Chapter 166 The Release Date of Painted Skin Is Set, Cutting Off the Schedule of Red Cliff

Chapter 166: The release date of Painted Skin is set, and it cuts off Red Cliff

After the filming of Pirates of the Caribbean 2 was completed, Wu Yuan did not stay for long. He returned to Los Angeles and took the original film of Painted Skin, which had already been post-processed with special effects, and went back to China directly.

As usual, the post-production editing of Pirates of the Caribbean 2 had nothing to do with Wu Yuan.

When he signed the contract that year, he did not fight for the editing rights.

In Hollywood, the number of directors who can take over the six major projects and still get the editing rights can be counted on one hand.

But as I said before, Disney also hopes that the Pirates of the Caribbean series will continue to sell well, and it is impossible for them to make any malicious editing.

Wu Yuan also has confidence in the materials he shot and in the editors of Disney.

Of course, the main reason is that it is really cool to be a hands-off boss!

When Wu Yuan returned to China with the finished film of Painted Skin, he enjoyed the personal pick-up of Mr. Han again.

It’s nothing, it’s mainly because the finished film of Painted Skin in his hands is too precious.

Three copies of this thing were specially made, and they were airlifted the whole way, just to prevent it from being damaged.

Once it was damaged, Weta Digital didn't have any original film saved, so everything had to be remade.

A small copy disc contained something worth tens of millions of dollars.

Mr. Han, who also participated in the investment, naturally came to pick it up in person.

"A big production of 150 million yuan." On the way, Mr. Han said with some emotion: "The era of mainland blockbusters is really coming."

"When we made "Hero", there was not even a movie with an investment of over 100 million yuan in China."

"In just two or three years, there are now four or five movies with an investment of over 100 million yuan approved every year."

"Feng Xiaogang's "A World Without Thieves" sold 120 million yuan at the box office, and he is now ambitious to make blockbusters."

"He wants to transform and shoot costume action movies like "Hero" and "House of Flying Daggers."

"But the script is still being worked on. The initial budget is to spend 20 million US dollars to make a blockbuster."

"Director Kai Ge's "The Promise" is also being filmed. This one is even more amazing, with an investment of more than 300 million RMB."

"After the success of "House of Flying Daggers", Yimou didn't want to make commercial blockbusters anymore, so he turned to make an art film."

"By the way, Jiang Wen's ban on directing has ended. Emperor Entertainment Group in Hong Kong is very optimistic about him and invested in a movie for him, which is now being filmed."

Wu Yuan quietly listened to Mr. Han summarizing the recent situation of major domestic directors.

But these news are not good news.

The two years from 2005 to 2006 were the two years when major mainland directors were collectively criticized.

Feng Xiaogang finally implemented a Hollywood-style commercial genre film in "A World Without Thieves", saying goodbye to his previous large-scale sitcom-like film model.

As a result, he took a big step and made a localized palace film "The Banquet" based on "Hamlet".

Although it was nominated for the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, it still couldn't escape the fate of being criticized.

Let alone "The Promise" directed by Kaige.

Zhang Yimou's "A Thousand Miles Alone" is a pure art film with little presence.

Jiang Wen's "The Sun Also Rises" was not well understood by many people, and it was also criticized when it was released.

In general, in the next one or two years, the reputation of the films of several major directors in the mainland will be criticized and questioned.

Wu Yuan was also a little helpless. Directors are really a group of very independent and self-willed people, and few of them can listen to others.

At the premiere of "Hero", Wu Yuan kindly reminded Chen Kaige and Feng Xiaogang, but after two years of serious thinking, the two made the same choice.

After chatting for a while, Wu Yuan and Mr. Han returned to China Film Group.

The first thing to do was to watch the movie.

As one of the investors of "Painted Skin", China Film must have a sneak peek.

There is nothing much to say about the process and content. Wu Yuan patched the original "Painted Skin 1" with the vision of 2022, and the finished product after perfecting the special effects is definitely better than Chen Jiashang's version.

Mr. Han is naturally very satisfied.

"It has to be you, Director Wu."

Han Sanping gave a thumbs up with praise, "Among so many domestic directors, you are definitely the best in the use of special effects in movies!"

"When Zhou Xun turned into a vixen, I was shocked. It was so realistic."

"And Zeng Li's disfigured makeup, was it made with special effects or real makeup?"

"That's special effects makeup." Wu Yuan explained, "This kind of special effects makeup is still relatively rare in China, but it is a very common filming method in Hollywood."

"By making a mold for the actor's face and then applying various realistic special effects makeup on the mold, the special effects cost can be saved, and the effect presented is not worse than special effects."

It is worth mentioning that in Wu Yuan's version of "Painted Skin", Peirong's appearance after being poisoned is bald and rotten with fangs, which is very Chinese horror style.

Zeng Li is different from Zhao Junqi. Her main feature in the crew is to be obedient. She will shoot whatever the director asks her to shoot, and she doesn't care that such makeup will look ugly on camera.

Just to do this special effects makeup, she had to prepare for several hours in advance to mold her face and apply makeup. Even the makeup artists were specially invited from Hollywood. They are all professional special effects makeup for zombies in zombie movies and have rich experience.

The actors are dedicated, the special effects makeup artists are professional, and the final effect is of course very good.

It is much better than Zhao Junqi's fooling around by simply applying a black spot on his cheek as poisoning!

"Very good, Director Wu is worthy of being in Hollywood, he should bring more cutting-edge film shooting technology from Hollywood to China for learning and application!"

Director Han praised repeatedly: "Your filming of "Painted Skin" must have brought a lot of new ideas and new technologies to domestic filmmakers!"

"For our Chinese-language films to develop and catch up with the level of Hollywood, we still need great directors like you to lead in person.

Wu Yuan has long been immune to all kinds of flattery from Director Han. After hearing so much of this, it is difficult for him to have any emotional ups and downs.

Nodding calmly, Wu Yuan returned to the topic: "When is the right time for "Painted Skin" to be scheduled?"

"It must be the Lunar New Year's Day! "Director Han slapped his thigh and said excitedly.

The most important time for the mainland film industry now is the Lunar New Year period, which is also the period with the most box office revenue.

Last year, during the Lunar New Year period, two big-budget and superstar-starred films, "A World Without Thieves" and "Kung Fu", both made over 100 million yuan at the box office, with a total of 300 million yuan at the box office.

This year, there are no mainland blockbusters scheduled for the Lunar New Year period.

Feng Xiaogang has no Lunar New Year works this year. Yimou's "A Thousand Miles Alone" is planned to be scheduled for the Lunar New Year period, but this is an art film and it is impossible to pursue high box office.

Chen Kaige's "The Promise", under Wu Yuan's various advocacy, was finally launched half a year later than the original track, and it could not catch up with this year's Lunar New Year.

Jiang Wen's "The Sun Also Rises" has just started shooting not long ago, so there is no need to think about it, and it is impossible for Director Han to bet on Jiang Wen to compete for the box office.

After counting, there is actually no commercial film by a big mainland director to support the Lunar New Year this year. How can this be possible?

Wu Yuan's "Painted Skin" came at the right time!

"Director Wu, this "Painted Skin" must be put in the Lunar New Year!" Director Han repeated again very firmly.

Wu Yuan didn't have any objections, "Speaking of which, this should be my first time to participate in the Lunar New Year battle, right?"

"Oh." Director Han said confidently: "Director Wu, all the movies in this year's Lunar New Year are not enough to beat your "Painted Skin"."

"I think we should make it bigger. ”

“Why not premiere it simultaneously in China, South Korea, and Japan on December 28 this year!”

“I think Japanese and Korean audiences will also like this oriental fantasy film like Painted Skin.”

“You are an internationally renowned first-line director in Japan. Although the box office sales in South Korea are average, your popularity is not low. After all, Koreans admire Hollywood movies very much. ”

This kind of simultaneous premiere in multiple countries has only been done by Hollywood movies.

Many Hollywood movies are premiered simultaneously in North America. Don’t laugh, there are three countries in North America, so this can be considered a simultaneous release in three countries.

Sometimes even some South American countries will premiere simultaneously.

But Chinese-language movies have not yet appeared in multiple countries. At most, they have premiered simultaneously in the mainland and Hong Kong Island.

The fact that Mr. Han can now shout out the idea of ​​"simultaneous premiere in China, Japan and South Korea" shows that his vision in the film industry is still very advanced and forward-looking.

In another five or eight years, Hollywood will have simultaneous premieres in China and the United States.

Because by that time, the Chinese market has become the second largest box office for Hollywood movies, and simultaneous premieres must be held to show the importance of the Chinese market.

For Wu Yuan now, the Japanese and Korean markets are the second largest box office for his movies, and he really needs to give enough attention to the second largest box office.

“I have no objection. If the three countries can premiere simultaneously, it is indeed a good thing, which can stimulate the box office more. "Wu Yuan nodded.

"Okay, I'll talk to the distributors in Japan and South Korea about the details."

Director Han rubbed his hands, "Japan is still Toho. As the largest distributor in Japan, we should try to maintain cooperation if possible."

"In South Korea, Seagate has always been responsible for distribution, but I feel that the publicity effect of their distribution is very average."

"You can change to SHOWBOX. This is a new distribution company that has only been established for a few years, but it is backed by a large Korean conglomerate, and it has no shortage of connections and money. Now they are in order to seize the distribution market. As long as they have good movies, they will dare to fight. "

"The Taegukgi that broke the record of Korean movies last year was distributed by their company, setting a historical record of 11.6 million moviegoers in South Korea. "

Wu Yuan nodded thoughtfully.

He knew SHOWBOX, one of the investors of "Red Cliff" and the distributor of the two parts of "Red Cliff" in South Korea.

Talking about this company, Wu Yuan could just cut into another topic.

"SHOWBOX, I know, one of the investors of Wu Yusen's "Red Cliff". "

Wu Yuan pretended to chat and asked: "Director Han, how is the preparation of "Red Cliff" going?"

When this topic was mentioned, Director Han, who was excited by "Painted Skin", immediately became depressed.

He sighed, "It's too slow."

"From casting to script, everything is too slow."

"Just casting, Wu Yusen has been dragging it out over and over again, from February to now, and after all this time, only Zhou Runfa, who plays Zhou Yu, has been confirmed."

"For the role of Zhou Yu's wife "Xiao Qiao", he said Zhang Jingchu, who played in "The Peacock", was suitable, but then he said she was not."

"At the end of last month, the three main actors, Chow Yun-fat, Leung Chiu-wai and Watanabe Ken, were finally decided, but Wu Yusen felt that Chow Yun-fat was not suitable for Zhou Yu and should play Liu Bei."

"Japanese star Watanabe Ken played Cao Cao, and their scenes ran through the main line of the whole film."

"Then he thought of inviting Andy Lau to play Zhuge Liang and Zhou Yu respectively with Leung Chiu-wai, which was another main line."

"It turned out to be a good idea. When I looked at the preparations in detail, the script only had an outline, and Wu Yusen was not satisfied with the specific content after seven or eight revisions."

"The Battle of Red Cliff" can be said to be the most hyped project in 2005.

From February to mid-August, one or two casting news about this movie were leaked almost every month.

Today it's Brother Bang, tomorrow it's Chao Wei, and the day after tomorrow it's Andy Lau who may join.

Including the actresses, the casting of Xiao Qiao and Da Qiao has slipped from Gong Li and Zhang Ziyi to Zhang Jingchu, who appeared at the Berlin Film Festival with "Peacock".

However, there are rumors that Zhiling will be invited.

It can be said that the behavior of "Red Cliff" to hype the casting is definitely the ancestor of those TV series and movies that hype fans in later generations.

Han Dong actually doesn't mind these hypes. Of course, he also hopes that the movie with hundreds of millions of investment can get more attention.

But what really makes Han Dong dissatisfied is that this project has been in preparation for more than a year, and Wu Yusen actually doesn't have a casting standard in his mind.

Because the script has not been polished yet!

The producers invited many screenwriters to write the script for "Red Cliff", including Mr. Zou Jingzhi, who is known as the first screenwriter in China, but Wu Yusen was not satisfied after reading it.

He thinks that the script of "Red Cliff" should change the characters in the film without violating the history of the general background.

Liu Bei should not be cowardly anymore, Cao Cao should not be treacherous anymore, Zhou Yu should not be petty, and should respect heroes like Zhuge Liang.

Wu Yuan listened quietly to Mr. Han's complaints.

In fact, he knew more than Mr. Han.

He also knew that even after Wu Yusen invited Lu Wei, the screenwriter who wrote Farewell My Concubine, to come up with the script of Red Cliff, the filming of this movie was not smooth.

Because of the disagreement with the director's ideas, the martial arts instructor was replaced halfway through the filming, and some of the previously filmed scenes needed to be reshot.

The main photographer of the crew had to leave the group because of the schedule.

Especially when Chow Yun-fat broke the contract midway, the scenery, costumes, etc. had to be redesigned because of the change of the protagonist.

The most important thing is that in terms of casting, Wu Yusen spent 100 million yuan on the film remuneration alone!

This is the 40 million yuan that Chow Yun-fat did not take away, otherwise it would have cost more!

Wu Yusen gave all this money to actors from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and South Korea. It was a pure waste.

Quietly waiting for Director Han to finish complaining, when he was thirsty and picked up the water cup to drink some water to moisten his throat, Wu Yuan asked calmly but sincerely: "Director Han, what do you think about me taking on the "Battle of Red Cliffs" project?"

"Puff——" A large mouthful of tea sprayed out of Director Han's mouth, almost spraying on Wu Yuan.

"Director Wu, you are not kidding, are you?"