The movie "Fengshen Part 1: Song of the Dynasty" (referred to as "Fengshen Part 1") was recently released in China, under the careful polishing of director Wu Ershan and the team's "ten years of grinding a sword", this "national mythological IP" presents an epic texture on the big screen, and is also given a more epochal meaning. Shi Aidong, development consultant of the film and researcher of the Institute of Literature of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Yiliqi, friend of Wuershan, founder of the Hangai Band, and Sun Jiankun, a teacher and historian at the Xi'an Innovation College of Yan'an University, were recently interviewed by China News to share their viewing experience and behind-the-scenes details.
An excellent example of a classic story reinvented
(Shi Aidong is a researcher at the Institute of Literature of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and a non-party figure.) As the development consultant of the movie "Fengshen Trilogy", Shi Aidong and director Wu Ershan proposed when planning the theme of the film together, it was necessary to reshape the storyline of the original work of "Romance of Fengshen", such as abandoning the "woman's misfortune theory" when presenting the image of Daji, and restoring his complex side as a "person" when shaping the role of King Shuo. )
The biggest highlight of the movie "Fengshen Part 1" is its screenwriting, followed by the visual effects. The most successful thing about the film in screenwriting is that it has reshaped the original storyline a lot, boldly and innovatively adjusted the intricate character relationships and plot, and made a traditional "Fengsheng" story into a "Fengsheng" story with modern concepts. From this point of view, the film can be said to be an excellent model for reinventing the classic story.
Initially, when I planned the film theme with director Wu Ershan, I proposed to reshape the original storyline of "Romance of the Gods" - that is, the relationship between the characters in the film remains unchanged, the personalities and values of the characters remain unchanged, and only the specific story and plot settings are changed. Although the original author is from the Ming Dynasty, for him, the story of "Fengshen " is also history more than 2000,<> years ago, and in a sense, we write the same story from the same starting point as him.
The script of the movie "Fengshen Part 1" is obviously slightly better than the original in terms of the richness of the characters' personalities. At the same time, under the premise of ensuring the basic historical consensus and character relationship, the film not only generally follows the original work in the story framework, but also rearranges the details to show a clear story thread, and the plot is more compact and intense.
Due to the change in the story and plot, the image shaping of the main characters of the film has also changed. The king in "Romance of the Gods" is tyrannical, and the wine pond is meaty, and the people are like grass mustard. And director Wuershan has created a more complex image than any previous version of King Jun, he is three-dimensional and has a variety of qualities.
In order to reflect the strategy of King Jun, the film sets up a lot of plots. For example, in the process of siege of the city, when Ji Fa rode his war horse to charge, the war horse was afraid of the fire and stagnated, resulting in the failure of the siege. King Shun reprimanded, "What the horse sees is decided by man. Then a piece of cloth was pulled off to blindfold the horse, and the horse went forward.
Urshan presents us with the destruction of a hero. In the story structure of the movie, King Shun is not tyrannical from the beginning, he was also a hero with great talents, but he was driven by ambition to go to the road of tyrant step by step. Whether such story logic can support a good story in the complexity of human nature and the absurdity of the world ultimately needs to be tested by the audience and time.
Since ancient times, Daji has been synonymous with "red face and misfortune", but "The First Part of Fengshen subverts this image". At the same time, the mental journey of King Shun is constantly changing. In contrast to these two characters, the traditional impression of "women's scourge theory" is "whitewashed" in a sense. The value of one's own existence is not just beauty. Daji in the movie is King Chun's "confidant", she licks King Chun's wounds and helps him heal; She understands his ambitions and uses her special abilities to help King Shun become the overlord of the world.
In the original work of "Romance of the Gods", King Cheng ordered Bigan to dissect his heart in order to see Bigan's seven exquisite hearts. But in the movie, Bi Gan took the initiative to cut out his heart in order to force Daji to appear, and after Daji ate Bigan's heart, he appeared in the original form of a fox, but King Cheng did not kill Daji as promised. According to the "Woman's Scourge Theory", King Shun should have killed her, but he did not because he needed Daji to help him achieve his greater ambitions. Such a setting completely abandons the "woman's misfortune theory". Daji has changed from a "red face of misfortune" to a "magical assistant", and the real "woe" is the ambition of the king.
The traditional symbol of the king is flat, he is a symbol from head to toe. We have made so many movies and TV series about "Romance of the Gods" in the past, and the image of King Feng is the same, but in "The First Part of Feng Shen", Wuershan shot the heroic side of King Feng and restored his image as a person, a complex process from a hero to a devil.
Therefore, when the audience watches this movie, do not use the so-called real history to contrast, the kings we see today are the result of the story reshaping of generations by descendants. The audience can think of him as a symbol, but today we redefine this symbol with film, and now, he is a more complex symbol created by director Wuershan than any previous era.
The relationship between the characters in the film has long been defined in the "History", and most of the plots in the original work of "Romance of the Gods" are actually fictional by the author, then, under the premise that the relationship between the characters and the story nodes of the film remain unchanged, the overall intention of the screenwriter and the shaping of the characters are far above the original "Romance of the Gods".
On August 8, director Wu Ershan, with the main creative team of "The First Part of Fengsheng", interacted with fans at Fuzhou Red Star Pacific Cinema and shared the story of the production team in front of and behind the scenes. Photo by China News Agency reporter Li Nanxuan
Wuershan "sharpened a sword in ten years" for the industrialization of Chinese films
(Ilik, founder of the band Hangai, is a Mongolian artist with Urshan and friends of more than 20 years.) Since the release of "The First Part of Fengsheng", Ilyich has been paying close attention to box office figures, and has also taken the members of the Hangai band to the cinema at his own expense, because "this is the brainchild of Lao Wu's ten years". )
After the release of "The First Part of Fengsheng", as moviegoers continued to express praise, the film's attention and popularity continued to rise, and the box office of the second week of the film surpassed the first week, showing the power of word-of-mouth communication.
"Fengshen Trilogy" is the brainchild of Lao Wu for ten years. Before the start of shooting, Lao Wu and his team visited more than 30 museums and monuments across the country, looking for the foundation and visual image source of the "Fengshen" culture in cultural relics and historical materials. It is precisely because of a lot of preparatory work in the early stage that he can truly integrate Shang Zhou culture and film structure and character shaping, and can fully and rigorously present oriental aesthetic art in the film.
The "Fengshen Trilogy" is filmed continuously, the crew has thousands of staff, and everyone can go to and from work on time every day. It took a year and a half to complete all the shooting on the set. Behind this methodical approach requires professional guidance and an efficient and tacit work team.
Lao Wu and I shared behind-the-scenes details of a scene while chatting. This scene is filmed Ji Fa straddling the horse, galloping, running in the wheat field, and finally returning home, the horse fell to the ground. This scene may only be a minute or two in the finished film, but the shooting was done by 2 horses of 3 different breeds. These scenes involving horses, Lao Wudu invited an international professional equestrian team for technical guidance.
It is especially worth mentioning that during the filming process, Lao Wu wanted to bring out a team of our own in China. At first, when choosing the filming location, the crew had contact with the team in New Zealand. The New Zealand government hoped that "Fengshen " could be filmed locally, and promised to provide support in terms of funding, scene construction and other aspects, but Lao Wu still completed all the filming and filming in China. He always believes that it is necessary to cultivate domestic production teams and set up a special effects company, he said, "We are not only for this film, but also for the industrialization of our own film." He invested heavily in the film, and it was not a lie that he said in an interview that if the movie did not serve well at the box office, he would need ten years to pay off the debt.
You asked me if "Fengshen No. 1" can go abroad, I think Lao Wu wants to promote "Fengshen " to the overseas mainstream film market, he once said that Chinese films cannot only have repercussions in Chinese circles after they go abroad. In my experience, overseas people's understanding of Chinese culture is still relatively one-sided. Many contemporary artists are trying to integrate Chinese culture with Western culture, so that Chinese culture can go out and connect with the world, and this stage must be experienced. First of all, more excellent cultural works with Chinese labels must go overseas, forming a phenomenon that provides enough and high-quality carriers for overseas audiences and audiences so that they can truly understand the "thousands of years" when we came. In my opinion, "first circulate, then understand" is the only way for us to tell China's story well to the outside world. Taking "The First Part of Fengshen " as an example, the profound cultural heritage, coupled with the blessing of high industrialization, makes it possible for more domestic blockbusters to go to the world.
On August 8, director Wu Ershan, with the main creative team of "The First Part of Fengsheng", interacted with fans at Fuzhou Red Star Pacific Cinema and shared the story of the production team in front of and behind the scenes. The picture shows actor Fei Xiang interacting with fans in the audience. Photo by China News Agency reporter Li Nanxuan
Two "non-pandering" are the key to the success of "Fengshen "
(Sun Jiankun is a teacher and historian at Xi'an Innovation College of Yan'an University. He believes that "The First Part of Fengshen does not cater to the traffic, and the other does not cater to the original work. The former has enhanced the film's intention and made it epic; The latter is reflected in the reshaping of the film's narrative logic, and this ancient myth that has been passed down for thousands of years can be more realistic and contemplative. )
After watching "The First Part of Fengsheng", I think this film can score at least eighty points. If you consider the "crotch-pulling" performance of domestic god and demon blockbusters for more than ten years, this score can be a little higher. Although there are still some regrets and room for improvement in terms of plot, lines, character shaping, etc., there is one thing in the whole film that cultural works (not only film and television) are very scarce now, that is, they do not cater to it.
There are two levels of the film's "non-pandering", the first level is relatively simple, that is, not catering to traffic. Putting aside the traffic in terms of actors, in the original work of "Romance of the Gods", there are many very famous and suitable bridges for hype, such as Daji seducing Bo Yi Kao, Lutai front three thousand palace women nude dance, cannon branded Meibo, seventy-two concubines were thrown into the pot, etc., each of which is a good subject for hype, which can be shot explicitly without worrying about being scolded. But the director categorically dropped these, although he lost a lot of hype and "drainage" points, but the intention of the film was enhanced, and a mythological film was made into an epic drama. However, this does not mean that the film should be made into a "clean book". In fact, a lot of dark places were actively added to the film. For example, Di Yi indifferently held up a wine cup made of Su Huan's skull at the celebration banquet to drink, such as King Shun who said that Bi Gan said that there would be heavenly punishment and said that he would sacrifice thousands of people, showing the cruel human sacrifice phenomenon in the Shang Dynasty.
In the current era, although everyone shouts "traffic is king", for cultural works, is traffic really "king"? Perhaps for some short-cycle works, such as short videos, public accounts, advertising, etc., traffic is indeed the foundation. But for some long-term works, if you blindly embrace the flow during the production process, the result may be counterproductive. Traffic comes and goes, and yesterday's traffic is likely to become tomorrow's joke in the blink of an eye. It is said that Wuershan prepared for the filming of the "Fengshen Trilogy" for ten years, and it took another five years after the filming in 2018 to be released. If you cater to the traffic of ten years ago when preparing, or the traffic of 2018 when shooting, then I am afraid that this film may not even have the opportunity to be released.
For a director with ideals and beliefs, it may not be difficult to make a film that does not cater to traffic. Therefore, I think the second level of "not pandering" in "The First Part of Fengshen " is even more rare, that is, not catering to the original work.
In recent years, whenever a film and television drama adapted from a literary work is released, there is always a voice criticizing it on the grounds that it "does not conform to the original work", and the "original party" seems to always stand at the top of the chain of contempt. But in fact, any film and television adaptation needs to destroy and reorganize the original work, and then get a new life, otherwise what is it called "adaptation"?
The adaptation of "The First Part of Fengshen " is obviously not tinkering, but drastic. There are two extremely commonly used settings in classical Chinese novels, one is "providence" and the other is "cause and effect". Almost all ancient novels cannot escape these two settings, and some are used well, such as the four masterpieces; Some are used poorly, such as interpreting the contradiction between Yue Fei and Qin Hui as "Say Yue Quanbian" by Dapeng pecking at Qiu Long in the previous life. And "Romance of the Gods" is undoubtedly a very poorly used batch, and it is not poorly used in some places, but there is a problem with the entire story framework. The cause of the Three Realms War was that King Shun inscribed an erotic poem in the Nuwa Temple, which may have the meaning of persuading the world to the ancients, but now people only think that these immortals are sick.
Therefore, "The First Part of Fengshen directly demolished the framework of the original work and reshaped a set of narrative logic. Heaven has become an ethereal background, the focus of the film has become desire and integrity, love and calculation, and the main line of the story has become the growth of a teenager. As you can see, these are old topics. But does old age also mean that these topics have eternal value, and are problems that every generation encounters and thinks about?
If not catering to traffic is a commitment to professionalism, then not catering to the original is a responsibility for the work. Judging from the final results, the reshaping of "The First Part of Fengsheng" is undoubtedly successful. These two do not pander to me, and I think it is the key to the success of this film. As for the restoration of a large number of details in the history of Shang and Zhou in the film, the design of character shapes inspired by the murals of Yongle Palace, the huge orchestra ceremonial guard when King Feng ascended the throne, etc., are the icing on the cake. (End)
(Interview and collation by Liu Jun, reporter of China News, author Luo Lujiao, Yin Limei)