Wu Yusen is 63 years old this year. He started making movies at the age of 25, and did not make his famous work "The True Color of Heroes" until he was 40 years old. Forty is not confused, the director who is now commonly known as the "Master of Violent Aesthetics" has been in the film circle for 15 years, and finally he has thoroughly grasped the dish of commercial films. Personality and ideas can also be carried forward and distributed through the shadow of the sword on the screen, and deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. When Hollywood directors began to put pigeons on the screen and the sound of gunfire made the protagonist fly in the air in slow motion, Director Wu must have sunshine in his heart. I like to read history books, and I must think of the highest ideal of life set by this ancient sage more or less when every movie is successful.
Speaking of which, John Woo can't be regarded as a person who "enlightened the Tao" earlier. Compared with Ang Lee, with his debut ("Pushing Hand"), he can use his own insights to successfully cut into the market excitement, and there are many movies that pave the way for "The True Color of Heroes". But come on, maybe the only thing worth talking about is a film called "Passenger", because the martial arts director of the film is Jackie Chan, and he was also a frustrated person. "What can a failed person and a frustrated person do together?" So this film has been unpopular since it was made.
However, after a lot of accumulation, once Director Wu got the key to open the market, the combination of years of accumulation and depression resulted in an explosive situation, which helped him rush all the way from Hong Kong to Hollywood. It was not without twists and turns. The first work is "The Ultimate Target" starring Shangri-La. During the screening, the audience laughed constantly, the media received a flood of bad reviews, and the box office failed miserably. It can be called the Woo version of "The Promise". However, in the second film, he got the temper of the Americans, and then he got the immortal classics "Broken Arrow", "Changing Face" and "Mission Impossible 2" in the memory of the post-80s middle school, and then another new exploration. The setback of "Wind Whisperer", and then the sensational "Cracks of Memory", Director Wu's path has become wider and wider, and his attainments have become more and more sophisticated, and he has vaguely reached the height of flying flowers and picking leaves can hurt people - at least He himself thought so, so he dared to make such a leap-forward attempt: to shoot "Red Cliff".
Many directors have succeeded in that way, and they will not be able to eat if they leave that way. For example, Chen Kaige, Tsui Hark are also a little bit, Zhang Yimou showed his hand at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games, so it is difficult to say whether there is a new way. Only Feng Xiaogang used "Assembly" to thoroughly prove: "I can shoot anything". The film is so popular, professional and good-looking that Director Feng became the vice chairman of the film association not long ago.
Wu Yusen has killed all the way from "The True Color of Heroes", and has never left modern weapons, and they are all small-caliber, no more than 100 people sparring, the only time he tried to use weapons of mass destruction, group army field battle is "Wind Whisperer" ", it turned out to be very ugly, so the attempt of "Red Cliff" this time really made people's heart beat. Not only did it return to the era of cold weapons, but it also had an epic war picture of "millions of troops" and multi-arms fighting together. At the same time, it should also be noted that the "Battle of Chibi" has long been concluded in the hearts of Chinese audiences, that is, Luo Guanzhong's "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", from the "Battle of Dangyang" to the end of "Falling Huarong", it took exactly ten The length of each chapter. After Luo Guanzhong, all the stories about "Red Cliff", storytelling, opera, novels, TV, and movies, all unfolded on this basis, with slight changes, and never too much deviation.
However, the pattern has changed in recent years, and some media commented: "Yi Zhongtian is the first person in the Three Kingdoms after "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". He did not devote a separate chapter to talking about Chibi, but there are many characters involved in the battle of Chibi. Different from Luo Guanzhong's other interpretations, his great success shows to a certain extent: in this era, no matter whether a country or an individual, only pioneering and enterprising can settle down and make a living, for the part related to history, it is also necessary, at least not excluded. Introducing new interpretations. Now it seems that, as the second person in the new story of the Three Kingdoms, John Woo stood up and shouted at Luo Guanzhong, who has dominated the world for hundreds of years:
"You are out of date!" This is indeed something that is not annoying, or even annoying. Happy, uplifting things.
Of course, it is not easy to drink this sound with confidence. In addition to the above, in order to create a magnificent war scene that exceeds the audience's expectations, the following principles must be followed:
First, it should look like "Three Kingdoms".
Second, the light is not enough, it has to make people feel like they have never seen the Three Kingdoms, which is beautiful and enjoyable.
The above two points exist in the depths of the hearts of thousands of viewers, and their understanding is indescribable. A slight increase or decrease will be beyond recognition. It is either lost in the old fashioned or destroyed in frivolity. As talented as Woo Yusen, it is difficult to have the best of both worlds. Fortunately, he has worked hard for many years to accumulate and comprehensively create the "New Three Kingdoms" world. Although there are constant criticisms, it is still a big success at the box office - the last episode has been released so far and has reaped 700 million , which is 300 million in mainland China, far exceeding the investment of 50 million US dollars, and the next episode has just launched Qianjing Unlimited, Director Wu's leap forward can basically be judged to be a success.
"If you know a little bit about everything, life will be more exciting."
Director Wu, who made a lot of money, said when he was on TV. This line of Zhuge Liang was designed by him to say to himself, but it was not all a joke. In fact, his "New Chibi" is, to a certain extent, a cauldron of "a little bit of everything". According to preliminary statistics, there are the following elements:
"All-star lineup + stunning stunt production + the story line of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Basic personalities of characters + Hong Kong-style humor + new interpretations of the popular Three Kingdoms + centralized and dramatic organization methods".
If there is a priority among so many things, there is no doubt that the first two points are the foundation of the box office. Even if there are none of the latter, if you work hard on these two points, you will not earn less money, and at most people will make more money. A few scoldings, there are countless precedents for "Hero" and "Night Banquet" before. And Director Wu's ability to laugh at Hollywood is by no means a vain name. First of all, his ability in casting and training has reached the realm, which once again proves that the director who can make Nicolas Cage fall into the ground is absolutely extraordinary. For example, when many people heard that Takeshi Kaneshiro would play Zhuge Liang for the first time, they would have more or less bizarre thoughts: this is a guy who has never gotten rid of the image of a little white face, how can he play an old and cunning role? But in fact, when this "passionate and humorous rural youth" (Wo Yusen's language) appeared in front of us, it did not surprise people. Although it was full of shocking lines, it firmly grasped the essential feature of "wisdom":
At the beginning of the game, if you listen to your ears, you can judge the number of enemy troops, arms and distances, set up a "Golden Light Array" to defeat Cao's army with less victory, cross the river alone, and join forces with Zhou Yu to set up a magnificent gossip array... Until the next episode, Against the backdrop of rolling white clouds on the horizon, he said leisurely: "If there are clouds like snakes, there must be heavy fog", which has made people completely forget the established image of "Kincheng Wu", just like the Wolong "wisdom like a demon" thousands of years ago Sir, until the end, with a wave of the feather fan, the east wind roared and swept the sky, and the yellow leaves fluttered in the sky, hunting and hunting, and with a heroic demeanor, I stood alone in the sky opposite the Chibi battlefield before the thunder broke. Who can doubt this? Isn't it Zhuge Liang? This handsome, humorous, and young Zhuge Liang was born out of nowhere. Didn't he give a fresh, lively and vibrant new interpretation of the mysterious and unfathomable military commander of Shu who was buried in everyone's memory and judgment?
Speaking of stunt production, even John Woo couldn't hide his pride, claiming that Hollywood's top stuntmen would also be amazed at the grand and realistic scene of burning a serial ship. Even if such rhetoric is exaggerated, it is an indisputable fact that the actual effect in the theater is not inferior to that of most Hollywood blockbusters. From the Bagua Array to the Cao Jun Water Village that stretches for thousands of miles, from the locust arrow rain when the grass boats borrowed arrows to the overwhelming Kongming lanterns before the war, suppressing the dazzling warships and warships covering the Yangtze River, and finally to the earth-shattering fire attack and infantry shield formation A decisive battle with the cavalry. The visual feast presented by John Woo is dizzying and breathtaking, and many of these scenes can become pioneering classics. To call John Woo the most successful director of depicting ancient Chinese war scenes in history, I believe no one will disagree.
Based on the above two points alone, this multi-year blockbuster is actually fully worthy of the ticket price paid by the audience, and the valuable and brilliant thing about John Woo is that he is serious about filming "Three Kingdoms", not other dramas.
Chen Han, the screenwriter of "Red Cliff", said that his and Woo's intention is to "stick to the blank space of history" to write, which just conforms to the above-mentioned basic principle of "like the Three Kingdoms and surpasses the Three Kingdoms". Chen Han recalled that John Woo read almost all the information about Chibi that he could find, including "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", as well as the CCTV version of the TV series "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and "Three Kingdoms", so although the whole film is full of Hong Kong It is humorous, and bold additions and deletions have been made to the main plot, but the characters' personalities have basically not changed - as long as the audience recognizes that the person is still the same person, the taste of the Three Kingdoms will not change - moreover, John Woo and Chen Han are still fully understanding the characters' personalities On the basis of, and made a wonderful performance. For example:
Cao Cao's "Send Ghost Soldiers", sent soldiers who died of typhoid fever across the river, spread the disease, and psychologically deterred the opponent. This is a newly created plot of the play, which sticks to the treacherous and vicious character of Cao Cao given by "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", without any trace of creation.
For another example, the two plots of borrowing arrows from grass boats and Jiang Gan stealing books were spliced into a "serial plan", which added an unwarranted charge to Cai Mao and Zhang Yunxin, and even made up for the "anti-intermediate plan" in "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" to a certain extent. "The flaw - Cao Cao killed the general with just a letter and a few slanderous words. It was too impulsive to write about this suspicious and wise traitor.
In this way, there are many good-looking plots in "Red Cliff" that originated from "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and are new to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Of course, there are also failures.
For example, when Xiao Qiao crosses the river, he can even seduce Cao Cao with his beauty to make Cao Cao miss the opportunity...
The glorious image of Prime Minister Cao, the first-time traitor who was so easy to create, collapsed and became an old lover who is hungry and thirsty. In this way, Cao Cao didn't have to wait until Chibi came back to be cleaned up. Of course, this plot may have a prototype in history, that is, during the war in Wancheng, Cao Cao subdued Zhang Xiu, and took over Zhang Xiu's sister-in-law with a lustful heart. Cao Cao was cleaned up, and his confidant Dian Wei sacrificed his life to save him and was able to escape. Therefore, Cao Cao said a sentence that was popular in China during SARS in 2003:
SARS, my life is over.
But that was when the overall situation was decided. Although Cao Cao was lustful, he never delayed his marching and fighting because of his lust, and since he suffered such a big loss when he was young, he would not make the same mistake again at a critical moment - I doubt Woo Yusen is also very helpless, but in order to take care of Lin Zhilin, he had to give up the "hard meat plan". With such a plot, the reason is probably that Zhang Shan who plays Huang Gai is not as big as Lin Zhilin. As I said before, all-stars and stunts are forever is the first. If Jiang Wen was replaced to play Huang Gai, Xiao Qiao's role would not have played such a big role.
But no matter what, "Chibi" can basically be regarded as a good film that is well-received and popular, and the surging box office is also the best vote for John Woo by the global audience, so John Woo said on TV, " There is also a line in Chibi that he designed for himself:
I need to calm down.
This late-blooming director can give people the impression that there is always a way to create surprises, which really corresponds to a sentence made by Yi Zhongtian through the demise of the Shu Kingdom:
No matter people or countries, it is not a good thing to fire too fast.
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