From Liao Gong talking to Wang Xiaohu about the idea of filming "Shaolin Temple", to Wang Xiaohu's selection of actors and bringing the crew to the mainland, it took less than a month, if it weren't for the fact that Shaolin Temple is currently being renovated and the crew couldn't enter the filming, such a fast speed made the people in the Ministry of Culture greatly surprised. 【Reading.com】

What does this mean?

illustrates Wang Xiaohu's positive surname!

Therefore, after Wang Xiaohu asked Zhao Gang to help report that he wanted to invest in Longsan Village, Pingling Commune, the comrades who attracted investment immediately went to the hotel where Wang Xiaohu stayed to negotiate, and talked about the efficiency and enthusiasm.

Fortunately, there is nothing to talk about in such a matter, it is nothing more than Wang Xiaohu's first batch of capital injection of 1 million yuan to improve the living standards of Longsan Village.

Some people may think that Wang Xiaohu has picked the door, but in fact, 100 million is definitely not enough to make movies, if it is used to improve the water and electricity problem in a village of five or six hundred people in the early 80s, it is absolutely not a problem, and more can be done.

Wang Xiaohu still maintains a certain skepticism about whether the money can reach the bottom smoothly, and intends to explore the way first, if things go very smoothly, then his second batch of funds will be smashed again, if the money is "deducted" in the local area, then things will be handled better, Lao Tzu only gives Wang Zhenrong money, and no one can expect to get half a dime.

"Lao Zhao, in the past two days, inform the people of the martial arts team to gather in Dengfeng, Henan."

After dinner, Wang Xiaohu sat on the sofa in the hotel and said to Zhao Gang.

The current Zhao Gang is not so much the one sent from above to protect Wang Xiaohu, but Wang Xiaohu's accompanying secretary, some words, some requirements, are conveyed through Zhao Gang in the middle, and there is no one more suitable for this position than Zhao Gang in China.

Zhao Gang nodded, "Is there anything else you need to handle as soon as possible?" ”

"Costumes!" Wang Xiaohu thought for a while and said: "The robes of the little monks, the robes of the old monks, and the costumes of the two teams of Tang Wang and Zheng Wang, by the way, go back and help me get more than 200 PLA soldiers, of which more than 50 were transferred from the cavalry battalion that cooperated last time." ”

Zhao Gang pouted and said, "Do you want to pay a salary?"

"Isn't it all free when 'Myth' was filmed?" Wang Xiaohu raised his head and said.

"It's different now, "Myth" didn't make you any less money!" Zhao Gang said disappreciably: "Our soldiers can't ask for money for eating, drinking, and Lazar?" ”

"Okay then, I'll go back and write an application or something." Wang Xiaohu sighed and said.

Zhao Gang was anxious when he heard this: "Don't, don't!" I'll report it truthfully, but we have to talk about it in advance, and you have to take care of the food. ”

Wang Xiaohu's words just now scared Zhao Gang a lot, you must know that once Wang Xiaohu wrote an application to it, it means that he is a little distrustful of his work.

Wang Xiaohu smiled, it seems that this trick is not good to try, nodded and said: "Okay, anyway, I was basically responsible for your food expenses last time, and thousands of people were in charge, and it is not a matter if these 200 people don't care." ”

It's hard for Zhao Gang not to hear the sarcasm in these words, but there is an advantage to cooperating with Wang Xiaohu, he will not treat the people below him badly, even if it is an ordinary staff member of the crew, Wang Xiaohu treats their food expenses the same standard.

Wang Xiaohu said a few more things, and finally said to Zhao Gang: "Okay, that's all, hurry up and get out, this is how big it is, my house is full of cigarette butts, and I'm not afraid of smoking you to death!" ”

Zhao Gang laughed and left.

Wang Xiaohu opened the window in the room to let the outside air circulate in, and after a long while, he called Jet Li and Yuan Heping into the house.

"Big Eyes, are the movements of the drunken stick and the drunken sword set up?"

Waiting for the two to sit down, Wang Xiaohu said to Yuan Heping with a smile, if Wang Xiaohu is picky about the action of the original "Shaolin Temple", the first thing to bear the brunt of is the drunken stick and drunken sword, maybe he felt very good when he watched it when he was a child, but then he seriously summarized it and found that the actions designed by Sun Jiankui and Yu Chenghui were not very exciting.

In this regard, Yuan Heping's experience is the richest, when he directed "Drunken Fist", Jackie Chan's decent drunken boxing style in the film was from Yuan Baye, and no one has more authority than Yuan Baye in "Drunken Kung Fu".

Yuan Heping nodded, as if he had expected that Wang Xiaohu would talk to him about this issue, returned to his room and brought back a set of action design plans for "Shaolin Temple", handed it to Wang Xiaohu and said: "Ah Hu, the movements of the drunken sword and the drunken stick have come out, and I am currently designing the movements of the Shaolin Five Hundred Arhats to practice, as for the movements of the Thirteen Stick Monks, this can only be designed after I meet the athletes and understand the action styles of each of them." ”

Wang Xiaohu flipped through the action design plan and found that Yuan Heping was much better than himself in drawing sketches, he could only draw stickmen, and Yuan Heping could at least draw the movements of the whole person, and even marked the action trajectory, and Jueyuan and Wang Renze's drunken stick vs drunken sword The whole set of actions was also well designed, and it was praised at the moment.

"Not bad."

Then he said to Jet Li: "Jie Zai, have you practiced the drunken sword?" ”

Jet Li grinned and nodded vigorously and said, "Master, I have practiced, I'll give you a set of practice when I go back." ”

"Okay!" Wang Xiaohu patted him on the shoulder with a smile and said, "I will meet your peers in a few days, after all, you have been in contact with the film industry a few years before them, and there are some precautions that require you to communicate with them more." ”

Don't look at Jet Li, he only filmed one scene after following Wang Xiaohu, and he also made a cameo appearance as Wang Xiaohu's son in "Hong Xiguan", but Jet Li has not been idle in the past four years, in addition to practicing in the Dragon and Tiger Martial Arts Union every day, training like other students, and being familiar with the entire production process of kung fu films, he will also go to the TVB artist training class with Stephen Chow, Huang Yuehua, Andy Lau and others to take acting classes in his free time.

Wang Xiaohu can't guarantee anything else, but there is one thing he is still very confident in, that is, if Jet Li stars in "Shaolin Temple", he will be stronger than the original in terms of acting skills and action display.

In his previous life, Li Lianjie didn't have any acting skills before he performed "Shaolin Temple", he just followed the national martial arts troupe to perform martial arts in various countries, and the accumulated acting skills were negligible, and he also had the silly and wooden Jueyuan that Wang Xiaohu's generation saw.

Of course, it doesn't mean that the original ecology is bad, in fact, the best thing about the whole "Shaolin Temple" is the actors, and the martial arts athletes back then were just a blank slate.

They don't know anything about the camera, they don't know anything about the film industry, and each actor has to play five or six roles at the same time, and they play extras in a different way in each scene.

As long as there is a machine and the director shouts to start, everyone will be serious about it, and they don't know if this shot has captured you, whether it is a panorama or a close-up.

Wang Xiaohu and Yuan Heping sat together to discuss the action design of the five hundred Arhats practicing in "Shaolin Temple", and the two had great differences on how to show the Shaolin 72 stunts.

And Wang Xiaohu does not advocate such a toss, according to his thinking: the long lens from far to near, through one shot to completely display the Shaolin 72 stunts.

"Long shot!?" Yuan Heping frowned when he heard this, shook his head and said: "Ah Hu, we are just shooting a kung fu film, not a documentary, there is no need to be so extravagant and wasteful, we have to waste a lot of film." ”

Yuan Heping was a little unimpressed by the concept of long lenses proposed by Wang Xiaohu, and the so-called long lenses were for short lenses.

In the film, long and short shots are two shots that play a completely different role, and the difference between the two is mainly in the length of the duration. The length of time between the time the camera is turned on and off determines the length of the shot, i.e., long shots often last longer, while short shots do the opposite.

The concept of long shots is not without precedent in Hong Kong kung fu films, and the most applauded by the audience in "Jingwumen" and "Raptors Across the River" was the long shot.

The final battle between Chen Zhen and Fujita Gang in "Jingwumen", the two fought from the beginning, from the house to the yard, after the camera was turned on, the middle was never turned off at all, that was the photographer carrying the camera from beginning to end, Wang Xiaohu and Bruce Lee played for more than 10 minutes, and the photographer also carried it for more than 10 minutes.

So after decades have passed, the audience still feels that the fight at the end is very realistic.

Later, Bruce Lee also tried this shooting technique in "Raptors Across the River", but Luo Lishi's performance was not as good as Wang Xiaohu in some aspects, so that shot was far from the height of "Jingwumen" in the history of world kung fu films.

It can be said that Wang Xiaohu started by playing long shots, and long shots are Wang Xiaohu's signature shots!

Wang Xiaohu said with a smile: "It's not that you don't know me, if you want to do a good job in a certain movie, you don't care about this bit of film, I want to let the audience have a sense of first-person substitution, so that everyone who has seen it can see a real and colorful Shaolin Temple." ”

Looking at Wang Xiaohu's firm gaze, Yuan Heping can only sigh, he is also a director, why do he always think about the cost, when can he achieve such a height as Ah Hu!

I heard Wang Xiaohu say: "I think about it like this, our camera moved forward smoothly, entered the mountain gate, turned a corner, started from an ordinary sweeping monk at the door, sleek to the monk who hit the bell, and then a few monks who cooked, they were cooking porridge while telling about the recent increase in disaster victims, and the food in the temple was getting tighter and tighter, and then the camera slowly withdrew, and shifted to the host who was knocking on the wooden fish in the meditation room, the host recited two verses, knocked on the wooden fish, and then the monk was severely reprimanding a few little monks who had violated the rules. Finally, follow the voice and freeze on the warrior monk who is practicing."

"How long does this have to be rehearsed?" Yuan Heping said with a wry smile.

He heard that in order to shoot the final battle of "Jingwumen", Wang Xiaohu and Bruce Lee rehearsed every day, and tossed for more than a month to ensure that there was no mistake in front of the camera.

This time is good! It's not a matter of one person or two, but to show all aspects of Shaolin Temple, God knows if the actors in the mainland will be as professional as Hong Kong, this is definitely a very big challenge! As the director of the film, Yuan Heping feels very headache and crazy!

"Try it, it's a big deal to shoot a few more times."

Wang Xiaohu smiled and comforted Yuan Heping, as long as he could shoot the effect he wanted, he wouldn't care how long the rehearsal was or how many shots he made.

Yuan Heping is only depressed now, and sometimes once Wang Xiaohu is addicted, even eight horses can't be dragged back. He is already secretly praying for the actors who participated in the filming of "Shaolin Temple": Amitabha, the Buddha bless them!

Early the next morning, Wang Xiaohu and Zhao Yazhi were about to get up and rush to Shanghai, and just as they were about to get in the car, they saw Zhao Gang running over panting.

"Lao Wang, you wait and go, there is an emergency in Hong Kong that you need to deal with!"

Wang Xiaohu frowned, could it be that Xiang Huaqiang took Xin Yi'an to cause a riot in the film industry? No, if that's the case, Shen Zhong should be able to suppress the scene, even if Shen Zhong can't handle it, Run Run Shaw, the Hong Kong police, and even Hong Kong Governor MacLehose will personally come forward to solve it.

"What's the matter?"

Zhao Gang said: "We received a call this morning, the call came from the confidential line of your home, the caller was Yuan Biao, he said that Yuan Heping's father Yuan Xiaotian was seriously ill"

"What's wrong with my old bean?" Yuan Heping panicked when he heard this, and went up and grabbed Zhao Gang's arm tightly and asked.

Zhao Gang shook his head and said: "I didn't answer the call, and I don't know the specific situation, Yuan Biao said to let Yuan Heping rush back as soon as possible." ”

"Hu!" Yuan Heping shouted, looking at Wang Xiaohu's eyes with some excitement: "I, I have to go back!" ”

"Let's go back together." Wang Xiaohu said.

"No, I don't. Your task on the mainland side is relatively heavy, and I can't delay your major affairs because of my personal affairs, so I can just go back myself. "Yuan Heping can still distinguish priorities.

Wang Xiaohu patted him on the shoulder and said, "Big eyes, don't worry too much, Uncle Tian is fine." ”

"Well, just not this time"

"I understand." Wang Xiaohu nodded and comforted him: "There is me here in "Shaolin Temple", you don't have to worry about things here, go back and take good care of Uncle Tian." ”

"I see!" After Yuan Heping said this, he followed Zhao Gang and hurried to Yanjing Railway Station.

"Ah Zhi, I'll send you to Shanghai first." Wang Xiaohu said.

Zhao Yazhi shook her head, looked at her husband and said, "Your side is important, don't worry, how can I say that I am also one of the producers of "Shanghai Tang", and I have studied directing work with you for so long, so I should be given the opportunity to intern, right?" ”

(To be continued)