Chapter 1080: Talk About the Past (24)
Xu Ke and Wu Yusen are old acquaintances!
Unlike Xu Ke, Wu Yusen did not study film.
He was quite miserable. He arrived in Hong Kong in 1951 and his family lived in a wooden house in Shek Kip Mei...
At that time, the underworld was rampant in Hong Kong. As a child, he was naturally bullied.
Therefore, two places became his refuge.
One was a church, where a priest took good care of him and asked him to sit quietly, looking at the cross and the statue of the Virgin...
This is why in future Wu Yusen movies, the Virgin Mary's gaze into the abyss will always appear when the climax comes.
Another place was a theater. Wu Yusen had no money to buy tickets, so he could only hold a stranger by the hem of his clothes and go in to watch a movie - adults can bring a child to watch the movie for free...
At the age of 9, Wu Yusen finally had the opportunity to go to school. An American family sent money through the church for him to study. In order to attend the first grade more normally, his mother also changed his age by 2 years.
So Wu Yu-sen wore a pair of rag shoes and walked from Shek Kip Mei to Mong Kok Union Primary School to attend school. After graduating from primary school, he received funding from the church to attend secondary school.
After graduating from high school, Wu Yusen met the president of "China Student Weekly" by writing film reviews...
The story goes like this. After Wu Yusen graduated from middle school, he had no way of making money and could only do odd jobs here and there. As long as he was given money, he would do anything. For example, porters, water delivery men, grape sellers, and writing.
At that time, in the Shek Kip Mei resettlement area where Wu Yusen lived, the houses were connected to each other, and the neighbors knew each other well. Everyone has a preference, which is to eat dog meat. Every time they killed a dog, Wu Yusen would feel horrified by the dog's pitiful screams.
Wu Yusen felt that killing a dog was the cruelest thing in the world. Every time he killed a dog, he would be heartbroken for several days. So, he wrote out all the collapse in his heart and wrote a piece "Killing a Dog".
As a result, "Killing a Dog" was published by China Student Weekly.
Mr. Lin Yueheng, the president of "China Student Weekly", later established the Institute of Creation and also established the "Life Film Group", which was open to the public free of charge.
Then, Wu Yusen and a group of good friends got the opportunity to learn filmmaking.
I got to know a large number of seniors in the experimental film industry. One of them was Qiu Gangjian. I admired him very much and recommended him to Zhang Che!
Zhang Che was also a film critic. He liked Wu Yusen, who had a background in "China Student Weekly", and accepted him without saying a few words.
Wu Yusen was down-to-earth in work and loved to delve into research. Chang Cheh made an exception and promoted him to the position of assistant director. He could be paid 600 Hong Kong dollars per play, which was considered a high salary at the time.
When Zhang Che was not on the set, he often asked deputy director Wu Yusen to give orders. Therefore, Wu Yusen made rapid progress.
At that time, Chang Cheh was the chief martial arts director of Shaw Brothers. He was co-directed by most of Shaw Brothers' martial arts films. Many times, Chang Cheh felt dissatisfied after watching the trailer, so he asked Wu Yusen to pass on the message and modify it...
This is very offensive!
People wonder if it’s your own intention...
Wu Yusen was slowly ostracized by his friends, and then...he resigned!
‘I can have nothing, but I can’t have no friends! ’
Then it was about Wu Yusen joining Jiahe, but Wu Yusen had a label that he carried with him for a lifetime: Zhang Jia Ban!
…
By the way, Zhang Che’s Zhang family class is very loyal!
When Wu Yusen filmed "A Better Tomorrow", he cast Ti Lung to play the role of the angry eldest brother, and also wanted to cast Lee Xiuxian to play the younger brother. However, Lee Xiuxian was too busy at that time - Magnum Pictures was a start-up company and was too busy...
The most loyal person in the Zhang family class should be Li Xiuxian.
In 1988, an important task of the "Zhang Family Class" was to "prepare the situation". Because they would later film "The Heroes" for their mentor Zhang Che, they had to do their best to find everyone who had collaborated with Zhang Che back then, especially Liu Jialiang...
The two had a falling out...
So Ti Lung and David Chiang came to guest star in Lau Kar Leung's "Tiger Is Back" for free, Li Xiuxian also guested in "The New Best Partner", and Huang Zhandu came to guest star in "Tiger Is Back" for free.
Liu Jialiang met Zhang Che and said that the first thing Zhang Che said to him at that time was "Jia Liang, I am old." Liu Jialiang also felt this, saying, "We are all old."
It's an icebreaker.
This is still Zhang Che's "least valued apprentice", so Zhang Che also said in the article that he did not help Li Xiuxian to achieve these achievements, it was all his own efforts.
Maybe it confirms the saying: The more students are disliked by the teacher, the harder they work to get the teacher's approval!
Liu Jialiang finally relented and asked Liu Jiaban's younger brother Liu Jiarong to be the action director for "The Heroes".
When working on "The Heroes", Lee Sau-hyun also returned favors to the creators in various ways. In addition to supporting "The Heroes", he also starred in "Tiger 2" starring Liu Jialiang. After Chen Kuan-tai temporarily replaced Ti Lung as the villain, Lee Xiuxian also borrowed Stephen Chow filmed "The Thief" for Chen Guantai.
Regarding Ti Lung, Lee Soo-hyun was very dissatisfied with him. Halfway through the filming of "The Heroes", he quit - he said that he fell off a horse and needed to have his teeth fixed. However, Lee Soo-hyun was very dissatisfied with him because before he said he would not act, he There were a lot of opinions on this role, one of which was why his character was killed by David Chiang. Li Xiuxian and others also changed the script for him, but in the end, he said he would not play it, so Li Xiuxian had to temporarily find Chen Guantai to play!
If Chen Guantai hadn't stepped in temporarily, this project would have been ruined...
The point is that you agreed to play the villain and joined the set to shoot, but then you said you didn’t want to shoot halfway through, so you might as well have refused from the beginning!
Including Zhang Che's funeral, Ti Lung did not come and sent his son Tan Junyan to attend. The reason was that he was in BJ to shoot "Huanzhuggege 3". As a result, a group of Zhang family members were dissatisfied. Wang Yu directly started filming on the spot, "X, who has never filmed here? Huh? Don’t you know how to ask for leave? Make this kind of excuse!”
This is also the most critical factor why David Jiang has not reconciled with Ti Lung so far.
By the way, the image of Ma Ge in "A Better Tomorrow" actually comes from Wu Yusen's mentor Zhang Che, especially in "The One-Armed Sword". Lei Li broke his arm and Ma Ge broke his leg. Both of them experienced ups and downs!
Wu Yusen may not have thought that much when filming, but he intentionally or unintentionally transferred the image of the wasted male protagonist in Chang Cheh's movie to Ma Ge, which is why Ma Ge is so touching.
…
"The filming of "A Better Tomorrow" was completed that year because all of Wu Yusen's previous films were not successful and were not well received before they were released. The boss even wanted to burn the negatives of the film..."
"Shi Tian?"
Xu Ke was surprised: "You know?"
Shen Xudong was delighted: "I have worked on "The Screening Room" and many of the materials have been verified. Moreover, I also know that Shi Tian appeared in "A Better Tomorrow 2" and Wu Yusen was very unhappy..."
Xu Ke also nodded: "I guess so...but I didn't think much about it at the time..."
One of the points of conflict between Wu Yusen and Xu Ke is in "A Better Tomorrow 2". Xu Ke forcibly dragged Shi Tian along...
How would you look down upon someone who looks down on you and even wants to burn your films?
However, Xu Ke shook his head: "Actually, it was Shi Tian who said this, but the one who is least optimistic about it is Mai Jia, and Mai Jia dislikes Wu Yusen very much..."
After a pause, Xu Ke continued to add: "The dubbing of "A Better Tomorrow" was completed on a typhoon day, and then the typhoon passed. Wu Yusen, Shi Tian and I went to have supper. Shi Tian was quite optimistic about the show and said it would be a box office success. It can be sold for 10 million to 12 million. Is he crazy and wants to burn this show?"
"Why doesn't Mai Jia think highly of Wu Yusen? He also appeared in "Funny Times"!"
"Funny Times", a new venture in Art City, has been directed by Wu Yusen...
At that time, Wu Yusen's film was in the hands of Golden Harvest, so he changed his name to Wu Shangfei. The box office of "Funny Times" was HK$5 million, which gave New Art City a good start.
"At that time, New Art City mainly relied on comedy to dominate the world. Wu Yusen was not good at making comedies..."
"His era is over... I guess no one will think highly of him after "Tai Ping Wheel"..."
Xu Ke sighed: "Maybe... I feel like he can't find a creative direction..."
"And you?"
"After "Shu Mountain", I want to try "The Condor" and "The Condor Shooting"!"
Shen Xudong scratched his head: "It's difficult!"
"Mr. Jin Yong agreed to my adaptation..."
Shen Xudong shook his head: "That's not the problem. There is only one successful logic for adapting movies from Jin Yong's novels, which is to allow moviegoers to see the movie before understanding Jin Yong's story. Otherwise, no matter how high the quality of the movie is, as long as it is linked to Jin Yong's story, it will probably be useless. Gotta get sprayed.”
"It's a pity that that era has passed."
"But PPTV's "The Empress' Martial Arts Strategy" has a good reputation..."
"It was a time-travel drama, and the protagonist was the empress, not the male and female protagonists of Jin Yong's novels..."