China Entertainment: Been working as a director since 03

Chapter 651 Who is the thief?
Li Yu wanted to film the story of the failed scholar Huang Chao, certainly not because he admired Huang Chao.

Huang Chao has a very bad reputation in history.

Historical books generally describe him with very bad words such as executioner, cannibal, and ruthless butcher.

Huang Chao's rebel army was poorly organized, and he did not have much control over the rebels under him.

As the rebels fought their way to Chang'an City, many innocent civilians died at their hands. These are facts that cannot be changed.

But historical evaluation is sometimes really mysterious.

Huang Chao's rebel army killed many innocent civilians. The Qing government troops led by Zeng Guofan ordered massacres many times during the suppression of the Taiping Army, and a large number of ordinary people were killed.

Logically speaking, Huang Chao and Zeng Guofan did many of the same things.

Zeng Guofan was actually called a "perfect man" and "half saint" by the Qing court.

Nowadays, there are still many people who praise him for his good family management, his ability in both literature and martial arts, and that he is a top master of political strategy.

This makes people very nervous. Both of them caused great harm to ordinary people. One is a butcher who left a thousand-year infamy, and the other is a "perfect man" throughout the ages.

The biggest difference between the two is that Zeng Guofan massacred the Taiping Army and civilians, while Huang Chao massacred the scholars and aristocratic families.

This may be one of the reasons why their historical evaluations are completely different.

Otherwise, why do we say that history is a little girl who can be dressed up by anyone?
When those people saw that their own kind were physically destroyed by Huang Chao, how could they not severely punish Huang Chao?
Just kill the peasants. Huang Chao is a guy with no moral principles. He even dared to kill Mr. Huang and played a game of Candy Crush with Mr. Huang's family tree. We must put him down.

After returning to the capital, Li Yu got to work. He read a lot of historical materials and planned to write a new script as soon as possible.

While reviewing historical materials, he discovered that if the outcome was that Huang Chao broke into Chang'an City, all officials below the third rank would be retained, and all officials above the third rank would be killed.

If this is the case, the movie can be very exciting, but it is not profound enough, and it has a feeling of whitewashing Huang Chao.

Li Yu did not want to whitewash Huang Chao.

Huang Chao was an executioner, but he was a special kind of executioner who treated common people and aristocratic families equally.

Ordinary people would feel relieved when he massacred the noble families.

But this does not prove that Huang Chao was a good man, nor can it erase the fact that his rebel army mistakenly killed many innocent civilians.

Li Yu wanted to make the script more meaningful while retaining a large part of the excitement.

To achieve this effect, we cannot just follow the history books.

Li Yu planned to do the same as he did with "Man Jiang Hong" back then and simply create a fictional history.

In this way, he will have more room to maneuver, and will also avoid some people with ulterior motives deliberately finding fault with the movie after it is released, accusing him of distorting history.

He directly told everyone that the story was fictitious and that the plot in the movie was all made up by him and did not exist in history.

What? They said they saw some historical references in Li Yu’s films?

That is their personal judgment and has nothing to do with Li Yu.

Li Yu will give them a disclaimer stating that any similarity is purely coincidental.

After deciding on the direction of the fiction, Li Yu changed Datang to Daxia, and Huang Chao to Huang Chao...

After half a month of seclusion, Li Yu finally finished writing the script.

Coincidentally, just as Li Yu finished writing the script, the national director who had finished filming "Green Book" in the United States returned to China and came to find Li Yu.

The more than 20 million euros investment in "Green Book" was all provided by Li Yu.

In order to give Li Yu face, Huana provided some convenience and support to the national master during the filming.

Li Yu wrote a script for him and provided him with the funds to make a movie so that he could compete for an Oscar again. The national teacher was naturally grateful. So he planned to visit Li Yu to thank him again as soon as he returned to China.

"No need to thank me, just help me take a look at this script." Li Yu handed over the newly written script.

The imperial teacher was very impressed by Li Yu's high productivity.

Li Yu was filming "Barbie" in Los Santos, and he was filming "Green Book" in several states in the southern United States. He and Li Yu did not meet in the United States.

But he knew about Li Yu's situation.

Li Yu has only been back in China for about half a month, and he has already finished writing another script?
Surprised, he took the script and nodded: "Let me take a look first... thief?"

That’s right, the name of this script is just one word: Thief.

The imperial teacher only took a glance at the plot summary and knew that Li Yu's script was based on Huang Chao of the Tang Dynasty.

Because the national master had a certain understanding of the character Huang Chao, the name of the movie "Curse of the Golden Flower" he filmed more than ten years ago was taken from a poem by Huang Chao.

The movie was adapted from a novel called "Thunderstorm", which tells the story of an emperor during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period.

Although it has no direct connection with Huang Chao, the city full of chrysanthemums and the dazzling golden armor arranged by the national teacher were based on Huang Chao's "Chrysanthemum Poem after Failure in the Imperial Examination".

After reading the introduction of the story, the national teacher was stunned for a moment. Could it be that Li Yu was also going to learn from him and make the whole Curse of the Golden Flower?

The question is, why is the name of the script called "Thief"?

If Huang Chao is said to be a thief, it does make sense. A failed scholar and a salt merchant who started a rebellion, isn't that a thief?

The imperial teacher also discovered that Li Yu, probably in order to avoid controversy, simply created a fictional background for the story, invented a country called Xia, and changed Huang Chao's name to Huang Chao.

The national teacher called him an expert and said he often played like this.

"Curse of the Golden Flower" is fictional, and "Shadow" is also fictional. The prototype of "Shadow" is a script called "Three Kingdoms: Jingzhou", and the national master adapted it based on this script.

The previous life's "Man Jiang Hong" was also fictional, but it was made particularly twisted.

In short, the national master likes to use fictional elements when making historical blockbusters.

Reading further into the script, the Imperial Master discovered that Huang Chao’s story line was basically the same as that of the historical Huang Chao.

He failed the imperial examinations many times and was very disappointed with the Great Xia court. Many years later, he seized the opportunity to rebel, broke into the Xia capital Chang'an, and killed all the royal nobles, high-ranking officials above the third rank, and the scholar families.

When watching this part, the national teacher felt that the plot was very cool and satisfying.

Those aristocratic families monopolized the channels for upward mobility, and there was even a strange phenomenon that one family produced seventeen prime ministers in the Xia Kingdom.

Those people deserved to be killed, Huang Chao did a good job in killing them.

At this time, the plot is different from what happened in history.

On the side of the Xia Kingdom court, Li Yu arranged a general named Chen Kuochuan to suppress the rebellion.

With the preconceived concept of fiction, the national teacher did not think there was anything wrong with the appearance of a fictional character.

This is reasonable. If there was no adaptation, why would Li Yu create a fictional character?

However, the more the national teacher read on, the more he felt that the Chen Kuochuan created by Li Yu was a little familiar, and he always felt that he had heard the story of this person somewhere.

There's something even more important. When the imperial teacher first read the script, he thought that the thief Li Yu was talking about was Huang Chao.

After seeing Chen Kuochuan appear, he was terrified because he could no longer tell who the thief was.

(End of this chapter)