China Entertainment King of Science Fiction

Chapter 527 The Most Challenging Movie

"This is Zhao Xiaoning, my old classmate and the treasure of our National Film Studio."

Jiang Ruoping introduced a thin man with an unremarkable appearance with a smile.

"Teacher Zhao, I have long admired your name."

"Director Chen, you are the one I have admired for a long time."

Chen Jingxing shook hands with the man and complimented him: "With Teacher Zhao at the helm, I have more confidence in the production of this film."

Of course, Chen Jingxing's words were not entirely polite. The old man in front of him was one of the top photographers in the country. He was the earliest student of the Beijing Film Photography Department. He was originally a member of the Xijing Film Studio, but was later recruited by Qin Zhonghe to work at the National Film Studio.

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Not only has he won all the five major domestic film awards including the Golden Horse and Golden Statue, he has also won many foreign awards, which is enough to be called a photography master.

Zhao Xiaoning served as the cinematographer for National Film's Great Cause trilogy, and the fifth-generation director and Jiang Wen basically worked with them. Jiang Ruoping's statement that the National Film Company's greatest treasure is not an exaggeration.

However, in recent years, Zhao Xiaoning has mainly appeared as an art director, and he has also focused on cultivating new talents in the crew. He is more low-key and basically does not appear in public, even at award shows such as the Golden Rooster Awards.

So Chen Jingxing and Zhao Xiaoning have both heard of each other's famous names, but this is really their first time meeting them.

Of course, this matches well with Chen Jingxing's background in non-majors and non-movie industry.

I have never made a similar war-themed movie before, but for the project "1951", my idea was to make a challenging war movie.

Looking back at "Fatal Identity" and "The Signal", the regular shooting techniques have a sense of ingenuity and lack of workmanship.

"1951?"

So in fact, the confidentiality measures of "1951" are not too strict. After all, the scripts are not produced on special paper. It is just new to people who are not from DreamWorks such as Zhao Xiaoning.

Although "Gravity" can almost be said to be a CG animated movie, and the so-called long shots were not shot in real life, this is what amazed Zhao Xiaoning.

There are some very experimental films in the world that have one shot to the end, but that is usually achieved in a fixed and stable scene. It is almost impossible to achieve this in a film with a large scene schedule and many actors like a war movie.

Chen Jingxing immediately turned into a monster in Zhao Xiaoning's eyes.

While watching everyone browsing the script, Chen Jingxing said: "The script for this movie has been under creation before, and neither China Film nor DreamWorks disclosed much information to the outside world, so there must be many teachers who are confused by such an effort.

"One shot? War movie?"

Thanks to the efforts of DreamWorks and China Film, this conference room is indeed filled with people who know each other well.

However, the lineup in front of him still exceeded his expectations.

Zhao Xiaoning was also very curious about the legendary young man in front of him. The influence of this biggest trend-setter in the domestic film and television industry in the past five years was almost omnipresent. His own students and colleagues had all told him about Chen Jingxing and DreamWorks.

"Director Chen, I know you are very imaginative, but this is too crazy and has no enforceability."

It would be too cheap for Guoying Guangguang to pay for it and just share the accounts. The talents in front of him are not used in vain, and there are great talents within Guoying.

Everyone is a top professional in the industry and has won at least five major Chinese awards.

"1951" is jointly produced by DreamWorks and China Film. Due to the special shooting method, this project has very demanding requirements for the production team. Therefore, China Film also did its best and sent out elite troops and even

Sending a master like Zhao Xiaoning out was somewhat beyond Chen Jingxing's expectations.

I want to show the effect of one shot in this movie!"

"The teacher didn't know something. DreamWorks' confidentiality measures have always been very strict. In the entire "Interstellar" photography team, I was the only one who had read the complete script."

After all, movies with huge investment such as "My 1949", "Beacon Mountain", "Shangganling" and "Changjin Lake" are not so aggressive.

Zhao Xiaoning looked around, greeted old acquaintances and apprentices one after another, and then became a little curious: "What kind of movie are you going to make? "My 1949" directed by Kai Ge was not so exaggerated, right?"

Moreover, Wang Chuan himself can actually be regarded as Zhao Xiaoning's apprentice. In fact, Zhao Xiaoning's apprentices and grandchildren are indeed spread across half of the film industry.

There was an uproar in the conference room.

"Teacher, is Teacher Lin okay..."

Usually lens language is indeed a talent, but this is a talent that can definitely be shown when you are just starting out. It is difficult to say that it can be cultivated and trained slowly.

Therefore, "1951" is of course not strictly one shot to the end. It is still composed of multiple longer shots. It just needs to cleverly hide the traces of editing between shots. It only creates a sense for the audience.

Produce a smooth visual experience in one go.

State-owned studios like Guoying are somewhat rigid in innovation and output, but this is due to many reasons and does not mean that they do not have high-level talents.

Zhao Xiaoning became more and more curious about Chen Jingxing, so Jiang Ruoping told him that there was a gift film that was quite challenging to shoot, and when the director was still Chen Jingxing, he agreed without thinking.

Therefore, many film critics and movie fans tend to believe that Chen Jingxing did not have a talent for camera language before, but he was shooting brain-burning science fiction sketches. He did not want to overwhelm the show and wanted the audience to focus on the story.

"The shooting method of "1951" was based on my expectation that the time on and off the screen would be synchronized, and then the traces of editing would be erased through post-production, so that the entire film would consist of one seemingly continuous long shot.

The reason why I invited all the talented teachers this time is that I want to create an unprecedented combination of the two elements of film aesthetics and war themes to create a unique chemical reaction.

"interesting……"

The plot itself is very simple, just like "Gravity", the story is simple, but the focus of the movie is how to express the story.

"Director Chen, are you saying you don't want to edit?"

Because this excludes the contribution of the photographer, the split-shot script was designed by the director. It is definitely the director’s credit that those few classic long shots and the extremely high-level composition of the entire film can be presented with CG special effects.

At the beginning, Chen Jingxing appeared as a creative director with a relatively big imagination, winning with brain-burning or creative stories. As for the composition, color, light and shadow of the film itself, as well as the lens language that the academy attaches great importance to, it is lackluster.

At that time, Zhao Xiaoning didn't care much about it.

Of course, this is only the upper part of "1951", which is a movie with two consecutive plots, and one shot is only the shooting method of the upper part."

In theory, "1951" doesn't need to be too secretive. After all, unlike "Inception" or "Interstellar," even if the plot is leaked, it doesn't make much sense, and it doesn't even matter as a spoiler.

At Chen Jingxing's signal, the assistant director of "1951" placed the script in front of everyone one by one.

It wasn't until "Gravity" that he was extremely shocked by those long shots and the stunning audio-visual language.

"It's quite mysterious. I just saw the script now."

Chen Jingxing clapped his hands and suppressed everyone's shocked comments: "Please note that I mean showing the effect of one shot to the end, not actually shooting one shot to the end. This is currently impossible to achieve."

His impression of Chen Jingxing had gone through several changes.

"It's too exaggerated."

I think many people, whether familiar with me or not, should know that I am the kind of person who likes to toss and challenge. I like new ideas and creative elements.

Of course, DreamWorks has its own top photographers, such as Wang Chuan, the photographer who just finished shooting "Interstellar" with Chen Jingxing. He has also won the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Awards - the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Awards in the past four years, including Best Photography.

Most of the technical awards went into the pockets of DreamWorks, which also allowed DreamWorks to have a top domestic production team.

Regarding the production team of "1951", Chen Jingxing's principle is that high-level talents are welcome, and a luxurious creative team must be formed.

I think some teachers have already seen the clues from the script. The entire script has only nineteen acts, twenty-three scenes, and each scene is a take.

It's just that DreamWorks has a large booth and many big productions. In addition, "1951" is indeed too challenging even for Chen Jingxing himself.

What I want to say is that the production cost and scale of "1951" are not larger than those of "Fenghuo Yunshan" and "Changjin Lake", or even lower. This is not a super blockbuster.

It is difficult for people to accept this sudden and huge leap in the presentation of audio-visual language overnight. Is this a sudden enlightenment?

The entertainment industry is small, and the film industry is even smaller.

But since "Source Code", Chen Jingxing's films have undergone considerable changes, and the composition, color, light and shadow, and lens language have made great progress.

What is the concept of a director with extremely high creative screenwriting talents who also has the ability of master-level lens language?

The subsequent "Matrix" and "The Martian" have repeatedly proved that "Gravity" is definitely not the result of the sudden blessing of some expert.

"Xiaochuan...Lao Hu...Old Ding...we haven't gotten together like this for several years."

Zhao Xiaoning quickly turned to the end of the script, a total of sixty pages, and couldn't help but said in shock: "Two hours?

Let me confirm again, there are only twenty-three scenes in total for the two-hour movie, and each scene only has one take, which means that the whole movie only has twenty-three shots?"

Chen Jingxing nodded: "That's right, this was determined after repeated deliberation by our pre-production department. Otherwise, the edited shot may have flaws. Ideally, only twenty-three shots are needed. Of course, there will be various differences in the actual shooting.

Due to various difficulties, it may not be possible, but we need to work hard towards this goal."

"Two hours, twenty-three shots, an average of five minutes per shot?"

Zhao Xiaoning exclaimed with both excitement and disbelief: "Are you going to make a war drama? Director Chen, your challenge is to climb Mount Everest."

(End of chapter)