Chapter 423 Discussing the Script with Zhang Yimou

"How could that be?" Zhang Yimou said quickly, "We are still us. There is a saying that goes, honor only belongs to the past."

"Oh? Outsiders say that Zhang Yimou is only good at making movies and not good at speaking. Is this a good way to speak?"

"Director, you are not an outsider, but you know me best!"

As the two talked, Wu Tianmin sat on the sofa, stopped Zhang Yimou from pouring him water, took out a magazine from his briefcase, turned to the middle page and handed it to him.

"Yimou, take a look at this."

Zhang Yimou took it and looked at the cover of the magazine first, the latest edition of "Yanhe".

Then he opened the article that Wu Tianmin asked him to read and read it carefully.

"Written by Minghua? The style is very simple, a bit like "No One Can Be Less" he wrote two years ago," Zhang Yimou commented while reading.

"Do you want to make a movie?"

"I do," Zhang Yimou looked up at the other person: "But, Director, I want to co-direct "Codename Jaguar" with Yang Fengliang, look at the schedule."

Yang Fengliang is also a director of Xiying. He served as the assistant director of the movie "Red Sorghum" last year, and the two have a good relationship.

After "Red Sorghum" won an award abroad, Yang Fengliang wanted to make a movie by himself, but was a little worried that he couldn't win it. So he found Zhang Yimou to co-produce it, in fact, he also wanted to guide him again, and Zhang Yimou agreed.

Who made the two of them work well together when filming "Red Sorghum".

After hearing what Zhang Yimou said, Wu Tianmin said lightly: "I just want to ask you, do you think this novel can be made into a movie? Can it be filmed well?"

"I do! Yes!" Zhang Yimou answered very straightforwardly.

"Then I will help you out. I will tell Fengliang."

Zhang Yimou smiled and said: "Director, you still understand me."

It turned out that Zhang Yimou didn't want to film "Codename Jaguar" at all!

He was not familiar with movies with urban themes, not to mention that it was an action movie. In his words, he had no feeling after reading the script.

But he had a good relationship with Yang Fengliang, so he had to agree for the sake of face, so that others would not say that he became arrogant after winning the award and forgot his friends.

But now that the boss of Xiying went to tell Yang Fengliang about this, he was no longer worried.

He knew that since Wu Tianmin personally found him with the novel, it must be the script that Xiying Studio focused on shooting this year.

After listening to Zhang Yimou's reply, Wu Tianmin said: "Okay, when you have time, find Minghua to discuss how to change it into a script. I'm leaving first."

Wu Tianmin stood up after speaking.

"Director, sit for a while." Zhang Yimou warmly tried to keep him.

"No, there are a lot of things to do in the factory." Wu Tianmin replied, and suddenly thought of something: "Where is your wife Xiao Hua?"

Zhang Yimou was silent for a while, and then replied: "She took Momo back to her parents' home."

"You, you." Wu Tianmin glared at Zhang Yimou fiercely, but said nothing, shook his head and turned away.

Zhang Yimou moved his mouth but said nothing.

His marriage with Xiao Hua had come to an end at this time.

Fang Minghua met Zhang Yimou a week later. He was looking at documents in the office when he heard someone knocking on the door.

"Come in."

A man in a jacket and a short flat head walked in with a smile.

It was Zhang Yimou.

"Yimou."

Fang Minghua walked out from behind the desk and said with a smile: "Congratulations, you have won glory for the country."

"I have to thank you for recommending such a good novel to me." Zhang Yimou said what was in his heart.

Back then, when he directed his first movie independently, Fang Minghua took the initiative to write the script for him, and it won an award after it was filmed. This time, the filming of "Red Sorghum" was also entirely due to his recommendation.

Fang Minghua said, "Why are you being polite? This is the right person. If it was someone else, I don't think this result would be achieved."

As the two talked, Fang Minghua poured a cup of hot tea for him, sat on the sofa next to him, and asked with concern, "By the way, Yimou, when will this "Red Sorghum" be released in the mainland?"

After the film was approved by the relevant departments, it was directly taken to Berlin to compete, but it has not been released in the mainland yet!

Fang Minghua asked again.

"I heard from Director Wu that they are talking with China Film Corporation, and the release is expected to be in the second half of the year." Zhang Yimou answered truthfully, "I don't know whether the audience likes it or not."

"Don't worry, I definitely like it, and the box office will be full by then!" Fang Minghua laughed.

"I hope so. To be honest, this movie cost 800,000 yuan, which exceeded the original budget." Zhang Yimou sighed, "You don't know, it cost 40,000 yuan just to plant the 100 acres of sorghum field, and it took a lot of effort!"

Fang Minghua didn't say anything.

Before he came to this era, he had seen similar posts on the Internet. Although "Red Sorghum" was written about Gaomi, Shandong Province, Zhang Yimou found that there was no sorghum planted there when he arrived in Gaomi for preliminary investigation.

How to shoot "Red Sorghum" without sorghum fields!

There was no other way, Zhang Yimou took out 40,000 yuan to let local farmers help him plant 100 acres of sorghum fields, saying that the harvest would belong to them.

However, the farmers were reluctant to apply fertilizer in order to save money. As a result, when the filming started, the crew arrived at the destination and was dumbfounded.

The sorghum in the field was sparse, short and yellow, not dense at all.

There was no other way, Zhang Yimou had to ask for help from the local decentralized departments, and asked for several sprinkler trucks. The county leaders approved 5 tons of fertilizers and prepared to irrigate manually. Just after applying fertilizer, it rained, and the sorghum grew day by day.

In the following days, together with the local villagers, weeded and watered the sorghum, and walked around the sorghum fields every day. It was not until the sorghum was about to mature that Zhang Yimou asked a group of leading actors to come here to experience life.

Although the shooting time was postponed, the sorghum was as tall as reeds. When the wind was blown during the shooting, it swayed in the wind, which was very beautiful.

Zhang Yimou was complaining about this now, and Fang Minghua was not convenient to ask again.

The two chatted for a while, and Zhang Yimou got down to business: "Minghua, last week Director Wu came to me with the novel "Qiu Ju Goes to Court" you wrote, and asked me to make it into a movie. I agreed immediately. I came here today, first, to sign a contract with you to purchase the film adaptation rights, and more importantly, to talk about rewriting it into a script."

Fang Minghua was not surprised by the purpose of Zhang Yimou's visit.

He took a sip of tea and said: "Of course I feel relieved if you shoot it. As for adapting it into a script, who are you going to find to adapt it?"

"Who else do I need to find? You!"

"That's fine." Fang Minghua did not refuse.

Write it down and adapt it into a script, speed up the filming, and meet the audience as soon as possible.

"Yimou, tell me about your requirements for this script." Fang Minghua asked.

"Actually, there are no requirements." Zhang Yimou put down the teacup, and seemed to be thinking about the wording:

"I think that our mainland directors, including myself, compared with famous Taiwanese directors Hou Hsiao-hsien and Edward Yang, focus on how attractive the plot is and how beautiful the pictures are when making a film, but lack attention to "people."

"You are like Hou Hsiao-hsien's "A Time to Live, a Time to Die", which won the Golden Horse Award, and Edward Yang's "A Day on the Beach". The movie focuses on "people" rather than stories, so the protagonist leaves a deep impression on the audience. I still have a lot of deficiencies in this regard, so Minghua, I hope your script can make up for my shortcomings."

Oh.

"Okay, I'll try my best." Fang Minghua said modestly.