When I saw Lu Chuan's interview, I drooled, and then I turned to his interview. It was much better than my nagging.
"Sanlian Weekly" Wang Xiaofeng Dialogue with Lu Chuan - Movie History Reveals the Secret
Lu Chuan: I want to make a warlike thing
Wang Xiaofeng
triple Life Weekly, March 30, 2009, Issue 11,
"I'm not worried about the box office of "Nanjing! Nanjing!" because it is a commercial film." This is what Lu Chuan said to the media before.
With "Nanjing! Nanjing! Entering the countdown to the premiere, Lu Chuan will no longer be as easy as the release of "Looking for a Gun" and "Kekexili". He is not worried about the reputation of this film, and even faces the same period as "Nanjing!" Nanjing! Lu Chuan also seemed very confident in the competition of films of the same theme that were released. Compared with people's compliments about his film, he would prefer to see a box office data that would satisfy him. Like many directors of blockbuster films, he began to worry about the box office. This may be a mental training process that many directors must go through. The reputation of the niche is no longer Lu Chuan's understanding of success. He needs a public level of recognition. Therefore, Lu Chuan's face developed pimples overnight. Even with the twists and turns that the film has experienced from project approval to shooting in the past, Lu Chuan has never had so many bags on his face. In three weeks, box office numbers will determine his appearance and his new place among future Chinese directors. This one-hundred-million-dollar film is a challenge for any director.
"When you communicate with this system in good faith, it is not a feeling of confrontation."
"Sanlian Life Weekly": "Nanjing! Nanjing! "I encountered a lot of trouble during the project review. What is the difference between this type of film and other film reviews?
Lu Chuan: I don't know what other movies are like, but this movie needs to be watched by the Central Propaganda Department and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in addition to the Film Bureau, so it will be decided after the opinions of the leaders of several other departments.
Looking back now, it's a really long story. We didn't know until we actually sent the script. That year, there were about four to five films about the Nanjing Massacre. If they were all approved, there would be four or five "Nanjing Massacre" films at the end of the year. Something went wrong with diplomacy. And the Japanese embassy also reacted when they heard about this, and then these projects were put on hold. Preparations By the end of 2006, the standing population of the crew has reached fifty or sixty people, and two scene selection teams are in China, and various designs including many firearms and costumes are being made. However, the news that came out seemed to say that this matter was going to be pornographic. The internal news to us was, "It's better to stop, because you are not the first, you are not the first to arrive, and you are not based on your qualifications." I heard that the directors who want to make this film include Tang Jili and Yan Hao, and both Germans and Americans have to do it. I remember that during that time, I went out for a drink with investor Tan Hong, and the most tragic thing he said was that all the money in his family totaled more than one million, "Lu Chuan, I will support you until you spend all this money, and then we will leave. At the end of the year, the film bureau gave us a message that the script had been given to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and it was clear that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had rejected it, and only "Nanjing Catastrophe" passed. But how do you deal with the people in the group? They were all a group of young men in their twenties. They were carefree every day. They went to work and sang. They sweated after playing football at night. Then they sat outside the warehouse and chatted about what the movie would look like. Special yearning. I suddenly felt that this was a dream, and only Tan Hong and I knew that this dream could not go on.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": How did it turn around?
Later, the two of us felt that we couldn't do this, so we decided to die, and the two of us started to code all kinds of people we knew. He knew a lot of people, and we went to meet various leaders. The most legendary is in December, I remember it was 11 o'clock in the evening, we both stood at the door of Zhongnanhai, were picked up by a car, and met a boss. This was the first time I entered Zhongnanhai, and it was in the middle of the night. The leader asked me why I wanted to make this play. I said, "Diplomacy and culture are two different things. I think that no matter what diplomacy needs, there must be a voice from the people. If we are not ready when diplomacy needs a voice from the people, where will the voice come from? We don't need it now. Voice, but when we need it, the voice is not there right away. If the film "Nanjing! Nanjing!" is a voice from the folk, I don't want to shoot a scar on my face or on my head The bag said you hit me and I wanted to tease out something else because I saw some different history." I can't say that meeting was pivotal, but it must have been one of the last dominoes toppled , because the first card is particularly huge and heavy, the leader must have helped.
Later, we met with three or four such leaders, and also met with some directors of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. When one director met us, his first sentence asked me, "Why do you want to make this movie? Tell me." I probably said something like this, "Actually, I don't want to cause trouble for this country, but I really don't think we're going to make trouble for this one scene. Besides, I think we're the only ones who can do it well." I said, " I have read other books, and they are all crying. It is precisely our book that is not crying. We are talking about what happened to the Chinese, because there are no Chinese in this history. You look through all our textbooks and there is no China in it. It's not a matter of human beings, the Chinese are killed. What the hell is going on with the Chinese? No! In fact, there is no such thing as the Japanese. As for such a core matter, only the people who enter the public memory are Germans, only the Germans saved the Chinese. In the end, only one German saved 200,000 Chinese in our children's memory. It's just such a good person and good deed. Does this work for us? Looking for another savior?" Anyway, I was very excited that day and said everything, obviously we are patriots, but our thoughts are different from others. The director was very nice, and he said he was willing to help.
At the beginning of March 2007, I learned that the Japanese Office of the Asian Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs approved it. I picked up the phone and called the Film Bureau, saying that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had approved it. At that time, the leaders of the film bureau felt that there was still a delay in what was removed from the diplomatic mouth, which was quite surprising. A day later, the letter that was supposed to be converted really passed. On March 22, the filming license was obtained. I remember that the Director-General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs once came to see the site we were preparing for. So after this incident, I think these officials are actually quite cute. They really came to see you at the scene. What do you want to do? These people are so excited that they have to do this.
Another very special person came here, He Long's daughter, Sister He. Because a friend said the day before, "Sister He, can you come and see you?", I said yes, come on, I didn't think about which Sister He was. The next day, a car suddenly stopped at our door, and Mrs. He came. I watched the props for a long time and gave us a lot of encouragement. I was particularly impressed by what she said, "In China, you don't want to do things for the country, you will be very smooth, very successful, or receive a lot of support as you should, and sometimes it's the opposite." Often there is no idea. People live very well, but those who have ideas are extremely painful and depressed. She said, "As long as you persevere, many people who are willing to help you will come forward. Because many people want to do this, but they won't do it. But as long as you persevere, slowly around your team Someone will be willing to reach out." At that time, when we were in a particularly difficult time, we planned to carry it, waiting for a hand to reach out. Indeed, on the way, various people reached out and pushed us to the end, including this approval. By the end of the shoot, all the hands that were stretched out were very thick. After watching the film, you can imagine how difficult it was to pass. I believe this is indeed an improvement, an iconic one.
I really think that when you are doing something very sincere, and you are also sincerely communicating with this system, it is not a feeling of confrontation. In fact, the system is also changing, because the system is made up of people, and the system made up of people is actually very flexible, and it depends on how you deal with it and how you communicate with it. Of course, I hope that one day the movie can be put on the table and passed, instead of us spending so much energy, about a year before and after. But I think these things I have experienced are helpful for me to make this movie from the creator's point of view. For example, when I was waiting in front of me, I was editing the book, and when I was waiting later, I was cutting the film again, and I didn't waste time.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": Has there been any change in the review after the shooting?
Lu Chuan: Now this version is 25 minutes shorter than it was then. I think these 25 minutes must be cut out. It’s not who forced me to cut them, but I think these 25 minutes make the film look very long. That's what I like, not necessarily what the audience likes, or what the movie itself needs.
In September 2008, I showed Mr. Han (Han Sanping) a rough cut. He was very excited after watching it and told me that we have to think about how to keep this film in the past. A week later, the review began, and it was passed on January 8 this year. During the review process, I was constantly revising it. It was not the opinion of the bureau, but I felt that the film was not good enough, not concise enough, and many things were too soft. cutting. When the comments came down, it surprised me. It was just two pages, a dozen comments, and there were no major revisions. They were all point-like, and there was no face-to-face talk about removing one of them.
Some leaders felt very excited after watching it, and sent me a text message to tell me that this was a movie that was beyond their expectations. In the days when the opinion came out, I was really anxious and scared. There are a few scenes that I really don't want to take away, such as sacrifice, I'm really afraid. During the first trial, there was an opinion that the Japanese drama was too heavy, and that the Japanese drama should be removed. These opinions were all gone when they were finally written, but the length was shortened. I can feel that many people are protecting this film. Without these hands to block this film, it must be riddled with holes. This is how this movie came about. Although it is long, what I can feel in it is actually help.
I cut out a lot of actors' scenes that only helped the actors, not the movie. At that time, I was actually a little selfish when I was cutting, because these actors had been with me for a year, and they all received very little remuneration, and they were all wrists. I was helping them if I could. When I started cutting the movie, I was not as ruthless as "Kekexili". When I cut "Kekexili", the actors didn't know each other, and it didn't have any big actors. I completely based on the needs of the material. And "Nanjing! "The actor has been with me for a year. When I cut it, I really couldn't handle it, and my hands were very painful. Because I know that the media will count when it is released, who has how many scenes, and what is going on. I suddenly feel that I am a little soft-hearted when I cut some people's scenes under such a cruel rule. Now this version, I edited it after watching it with Wang Shuo. Because sometimes when you look at it with different people, your threshold is high.
"Without these hands to block this film, it must be riddled with holes.
" Sanlian Life Weekly: What advice did Wang Shuo give you?
Lu Chuan: I remember a few friends came to watch it one day. It was a 2 hours and 15 minutes version. I didn’t expect Wang Shuo to come, so I was more nervous because he was sharp and he didn’t need to speak when he watched it. I suddenly realized that There's a lot of stuff that shouldn't belong in this movie because he's the pickiest guy. He also watched "Kekexili", and after reading it, he said to me, "I thought it was a good thing for a good person, but you made it like this." This time, he said again: "I found out that you're going back to the things that I think you must have screwed up, and you've been tinkering with them. Why do you always take risks?" After reading "Nanjing!" "He first told me: "I especially like the second half, I especially love this ending, like the European films I like, the feelings, viewpoints and your shooting style are all relaxed, which is very good." The first half, To be honest, although the filming is good, I can't stand it because it is the public memory of Chinese people, and you don't find a new perspective. But you can't do anything about it. If you want to shoot this from the perspective of a Japanese soldier, then forget it, you are a traitor. I can tell you're having a hard time on this. But the Japanese line is so good that I didn't expect there to be this line. That line is where the artistic merit of the drama is decided, and you've held it up. "The next day I sat there, called the editor, and re-edited it. At that time, the investor said that if it is shorter, it can accumulate more games in a day. I have been stuck at 1 minute and 2 minutes. I couldn't cut it. But I spent about four hours with the editor that day. I asked him how much he cut, and he said you cut it for 12 minutes. 12 minutes, in fact, the version I showed Wang Shuo was basically finalized. , at that time, if you move the scissors, all the processes will be redone. It takes about a week and a half, at least ten days, a very complicated process. The DI side needs to be re-aligned, and the sound side has to be re-aligned. Wang Shuo I didn't tell me which scene he felt uncomfortable, just that feeling, you are with someone who is more critical in the literary and art circle, he is hard to be moved, and the worldly emotions don't mean much to him anymore. For example Said, I personally like the scene of massacre and then shouting long live, I think this is something that our generation may be excited about, maybe not to him. But I think it was decided after watching that scene with him in the end. I downloaded this film, because some things only belong to Lu Chuan, and it should not belong to this film. It was very clear that night. When I was cutting the film, I sent a text message to my friend saying that I was back to "Kekexili", and I suddenly I don't recognize my six relatives anymore. I don't know anyone who I love. All the scenes are kept if they can be linked to this movie, and they are cut if they are not.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": How did you write this script at that time? Maybe two shots require you to read half a book of information. When you went to look up these materials, what were the things that sent you out that made you feel compelled to show them?
Lu Chuan: There are too many, I can't tell you right now. First of all, I have to thank the major I studied in school. We read books in reverse. What is intelligence? Collecting it from public channels is called intelligence. How do you find out the truth from publicly collected intelligence? Comparison. You have to listen to four people describing the same thing, and after comparing, you can be sure which ones are true. The information in Nanjing is the same. I remember that I read the Chinese writing first, but I didn’t feel it at all. I didn’t want to take pictures except when I was full of anger. They all broke arms and legs, and they all cried. . 70 years on and we're still talking about this as a weakling, it's silly, really. When I started to read Japanese diaries and found some shocking things, I suddenly realized that Chinese people are pretty cool. I remember that there was an entry in a diary. After their team entered Nanjing, they found a German tank parked on the street. It was about to explode. Later, it was said that it was good because the track was broken, so they kept it for later. Bar. Because the Japanese adore Germany, and German stuff is good, their little broken and thin-skinned tanks are incomparable with German tanks, so they didn't blow up. But as soon as the team passed, a machine gun was extended from the tank and the team was completely wiped out, and the team behind quickly surrounded the ground and shot at the tank. In the end, the Japanese army came to surround them and asked them to surrender. In the end, a few of these guys ran out of ammunition, and the Japanese still didn't dare to get in. In the end, they poured gasoline on them and burned them alive in the tank. I suddenly thought, this is too stupid. And the Japanese are talking about it with reverence. The person who wrote the diary said that he didn't catch up with this matter. When he saw the bodies of a group of comrades in front of him, he asked, and then he knew what was going on. Another one I saw in the diary was called "Cold Guns in the Streets and Alleys". A shot from the window sill killed a Japanese soldier, dragged the man over to take a look, and said that it was a little boy who was not fully developed. Then it slashed with a knife. But the little boy shot a cold shot and was also wearing the clothes of a Kuomintang soldier. When you see a lot of this kind of thing, you will wonder what the historians are doing, and why our historians have wiped out all these resistances. I started to look at their previous logic, and their logic was "because we didn't resist, so you shouldn't kill me". I think this is bullshit logic. It is only natural for me to resist. I resisted being captured. You can't kill me because I resisted.
Then there was the raising of my hand in the refugee camp. I used to feel like giving up. It was probably in the middle of 2006. I thought this movie was boring, so why did I film it? I suddenly found a whole bunch of fresh stuff. For example, the prostitutes are recorded in the diaries of Rabe and Weitling, as well as in the diary of one of our female professors named Chen Ruifang. Both Rabe and Weitling wrote in their diaries: The Japanese came to us as refugees today. The camp wanted prostitutes, and said if there were any prostitutes here, we would take them away. Rabe's diary says "We let them take it away". Weitling wrote in his diary, "Some prostitutes stood up and I let them go." You have to imagine when they left, it was all over the city talking about how the Japanese raped, gang-raped, raped and killed women. when. That's not a good thing, it's not that they earn fifty thousand dollars a day. Rabe made an understatement. When I was watching it, I suddenly realized that people have a position. If you help us, he is also a German. He will not stand on the position of our fellow brothers and sisters and say let them go. If they are all Chinese, maybe his narrative is not like this. When I was thinking about this, I was very excited, and they took the initiative to stand up. Then I saw another sentence in the diary of another Japanese, saying, "Today I went to the comfort station to be very disappointed. Among the women who came from the refugee camp, a woman suddenly went crazy and pulled out her bayonet to kill one of our soldiers. In the end, we caught her and killed her. Before she was caught, the other comfort women desperately grabbed a bayonet, not to kill our people, but to kill themselves by grabbing the bayonet." So he felt It was very unfortunate for the comfort station to encounter such a thing. A woman might have been bullied, so she pulled his bayonet and stabbed a Japanese. When the Japanese transferred troops over, these women grabbed the bayonet and wiped their necks desperately.
These feelings make me feel that this play has begun to take the lead in the Chinese side. I'm thinking that the Chinese must have something to support this nation to survive today. Just like the subtitle of this movie - the city of life and death, in such an extreme environment, how people face life and death is something to talk about. Because I saw these things, I didn't want to make up things, I thought of "Nanjing! Nanjing! "In fact, there is a very powerful aspect, and it is the aspect that has supported this nation all the way to this day, and it has been deliberately ignored by people. It would be unfair to the dead if we only remember that the Germans saved 200,000 people in this matter. So it became clear that things started on the Chinese line, which made me think it started to make sense.
"In the end, I poured gasoline on my brothers and burned them to death in the tank. I suddenly felt that this was too 'cow'."
"Sanlian Life Weekly": When did the first draft of the script finish? How was it changed later?
Lu Chuan: The first draft was finished in March and April of 2006, but that is a world of difference from now. The previous script was quite commercial. It included the love between Teacher Jiang (played by Gao Yuanyuan) and Lu Jianxiong (played by Liu Ye), Liu Ye's escape, and that kind of expected expectation. But in fact, I think the filming process is a process of subversion of the script. Because we demand absolute truth, the shooting scene has become the best stage to criticize and subvert my script, but I don't feel that I have no face in this matter, and this matter has to be done. Because I am a person who has never experienced life and death, I write scripts at home. Although I have read a lot of materials, many things are taken for granted. But at the scene, we have 600 to 700 people on the scene every day, if there are more than 1200, 1600 people, all of them are wearing the same clothes to practice there. You know that many things written in the script are not allowed to happen. For example, Liu Ye, as soon as Liu Ye arrived at the scene, I knew that it was too difficult to let such a brother live. When I finally decided to kill him halfway, I really struggled inside. You know that it is almost impossible for such a handsome guy of 1.86 meters to live out of Nanjing City. So unlikely to survive. Subversive writing like this is basically done on the spot.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": At that time, there was indeed an escape.
Lu Chuan: Some escaped, and many escaped. Many people have the experience of escaping, but they are all very inconspicuous people who can obviously dress up as traders. For example, after March and June, some people lie in ambush for up to six months before running away. Some of them didn't even run away, they just got married and had children there. But someone like Liu Ye had to let him run away when the plot was at its most intense. In fact, he faced a big problem. Basically, there is no scene that has not been changed, and this kind of qualitative change has taken place.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": You said that the core of this film is about Chinese people's self-help. What changes have taken place in the structure?
Lu Chuan: Actually, I always wanted to shoot both Chinese and Japanese. When I was interviewed before, I didn't dare to say what happened to the Japanese. And I never dropped the line because I feel like it's two sides of the same sheet, and it's not a complete event without either side. The biggest change is that when I was halfway through the shoot, I suddenly realized that I was no longer shooting the specific issue of the "Nanjing Massacre". I thought we might be shooting something about how people understand the nature of war, and we have It is possible to do one thing to surpass the Chinese and Japanese, and to be able to touch something that is a general rule-that is, the relationship between people in the face of war and the relationship between people and war.
I'm not the kind of person who gives it a very high idea right away. I may be impulsively wanting to do it because of a scene. "Nanjing! Nanjing! "There are two or three scenes that I saw in my eyes before filming, such as the sacrificial dance. It can be said that I have a huge desire to film this dance, but why do I want to film this dance, I am very It's hard to give you a clear explanation. I think this matter has a very big meaning in it, and this meaning will keep me awake. When the scene was filmed, the two drummers got off the plane, the two best drummers in Japan, and I asked my Japanese instructor to bring them over. At that time, the drum was also transported from Henan. In order to make the drum hit the sound we wanted, we used a 12K lamp to keep the drum surface dry to tighten the skin. I let them knock once and they just went "wow" and knocked for four minutes. I was watching from the outside, and my heart was full of that... Suddenly I felt that it was worth doing. We must bring this drum and this sacrifice to all Chinese people. Because of this threat, this threat of being conquered has never gone away, and it's been inherited there. They may not rush to China, at any time. Now let us Han nationality, or let us Chinese come up with a piece of shocking cultural heritage passed down from generation to generation, I think it is gone, we are left with yangko, where is our real thing? The essence of war is mental torture, it is a culture dancing on your ruins. After listening to the guys playing the drums that day, all of us were terrified. At that moment, I felt like we did something very right.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": In this film, people from two countries cooperate to do something that once had hatred in history. What is your state of mind?
Lu Chuan: The job requirement of a profession when filming this film is to make myself 100% Chinese when filming this film in China. I hated them to the core when I was filming the massacre, and I cried in front of the monitor when they shouted there that China cannot perish. But when I'm doing Japanese scenes, I ask myself to be Japanese. Because I don't think Japanese people are considered human in Chinese movies. Two days ago, a reporter at Peking University asked me, I heard that you photographed Japanese people as adults, why? I said, are they not human? They are human beings. To put it bluntly, in this movie, I can make them jumping beam clowns with Dan's beard. But this is an insult to ourselves. 70 years ago, you were defeated by these people, and you were defeated by the clown? no. We also know how powerful they were 70 years ago. They were a single infantry soldier, and they could have 1,800 rounds of ammunition a year for live-fire training. It would be good for us to have 10 rounds. In their memoirs, before 1943, we could not fight the Japanese with bayonets. Later, we carried out special intensive training, so that we might be able to be one-on-one. Before, it had to be two-on-one. The Japanese draw strategic maps for every battle they participate in in their diaries, and many people have small cameras in their pockets. What is their education level? Ninety-nine percent of our army is illiterate. So when you slander it and you can never face history, these things can happen again. So I want to show the Chinese audience what kind of opponent we lost to 70 years ago. So there are emotions, but you can't let emotions take over your reason, it will become a matter of self-entertainment.
So on the issue of hatred, I have been admonishing myself not to lose my mind because of hatred, and then in the process of contacting them, I formed some ideas. I may have stumbled into this subject in a state of ignorance. A friend told me that you should study the bombing of the Soviet Red Army in Germany during World War II when it was about to win, and then think about the relationship between massacres and war. Later, I found out that it was indeed the case. At that time, the Red Army carried out devastating bombings on completely undefended German cities. In the end, it looked like the surface of the moon from above. One by one, hundreds of thousands of people died overnight. That’s why Churchill was right when he said, “Even in a just war, one more step is evil”.
I used to really think that the Nanjing Massacre was a case, because I grew up breathing this air in this environment. I think it was the Japanese who especially hated the Chinese, and it was a release of hatred, but after I learned more , after I made a comparison between the massacres on Chinese soil and the massacres in the world, I found that the grassroots enforcers in the war, their psychological and physical rights have been highly obtained, when the rights of life and death become a battlefield After the gods above, the atrocities expanded, and the massacre became inevitable, because those people are no longer human in your eyes, but materialized things that need to be resolved. High acquiescence, because there is no longer punishment for what you do, so slaughter becomes inevitable. I don't think it's less meaningful when you connect it to the entire history of the Holocaust, I think it's more meaningful. We should re-look at what happened, and the conclusion we can get from this history should not just be how cruel and stupid the Japanese are, this is too simple, what we should realize is what works for the moment, This is the attitude to solve the problem.
There are also many ideas that I felt during the shooting process. For example, I saw the Japanese use ropes to entangle people, and a hundred people walked out. After the shooting, another 100 people walked out. When I was shooting this scene, I Suddenly found that this is the essence of their slaughter. Originally, we always thought that a family would be dragged out and brutally killed. We would think that the Japanese would kill people blindly, but this is not the case. 80% of their killing plans are based on steps and plans. Efficient batch processing, killing people when they see people in the city is only part of the subsequent spread, and the mass slaughter is the core, they are strangling like a machine, killing those captives in batches, this is the The real subject of massacres, and such stories are rarely known and understood due to their extinction, and I only learned about them from Japanese diaries. One hundred people were dragged out and killed, and the remaining people who were still alive waited less than 30 meters away, and then watched helplessly before being taken away. This is especially in line with the Japanese way of doing things. This is massacre.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": What is their reaction and state of cooperation with Japanese actors?
Lu Chuan: This is a very complicated matter. Do I understand their emotions? I don't understand, the Japanese actors I hired, they stayed with me for nine months, but Lu Chuan asked me to do the same thing, such as asking me to go to Tokyo to shoot a scene like this, I absolutely couldn't do it, give me a thousand If I don't go either, I don't think I can take it, but here they are. This time, many scenes were filmed by discussion, because one thing about Japanese actors is that they don’t shoot if they don’t understand. He will say that he can’t do it, but I want to convince him and tell them that they have to do it, because That's what your people did at the time, so we forced us to find a lot of photos. Later, it was not a question of persuasion. There was a scene where a young boy named Water was strangled to death in the city. Yes, this is also true. But then this scene was useless. I remember that after the scene was filmed, a staff member told me that he was hiding and crying, feeling very broken and wanting to go home.
There are also some very subtle things. For example, the drum-beating scene almost turned into a group fight. It was like this at the time. When the drum was raised, some of the extras were still joking and beating the drum. The Japanese actors were unhappy. They thought how could they be joking when filming such a serious scene. They came down and punched the extras with a "bang". These extras were all from the martial arts school, and immediately surrounded the Japanese actor. Actor, our staff rushed over to help pull the frame and protect the Japanese actor. I was not there at the time. But I want to talk about a very sensitive topic. Japanese actors have a higher level of respect for this play than our actors. They will stand aside very seriously and respectfully. Angrily glaring at those people, but our actors sometimes get very angry, shouting "Down with the Japs" and so on. But the core of this matter is that Japanese actors can't stand our disrespect. Although their methods are rude, but think about it carefully, in Japan, they often talk loudly to solve problems, and this is their way.
In fact, my heart is very complicated. When I see Japanese actors acting, it is really special. I often warn our actors that we once lost to the Japanese on the battlefield, and now we can no longer lose to them in acting. We want to show the best state of our Chinese actors, but the state of Japanese actors is obvious to all, and it also broadens the span of my understanding of this drama. From a certain point of view, they support this drama. The grandfather of Nakaizumi Hero who played Kadokawa was a Japanese devil. He participated in the Nanjing Massacre and then returned to Japan to commit suicide, so he has more family feeling than ordinary Japanese actors.
In the process of filming, it was not easy for them. They were almost beaten by Chinese actors several times, but they were very good. I remember when filming a rape scene, they didn't dare to put their hands on the girl's body, and then I told them that if you don't do the actual show, these girls have to be naked all the time, and then I tell them where to put them, and when they say "stop" at the end of the show, they're done and then Close the clothes for them and bow to the girls, which I saw with my own eyes. On the contrary, some of our staff are laughing and laughing. I even held a meeting for them for this matter. These girls are all willing to come. They are very great and we should take it seriously.
There are also Japanese actors who let me learn a lot from them. For example, in a scene where Yitian killed Xiaomei Tang and walked to the street, suddenly someone shouted "I want to go back to Japan". I didn't make up that scene. At that time, we were all stunned, because this was not in the book, but the Japanese actor Xiao Hei performed it himself, and then Ida went to "bang" and gave him a punch. Xiao Hei's face was swollen, and he said to me aggrievedly, "Why is he so cruel?" I felt that at that time, Yi Tian was Yi Tian, and Xiao Hei was Xiao Hei.
"Actually, what has been a strong support for this nation until today is deliberately ignored by people."
"Sanlian Life Weekly": In the movie, there is a scene where John Rabe went to Shanghai, and the rest is the Chinese people's own business .
Lu Chuan: Yes, he left in the middle. He left on February 18, 1938. At that time, the whole of Nanjing had just fallen into dire straits, and the Nanjing International Security Zone was not established by him. He was appointed as the chairman, which was first proposed by a Chinese professor. Regarding Rabe, the history of this man actually depends on him. Later, the mayor of Nanjing tried every means to find him. After World War II, some courts were established in Europe to sort out the Nazis. Rabe was almost sentenced. He did some good things when he returned to Germany, that is, he wrote a report and gave a speech about the persecution that took place in Nanjing. I think he is a great person in this regard, because he was warned by the Nazis at that time. Stop talking nonsense, and his family once lost their livelihood after that. At this time, the mayor of Nanjing heard about this matter and wrote a letter to invite him to ask their family to move to Nanjing. The government will provide all the The cost is exactly the same as the Jews did to Schindler. At that time, the people of Nanjing were not rich, but they still raised a huge amount of money to buy food for him and send it to him. Once a month, he wrote in Rabe's diary when he was the first He was very excited when he received canned food and other items sent from Nanjing this time, and this behavior continued until Rabe's death.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": Why do you want to make such a movie?
Lu Chuan: Since "Kekexili", I have a feeling that filmmaking has become a way of life for me, and it will record my many, many feelings. "Nanjing Nanjing" records some of my feelings in the past four years, and For the first time, this film showed my views on love. For me, it is not just about the Nanjing Massacre, it is a film about people, and it is an excavation of myself. A lot of opinions, I'm very satisfied that I finally found and expressed them.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": Kadokawa's last suicide was your reflection on the war?
Lu Chuan: The last scene of Jiao Chuan was the last thing I came up with. I think in the end, the reflection on a war should no longer be divided into Japanese and Chinese. At this time, Kadokawa should reflect on behalf of all of us, not just himself.
About Zhang Chunru's suicide by swallowing a gun, I have found many documents before and after, including the autopsy report. The American coroner who performed the autopsy on her said this: "I have seen many women commit suicide, but most of them are cut. Wrist, gas, hanging, jumping off the building is the ultimate, but rarely choose to commit suicide by swallowing a gun, because at least there is a reservation about her appearance, but Zhang Chunru killed herself with a large-caliber pistol, what has she experienced in her heart? What kind of darkness?" Her looks were a rare and convincing beauty, but she chose such a way, pulling the car aside and killing herself. I was wondering why many people committed suicide, including Weitling, who was rescued by jumping into the sea on the boat back to New York, but he committed suicide after returning. This is a few years after the end of the Nanjing Massacre. .
Like Weitling doing a lot of work and finally committing suicide, but how many people know who he is? Like Zhang Chunru, she obviously died for this matter, or why would she choose to end her life in such a time when her reputation has reached such a stage, obviously because this matter is like a shadow It eroded into her body, and she couldn't get rid of it.
When I filmed that meeting, although I didn't think about committing suicide, I did feel very broken down, but I also wanted to express a kind of relief, and finally releasing Xiaodouzi was a kind of relief and an explanation for life. For the scene where Kadokawa died, I didn't write the sub-shots, I just shot it after the talk, including the scene where Xiaodouzi blows the dandelion, but when I was shooting this scene, I found the feeling that it was done in one go, and the scene was already fast. The filming is over, but I seem to have found the feeling that I can make movies. I feel that I am free, which is different from the state where I was very competitive with myself at the beginning.
"Sanlian Life Weekly": Although the ending is beautiful, the whole process of the film is very depressing. Now that the audience has become accustomed to entertainment consumption, do you think the audience can accept this film? In other words, do you have any confidence in the box office?
Lu Chuan: When I was in Shanghai, the investors gathered together. They were very confident in my film, but I was very afraid. I was very lucky among the directors of the same generation, because there were investors who could give me so much money. Let me have such a dream, everyone throws money at me, hoping to make a difference. We did two test screenings in Shanghai, and the word of mouth is needless to say, but a friend of mine told me: "How can you give the audience one? Reasons to let the audience come in? As long as you can let the audience in, the rest will be handled by the film, but I am afraid that the audience will not come in, so the word Lu Chuan is not enough." I have tried my best for the past three and a half years. The strength and responsibility of the film, if the box office of this film is not good, I don’t think I don’t care, there will be many people seeing it through different ways, and this film will go farther than we imagined.
(Intern Chang Mengmeng and Qi Si also contributed to this article)
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Crying people can't think - "Universal Screen" interview
This movie is actually a piece of Chinese s face.
The Chinese have lived to this day, and there is not a single aggression that cannot be resisted. How can they become lambs without resistance when they arrive in Nanjing?
When a person cries, many senses are closed, and you can't make a crying person think.
After all, "Nanjing! Nanjing! is actually an anti-war movie.
On the whole, "Nanjing! Nanjing! " is a very bold style. First of all, the Japanese soldier Kadokawa is "Nanjing! Nanjing! "The first protagonist with the most inking and the most three-dimensional richness throughout. Although it feels natural in the end, aren't you afraid that someone will resent it?
I didn't think about it beforehand. When I showed it to some friends recently, people started to ask me whether the ultra-nationalists would jump out and make irresponsible remarks? This setup is based on a basic idea, which is to make a new movie. There have been many movies about the Nanjing Massacre, and it has become a very symbolic thing, but as far as I feel from reading historical materials in the past few years, in addition to some things that have entered the public eye, there are actually a lot of things that we do not understand. Knowing the historical facts, if it sounds good, it is forgotten, and if it is bad, it is deliberately obliterated. Then I think this article has to be turned over from the beginning. The best way is to look at the Nanjing Massacre from a different angle. It may be more shocking to follow the eyes of the Japanese into the city.
As far as we know, a lot of the material used in the filming was useless, and Liu Ye's role was modified a lot. He did not hide in the refugee camp nor escaped Nanjing in the end. Are you not afraid that the audience will feel a sense of rupture in the story?
In the matter of Liu Ye, our main creators have struggled, but in the end, everyone decided to make Liu Ye sacrifice in the middle. It turns out that Liu Ye in the script is very complete, but the movie actually has life and will make demands. I remember that when Liu Ye entered the refugee camp at that time, the extras couldn't hide him at all. He was 1.86 meters tall, with a strong image and stood out from the crowd. So we felt that if we let him live, it would be too much of a movie.
In fact, I can shoot like this completely, because many Chinese movies have been made in a very unrefined way. Later, I decided that this matter was too important, and I didn’t make a rash decision, so I just started filming. In fact, from the first month of filming, this incident has been a shadow in my heart, because he was too dazzling in the refugee camp. It was the Japanese soldiers who must have shot him first. At that time, the Japanese army in Nanjing completely hunted down the Chinese soldiers in a way of cleansing, so if you think about how he would survive if he appeared again and again, the logic is unreasonable.
When did you decide not to shoot like this?
It's really the end of the shoot. I've been thinking about it all the time, and finally Liu Ye's schedule is up, so I just follow the flow and handle it.
So how did you communicate with Liu Ye?
The last time he was on set, I had an all-night chat with him. In fact, Liu Ye's performance in this drama, I think is undoubtedly the best since his filming. I hope he will forever remain in the public memory of Chinese cinema as a Chinese man. After I showed the film to a few overseas friends and filmmakers, they would say, God, this actor is a superstar. But when I talked about it at the time, both sides were very sad. I later rewrote the scene of the Yijiangmen massacre for him. He dubbed it a while ago and watched it completely. He was so excited that he smoked in the corridor. Smoke for a long time.
Do the protagonists in the film have prototypes?
All have. Perhaps the biggest advantage I have over other Chinese directors who want to shoot this subject is that I have read a lot of Japanese soldiers' diaries. I have a friend named Fan Jianchuan, a real estate developer in Sichuan, who used his savings to build 28 Jianchuan Museums, including the Anti-Japanese Museum and so on. At that time, he knew that I was going to do this. He opened the museum for free, and let me bore inside like a moth for a long time. Deeds, because a Chinese teacher recorded in his diary that Japanese soldiers searched for men during an operation. After consultation with foreigners, the Japanese army agreed that those with relatives could leave. One teacher changed clothes and saved six people. Finally, the Japanese soldiers were killed. Find.
Does Xiaodou also have a prototype? This role doesn't focus much, but it is one of the most successful parts of the film, because as soon as he appears, it instantly makes people feel heartache.
The Jianchuan Museum has an anti-prisoner hall, and I accidentally saw a photo in it, which was particularly shocking. This is a picture of a baby soldier. His name is Ji Wanfang. He is covered with kettles and cups. He is a small reminder. He is the youngest soldier captured by the Japanese army. After seeing this photo, my heart ached, so I wanted to arrange such a person beside Liu Ye to make the colors more colorful.
In fact, the little actor is not good-looking, but he is very real.
This kid was found in Tianjin. I thought he was very moving. I didn't realize whether he was ugly or not. His face was very thick. If you squeezed him, he would give you a naive smile. I liked him very much at first sight. When the scene was filmed, the whole audience was shocked. Liu Ye had to hold him down a little, or he would rob him of the entire scene. He definitely didn't mean to steal the show, but you wanted to follow him whenever he did. For example, if he knocked on Liu Ye's back and passed the bullet, your eyes would follow him. I had to let him go. He painted, otherwise the camera wouldn't follow Liu Ye.
The original setting was to let Xiaodouzi die in the Japanese army's living assassination, and it was also filmed. Everyone saw the demo and felt that it was a pity to let Xiaodouzi die like this. He should be allowed to live, so he hired this little actor. I have been raising it in the crew since I came back, because I haven't really thought about how to make Xiaodouzi live. Later, while filming the ending, it slowly appeared in my mind. The original ending was that Liu Ye escaped alive. The child stayed in the crew for 8 months, grew 14 centimeters, and changed from a small child to a teenager. Sometimes it's interesting to think about making a movie to record a child's growth.
One of the most shocking parts of the film is that you point the camera at the faces of the extras, and each face is so real that you can't help but believe that they are the victims at that time. How did you come up with this idea?
When I first wrote the script, I read a lot of sources, made a compilation and a lot of cards. After watching it, photographer Cao Yu said that the film is actually a face of Chinese people. This feeling is a common understanding of our main creators. What I said might offend some researchers. Some of the images of the Chinese people in this incident were really deliberately obliterated, because we have been resisting all the time. The Chinese people have lived to this day, and there is no aggression that they cannot resist. Why? When you arrive in Nanjing, you become a lamb without resistance? The resistance of the Qing army in the south of the Yangtze River was very tragic. After seven or eight months, they could not fight down and finally slaughtered the city. I read in the diary of the Japanese soldiers that there were seven or eight prostitutes at the comfort station and pulled out the bayonets of the Japanese soldiers to stab them, and when the Japanese were injured and ran away and blew the assembly whistle to kill these comfort women, These people grabbed a bayonet and wiped their necks. Another Japanese soldier wrote that they entered the city in a small group and had just passed a burned-out German tank when a machine gun suddenly protruded from the tank and killed more than half of the group, including two Chinese The soldiers didn't run, the bullets didn't come out, and they were doused with gasoline and burned to death. After you read these things a lot, you will think, oh, the Japanese massacred because our resistance was too serious, and they will retaliate. This is very logical.
I especially want to pass "Nanjing! Nanjing! "Restore the face of the Chinese at that time. In fact, I found that the theme of the Nanjing Massacre will make many people not want to watch this movie, because they will feel that it is nothing more than Chinese people being killed. We especially want to show those things that were deliberately concealed, 70 years later, and now we are sitting here, you name me three of the 300,000 victims, let alone three, you can't name one . We paid the price of hundreds of thousands of people, and in the end not a single name was left. What we talk about in the science textbooks is the attitude of the weak, and 70 years later, he is always dragging others and saying: You beat me, you beat me! Then when others are happy to touch you today, you are very beautiful, but one day when others wave and mouth again, they say: You hit me, you hit me! I especially hate that statement.
So in "Nanjing! Nanjing! ", from the protagonist to the silent Chinese faces, I especially want the audience to be able to gaze at them once. From photography, art, makeup to clothing and other departments, they are treated the same as the starring actors in the reproduction of their shapes. Their costumes are actually as elegant as the leading actors. There are 100 sets of clothes that are different from the leading actors in terms of workmanship and cost. the same. Every time we are at the scene, we have to carefully pick faces among more than 1,000 extras according to historical photos, and pick the faces of Chinese people we recognize. Each time it lasts for two or three hours. We are very lucky, because when shooting in the Northeast, the armed police sent a large number of troops to support the shooting. Those young men are all from rural areas, and many of their faces still maintain the simplicity, determination and helplessness of Chinese people. The information is very rich, very look good.
If someone else shoots "Nanjing! Nanjing! " may be very emotional and even more tragic than you, but you keep reclaiming this kind of emotion, which makes "Nanjing! Nanjing! "has a more real and powerful aura.
This may be due to my personality. I have always been stingy with my emotions in filming, and I don’t indulge very much. Especially in such a film, if you indulge a little, you will cry a lot. Even if I go to film very depressed, it is estimated that Some scenes lead to crying. We wanted to be able to let the audience "visit" such a tragic event as calmly as possible most of the time, to let them experience it, and not make them cry. When a person cries, many senses are closed, and you can't make a crying person think.
As for the sense of realism you mentioned, I said in the director's explanation that this kind of feeling has to come to the face, from the beginning to the end, it is like a tsunami, and the audience must be overwhelmed with the most powerful and fresh real details. , let them breathe the breath of that era. Only these most real details can form a comprehensive aura.
"Nanjing! Nanjing! ” subverts our emotional systems somewhat, because it ends up being a victim of both parties. It gives us a new perspective on the Nanjing Massacre, and even Sino-Japanese relations. The audience may involuntarily wonder, if I were a Japanese soldier, would I be like them?
After reading the diary of the Japanese soldiers, I felt that war was a different scene in the eyes of the perpetrators. Many things are too terrifying for the victim, but in the diaries of the Japanese soldiers, they would say that they went out with the squad leader today, and what they were doing was very obscure, or that they found a can of brown sugar today, especially I'm happy, and said that I can cook red bean rice cake soup at night, and I must have a good meal. You will find, I X, your hell is someone's paradise, and people are having a good time. For the perpetrator, war is not the kind of tension you and I imagine, but a daily routine, very relaxed. This kind of defamiliarization of war is very valuable, because you can't be a victim forever. To put it badly, in tomorrow's war, you may be the perpetrator. When you are in the top position, will you? Not restraining your behavior after becoming a god of war? If we don't have a very high level of self-examination and self-control, we will completely participate in this kind of group evil.
"Nanjing! Nanjing! "The plot has been downplayed the drama, the lines are few and the rhythm is slow, but it has always attracted you to look down involuntarily, which makes people feel like you are in a dream.
Frankly, I suddenly discovered this feeling in the final cut, especially at the end, when the piano starts and the little beans come out, and suddenly it feels like an old movie or a silent movie, and it develops a particularly unique meaning, which is this. kind of dreamy.
To be honest, when Kadokawa died at the end of the shoot, my heart actually died too. This is my last feeling. On the last day of filming, I only came up with this ending, and after I told everyone about it, they all thought it was good, and the filming went on the next day, and it went surprisingly smoothly. I feel that this ending entrusts me with a huge kindness and dream. I hope that one day, human beings will treat and respect life like this, and Xiaodouzi is like a kind of fire, passed from Liu Ye's hand to Jiang Shuyun's hand , and then pass it on to Kadokawa. I think the reason why all countries can live in peace is because of the great kindness in the hearts of its backbone people. Together, these people can protect and respect life.
The ceremony of the Japanese army entering the city is very surprising, because it is very beautiful, and the music and pictures have a breathtaking power. I thought at the time, what is Lu Chuan doing to make the Japanese army so majestic? But when they were in the midst of wolf smoke, they suddenly felt a very strange devil. How did you come up with this scene?
I don’t know if you have this feeling when you write your manuscript, that is, you don’t start from the first word, you may write a paragraph first, and then this paragraph floats there, like a pontoon, your entire The job is to connect this pontoon to the other side. This scene was one of several pontoons of mine at the time, and the script was rewritten almost from start to finish, but only this scene remained.
Before filming, I read a lot of materials. One night, I suddenly dreamed that on a sea of rubble, Japanese troops beat drums but silently danced their folk dances in the ruins of Nanjing. . I woke up immediately, wrote it down quickly, and the image just lingered. I believe in fate very much. I think God let me make this movie, and making this scene is a very core thing.
I have prepared a safer version of the scene myself, which may actually detract from the significance of the scene: this scene is an abstract representation of the outcome of the war. In essence, the result of the war, I think, is that the culture of the invading tribe dances on the ruins of the historical and cultural ruins of the side that was destroyed. After I found this statement, I felt that this scene had to be filmed, because until now, there are still many terrible alien cultures still dancing on our land, but it has not been done through the form of war. I'm not going to judge it good or bad, I dare say I'm a particularly rational patriot, but I'm not a nationalist. I joined the army at the age of 18. After eight years as a soldier, I jumped off the Yangtze River when I was supposed to block the pipeline with my comrades.
When I was a soldier, I studied military history, history, and war history, and knew the nature of massacres in war, so I felt that it was actually very meaningful for modern people to understand this nature. The threat is still there, and not only do we have to be alert to the possibility of aggression against us, but we also have to be alert to the possibility of aggression against others, really. Churchill said that a just war goes one step further and is evil. At the end of World War II, the Germans were already maimed, but the Allies still threw petrol bombs in the civilian area of Dresden completely and uncontrollably, burning 40,000 people overnight. Later, the photos were released, and the place was burned to the ground. like the surface of the moon. After all, "Nanjing! Nanjing! is actually an anti-war movie.
"Nanjing! Nanjing! "After watching it, I feel that the creator's intention and mentality are very strong. Many people may have thought of repaying others with their own way, but I believe that after watching "Nanjing, Nanjing", you may give up this idea, or reflect on whether this idea is right or not.
People yearn for freedom all their lives and hope for great freedom. In this state, death can give you, and another is the battlefield. This is especially scary. There is a female writer who has written a book about killing on the battlefield. I think her understanding is a bit vague. The key point is that women have no desire for war, but men have it in their hearts. This is a particularly terrifying thing. Because you really go to the battlefield, after seeing three or four brothers dead, all your worldviews will change, especially when you conquer a highland or a city, you are facing an object that must be revenge, and you will never take revenge. Treat him as someone you know or can communicate with online, you have no feelings for him, only revenge, pleasure, spiritual and physical indulgence in your heart, because tomorrow you may fall into chaos like your brother In the pile of corpses, his face was smashed to pieces.
I think "Nanjing! Nanjing! "At least opened an opening and provided a direction. When you think about it again, you can walk in this direction. In fact, my inner experience is actually much more than what it presents, so I cherish this opportunity to talk about my thoughts before the movie is released, because when I want to talk about "Kekexili", the movie is about to end. . Are the audience willing to listen to Lu Chuan? They might want to hear it, but only a little.
Interview/
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