Huayu: The director just wants to save money

Chapter 152 Various Thoughts
The word "exaggeration" is a contrast.

Especially after Liu Shishi watched "The Storm Riders", she found the ideas of the new "Swordsman" more and more acceptable.

"Then there is only one problem left, which is the portrayal of Emperor Jiajing. In your drama, Emperor Jiajing is portrayed as a good emperor... well, not a good emperor, but an emperor who works hard to govern the country. This image seems to be different from the Emperor Jiajing in previous film and television dramas.

In the past, Jiajing in film and television dramas was basically portrayed as a villain or a fool. For example, the Jiajing in "The Ming Dynasty" was extremely intelligent but selfish.

In the movie "The Strange Hero Yizhimei" that I filmed, Jiajing was confused and ignorant. He was even deceived by Yan Song and kidnapped out of the palace. Although he reformed later, it was only to give a perfect ending.

Will your method of shaping characters cause problems for the audience? If you rashly change the audience's impression, for example, by making a bad guy good, or a good guy bad, there will probably be a lot of controversy."

Liu Shishi asked questions based on her own experience.

Zhou Mo smiled and said, "The fact that you have thought about this shows that you have indeed started to study the market and audiences recently, but it is still not enough."

"How to say?"

"The first point is the characters in film and television dramas. If you rashly change the image of historical figures, there may be problems. For example, some movies will change Empress Dowager Cixi into an image of a woman who works for the country and the people. Doing so is definitely courting death. No matter how many times the director explains, the audience will not accept it.

But this is not necessarily the case for some characters. For example, before "The Yongzheng Dynasty" came out, the image of Yongzheng in the film and television industry had actually never been very good. Although he was not full of evil, he often appeared as a villain, a tyrant who murdered loyal people. It was nothing like it is now, when a group of people sing his praises and even travel back in time to fall in love with him.

Therefore, as long as the character I portray is not as hopeless as Empress Dowager Cixi, then as long as the script is good enough, there should be no problem for the audience to accept it. "

Liu Shishi nodded in approval.

"That's right, that fool Yang Mi, she definitely didn't know about this kind of thing when she was filming 'Palace'."

Zhou Mo: ...

"Shi Shi."

"Ok?"

"You have indeed changed a lot."

Liu Shishi smiled sweetly: "Thank you for the compliment, please continue, Teacher Zhou."

Zhou Mo stretched out his second finger.

“The second point is that there is nothing wrong with Emperor Jiajing’s early words about working hard to govern the country.

As a young man who had never received an emperor's education and was helped to take the throne halfway, Zhu Houcong had no power at all when he first ascended the throne.

But it was such a person who, simply by relying on the big thing of "recognizing his father", gradually centralized all the power. This operation was almost comparable to that of Emperor Wen of Han.

After gaining power, Zhu Houcong did not become corrupt as quickly as described in some novels. Instead, he worked hard for a long period of time to restore the country's strength and the people's power, and also promoted a number of reforms.

It was not until later that his mother and son died, and the reformers he had chosen also died, and the court's reforms entered deep water and could not be implemented, that he began to give up.

In real history, Hai Rui wrote a memorial to criticize Jiajing. The fact that the first half of the article was all praising Hai Rui was not necessarily intended to praise first and then criticize. It could also be that he really thought Jiajing was a wise ruler in his early years.

In addition, from the perspective of the temple name of Emperor Jiajing, in history, all the emperors who were given the temple name of Emperor Shizong were basically emperors who had done something.”

Ever since Zhou Mo obtained the adaptation rights for Jin Yong's entire series, he has been thinking about how to adapt them in order to unleash the value of these works as much as possible.

Like in the past, the model of making appropriate adaptations based on the original work and then finding someone to shoot it is likely that there is only one idea.

In the previous life, there were so many adaptations of Jin Yong's series, but before Zhou Mo traveled through time, the most classic ones were still those that impressed the public.

As for the subsequent ones, the more famous they became, the worse they got, and the ratings kept getting lower and lower.

As for the reason, first of all, casting is a big problem.

With the development of the times, the medical beauty industry is also constantly developing. It is becoming increasingly difficult to pick a bunch of natural beauties to play Xiaolongnu, Zhao Min, and Zhou Zhiruo like in the past.

After all, whether it was Li Nuotong, Liu Yifei, Zhou Haimei, or Da Meiyuan, they all left a deep impression on the audience.

It is too difficult to find actors who can surpass them.

Medical beauty may have improved the average appearance of the film and television industries, but it is only an average.

The top ones are always rare (1).

This situation is particularly evident in the subsequent remakes of Jin Yong's works in his previous life.

The situation is slightly better for several mainland adaptations.

Although the rating is low, the casting is still okay.

Like in Jiang Jiajun's version of "The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber", Chen Yuqi and Zhu Xudan, who played Zhao Min and Zhou Zhiruo, although their acting skills were not that good, at least their image passed the test.

Despite this, there is also a xiaolongbao version of Xiaolongnu.

It was a river of sadness.

Michelle Chen was originally a rising star.

The role of Xiaolongnu almost ruined her career.

If things are like this in the mainland, it is even more outrageous in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

But in Wang Jing's "Nine Yang Magic" filmed in 22, the actress who played Zhou Zhiruo was none other than the new generation of Crystal Girl.

late autumn.

tsk...

The casting is in this situation, not to mention the plot.

After so many years of adaptation of martial arts novels, not only has there been no progress in the conception, but more and more emphasis has been placed on romance.

Although love is an indispensable topic in Jin Yong's series of works.

But besides love, they also have family, country and the world.

Chivalrous and tender, chivalrous comes in the front and tenderness comes in the back.

But later TV dramas were left with only tenderness.

Therefore, if you want to make martial arts films and TV series that are different from the past, you must find another way.

On the one hand, the original work is combined with history. These contents have been mentioned before and will not be repeated here.

On the other hand, it is to develop the supporting characters in the novel.

In Jin Yong's series of works, in addition to the protagonists of each generation, there are many other characters that can be explored.

Like the three free and easy elders in "Tian Long" , the five great masters and the Ancient Tomb Sect in "The Return of the Condor Heroes" , and the Five Mountains Sword Sect in "Swordsman" , all can be explored.

And "Huashan" is Zhou Mo's attempt to do this.

For him, as long as the Huashan project is successful in the future.

I won’t say much, as long as the box office can exceed 200 million.

This means that this path is completely feasible, and there will be an additional area for the development of martial arts novels.

In fact, someone had walked this road twenty or thirty years ago.

Films like "Invincible in the East" and "Ashes of Time" have achieved good results.

Later, with the decline of Hong Kong films, it gradually became a thing of the past.

But now, with the rise of the mainland film market, further development may not be able to reach its previous heights, but it should still be possible to try to extend the life of martial arts.

While Zhou Mo was thinking, he was also constantly improving his ideas in his notebook.

Liu Shishi watched quietly from the side.

She now particularly likes to watch Zhou Mo thinking.

Men who work hard are the most attractive.

Whenever Zhou Mo works, he always exudes a strange attraction.

Liu Shishi licked her lips.

She seems a little hungry again.
On the other side, Zhou Mo was thinking about another thing——

Just now, while searching through some martial arts movies of the past, he realized a phenomenon.

Some movies that did not perform well at the box office in the past may not necessarily fail now as the times change, but may instead achieve very good results.

The market is changing, and so are audience tastes.

For example, the audience’s opinion of Linghu Chong.

In the past 10 to 20 years, the conflict between Linghu Chong and Yue Buqun was still very obvious in film and television dramas.

Although Linghu Chong is a bit unruly, he is still a decent person.

And Yue Buqun was positioned as a hypocrite from beginning to end.

But as martial arts novels have been continuously structured in recent years, Linghu Chong has become increasingly disliked by the audience, while the number of times Yue Buqun has been sympathized has been increasing.

Another example is Stephen Chow's "A Chinese Odyssey" which performed quite mediocrely when it was released.

Even with the dual blessings of Stephen Chow and Sun Wukong, it did not make it into the top five of the annual box office.

But in recent years, some voices have said that the evaluation of "A Chinese Odyssey" has been getting higher and higher, and some videos related to "A Chinese Odyssey" on the website have been played over one million times.

These videos are not specially recommended by Mile Station.

Similarly, there was Cheng Long's "New Police Story", which was also a huge flop back then.

With an investment of over 80 million, the final box office was only over 60 million.

I didn’t even get my money back.

However, in the previous life, a Korean movie that borrowed the plot and action design of "New Police Story" directly became the sixth in the Korean film history ranking after its release.

The film is called "Old Hand".

After that, "Veteran" was remade in mainland China and also grossed 400 million yuan.

It’s the same story of the second generation doing evil, and the police fighting with the second generation and finally successfully arresting them.

The success of "Veteran" and "Big Shot" and the failure of "New Police Story" all prove the impact of the times on the box office.

Zhou Mo thought of this and asked himself.

"In that case, can I find Cheng Long to film a version of New Police Story?"

The answer is of course yes.

At this stage, Chenglong's box office appeal is still there.

The box office of "Chinese Zodiac" exceeded 800 million, and Jackie Chan was the only one who carried the box office of the entire movie.

Now it is 2012, and "Chinese Zodiac" has been completed and entered the post-production stage.

After "Chinese Zodiac", Cheng Long's next movie is "Police Story 2013".

According to Zhou Mo's memory, "Police 2013" is undoubtedly a bad movie.

Since it is a bad movie, there is every opportunity for improvement.

Even though the plot of "Police 2013" is so bad, it still managed to get over million at the box office. A big part of the reason is that Cheng Long's box office appeal is at work.

After confirming that it could be optimized, Zhou Mo made the decision immediately.

I want to collaborate with Cheng Long to make a movie.

　Zhang Yimou once said: Why not use actors who have frequently undergone plastic surgery to make movies? Because after the surgery, the facial muscles will become uncoordinated.

　　Brother Kaizi also made similar remarks.

　　Although Zhang Yimou has had some setbacks in the past two years, his skills are still reliable.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)