see was pirated DVDs, real cinema movies, such as 1995's "Red Fan District" and "Journey to the West", which were only a few.
After that, as long as Hong Kong films join a few mainland actors or other important staff, they can become co-productions and enter the mainland market for release without restrictions on quotas.
In other words, Hong Kong films are no longer just targeting Hong Kong and southeast Asia, but have gained access to the entire Chinese mainland market.
For Hong Kong films, this is tantamount to a major change of return.
The two "Infernal Affairs" sequels have joined the mainland film production and distribution company, "Infernal Affairs II" has mainland actor Hu Jun participating, and "Infernal Affairs 3: Ultimate Infinity" has mainland film emperors Chen Daoming and Huang Zhizhong joining.
Therefore, in "Infernal Affairs II", the picture of Hong Kong's return to the motherland is an echo of this event.
"Infernal Affairs II" made a good start for the co-production between the two places, but the mainland box office that year was not good, only 8 million, and "Infernal Affairs 3" ranked 6th at the box office because it starred Andy Lau.
In 2004, the box office champion in mainland China was Stephen Chow's "Kung Fu", which was 173 million; Andy Lau's "Ten Faces Ambush" and "No Thief in the World" ranked 2nd and 3rd respectively.
Since then, film cooperation between the two places has become more and more frequent, but the effect is not very satisfactory. Because of the mainland's film censorship system, Hong Kong films have added a lot of restrictions on content creation.
In 2004, there were 32 hong Kong-mainland co-productions, almost half of the annual production of Hong Kong films that year; in 2005, the number of co-productions began to decrease significantly, especially in Hong Kong films, where there were almost no cops and gangsters; in 2006, there were only 18 co-productions.
So, there is a sentence in the poster of Infernal Affairs II:
Although "Infernal Affairs II" is a gangster police film, the content elements are far more simple than gangsters and police gangsters.
The newly added Wu Zhenyu became the male protagonist, and the second generation of the gangster Ni Yongxiao, played by him, was the biggest attraction and surprise of the whole film, and many fans liked "Infernal Affairs II", all because of him.
From Ni Yongxiao's point of view, "Infernal Affairs II" is a gangster film.
Wu Zhenyu is a recognized acting school, who has been nominated for the Hong Kong Academy Awards 5 times, but unfortunately has not won an award so far. In 2000 and 2004, when Wu Zhenyu had the best chance of winning the Academy Award, he lost to Andy Lau.
In 2000, Andy Lau was named the film emperor with "Dark War", and Wu Zhenyu was the golden horse award film emperor that year, and his work was "Gunfire".
However, at that Academy Awards, Wu Zhenyu nominated the film emperor for "BurstIng Criminal Police", "Gunfire" did not even have a film emperor nomination, and the best director was Du Qifeng of "Gunfire".
In 2004, Wu Zhenyu of "Infernal Affairs II" was recognized as a big hit, but still lost to Andy Lau of "Big Guy".
The film emperor who won the Hong Kong Film Awards should not only talk about strength, but also talk about fate.
Wu Zhenyu of "Infernal Affairs II" can't get the movie emperor, and it seems that like the character Ni Yongxiao in the movie, he didn't lose in strength, he lost in life.
At the beginning of the story of "Infernal Affairs II", the Hong Kong gangster leader Ni Kun was assassinated, and for a time the community was leaderless, and the five divisional big brothers, in addition to Han Chenzhong, played by Zeng Zhiwei, the other four big brothers were each pregnant with a ghost fetus and decided to join forces against the Ni family.
As a result, ni Yongxiao, the second generation of the black generation, easily got the four big brothers out of the way; taking advantage of the unseemly pain points between the four people, they broke each of them, and even the police who monitored him all night praised his methods.
After this night, Ni Yongxiao successfully ascended to the throne, and the gang world in Hong Kong was still the Ni family.
Four years later, in 1995, Ni Yongxiao, who had a solid foundation and strong financial resources, began to clean up the five eldest brothers under the door, in addition to the four who wanted to oppose at that time, including the loyal Han Chen.
Because Ni Yongxiao found out that his father was sent by Han Chen's wife to assassinate him, and it was Liu Jianming, an undercover agent sent by Han Chen to the police force.
The four eldest brothers were successfully eradicated, Han Chen's wife was also killed, and the senior inspector played by Hu Jun was killed by the car of Inspector Huang Zhicheng played by Huang Qiusheng; only Han Chen escaped the disaster, but could only wander in Thailand.
Even the police undercover played by Zhang Yaoyang was eliminated by Ni Yongxiao.
After this night, Ni Yongxiao's gangster world was more stable.
Soon, Ni Yongxiao began to learn to speak Mandarin, washed his underworld career white, and actively developed into politics.
At this time, Han Chen and Huang Zhicheng, who were far away in Thailand, began to cooperate, and he was willing to be a tainted witness to testify against Ni Yongxiao, so Ni Yongxiao's invitation to attend the return dinner was withdrawn, and his qualification as a consultant candidate was revoked.
On the eve of his return, Ni Yongxiao was headshot at a food stall, and even his family, who immigrated to Canada early, was shoveled by Thailand' helpers.
In 6 years, the Ni family, the largest gangster family in Hong Kong, has been uprooted, and Hong Kong has entered a new era from the inside out.
Ni Yongxiao, who represented the old era, was replaced, which was a historical necessity and his destiny.
However, the story is far from over.
Han Chen gradually took over the Ni family's turf, became the new boss, and became a partner with the new drug lord in Thailand; the undercover Chen Yongren and Liu Jianming have not yet been exposed, and the task is there.
[In 1992, Zeng Zhiwei won the Academy Award for Film Emperor with "Tale of Two Cities" and defeated the popular "Lame Hao" Lu Liangwei, who really has the fate of a film emperor. 】
The six years in the story of "Infernal Affairs II" are not only the key years for the rapid decline of Hong Kong films from the peak of glory, but also the most turbulent years for hong Kong citizens.
In 1991, the floods in eastern China caused Hong Kong's 6 million citizens to show all solidarity and patriotism in disaster relief; however, by 1993, it quickly entered the peak of the immigration wave.
In the decade before 1997, more than 300,000 Hong Kongers emigrated abroad, mostly middle-class, most of them to Canada. [Xu Guanjie moved overseas in 1992, and Zhou Xingchi also wanted to immigrate to Canada, but was rejected for special reasons.] 】
Miraculously, ten years later, in 2003, when "Infernal Affairs II" was released, There was a clear wave of immigration in Hong Kong.
On the one hand, after the return of Hong Kong, although it has experienced a round of catastrophic financial storms and soaring housing prices, Hong Kong can continue to be stable and prosperous, and still have better development; at the same time, life in countries such as Canada and other immigrant destination countries is very comfortable, but it is not suitable for career development.
Therefore, the immigration mentality of Hong Kong people in the past and the mentality of embracing the return of Hong Kong people shown in "Infernal Affairs II" are also the desire and struggle of Hong Kong filmmakers for the entire Chinese mainland film market.
Since this time, a large number of Hong Kong filmmakers have developed northwards, and Hong Kong films have gradually integrated into Chinese films; Chinese films have also rapidly developed from a box office of 100 million yuan to a scale of 5 billion yuan.
This is indeed the best time for Hong Kong cinema, and it is also the worst era.
[Out of the mix, sooner or later to pay back.] 】