Hong Kong Entertainment: The King of Kung Fu

Although Yang Ye hoped to spend more time with Adjani and Yang Xi, the movie was still completed within the planned time.

It was the last scene. Luo Lixian took the walkie-talkie and said to Yang Ye: "Director, preparations are complete!"

"OK, evacuate the crowd, everyone. Stallone, you only have one chance, be good!"

Stallone made an OK sign and climbed into a military truck.

Police personnel came to maintain public order and put up horizontal cordons to separate all the melon-eating spectators.

Stallone drove the truck on a rampage, rushed to the gas station set up by the crew, and filled the gas station.

"boom!"

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

A violent fireball exploded instantly, and the gas station was completely destroyed.

The violent explosion caused the melon-eaters watching the excitement in the distance to scream.

But Luo Lixian's explosive points were well buried, and all the explosives exploded within the predetermined range.

When the melon-eaters saw such a big firework, the horror on their faces turned into excitement. They applauded one after another, and some even whistled!

Yang Ye has a black streak on his head, no matter who he is.

Stallone came over and said happily: "Hey, Nick, your team is so professional!"

Yang Ye said: "This is all thanks to Ah Xian, he is an expert in blasting."

Stallone went over and hugged Luo Lixian and said, "Bruce, would you like to have a drink later?"

Yang Ye turned off the camera himself and said loudly: "I announce that "First Blood" has been successfully completed!"

"Bah bang bang!" Everyone applauded enthusiastically.

"This film was a collaborative effort between the Hollywood and Hong Kong teams, and I'm very happy that everyone worked together to complete this difficult task. Believe me, we created an outstanding work."

Stallone took over and said: "No! No! Nick said this is an excellent work, but I disagree. I think... this will be a great work!"

"Hahaha!"

……

When Yang Ye returned to Los Angeles, "Blade Runner" had already been released and hit the streets.

The US$30 million investment only returned US$27 million in box office, and all the money Golden Harvest had previously made in Hollywood was lost.

Zou Wenhuai worked hard in Hollywood for several years, but ended up working in vain and returned to Hong Kong sadly.

At this time, "Sword Rain" successfully landed on the North American summer schedule.

In the past few years, "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" has grossed more than 50 million US dollars at the box office in North America, making Lin Qingxia quite famous in the United States.

This time, the promotion of "Sword Rain" was based on sheep's head and dog meat, starring Yang Ye and Lin Qingxia, and deceived a large number of audiences into the cinema.

Good guy, after ten minutes of acting, Yang Ye received the lunch box, and Lin Qingxia had plastic surgery and was replaced by someone else.

The Yankees in the cinema looked confused and called liars.

Fortunately, the suspense of this movie is good. The setting of a couple who turns out to be a life-and-death enemy is still relatively novel in this era.

In the end, the plot turned around and Li Lienji took action, which really surprised the audience.

Also, the overall art style of "Sword Rain" is in the same vein as "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon". The beautiful movie scenes and exciting fights are very comfortable to watch.

"A Rain of Swords" ultimately earned more than 2300 million U.S. dollars at the box office. Jet Li became famous in North America with this movie.

If it had been a few years ago that Jet Li had made US$2300 million at the box office in North America and the news had spread back to Hong Kong, he would have definitely become a god in one battle.

However, Yang Ye and Chen Long have done very well at the box office in North America in recent years, so after the news spread, it was just that, and no one discussed it.

In fact, in recent years, the box office of movies starring Yang Ye has not improved in North America.

"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" reached its peak, then slowly declined, and "Sediq Bale" hit a new low.

The reason is also very simple. The Americans looked very novel at first, but the feeling of curiosity faded away after seeing more.

The racial and cultural barriers are very close, and Americans are very arrogant.

However, Yang Ye can come up with new tricks every time, so he can still maintain his appeal.

On the other hand, Yang Ye's box office performance in the Asian market has repeatedly reached new highs.

So his overall box office performance hasn't declined.

Still one of the world's most box-office action superstars.

Every time a new work comes out, film dealers from all over the country flock to it and it will be sold out in minutes.

……

In the screening hall of United Artists, film dealers from all over the world gathered here.

Because United Artists will hold a screening of two action movies.

One is "Shanghai Noon" directed by Chen Long and co-starring Tom Cruise.

One is "First Blood" directed by Yang Ye and starring Stallone.

Everyone watched "Rambo" first.

The film is actually not finished yet, it only has 40 minutes of raw footage.

However, the film producers had full confidence in Yang Ye and Stallone and insisted on watching it, so they had no choice but to show it to fool them.

The clips released have no logic, only a few scenes of racing, fighting and explosions.

But these scenes were extremely thrilling, exciting, and hot, and the producers couldn't stop watching them.

As a result, after the screening of the pornographic film, it only took five minutes for the international distribution rights to be sold out.

Next is "Shanghai Noon" by Chen Long.

The plot of this movie is extremely simple and nonsense.

In 1881, Princess Peipei of the Qing Dynasty did not want to get married and yearned for the outside world, so she fled to the United States with her English teacher.

It turned out that the teacher was a liar. He colluded with others, kidnapped the princess, and asked the Qing court for a ransom of 100,000 gold bars.

The Qing government also stepped on the horse and called four internal masters and an interpreter to take the gold bars to the United States to redeem the people. Chen Long was one of the internal masters.

Chen Long is a cool leading actor in this movie.

As soon as they arrived in the United States, they were robbed in the Nevada desert and their translator was killed.

Then Chen Long lived in an Indian tribe and slept with the chief's daughter.

Then the chief gave his daughter to Chen Long to be his wife, on the grounds that... it was better than marrying a white man.

Chen Long took his wife to rescue the princess and met the cheating cowboy Tom Cruise.

A funny master and a cheating cowboy formed a two-part team. They were full of jokes and finally succeeded in rescuing the princess.

Chen Long did not return to the Qing Dynasty. He cut off his braids and lived a shameless and impetuous life with the princess.

As for his Indian wife, I left it to Tom Cruise. The princess is more fragrant.

But overall, there's actually nothing wrong with it.

Chen Long was just a slave in feudal society in the Qing Dynasty, but he could have gold and princesses in the United States. He only went back because he was mentally ill.

To put it simply, this movie is a pot of random stew, integrating many elements such as Chinese Kung Fu, Western Cowboys, Indian culture, Sino-American cultural conflict, etc. It can be regarded as a good popcorn movie.

The atmosphere in the screening room was very good, and the film producers laughed loudly. In the end, the international rights were snatched up!

Subsequently, the schedule of "Shanghai Noon" was set in late August, grabbing the tail end of the summer season.

The production of "First Blood" has not yet been completed, and there will be time for promotion in the future. The summer schedule cannot be kept up, so it was finally decided to compete for the Thanksgiving schedule. When the schedule was fixed, Yang Ye joined the editing department and started editing the film.

For the films made by Yang Ye, he can only take the lead in editing them, and it is not easy for others to do it.

In the film era, editing was very troublesome, because only one photo was printed after the negative was taken, and if it was damaged, it would be gone.

Unlike later computer editing, if this version is not good, you can re-cut it, move it one frame, make it longer or shorter, it is very convenient.

In the era of film editing, the film needs to be placed on the machine and selected one by one.

Pull out what you need and hang it up, just like building a wall. Put all the films you need on the shelf one by one.

Therefore, whatever materials are shot every day and need to be used, must be put together first.

Otherwise, if you find that the connection between this picture and that picture does not look good, or the splicing point is not good, it will be very troublesome. You need to put the original one back, find a new frame, or join the half frames.

This is why when making a movie, you must have a record and a script.

The record board is marked with the roll number, scene number, shot number, and entry number. The content shot on that day must be placed in categories according to the standards and must not be messed up.

Once there's a mess, it's over.

Crazy directors like Xu Ke and Cameron use at least hundreds of thousands of feet of film to make a movie.

If there is no classification and you want to find a frame from it, it is no different than finding a needle in a haystack.

Editors in the film era were extremely important. Every time the editor cut a place, he would draw a mark on the film with a crayon.

At the moment when the knife is cut, the psychological pressure is very high, because once the knife is cut, there is no way back.

You must have a precise vision and a ruthless attack. You don’t need one more frame or one less frame.

Yang Ye likes to edit films very much, because when he lifts the knife and drops it with his hand, he feels an inexplicable sense of satisfaction, which is more enjoyable than making a film.

Talking about the film "First Blood", it was impossible to leave it to Hollywood editors.

Yang Ye went into battle himself, found a female editor named Claire to be his assistant, and plunged into the editing room.

Why do you need a female editor?

It’s not because he is an LSP and wants to engage in the Ocean Marathon.

But because... the job of editor is actually more suitable for women.

Because the female editor has a delicate mind and will treat the movie like a mother takes care of her baby.

Hollywood understands this, so they have a lot of female editors, and often female editors win Oscars.

Can you believe that war movies like "Lawrence of Arabia" were all edited by women?

However, there is only one female editor in Hong Kong films, Lam An-yee, who is also one of the most powerful editors in Chinese-language films.

Claire assisted Yang Ye in editing the film, all looking confused.

Yang Ye sat in front of the computer and casually reported the field number and roll number, and Claire helped him organize and classify them.

With tens of thousands of feet of film at his disposal, Yang Ye could easily call out the required fragments and then put them together with a click.

Claire couldn't keep up with Yang Ye's rhythm at all, and didn't understand his logic.

For example, she discovered that in Yang Ye's film, when fighting, he didn't fight directly at all.

Instead, some very scattered body movements are integrated together to form a brand new picture, and the final effect is very sharp and beautiful!

Claire couldn't find Yang Ye's logic, so she classified it according to the picture.

Punch to the left, kick to the right, one person, two people... this way.

After they were divided, they were put together according to Yang Ye's requirements.

After putting it together and having a structure, Yang Ye started to repair it.

Yang Ye didn't hesitate at all. This one was two frames long, clicked the knife, and threw it away.

Claire was so anxious that she almost cried: "Director, you can't do this. What if you can't come back in the future?"

She also has a sense of responsibility, because once a frame is missing from the picture, if the entire copy is used for recording, the sound and picture will be out of sync.

But if this frame cannot be found, we have to select the negatives again, develop them and add them in, which is very troublesome.

However, Yang Ye didn't care at all, watching, cutting, and throwing away.

He has the picture in his mind and the accuracy in his hands, so there is no way he can make any mistakes.

Cut off the excess and unnecessary!

It took Yang Ye less than half a month to finish editing "Rambo" and handed it over to United Artists for a copy. At the last look, it was extremely smooth.

Claire was so impressed that she called Yang Ye the golden scissors.

Years later, Carlyle won an Academy Award for Best Editing.

She stood on the stage and said: "I want to thank Mr. Nick Young. I used to be his assistant when editing "First Blood". I didn't know until then that editing is an art.

Before Mr. Yang edits the films, he will watch all the films so that he knows them well. Later, I also formed this habit.

I started editing films independently. Before editing, I would read all the images, including the OK and NG clips, so that I could slowly expand and know what I wanted! "

"First Blood" was edited and Cameron's script was written.

Yang Ye watched it again. It was similar to the "Alien 2" in his impression, but it had at least three times more content, and it also involved all kinds of messy camera positions and shooting methods.

That's right, Cameron is famous for his useless films. Not only are there many NG strips, but there are also more useless scenes.

He first took countless pictures and then slowly selected the ones he needed.

A 100-minute movie requires about 10,000 feet of film, but this product can shoot a million feet.

In "Alien 2" written by Cameron, the closed space of the first film was destroyed, and the mystery was also reduced, directly changing from a thriller and horror film to an action film.

It's about humans migrating to the planet where the aliens are, and sending out troops to fight the aliens.

When it comes to fun, among all the great directors, Cameron ranks second and no one dares to rank first.

This guy is extremely good at foreshadowing and creating atmosphere. He will even give you a little refreshment in the early stages of the film to confuse you, and then in the last hour, it will make your scalp numb.

He will fully explain the story background, story environment, character relationships, situation analysis, etc. in the early stage.

However, these rich preparations are not boring, but proceed in an orderly manner.

As the film's foreshadowing slowly develops, the audience gradually becomes integrated into the film, as if they are actually in it. At this moment, the fun begins.

Take "Titanic", which is most familiar to the public, as an example. It is a serious romance film. Male viewers will usually assume the role of Jack, a loser, and look forward to how he will seduce the rich and beautiful Rose.

But starting from the last hour, the big scenes bombarded one after another, and the audience forgot about everything except being happy.

The global box office champion "Avatar" is a model among models. The story background and the conflict between the two sides are explained in the early stage. After enough preparation, the war finally begins, with all kinds of indiscriminate bombardment, which will make your scalp numb.

Is this the case with the current "Alien 2" and the "Terminator" copied by Yang Ye.

Yang Ye had nothing to say about such a script. After reading it, several senior executives from United Artists expressed their satisfaction and praised Yang Ye for his knowledge of people.

"How much do you want?" Yang Ye asked bluntly.

"Ten million!" Cameron thought for a while and said.

Ten million is enough money, and there is no way this guy can make a movie without overspending. Every time, he always says it will be less, and after he gets the investment, he keeps trying and finding various reasons to increase the money.

When filming "Titanic," the budget went so high that Fox couldn't sustain it, and Paramount came to the rescue.

"I'll give you fifteen million, and the production will be completed within one year. Are there any problems?" Yang Ye said directly.

"No problem!" Cameron's chest clapped loudly.

It’s no wonder that there is no problem, 1500 million is simply not enough. (End of chapter)