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Chapter 602 Nolan's Visit
In the beginning, the Lunar New Year stalls started in early December and continued until before the Chinese New Year. There was no concept of Spring Festival stalls before—who would watch movies during the New Year?

Later, with the development of the market, the competition for Lunar New Year films became more and more fierce, and more and more blockbuster films were released at the end of the year.

After the Spring Festival stalls were developed, the Lunar New Year stalls were further extended.

Developed to the present, the Lunar New Year stalls generally start from mid-to-late November-special years will even start earlier from early November and last until early March.

And this year's Lunar New Year file is the most special.

This year's Chinese New Year is very late, February 2th is the first day of the new year, making this year's longest New Year's Eve festival in history, as long as 19 days!
And this year's Lunar New Year file competition is unprecedentedly fierce.

Directors Xu Ke, Wu Baige, and Jiang Wen competed on the same stage. Jackie Chan, Zhou Runfa, Ge You, Liang Jiahui, Chen Kun, Tong Liya, Li Bingbing, Liu Jialin, Zhou Gongzi, Huang Xiaoming, etc. all had works screened.

However, the four major mainland directors - Zhang Yimou, Cheng Yu'an, Chen Kaige and Feng Xiaogang - will continue to be absent from the Lunar New Year festival collectively this year!
They were not there during the Lunar New Year holiday last year.

It is precisely because of the longest Lunar New Year stalls in history that this year’s Lunar New Year stalls only started at the end of November – with Zhou Gongzi’s "The Best Life for a Coquettish Woman" and Wu Baige's "Peace Wheel".

And almost the entire November file was inexplicably vacated.

Leave it to Yu Wei's "Super Body" and the upcoming "Interstellar".

"Super Body" also knew that after "Interstellar" was released, there was no way out for it. Fortunately, "Super Body" performed well in China. It was released for 20 days, and the total box office exceeded 3.5 million!
Make a lot of money remotely!
Nolan and Matthew McConaughey flew to China a few days ago to launch a promotion with Liu Yifei, which made the audience hooked.

In his spare time, Nolan also went to the preparatory team of "The Wandering Earth". He was very curious about how Cheng Yu'an would make a sci-fi film.

But after watching the preparations for "The Wandering Earth", he was a little disappointed, and it seemed to be no different from his filming.

However, he is very interested in the two new 4K 3D IMAX cameras newly arrived by the crew (the other four will be delivered together early next year).

He himself uses the old model, and he is reluctant to buy the latest model from IMAX.

"Cheng, these two cameras are so beautiful!"

It wasn't just Nolan. When the two cameras came to the crew, Cheng Yu'an and Qin Ranqiu's eyes were straightened.

From outsiders' perspective, these two machines may seem silly, but in the eyes of the director and cameraman, they are undoubtedly their muses.

This line, this texture, feels more comfortable than touching your own wife.

Cheng Yu'an has spent most of the past two days getting familiar with these two machines, and he has never played with a camera of this specification.

This kind of machine is not difficult for professionals to get familiar with, and it can be played in ten days and a half months.

Nolan said excitedly: "You must rent this machine to me in the future."

Cheng Yu'an smiled and said, "I'm afraid it won't work. I don't have a schedule for three years behind my camera, and it has already been reserved."

Yuan Yuan bought six cameras in one go, and many production crews in China have their eyes on these guys and want to rent them.

Not all crews are as generous as "The Wandering Earth", buying six state-of-the-art cameras for filming.

Anyway, "The Wandering Earth" didn't start up so quickly, so it's better to rent it out temporarily than to leave it alone.

Nolan also looked at some conceptual design drawings of "The Wandering Earth".

Nolan is a sci-fi expert and a good friend of Cheng Yu'an. The crew designer doesn't need to keep him so secret, and even wants him to raise some opinions.

After all, it is clear to the bystanders that Nolan can not guarantee what good ideas he can come up with from the perspective of an outsider.

Nolan said with a smile: "Cheng is the best director, I have nothing to say."

But when he saw the design draft of the navigator space station robot Moss, he frowned, feeling familiar.

Cheng Yu'an also knew that he had noticed it, and took the initiative to explain: "It's very familiar."

Nolan has one thing in common with Cheng Yu'an, their movie enlightenment is Kubrick's "2001 A Space Odyssey".

Nolan recalled watching "2001: A Space Odyssey" when he was seven years old and said: "I will never forget that viewing experience, because that film brought me into another world in an almost impossible way. .”

Therefore, Nolan felt familiar when he saw Moss' design draft at this time.

The prototype of Moss is the intelligent robot Hal 2001 in "9000: A Space Odyssey".
The image of Hal 9000 seems very monotonous now - just a red dot.

But this image gives people a very scary feeling in the film, staring at you like a human eye, and the voice is cold and restrained, giving people a monotonous and eerie feeling.

This red-eyed image was also paid tribute to "Robot Story" in 2008. The prototype of Alter is also Hal 9000.
Of course, Cheng Yu'an and his team also chose to pay tribute to their idols.

Nolan said with a smile: "When I look at any robot now, I don't have the same feeling as when I looked at Hal 9000."

"2001: A Space Odyssey" has had as much influence on sci-fi movies as "Sherlock Holmes" has had on detective novels.

Later generations of authors have written more exciting stories and created more moving characters, but all this comes from "2001: A Space Odyssey".

Nolan continued: "Cheng, I have an idea. I'm going to fix 2001: A Space Odyssey."

"Oh?" Cheng Yu'an also became interested, "Is it restored to 4K?"

"No," Nolan said, "The charm of "2001: A Space Odyssey" is not in 4K, but in 70mm film. I want to restore the quality of this movie half a century ago. Do you want to do it with me?"

Cheng Yu'an is very interested, but his time does not allow: "I'm sorry, I also want to help, but I really don't have time here. You must send me a copy after you repair it."

"of course can."

Nolan visited "The Wandering Earth" for half an hour, and he was very impressed by the generosity of Chinese movies:
"You have successfully resisted Hollywood's encroachment. Local films can also make such a large investment without fear of losing money. The British domestic market is too small, and a large part of it is occupied by Hollywood. In the UK, directors want to make such a large local production. It cannot attract investment.”

Cheng Yu'an said: "This is due to China's vast territory and huge population. Our population can support us to build more theaters."

"We have less than 4000 screens in the UK, and the annual growth is too slow." The number of screens in the UK only grows slowly at a rate of 500 yuan a year, and sometimes stagnates.

"The movie tickets in the UK are too expensive." Cheng Yu'an complained.

Speaking of this, Nolan smiled wryly: "The high ticket price makes many British people prefer to watch TV rather than go to the cinema, and we have nothing to do about it."

According to statistics, British movie ticket prices are the highest in the world, not one of them.

The average fare is over $20!In high places, the ticket price even reaches 27 US dollars.

This ticket price is considered too expensive by British film industry analysts: "(Watching movies) is no longer the same as the previous generation, and it is not a cheap pastime."

Nolan is not soft when he complains about his own country: "The British population is too small to spread the cost of theaters. Both the producers and the theaters are profitable, so they can only increase ticket prices.

"The government doesn't pay much attention to movies, and the money is spent on energy consumption and utility bills every year. It would be great if the UK could pay as much attention to movies as France and China do."

Nolan and Cheng Yuan talked while walking.

The two stayed in the "Wandering Earth" preparatory team for half an hour before Cheng Yu'an sent Nolan back.

(End of this chapter)