CEE started with Nortel lecturers

Chapter 299 An unexpected grand prize

"Okay, I'll go find someone to make arrangements." Chen Sicheng went to contact the person without stopping. He was more caring than Gu Zhongyu. After all, as long as this movie can win an award in Toronto, he will become the number one young director in the country. People!

He always felt good about himself and simply ignored that there was Guo Fan in front of him.

"Dear, although your idea is very good, I still want to remind you that this method is not new. Dark Horse Films used public opinion to build momentum and deliberately became popular to interfere with the film festival's evaluation. This kind of thing has happened before But you'd better temper your expectations."

As a veteran, Shalizi has seen all kinds of strange tricks used by film producers to win awards. Gu Zhongyu's idea will definitely not be hidden from the jury.

Gu Zhongyu shrugged: "It doesn't matter. I have always considered winning awards to be dispensable. Really good movies do not rely on the recognition of awards."

Just like the Golden Rooster Award selection before Gu Zhongyu traveled through time. As one of the three major Chinese awards, the Golden Rooster Award is one of the few in the country, and it can even be said to be the only professional award. Even though there have been controversies during previous award evaluations, the Golden Rooster Award still has a certain gold content.

But in which session, "The Legend of the Gods" received the most nominations, with a total of nine nominations, including Best Picture, Best Screenplay, Best Director and Best Supporting Actress. "Untitled" was second only to "Apotheosis" in the number of nominations, with a total of eight nominations, including Best Picture, Best Screenplay, Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor.

Behind these two films are "King of the Sky", which received five nominations; and "China Ping Pong" and "Universe Exploration Editorial", which received four nominations.

Yes, "China Ping Pong" was nominated for Best Director and Best Picture.

However, "The Wandering Earth 2", which was highly anticipated and received rave reviews, only received three nominations, namely Best Picture, Best Sound Recording and Best Art. Yes, you read that right. The number of nominations for "The Wandering Earth 2" is not as good as "Fengshen", not as good as "Unknown", and even not as good as "King of the Sky" and "China Ping Pong".

Moreover, among the three nominations for "The Wandering Earth 2", in addition to Best Picture, the other two are Best Sound Recording and Best Art, two awards that basically no one pays attention to.

When they first saw this list, many people even suspected that this list was forged by some bloggers in order to gain traffic. They simply did not believe that the Golden Rooster Awards jury was so outrageous, but in fact, the Golden Rooster Awards were just that outrageous.

Even though "Fengshen" is indeed a good movie, in the words of some netizens, "Fengshen" is just a good movie, while "The Wandering Earth 2" is a great movie. However, the experiences of these two films at the Golden Rooster Awards were completely opposite. It is also because of this reason that this topic has been at the top of the hot search list of XXXX for a long time, with a popularity of more than million.

The reason is actually very simple. "The Wandering Earth 2" is a symbol of the new film power, and director Guo Fan is also considered a representative of the new school of directors. His "alternativeness" has touched the cheese of some old scholars.

But will anyone think that "The Wandering Earth 2" is inferior to movies like "Fengshen" and "Unknown" because it won fewer awards?

Totally impossible!

The eyes of the public are sharp, and they will only spit at the jury and those movies that are seeking fame, and then turn around and promote "The Wandering Earth 2" to a higher position!

……

On the day of the awards ceremony, it was the turn of the red carpet that everyone loves to see. However, since the only Chinese films participating in Toronto were "Partners in China", "Man of Tai Chi", "Destiny" and "Watermark Street", there were only four familiar faces. Neither Chen Kexin nor Jia Zhangke, not even the female stars that Gu Zhongyu liked, were seen, and Fan Binbin didn't even come to caress behind the blanket.

"Hello Mr. Gu, I watched "Partners in China" written by you and Director Chen. It was quite good. This time's "The Invisible Guest" is also very interesting. If you have time, let's sit down and chat."

"Okay, definitely next time! Definitely next time!"

Gu Zhongyu did not expect that Jia Zhangke, who had always been unruly, would take the initiative to say hello to him when he arrived backstage.

Jia Zhangke is an old rebel. His films such as "Xiao Wu" and "Platform" all focus on in-depth exploration and criticism of real problems in domestic society, such as the decline of rural areas and the decline of the working class. Dilemma, etc., while shaping the story and characters, it also assumes a certain social responsibility and reveals the ugly side of real life.

Therefore, this guy’s movie basically has no chance of getting the domestic dragon label. It is said that as soon as the big bosses in the review department see his name on the list of producers, their first reaction is to reject it directly!

But don’t think that he won’t make money if he can’t release it. Foreigners are very convinced of Jia Zhangke’s account. He relies on foreign investment and then sells the copyright overseas to make profits; for example, in 2006’s "The Good Man from Three Gorges", the copyright sales It went to 75 countries and recovered more than 4000 million yuan in copyright fees, which was nearly 7 times the cost of filming; "Old Friends in Mountains and Rivers" invested more than 4000 million yuan, and the cost was recovered through overseas copyright pre-sales before it was released.

His first work "Xiao Wu" cost 38 yuan, but it directly earned more than 500 million yuan. That was 1998 million yuan in 500!

The same goes for the movie "Destiny" this time. It is prohibited from being released in China but has received numerous praises abroad. It just won the Best Screenplay Award at the 66th Cannes International Film Festival and was also selected into the BBC's top ten films of 2013.

Tsk, tsk, tsk, the BBC gave a Chinese movie one of the top ten best films. If you think about it carefully, you can also know what the story of this movie is. It perfectly conforms to foreigners' imagination of the living environment of Chinese people.

It is true that there is nothing wrong with making a movie to expose social reality, but Gu Zhongyu still sneered at this behavior of exposing one's own scars to please foreigners.

As the domestic film market develops, the so-called Chinese literary and artistic films represented by Jia Zhangke will slowly fade away in the European and American film industry, because now it is not difficult for domestic literary and artistic films to have a box office of over 10 million, and it is possible to achieve a box office of over 100 million. , the domestic shooting budget can be more than 10 million, while the European and American markets have not changed much in recent years.

She also needs to talk to him, since if we don't agree with each other, it's impossible for Gu Zhongyu to have anything to do with him.

Jia Zhang could see that Gu Zhongyu was perfunctory, so he lost interest in continuing the conversation. Chen Kexin got along well with him. When the two directors got together, it felt like they had a lot in common.

The performance at the opening ceremony was the well-known Canadian actress Avril Lavigne. She wore a black leather skirt, leather jacket and leather boots with her iconic smoky makeup. She was dressed like a punk girl and her hair was dyed colorful. This time The song "What the Hell" was sung: "You say that I'm messing with your head..."

“Yeah yeah yeah yeah…”

This song is good, but the makeup is too harsh on the eyes.

"What's wrong, dear, are you also interested in a girl like this?" Shalizi saw that Gu Zhongyu was listening seriously and thought he was interested in Avril.

"Why do you think so? I just think her outfit is too eye-catching, just like a little girl."

Shalizi chuckled: "I thought you were unsatisfied in the past two days and wanted to go hunting! I still want to remind you that the outside world said that Avril has a serious skin disease. Even if you want to find it, you have to be careful. Don't try to trick her, otherwise if you take off your clothes..."

"Is there such a thing?" The rumors from the outside are true, but it is not a skin disease. Avril Lavigne contracted Lyme disease due to insect bites, a zoonotic infectious disease, but because Avril Lavigne insisted at the beginning that I was not sick, but I delayed the best time for treatment, which resulted in me having to retire and recuperate for five full years.

Gu Zhongyu really had no interest in Avril, but now that he heard Shalizi say that she was sick, he couldn't help but think of Yao Beina, and he didn't know what the girl's current state of cultivation was.

In his previous life, Gu Zhongyu had always liked the singer Yao Beina. Unfortunately, the beauty died at a young age. Therefore, after they met by chance in 2005 and became friends, he was obsessed with Yao Beina, and they met every now and then. Just take care of her health in a roundabout way.

Because of this, Yao Beina always misunderstood that Gu Zhongyu wanted to chase her, but he really didn't mean it. He just wanted to save someone's life.

Fortunately, Huangtian paid off. Under Gu Zhongyu's frequent reminders, Yao Beina was diagnosed more than two years in advance. Because he was discovered early and treated in a timely manner, he has been resting peacefully in the past few years and hopes that he will not suffer from the disease again. It relapsed just like in the previous life.

After being reborn, you have to do something good. The feeling of saving someone's life is much more valuable than making a hit movie.

……

"An excellent movie can always reflect the various aspects of life..."

In the banquet hall of the InterContinental Hotel in Toronto, Film Festival Chairman Pierce Handlin and Artistic Director Cameron Bailey announced the winners of the various awards at this year's Toronto Film Festival to the media present.

A few days have passed, and most of the movies have been screened long ago. The reason why many filmmakers wait until now is to wait for the final grand prize to be announced.

The "People's Choice Award" is voted entirely by film critics, media reporters and ordinary movie fans, and its gold content is highly praised.

Especially in recent years, as long as you win the People's Choice Award, your ticket to the Oscars is almost booked!

Political correctness seems to have become the mainstream in recent years, so no one is very optimistic that "The Invisible Guest" or other movies will win awards. Their choice is still "12 Years a Slave".

"The winner of the People's Choice Award is..." Cameron Bailey paused briefly and said the answer, "'12 Years a Slave'!"

Sure enough, as expected, the quality of the movie is ultimately no match for the mainstream of political correctness.

There was thunderous applause at the scene, but other film crews were a little dull, especially Gu Zhongyu, Chen Sicheng and Sha Liz looked at each other, but they still had to applaud.

But then, the fun comes!

After Cameron Bailey announced the People's Choice Award, he did not leave. Others looked suspicious, and Gu Zhongyu was full of questions.

What do you mean?

Is it like the Cannes Film Festival, with another double-yolked egg?

Cameron came up with another list of winners and announced: "At this Toronto Film Festival, the best film in the Midnight Madness section is..."The Invisible Guest"!"

puff!

Gu Zhongyu almost fell down on his seat with laughter, Chen Sicheng was dumbfounded, and Shalizi and Alexandra also opened their mouths in disbelief to Gu's size.

The people at the film festival are so naughty that they actually gave this award to them!

The Midnight Madness section, as you can tell by its name, is not a normal award. It is unique to the Toronto Film Festival and aims to discover outstanding Cult films (niche films) from all over the world. Annual selections are only screened after 12 midnight. Horror movies, action movies and weird movies that defy categorization.

Famous heavy-flavored films such as "Human Skin Inn", "The Raid" and "Jennifer's Body" all had their world premieres in this section. Chinese director Xu Laoguai's "Once Upon a Time" series and Mak Junlong's "Zombie" also premiered in this section. Unit screening. Martin McDonagh (director of "Three Billboards"), who benefited from the Toronto Film Festival, also won an award in this section for "Seven Psychopaths" in 2012.

But no Chinese-language film has ever won this award. After all, there is no room for cult films in mainland China, and Hong Kong and Taiwan are too small, so they have always been weak in this aspect.

"The Invisible Guest" also has elements of suspense and thriller. It is not impossible to classify it as a cult film, but the film festival definitely has ulterior motives in awarding this award to them.

Logically speaking, the Midnight Madness category should be announced before the People's Choice Awards, but the festival placed him after "12 Years a Slave", and it was announced by the same person.

The intention is very clear: your movie is good, we really like it, but because of current political correctness, we cannot give you the People's Choice Award, but I am embarrassed to let you go home empty-handed. I want to give you some comfort, don't dislike it.

Sure enough, on the set of "12 Years a Slave" next door, director Steve McQueen looked very unhappy, but he couldn't help it. After all, he still won the biggest award.

This should be regarded as a silent protest at the Toronto Film Festival!

But it's a good thing to win an award. As a director, Chen Sicheng is very happy. He has been working hard in China and has never been treated like winning an award abroad. Finally, he sold himself to Zongheng Film and Television in vain.

He wanted to rush up to receive the award, but seeing that the boss Gu Zhongyu hadn't left yet, he could only stand up anxiously and hug and celebrate with Chen Kexin and others from China.

"Come up, Director Chen, this is your good day!"

Except for the Oscars, the highest awards at most film festivals around the world are awarded to directors. As a boss, there is no need to steal the limelight from Chen Sicheng at this time.

Chen Sicheng, who received Gu Zhongyu's affirmation, smiled happily. After shaking hands with Gu Zhongyu and Shalizi and thanking him, he stood up and walked to the temporarily arranged awards podium in the hotel.

Although it won the grand prize, the Toronto Film Festival did not set any trophies.

　I'm going to be a little busy in the next few days, and I may take two days off. Readers, please bear with me!

　　

　

(End of this chapter)