Hong Kong Entertainment: The King of Kung Fu

He Guorong felt like he was dreaming!
He is an Australian who taught himself to speak fluent Cantonese because of his fascination with Hong Kong movies and music.

Because his idol is Zhang Guorong, he gave himself a Chinese name, He Guorong.

A few months ago, Leslie Cheung went to Sydney for a concert. In order to get closer to his idol, he used various channels to become Leslie Cheung's exclusive driver in Australia.

I also took the opportunity to ask some questions about Hong Kong movies, and then resolutely came to Hong Kong to pursue my dream!
It just so happened that "Mojin: The Lost Tomb" needed a white actor who could speak Chinese, so Zhang Guorong recommended He Guorong to Yang Ye.

So, he successfully signed a contract with Baiyang Agency, joined the crew of "Mojin: The Lost Legend", and became the third villain.

This is life!

When in Rome, do as the Romans do. He Guorong held a stick of incense in both hands and followed the others' example, worshipping the Second Master devoutly and praying silently in his heart: "God of Movies, please bless me!"

After everyone offered incense to the Second Master, Yang Ye personally unveiled the red cloth covering the camera and said with a smile, “I declare that the filming of “Ghost Blows Out the Light: Mojin: The Lost Tomb” has officially started!”

"Good luck with the boot!"

After a round of cheers, Yang Ye, Hong Jingbao and Zhong Chuhong worked together to cut a golden and crispy suckling pig from head to tail, and then shared the meal with the crew members.

He Guorong got a small piece and put it into his mouth with some excitement.

"Ccrunch! Crunch!"

What a delicious pork, what a wonderful day!

……

Filming "Mojin: The Lost Tomb" was a brand new challenge for Yang Ye.

Because "Mojin: The Lost Legend" is a 3D movie, and the shooting methods of 3D movies and 2D movies are completely different.

If Yang Ye copied the original "Mojin: The Lost Tomb" to shoot the film, the film would become very mediocre!

So... almost all lenses had to be redesigned.

Watching a 3D movie in 3D mode in a cinema and in 2D mode at home give people the feeling of watching two completely different movies.

Why is this so?
Because the most important thing about 3D movies is to get close to the human perspective, allowing the audience to experience what is happening in the story together with the characters.

When audiences put on 3D glasses to watch movies in the cinema, they will have a sense of being in the scene, and the sense of immersion is maximized.

If you go home and watch it on TV or computer, the sense of immersion will be gone and the viewing experience will be much worse.

This is why people who went to the cinema to watch the IMAX version of "Avatar" thought it was a masterpiece.

Those who have only watched it on the computer will think, this movie is worthy of a $27 billion box office? It is far inferior to the previous movies of God of War!
In terms of specific lens usage, 3D movies rarely use horizontal camera movements, and will try to keep the lens moving forward.

When choosing a lens, wide-angle lenses are more often chosen, as this is closest to the feeling of seeing with the human eye, making the picture very three-dimensional and with rich composition.

This is where the problem lies. In order to maintain the three-dimensional sense of the film, the cinematographer has very limited options for camera movement.

Therefore, when a movie is shot, its camera language will be very poor.

In non-3D mode, the viewing experience will be very poor.

We know that film is a comprehensive art form, and people watch movies not just to watch a story.

If you just want to read the story, can't you just read the novel at home?
You can also use your own imagination to fill in the blanks, which is more fun than watching a movie!

For a movie, the way of telling the story is more important!

A top-notch film team can make an ordinary story full of climaxes and make the audience feel excited.

For example, in Akira Kurosawa's "Seven Samurai", the final decisive battle involves only more than 30 people, but it can convey the momentum of thousands of troops.

And some really bad war movies, with thousands of extras, still look like a bunch of minions fighting each other!
To give a more intuitive example, the plots of Chen Long's movies have always been simple, just to lead into the action scenes, and it has not changed for decades.

Then why do some people think that Chen Long makes bad movies every day because he is old?
He really didn't make bad movies, he just couldn't do it anymore.

If you replace the movie shot by Chen Long in 2020 with the Chen Long in 1980, it will be absolutely amazing!

Therefore, Yang Ye had to start all over again with the camera movements of the original version of "Mojin: The Lost Tomb".

Not only that, all the action scene designs in the original "Mojin: The Lost Tomb" also have to be overturned and redone.

Some people find Xu Ke's "Flying Daggers of Dragon Gate" very ugly and complain that Xu has grown old and has lost all his sharp style.

That's not the case. It's just because "Flying Daggers of Dragon Gate" is a 3D movie and it's impossible to use Tsui Hark's most fast and sharp editing.

Why? Because this shooting method requires constant switching of multiple angles, multiple shots, and fast editing. In 3D mode, some viewers will feel dizzy or even vomit.

Therefore, all traditional filming methods must be abandoned and a new set of filming methods suitable for 3D movies must be designed. If the audience is not used to it, the boss will be criticized.

Of course, even if there were no such reasons, the action scenes in Mojin: The Last Dragon would still have to be redone.

The action scenes in the original "Mojin: The Last Dragon" were terrible and contained no surprises.

But there is no other way because Chen Kun, Huang Bo and Shu Qi are not professional action actors.

This greatly limits the ability of the martial arts instructor. If they design some awesome moves, the three of them simply cannot perform them.

The three of them could only perform one action at a time, and if it was a little difficult they had to use a stand-in, which naturally ended up looking ugly.

For a Hong Kong action film led by Yang Ye, this is unacceptable.

Generally speaking, it is better to use more long shots in martial arts scenes, because long shots can bring a sense of tension and realism.

Then some short shots are interspersed to show precision.

Excellent action actors like Jet Li and Zhen Zidan can perform fifty or a hundred moves in one shot, smoothly and in one go.

After shooting, you can edit the film however you want according to your requirements, with a high degree of freedom.

Even if you deliberately cut it into pieces like Xu Ke did, it is still cut from a complete set of movements, so the sense of fluidity is much better.

It's also comfortable to be a martial arts director. You can be imaginative when designing action. Any difficult action you can think of can be performed by the actors.

Of course, the fighting scenes in the "Ghost Blows Out the Light" series cannot be too fancy, but should be realistic, and with a little humor, it will be perfect. …

Yang Ye made an excuse, saying that he was too busy.

So this "Mojin: The Lost Tomb" does not have a detailed storyboard like the previous ones.

Yang Ye no longer controlled everything in a domineering manner. He brought together the leading actor and action director Hong Jingbao, assistant director Johnnie To, photographer Christopher Doyle, script supervisor Peter Chan and others to form a temporary creative team.

Among these people, Chen Kexin was introduced by John Woo. Chen Kexin lived in Bangkok when he was a child and can speak Thai.

In 1983, John Woo filmed "Heroes Without Tears" in Thailand. Chen Kexin was John Woo's translator and later joined Golden Harvest Company.

Of course, John Woo was fired by Golden Harvest not long after that.

After his resurgence with "A Better Tomorrow", John Woo gained a say in Baiyang Film and Television.

Taking advantage of the opportunity to help Yang Ye shoot "Terminator 2", he introduced Chen Kexin to be the script supervisor.

Of course Yang Ye knew that Chen Kexin was very talented, so in the last three films, Chen Kexin was Yang Ye's script supervisor.

A script supervisor has the opportunity to be promoted to a director. In Yang Ye's case, Chen Kexin has embarked on the same path as Johnnie To.

John Woo likes to support younger generations. If he thinks someone is talented, he will find ways to help.

It was like this when I helped Xu Ke back then, and it was the same when I helped Chen Kexin and Zhou Xingchi later.

When John Woo was filming "The Young Warriors", Stephen Chow was just a supporting actor.

John Woo saw that Zhou Xingchi was very talented, so he said to him, "You will be a star and a great actor in the future."

Zhou Xingchi didn't believe it. Although he was very ambitious, he had been in the industry for many years but no one gave him a chance. He said, "Will it happen?"

So John Woo changed the script, adding more scenes and lines for Zhou Xingchi, giving him the opportunity to perform.

……

This time when filming "Mojin: The Lost Tomb", Yang Ye turned into a big-eared thief and opened up the channels for people to speak freely.

Before shooting starts every day, we will hold a small meeting to discuss what will be shot tomorrow.

Then we discussed together how to shoot.

Of course, Yang Ye has been immersed in the film industry for many years and has a wide range of knowledge. His insights often make other people's eyes light up and exclaim that this is actually possible.

For example, he asked the photographer to use handheld shooting to follow some shots of the protagonist entering the tomb passage.

The resulting effect makes the audience feel a stronger sense of danger in the space.

Therefore, everyone thought that Yang Ye was just training them.

Therefore, we are very grateful. We rack our brains every day, speak up actively, express our ideas, and have a very high enthusiasm for work.

In fact, Yang Ye just borrowed the design of PS3 games such as "Tomb Raider" and "Uncharted".

These games have many perspective designs that express spatial dangers, which, when applied to movies, can give people a whole new experience.

A few years later, when these adventure games came out, they often borrowed space design and camera usage from the "Ghost Blows Out the Light" series of movies.

The "Ghost Blows Out the Light" series of films has therefore become the source of inspiration for various adventure games in later generations, and is thus regarded as a classic of the generation.

This... is the reversal of Tiangang!

……

While Yang Ye was filming "Mojin: The Lost Tomb" step by step, he was also observing the global stock market situation.

On Monday, October 1987, 10, the largest crash in history occurred.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 508.32 points, or 22.6%, in one day.

Subsequently, the global stock market suffered a severe impact, many millionaires became paupers overnight, and thousands of people suffered mental breakdowns and committed suicide by jumping off buildings.

This day was called "Black Monday" by the financial community, and the New York Times called it "the worst day in the history of Wall Street."

Yang Ye has two main businesses, one is the entertainment industry, and the other is shopping malls and cinemas throughout Southeast Asia, which generate huge cash flow.

A lot of money has entered the stock market through the operations of the investment team.

Yang Ye didn't want to be a stock god, so he just gave a little reminder, avoided some risks beforehand, and bought at the bottom afterwards.

During this stock market crash, take the opportunity to buy some high-quality stocks and hold them for a long time.

When it comes to making money, take your time and don’t be in a hurry.

However, he ordered the purchase of a lot of shares of computer giant Wang Laboratories.

Wang An is the fifth richest man in the United States, with a personal net worth of $20 billion, and the richest Chinese in the world.

In fact, Yang Ye is richer than Wang An, and he is the real richest Chinese.

However, Yang Ye's company is not listed, and his investments are very dispersed, with a little here and a little there, all of which are small holdings, so his personal wealth is not easy to calculate.

Everyone knows that Yang Ye is rich, but no one knows how much money he has!
At this time, Wang An's company was already on the decline, and the investment team believed that Yang Ye had made a stupid move and that he was acting on his emotions.

However, Yang Ye is the boss, and the investment team must obey his decisions.

Wang An suffered heavy losses in this stock market crash, with his wealth reduced by half, and this was just the beginning.

Three years later, his computer company with a market value of 5 billion US dollars will be reduced to only 100 million, and the company's stock will be worth nothing.

Yang Ye invested tens of millions of dollars to buy Wang Laboratories' stocks, but it was simply a waste of money.

However, he wanted to give it a try to see if he could save the company! (End of this chapter)