Hong Kong Entertainment: The King of Kung Fu

Chapter 697: Going Home for the New Year

PS: The movie shot by Li An is called "Lust, Caution", and the movie starred by Zhong Liti is called "Lust, Caution". The two have nothing to do with each other.

……

At the 1995 New Year's Eve concert, Yang Ye was the last to appear on stage and sang "BJ One Night" with Yang Yuying.

After the first season of "The Voice of China", Yang Ye never sang on stage again, released any new songs, or even an album.

Some people say that after Yang Ye became the richest man, he started to act arrogantly.

It’s good enough that he can insist on making movies for you, how can you expect him to sing for you?
In fact, Yang Ye didn't have any idea of ​​showing off. He insisted on making movies because he liked it, but he was not so passionate about music.

Every time he released an album, it was done with a purpose and a gimmick.

The release of "Under the Lion Rock" became the originator of Cantonese songs.

He released the album "Chinese Folk Songs", put forward the slogan "Sing your own songs", and became the pioneer of Chinese folk songs.

The English album was released only at the request of PolyGram.

The release of "Kamen Dance Kai" was purely for fun, to test the reaction in Japan.

The purpose of publishing "Wuxia" is to take advantage of Jin Yong.

The last album, "Pearl of the Orient", was released to commemorate the tenth anniversary of their debut.

After that, there were only sporadic singles released, because there was no purpose or gimmick to release records.

At this moment, Yang Ye appeared at ATV's New Year's Eve concert, which made his fans very excited.

The atmosphere at the Hong Kong Coliseum was extremely warm, and the ratings reached their highest point at this moment.

There were many celebrities sitting in the front row of the guest seats. When the camera was turned to them, they stood up very cooperatively and shouted along with Yang Ye: “One night in Beijing. One night in Beijing.”

In the VIP ticket area nearby, one could see Lai Wenfeng holding Yang Yuying's light board, calling his friends and cheering for her.

After Yang Ye and Yang Yuying finished their performance, they returned to the backstage to tidy up and prepare to celebrate with everyone.

Su Huilun and Liu Xiaohui came over and asked Yang Yuying curiously, "Gang Gang, the one with the last name, is it like this every time?"

Yang Yuying said helplessly: "Yes, no matter where I perform, he always sits in the first row."

Liu Xiaohui exclaimed: "Wow, he is so persistent!"

As the group came out of the Hong Kong Coliseum, they saw Lai Wenfeng walking towards Yang Yuying with a bouquet of flowers.

"Ms. Yang, you sang so well tonight!"

Yang Yuying took the flowers and said, "Thank you!"

Lai Wenfeng was about to speak when Yang Ye beside him suddenly said, "Mr. Lai, right?"

Yang Ye had directly ignored Lai Wenfeng last time, which made him very angry, but he was not stupid. He knew that Yang Ye was someone he could not afford to offend, let alone in front of his sweetheart.

He said very politely: "Hello, Mr. Yang!"

Yang Ye didn't put on airs this time. He smiled, shook hands with him and exchanged a few words.

"The New Year is coming soon. Are you going back to your hometown this year?"

Lai Wenfeng calculated the time and found that there was still about a month left. He nodded and said, "Let's go back!"

"Yes, have a good new year!"

After Yang Ye finished speaking, he took the three girls away.

Lai Wenfeng looked at the backs of several people and felt a little confused.

……

The celebration banquet was very lively.

Although it was very late, everyone still happily gathered together to strengthen their relationships.

As soon as Yang Ye and the three girls walked into the banquet hall, they were warmly welcomed. After all, he was the boss.

Yang Ye was a very casual person. He waved to everyone, signaling them to do what they were supposed to do, and then everyone went back to eating, drinking and chatting.

The dinner was in the form of a buffet. Yang Ye and the three girls took some food and found a place to sit down.

It was already one in the morning. People in this line of work had to maintain their figure, so they didn't eat much. Yang Ye just had two bites.

From time to time, people would come over to toast him or congratulate him, and he would always respond in kind.

"Uncle Yang, Happy New Year!"

I don't know when Li Wen came over.

"CoCo, Happy New Year!"

Li Wen made her official debut after participating in the 93th China Voice in 94. In , she released a Cantonese album, which sold triple platinum in Hong Kong and was a great success.

The record company then helped her release a Mandarin album, which sold 500,000 copies, making her a rising star in the Chinese music scene.

"I went to see The Matrix the day before yesterday. It was really good!"

Yang Ye said helplessly: "Recently, everyone who talks to me starts talking about The Matrix."

"Because it's really good, I feel it's very profound, and after watching it, I thought about it for a long time."

Yang Ye had been talking about The Matrix for the past two days and felt like vomiting. He didn't want to talk about it anymore, so he changed the subject and asked, "How are you doing in Hong Kong?"

Li Wen is optimistic and cheerful, like a little sun. She said happily: "It's great. I met a lot of friends and made music with everyone. It's very happy."

Yang Ye asked: "Have you ever thought about developing in Europe and America?"

"Going to Europe and the United States?" Li Wen couldn't help but be stunned.

Yang Ye nodded: "Yes!"

"I have thought about it. After all, I grew up there and am more familiar with the environment there, but as an Asian, there aren't many opportunities."

"What if I support you to go?"

"Then I'll go!" Li Wen puffed out his chest and agreed very straightforwardly.

"Girls' Generation and Seiko Matsuda both briefly achieved some success in the European and American pop music scene, but they were unable to sustain it.

You are doing very well in Asia now. In time, you may become the queen of Chinese pop music. But if you go to Europe and America, you may just be lost in the crowd. You have to think clearly! "

"I'll go!" Li Wen answered firmly.

"What's the reason?"

"I believe you!"

Yang Ye couldn't help but laugh, and couldn't help but rub her head with his hand: "Aren't you afraid that I will sell you out?"

Li Wen really enjoyed Yang Ye's intimate actions, which gave her a feeling that Yang Ye doted on her. She wrinkled her nose and said naively, "Then I'll help you count the money!" "Hahahaha!"

Yang Ye and the people around him laughed out loud.

"Put aside all the announcements you have and come with me to America in a few days!"

Li Wen was overjoyed: "Okay, I'll take care of it tomorrow."

……

A few days later, Yang Ye took Li Wen to Tokyo, held a roadshow for "The Matrix", and then flew directly to Los Angeles.

In North America, "The Matrix" is currently in theaters, and it has surpassed Jim Carrey's "Dumb and Dumber" at the box office to become the Christmas box office champion.

As soon as Yang Ye arrived in the United States, he went on TV to promote "The Matrix".

Because "The Matrix" is no longer a pure kung fu film, but a mixture of philosophical thoughts from all over the world.

Yang Ye draws on the strengths of many others and very skillfully tailors various elements to specific scenes. He also uses characters to string together different philosophical viewpoints that echo each other, which is very clever.

So as soon as this movie was released, it caused various interpretations from movie fans around the world.

After Yang Ye arrived in the United States, the TV station even invited French philosopher Jean Baudrillard to have a conversation with Yang Ye.

There are many tributes to Baudrillard in "The Matrix". For example, at the beginning of the movie, Neo took out a box with the appearance of a green book containing software. That book was Baudrillard's "The Theory of Simulacrum".

The so-called "theory of simulacrum", Baudrillard believes that in the consumerist society at the end of the 20th century, images of simulated reality created by mass media and the Internet have long replaced reality.

Although humans believe that they live in reality, in fact their spiritual world is already living in simulation.

When illusion dilutes the weight of reality, reality becomes a desert.

This situation is strangely similar to a scene in a movie, in which humans live in isolated machine test tubes, relying on the reality simulated by the "Matrix" to survive.

This scene in the movie is like a metaphor for the entire human society.

Baudrillard famously said about the consumerist society of the 20th century: Welcome to the desert of the real.
In Yang Ye's "The Matrix", the same words were said to Neo through Dillon's mouth: Welcome to the real desert!

However, this conversation was not pleasant, as Baudrillard believed that Yang Ye had misunderstood his theory.

Because in the movie, the false "Matrix" and the real "Yingzhou" form a binary opposition.

The function of the Matrix is ​​to enslave all mankind, while the mission of Yingzhou is to save all mankind.

Baudrillard believes that the boundary between reality and virtuality has long been blurred and this binary opposition does not exist.

Yang Ye either misunderstood because he didn't understand, or he deliberately misinterpreted it, because making a movie requires two forces to confront each other.

Yang Ye didn't say much about this. He just said that the relationship between "Matrix" and "Yingzhou" will be explained and demonstrated in more detail in the sequel.

Once a work is published, it no longer belongs entirely to the creator, and people can interpret it freely based on their own understanding and needs.

Authors cannot easily define their own works, because this may lead to standard answers, reduce the discussion space for the work, and greatly damage the value and vitality of the work.

During the roadshow, Yang Ye held a signing ceremony with the newly established DreamWorks Films.

Poplar Pictures invested US$3000 million in DreamWorks, acquiring a 12% stake and obtaining the agency rights for DreamWorks in Asia except the Chinese mainland market.

It’s not that Spielberg didn’t want to give the agency rights in mainland China to Yang Ye, but that Yang Ye couldn’t do it.

Because in mainland China, only China Film Corporation has the distribution rights for imported films.

In addition, Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner have officially left CAA agency and established C/W production company, preparing to go it alone.

Yang Ye invested in the company and prepared to personally create C/W Productions' first work for Tom Cruise, which was "Mission Impossible".

"Mission Impossible" was originally a TV series of the same name produced by CBS TV in the United States in the 1970s. Yang Ye asked United Artists to buy the copyright and then hired a screenwriter to turn it into a movie script.

Yang Ye first set up all the action scenes in the movie, and then the screenwriter completed the script based on his settings, and he reviewed and revised it.

Now, everything is almost ready.

Yang Ye attended the opening ceremony of C/W Production Company, and then announced the filming plan of "Mission Impossible" with Tom and Paula, and announced that the production scale will reach 100 million US dollars, which is a solid Hollywood A-level blockbuster.

For a new company, that's a bit grandiose.

However, with Yang Ye personally directing the film and a popular star like Tom Cruise starring in the lead role, no one questioned this.

In the past two years, Yang Ye's performance has been truly brilliant.

He once predicted that the box office of "The Bodyguard" would be over $300 million and have a chance to win the box office championship.

In the end, "The Bodyguard" took in more than 400 million yuan at the box office, ranking second at the box office, unfortunately losing to an animated film "Aladdin".

After this battle, people believed that he could really predict the success rate of a film after it was put on the market based on factors such as the director, starring actors, genre, and release date of a film, with his many years of experience in the film industry...

Not long after, this matter was verified once again.

Yang's private equity fund invested 10 million US dollars in "Jurassic Park", and the box office soared to billion US dollars, and Yang's fund made a profit of more than million US dollars.

This god-like predictive ability left investors stunned and made even more investors excited.

To date, the funds controlled by Yang's Private Equity Fund have reached 3 billion US dollars, and all of this money has been used by Yang Ye for various investments.

When Yang Ye appeared in Los Angeles, he was like a God of Wealth, his whole body shining with golden light, and countless people were looking forward to working with him.

It is for this reason that the cooperation with DreamWorks went so smoothly.

Paramount's female president Shirley Lansing finally agreed to change jobs after Yang Ye visited her three times.

The first task Yang Ye gave her was to bring over "The Truman Show".

"The Truman Show" is an unfinished project. It has been tinkered with for four or five years, but there is still no improvement.

It was originally a science fiction thriller set in New York. It was very dark and depressing, and was never well received.

Moreover, this film requires a large number of actors and the budget is at least 60 million. The pressure to make a profit is too great, so it has been shelved.

Yang Ye fell in love with this shelved movie at first sight, naturally to prove his extraordinary vision.

Those garbage you look down upon are actually a gold mine!
During Yang Ye's stay in Los Angeles, he helped to finalize the director and leading actors.

The director is Peter Weir, the director of the original version, and Yang Ye naturally chose comedy star Jim Carrey to play the leading role.

Yang Ye convinced screenwriter Andrew Niccol that if he wanted to make money from the script, he had to change it into a comedy and explain it from an absurd perspective to make the story of the film more light-hearted.

In order to achieve this effect, a comedian must be found to star in the film.

The most popular comedian in the United States right now is naturally Jim Carrey.

Some netizens in later generations have always said that Zhou Xingchi imitated Jim Carrey. In fact, Zhou Xingchi had already become famous with "God of Gamblers", several years earlier than Jim Carrey became famous with "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective".

In Yang Ye's opinion, Jim Carrey is not as good as Zhou Xingchi.

Jim Carrey mainly relies on exaggerated expressions to win, while Stephen Chow's comedic talent is all-round.

(End of this chapter)