On February 23, 2015, the 87th Academy Awards ceremony was held in Los Angeles, USA. Chinese actress Huang Shengyi did not show up at all, but created a lot of trouble. At that time, she held an invitation letter dated January 2014, claiming that she was invited to attend the Oscars and would join hands with actor Tom Hanks, but before the ceremony, she fainted in the hotel," Sadly" missed the chance to fight with Scarlett Johansson.
Even the edge of the red carpet was not next to each other, but there was such a big commotion - Huang Shengyi's move has almost become the pinnacle of Chinese female stars rubbing against the red carpet to make headlines. After all, the previous carpet stars were still wearing fancy clothes. stage of writing.
At that time, Yang Zi, who was accompanied by Huang Shengyi's agent, in order to clarify the speculation and to prove the legitimacy of Huang Shengyi's trip, showed the domestic media a film contract that had just been signed. There was a clause in it, requiring Huang Shengyi to use the film In the name of participating in a series of activities such as the Oscars. According to Yang Zi, the film, which has not yet been shot, "invested 200 million US dollars, co-produced with Chinese and American teams, and will invite Tom Hanks to play the male lead", called "Big Bombing".
This was almost the first time the movie "The Big Bomb" appeared in public view, but not many people took it seriously at the time. Three years later, in 2018, in the turmoil about Chinese entertainment stars and Chinese movies, "The Big Bomb" was involved again and again, and finally canceled the release plan in China.
In this year when the total box office of Chinese films exceeded 30 billion yuan, this film not only gave birth to a "China's poorest director", but also the absurd, bizarre and ups and downs of the filming process, it is also enough to be recorded in the history of Chinese films to remind , Alert every Chinese filmmaker who claims to love movies - what do you love? And, what exactly is a movie?
Text | Li Yue
Editor | Goldstone
prepare for auction
" 80 million can only be called 'bombing'. If it is to be called 'big bombing', at least 400 million must be invested. "
The London bombing, the Berlin bombing, the Tokyo bombing, and the Chongqing bombing are known as the four major bombings during World War II. Among them, the Chongqing bombing lasted the longest, as long as five years.
In the past five years, Japan has carried out 218 bombings on Chongqing and dispatched more than 9,000 aircraft sorties. At the worst time, the air defense alarm sounded for seven consecutive days, and the fire caused by the bombing took three consecutive days to be extinguished.
In the nearly 80 years after the end of World War II, the first three bombings have been made into movies many times, but the Chongqing bombing did not.
In the autumn of 2010, Yang Buting, the then chairman of China Film Group, approached director Xiao Feng, hoping to put the Chongqing Bombing on the screen, and planned to release it in 2012. That year, the box office of Chinese films just broke 10 billion, and the whole industry was in the midst of an uproar in which almost everyone was complacent and ready for big projects. At the project launch conference, Xiao Feng, who is known for his main theme military works, said excitedly: "History cannot be missing pages, and movies cannot be absent."
In Xiao Feng and producer Jiang Haiyang's original production plan, "Big Bombing" was a main theme movie with a budget of 80 million. However, the creation of the film was not smooth-how to squeeze a grand and long historical event into a film about two hours long, the start-up team obviously underestimated the difficulty of this project. In the script creation link, the crew changed six screenwriters one after another. In the end, Xiao Feng had to find his classmate, Chen Ping, who wrote "The Passionate Years", to create a suitable story framework.
Director Xiao Feng (right) and producer Jiang Haiyang. Figure / Network
This delay has been several years. The originally agreed actor has passed the schedule, and the first two investors have also withdrawn their funds one after another. Xiao Feng had to bear the scriptwriter's remuneration and the travel expenses of the scene survey, and passively became one of the investors. Script copyright and filming rights.
According to "Entertainment Capital", at the end of 2014, Xiao Feng once pinned his hope for the start of "The Big Bomb" on the booming LeTV Films at the time, but the cooperation failed in the end. When he was almost in a desperate situation, Xiao Feng, who was eager to advance, got acquainted with Hehe Film and Television.
At the time, the film and television company seemed like an excellent partner. They have successively participated in film projects such as "Jing Zhong Yue Fei", "Loyalty Yang Jia Jiang" and "Eight Stars", and they also rely on Kuailu Investment Group, a financial enterprise founded by businessman Shi Jianxiang, which has more than ten P2P company. At that time, Shi Jianxiang, although he was in the financial circle, looked like he had been in the film circle all the year round. When he appears in front of the media, he always wears a white tunic suit. He loves to take photos with celebrities with thumbs up and post them on Weibo. .
Shi Jianxiang. Figure / Network
After Hehe Film and Television intervened, the five-year-old "Big Bombing" finally entered the real shooting stage.
However, the boss Shi Jianxiang was not satisfied with the 80 million investment plan. He once told the media that 80 million yuan can only be called "bombing", and "big" cannot be used. If it is to be called "big bombing", at least 400 million yuan must be invested.
At the beginning of 2015, the pre-production team began to set up scenes in the Zhejiang Xiangshan Film and Television Base, but the money promised by the investors was delayed. According to Xiao Feng's later recollection, the investor asked to revise the script and production in the direction of big scenes and big casts, and claimed that they must see the satisfactory text before giving money.
As a result, before the official start of filming, the crew will be in a dilemma of no money available at any time.
When he stopped investing for the first time, Xiao Feng used his own money to buy two ten-wheeled cards as prop cars that were in urgent need of payment. When the main scene Chaotianmen Wharf was built, the investors stopped investing again. In order to resolve the crisis, Xiao Feng had to take out his savings. Since then, his money has been circulating in the crew's public account, and the investor's money has come in and returned to him.
build momentum
" The Big Bombing paid as much as 3,000 yuan to the media to visit the class, while in other crews, this figure is usually around 200 yuan. "
On the eve of the Spring Festival in 2015, the staff of the "Big Bombing" crew couldn't even get the money for the New Year's Eve dinner. The artist cried and called Xiao Feng and Jiang Haiyang, and asked the two brothers if they were successful or not, and let him celebrate the new year. Displaced from home in Xiangshan, he was under the pressure of being called for debts.
And just a few days later, on the fifth day of the new year, Huang Shengyi staged a scene where he fainted in a hotel and was unable to attend the Oscars. Before the Oscars, Shi Jianxiang also accompanied Huang Shengyi to participate in the American Independent Spirit Award ceremony. In the news pictures they sent back to China, the two were surrounded by more than a dozen well-known media, but later the media pointed out that in the photo, the microphone on the microphone in front of them The logo size is uniform and is fake.
Huang Shengyi in "The Big Bomb", but her role did not appear in the final film. Figure / Network
It was not Xiao Feng who made Huang Shengyi's relationship with "The Big Bomb". When Shi Jianxiang was looking for a cast for the film as the producer of "The Big Bomb", it was Huang Shengyi who signed the contract first, thanks to her husband Yang Zi (then Only admitted to the outside world as an agent) was brought in by Shi Jianxiang to be the propaganda person in charge of "Big Bombing".
Under the leadership of Shi Jianxiang and Yang Zi, "The Big Bombing" showed a great battle to the outside world.
In July 2015, more than two months after the film started, Shi Jianxiang and Yang Zi once organized a large-scale media visit. Zi had to stand on a chair and hold a loudspeaker to maintain order, coordinating everyone to come forward in batches to shoot the actors.
During the filming of "The Great Bombing", the scene of the visit organized by Yang Zi. Figure / Network
A month later, Shi Jianxiang told the media that the film's budget had no upper limit. As a member of the film's start-up team and executive producer Wang Ding, he was very alert when he heard it: "You must think about the reckoning after the fall." After receiving the news, Xiao Feng held a meeting with the producer overnight in the crew, emphasizing that it is still necessary to live in poverty and hardship. Day by day, plan carefully and make sure the accounts are clear.
In November 2015, after the "Big Bombing" was completed, Shi Jianxiang and Yang Zi held a celebration banquet in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, which is known as "the most prestigious residential area in the world". It was a celebrity-filled night, known as "invite half of Hollywood" and "shake Hollywood". The stars present were Adrien Brody, Huang Shengyi and Ma Su who participated in "The Big Bomb". , as well as Stallone, "Transformers 4" actor Mark Wahlberg, the Hilton couple and so on.
According to "Entertainment Capital", under the auspices of Yang Zi, "Big Bombing" paid as much as 3,000 yuan to the media to visit the class, while in other crews this figure is usually around 200. He bought the coverage regardless of the cost, and the coverage ranged from local tabloids to two full pages of the Los Angeles Times, "buying seven to eight hundred thousand." In the end, he also bound the results of "sprinkling coins" everywhere into a booklet, with a photo of Shi Jianxiang's photo left in an interview with the media on the cover, as the closure of the propaganda work.
If you search now, you can still find a lot of manuscripts touting "The Big Bombing" and Shi Jianxiang at that time. The characteristics of these manuscripts are that whenever Shi Jianxiang is mentioned, a dozen or even dozens of titles on him will be listed, including " "Special envoy for cultural exchanges between the United States and China, and the first good for Shanghai businessmen" is a confusing title. In addition, a movie poster must be inserted. On the poster, Shi Jianxiang's head is more prominent than the actor's portrait.
"In the era of Internet+, face and inner face are not always the same." This is the emotion expressed by director Xiao Feng on Weibo not long ago, and this is also the epitome of the whole shooting process of "The Big Bomb" - in terms of face, Shi Jianxiang is everywhere. Swagger, inside, in the Xiangshan Film and Television Base, Xiao Feng has no words to describe his suffering.
shoot
"For a long time after the movie was turned on, the actor Liu Ye was speaking into the air. "
After the film officially started, money was still a big issue.
Most films apply for funds from investors at least once every one to two months during the shooting process, but Hehe Film and Television requires Xiao Feng and producer Jiang Haiyang to apply for the next week's budget every week.
After the crew has made a detailed budget, they will report it to a three-person working group of Hehe Film and Television. If any of them are away on business trips, or are dissatisfied with the budget, or have doubts, they can not approve it. Therefore, the resident population exceeds 1,000. People's big crews can fall into financial crisis at any time.
In addition to the weekly approval of funds, Xiao Feng was also required to report to Shanghai every two weeks to a month, and even the main creator and leading actor had to follow him, and it took two days to go there. At the same time, the entire crew had no choice but to Xiangshan stopped work and waited.
During the filming of the film, director Xiao Feng expressed that funds were tight. Figure / Network
After arriving in Shanghai, Hehe Film and Television will hold a questioning meeting with 20 to 30 people. Anyone has the right to ask questions about the filming process, and Xiao Feng and the creators must answer them one by one. Shi Jianxiang will also inquire about the progress in detail and put forward his own views. Even when the shooting progress has exceeded one-third, they still want to replace the entire creative team and replace it with a Hollywood lineup on the grounds that the existing team cannot control the project.
"They didn't say anything about substitutions, they just said we didn't vote." Xiao Feng recalled. However, because he passively participated in the investment and held the shooting rights, he kept his position in the crew.
If the replacement fails, the investment is convenient to assign "supervisors" to the crew in the name of the executive producer. Sometimes it is the boss's assistant, and sometimes it is a friend who has business dealings with Shi Jianxiang. The only thing they have in common is that they don't know anything about movies. But these people have a strong voice over "The Big Bombing". The crew should send special people to deal with them and give them enough face, so as to prevent them from saying that the crew is not good and affecting the shooting progress after returning to Shanghai.
It is worth mentioning that when the filming of "The Big Bomb" first started, Shi Jianxiang once accepted Cui Yongyuan as the chief producer. At that time, Cui Yongyuan was also known as Shi Jianxiang as friends, and once served as the image ambassador of Kuailu's wealth management project "Daily Loan".
Cui Yongyuan and Shi Jianxiang were always friends before becoming the chief producers of "The Big Bombing". Figure / Network
It's just that Cui Yongyuan's "Chief Producer" career didn't last long, "After a week, they won't let me do it. When the meeting is in another week, I'll be nothing and become a consultant. Cui Yongyuan believed that the reason he was dismissed after working for a week was because "I felt that there was a problem and I couldn't do this, so everyone boycotted me."
Just after being "boycotted" from the "Big Bombing" crew, in early January 2016, Cui Yongyuan and Kuailu Group jointly established "Shanghai Yongyuan Investment Development Co., Ltd." with a registered capital of 100 million yuan.
And throughout the filming of "The Big Bomb," the financial crisis was almost never interrupted. The poorest time for the crew was two months after the film started, and Tom Hanks, who was previously promoted, did not appear, and was replaced by another Hollywood star, Bruce Willis. But when the latter arrived at the crew, the accountant said that the crew only had more than 10,000 yuan left on their books, and they couldn't even get the hotel deposit. Xiao Feng had no choice but to remit all his bank deposits at the filming site using online banking.
At the welcome meeting for Bruce Willis, Xiao Feng and Jiang Haiyang glanced at each other. Although they didn't say anything, they both understood that they were cheering each other up, and no matter how difficult it was, they should insist on filming this project: "Maybe If you don't believe me, Xiao Feng and I stood there, facing each other, and we two men burst into tears."
But on the other side of poverty, big-name stars continue to join the crew.
According to the agreement, "Big Bombing" implements a "dual-track system" financially. Xiao Feng and Jiang Haiyang are only responsible for the daily production expenses of the crew, while the actor contract and remuneration should be directly responsible for Hehe Films. Therefore, after the movie started, Hehe Film and Television did not stop adding actors in the past.
In order to deal with it, the crew has three ABC film crews. Xiao Feng is in charge of groups A and B, who shoot the main plot and special effects. Group C is directed by Jiang Haiyang, who is responsible for handwriting and adding scenes to the temporarily added actors. They often received a phone call the day before, and the next day, which big name was coming, and then a group of people had to write the plot all night, preparing costumes, props, and makeup.
According to "Entertainment Capital", once, Xiao Feng was temporarily called to Hong Kong by Shi Jianxiang. As soon as he entered the room, he found eleven Hong Kong stars sitting in the room. Only then did he know that the purpose of his visit was to make up and tell dramas for them on the spot. , Wheel battle alone for half an hour, talking about smoke in the throat. In the end, Shi Jianxiang sent him a text message: "I didn't expect you to be very eloquent. I am very confident in this movie." In the end, half of these Hong Kong stars participated in the performance.
Jiang Haiyang once said in an interview that some of the actors he filmed knew when he joined the group that his plays would not be used in the film at all. But this did not prevent these actors from appearing on the set of "The Big Bomb".
These actors tend to give the crew a short amount of time, but they are paid very well. Take Fan Bingbing as an example. She was originally the first female number one favored by the management, but she only signed for 5 days due to scheduling problems. It was written in the contract that she could add 3 more days if the filming could not be completed. Later, the police report on the tax case stated that Fan Bingbing took away 30 million yuan in a 5-day schedule, of which 10 million was taxed normally, and the remaining 20 million was tax evasion of 6.18 million by splitting contracts and other methods.
In order to prevent such behaviors by investors, Jiang Haiyang once gave them an analogy: "It is normal for a person to wear one ring. Wearing two rings is a bit of a personality. People who wear three rings think this person is a bit strange. If If all these actors come, maybe it's like all our fingers are wearing rings, right?" But the investor said: "You think about the laws of art, I think about the laws of capital, don't come. convince me."
In order to match the positioning of "international blockbusters", Hehe Film and Television has always insisted that the heroine must be a first-line celebrity, which led to the delay in finalizing the candidate. For a long time after the start, the actor Liu Ye was speaking to the air.
In the end, when there was only one month left to finish the production, the crew had to come forward to find Ma Su to come to the rescue. Since Liu Ye and Geng Le were facing the expiration of their schedule and had to leave the crew, Hehe Film and Television had to compromise and reluctantly agreed to this plan. When Xiao Feng met Ma Su, the most important question he talked to her was not about drama and script, but asked her if she could accept acting alone in the air.
Ma Su who appeared in "The Big Bomb" as the heroine. Figure / Network
collapse
" In June 2016, the Central Office of Pursuing Escaped Persons issued a notice on clues of 50 fleeing persons, among which the name of Shi Jianxiang was included. "
Before 2016, although the stumbling and stumbling was extremely difficult, the crew could still apply for funding from Hehe Film and Television. At the beginning of 2016, when the film entered the post-production stage, it was no longer able to get a penny from Hehe Films. At that time, Xiao Feng thought that he could wait for a turnaround as before. Unexpectedly, what he was waiting for was a bigger crisis.
In March 2016, Hehe Films' last project "Ip Man 3" before "Big Bombing" was released, with a box office of 155 million on the first day, breaking the opening box office record of a Chinese action film, and then became the most popular film in 60 hours. A Chinese-language action movie that is about to break through 400 million yuan at the box office.
Soon, overwhelming doubts appeared: why this film can be full during the daytime and after midnight on weekdays, and it is still sold out in remote theaters with a ticket price of up to 200 yuan, and even densely packed in the same theater To 10 minutes a game, and such a situation generally exists all over the country?
In the end, the film bureau intervened in the investigation and finally found out that the film party was buying box office and interfering with the market.
Donnie Yen, Shi Jianxiang and boxing champion Tyson who are promoting "Ip Man 3". Figure / Network
Why did the producers who originally made money from box office share pay for the box office themselves? To understand such a bizarre operation, we need to go back to the back of Hehe Film and Television. The business model that Kuailu Group pursued when it entered the film industry was called "Internet + Film + Finance". They launched financial products in the name of filming and promised to invest After the movie is released, the audience will get high returns, so as to absorb the funds of ordinary investors.
In order to convince retail investors who don't know the movie market that the company is doing well, they need to create box office myths and use that to drive up the stock price. To put it bluntly, they are not trying to make money at the movie box office. Movies are just a part of the financial leverage in the capital game, creating a false and prosperous bubble for them - the reason why Shi Jianxiang is willing to be in the cast and media coverage of "The Big Bomb" The same is true of investing in projects regardless of cost.
However, with the investigation of "Ip Man 3", the first domino was torn down, and all P2P products under Kuailu had a redemption crisis. Kuailu's capital chain broke, and Shi Jianxiang fled to the United States. In June 2016, the Central Office for Pursuit of Escaped Persons issued a notice on clues of 50 escapees, among which the name of Shi Jianxiang was included.
After Hehe Film and Television was completely unable to count on it, Xiao Feng once again became the "receiver" of "The Big Bomb": "I have experienced a series of financing loans, mortgage loans, liquidation of stocks, redemption of investment funds, and exhaustion of personal deposits. The self-destruction program quickly became the director with the most debt in the country."
Some colleagues also persuaded Xiao Feng to stop the loss, but he felt that if he didn't do it, the film would die, and the efforts of nearly 2,000 people would be wasted. In his concept, "movies are our films, others are just investments". According to Xiao Feng himself, his personal assets were only 1,516 yuan at one time, and he became "the poorest director in China".
After leaving Hehe Film and Television, Xiao Feng also began to work hard to bring "The Big Bomb" back to the track he could control.
For example, in order to control the length of the film to about two hours, the plot still revolves around the 11 main characters originally set in the script, and the scenes of the "big names" including Fan Bingbing, Huang Shengyi, and Liu Xiaoqing are reduced to one or two. The shots, focus on the opening and ending eggs. Even he himself joked that this is "the most expensive egg in history".
In the final film, Fan Bingbing's lens just flashed by in the egg. Figure / Network
stranded
"As a result of the capital accident, let us, a scholar who is engaged in art, continue to take the blame. "
In the second half of 2016, the "Big Bombing" crew was also implicated in the Kuailu incident and underwent financial review by the relevant departments. After review, the crew spent a total of 130 million yuan for filming, and the accounts were clear and there was no problem. Xiao Feng thought it was all right at the time, Kuailu's business was a matter of capital, and "The Big Bombing" could still be continued.
Dawn has also appeared. On May 17, the crew announced at the Shanghai Film Festival that the schedule will be August 17.
But a week later, Cui Yongyuan began to attack Feng Xiaogang and Fan Bingbing on Weibo. Initially, he aimed at Feng Xiaogang's new film "Mobile Phone 2", but since Cui Yongyuan posted the first contract with Fan Bingbing's name on it, things have quietly changed.
The contract showed that Fan Bingbing shot a movie with a remuneration of 10 million after tax. In addition, the crew had to pay a daily meal allowance of 1,500 yuan, and the make-up artist's remuneration was settled according to the monthly salary of 80,000 yuan. Mosaic was hit, but it was later confirmed that this contract was signed by Fan Bingbing and the "Big Bombing" crew.
Since then, all Cui Yongyuan's revelations, including an actor's 4-day schedule in exchange for 60 million yuan through a yin and yang contract, Huang Shengyi and Yang Zi's couple jointly taking away 750 million in various names such as being in charge of publicity, all revolved around "The Big Bombing". Yang Zi, who was named, immediately clarified on Weibo that he and the company under his name "never involved and signed a 750 million yin and yang contract, and have never had such a large sum of money with any unit."
The incident is still escalating step by step. After a series of revelations, Cui Yongyuan accused the bombing of a "big fraud" and a "money laundering movie" and called on the audience to boycott it.
As for why Cui Yongyuan had a performance contract signed by Hehe Films and the actors that should have been kept secret? In all his interviews this year, he vaguely interprets the source of the contract as being offered to him by "people who want to uphold justice, who want to uphold justice," and say he still has a drawer in his hand. Cui Yongyuan never responded positively to his relationship with Shi Jianxiang.
In June this year, the main creators such as Xiao Feng and Wang Haiyang held an "Explanation Session" to try to clarify the relationship between creation and capital, but it did not exchange for the final release of the film. Figure / Network
On August 7, 2018, just 10 days before the original release date of "The Big Bomb", the film official issued a document to change the schedule to October 26. A few days ago, on October 17, Xiao Feng once again updated his Weibo, announcing that "it's time to put it down", and then the crew officially confirmed to the media that "There is no plan to release "The Big Bomb" in China, and it will only be released in North America." .
This will also mean that "The Big Bombing" will not receive any revenue in China. According to the original plan, all revenue from the film's release will go into the account designated by the relevant departments to compensate for the losses in the Kuailu case. ordinary investors.
In July of this year, the author of "Daily People" had seen the final film "The Big Bomb" that was about to be released at that time. In the movie, almost every role is played by a star, except for Liu Ye, Bruce Willis, Song Seung-hsien, William Chan, Fan Wei, Ma Su, Che Yongli, Wu Gang, Feng Yuanzheng, Zhang Junning, Geng Le, who are on the starring list, there are also experienced actors. Nicholas Tse, who died in an aerial battle, Hu Bing, a doctor who rescued the wounded in the hospital, and Lei Jia, a nurse...they hardly had any lines.
In today's reality, Shi Jianxiang and Yang Zi, who once tried their best to build momentum for the movie, have already closed their voices. After sending the Weibo to clarify for themselves, Yang Zi has never updated Weibo again.
In the face of the final fate of "The Big Bombing", in an interview with "Poison Tongue Movie", producer Jiang Haiyang once sighed: "The capital accident caused the disaster, let us, a scholar who is engaged in art, continue to take the blame." As for what this is What kind of movie? Its official Weibo statement is that "The Big Bombing" is "an extreme case in the environment of capital kidnapping and creation."
During the 8 years of filming "The Big Bombing", Xiao Feng was once described as "nine deaths" and "survival after disaster". After this calamity, he still hopes that he can believe in "life" - "Yu Sheng firmly believes that: the great road in the world will eventually be smooth for good people. The sky has eyes, and retribution will definitely return to its place."
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