Literary Master 1978.

Chapter 485 Great Compassion

Prince Road, Shengji Restaurant.

At around nine o'clock in the evening, the restaurant was still bustling with guests toasting each other, laughing and chatting, creating a lively atmosphere.

Tao Yushu walked out of the hotel, glanced at the various neon signs on the street, and then stopped at a Mercedes-Benz parked in front of the hotel. He opened the door and got in.

"Sister, are you okay?" Tao Yumo asked with concern.

"It's okay. I just drank two glasses of wine. I'm happy today, and I can't refuse a toast from someone."

As Tao Yushu spoke, her eyes were fixed on the street scene outside the car window. She felt an indescribable sense of ease and comfort, a feeling she had not experienced for a long time.

"You can have a good sleep this time!" Tao Yumo suddenly said while driving.

Tao Yushu smiled and said, "It's still far from time to rest on our laurels. We have only just passed the stage of survival."

Tao Yushu invited the company's employees to dinner tonight to tell everyone a good news.

Just this afternoon, Tao Yushu signed a contract with Shaw Brothers.

Lam Films took over Shaw Brothers’ 10 theaters!
From now on, Lin also owns his own cinema chain.

For a film company, cinemas are not necessary, but for Lin, cinemas are necessary.

Wandao is just a tiny island to the mainland, but it is a behemoth to the Lin family. Facing its ban, the Lin family must concentrate all their energy to deal with it.

10 cinemas are not a lot, and in terms of scale it can only rank sixth in Hong Kong.

But if the two southern lines, which are also from the Z school, are added, the cinema resources that Lin can mobilize will be very considerable, almost as good as Golden Harvest's Jiale and Cinema City's Golden Princess.

With these cinema resources, Lam’s base in Hong Kong has been stabilized, and it can be said that it is in an invincible position.

Of course, if the Hong Kong and Kowloon Freedom Federation is determined to deal with the Lin family, they will definitely be in trouble.

After returning home, Lin Chaoyang asked about today's dinner party, and Tao Yushu talked about it happily.

Lin’s company now has its own cinema chain. Tao Yushu, the boss, is happy, and his subordinates are also very happy.

It is hard to find a boss as generous as Tao Yushu these days, so they certainly hope that Lin can develop in a long-term and healthy manner.

Cinema chains have now become almost standard for major Hong Kong film companies, including Golden Harvest and Golden Lok, Cinema City and Golden Princess, D&B/Bo Harvest and D&B…

Having the cinema chain not only helps them get rid of the negative impact of the ban from Taiwan, but also proves the development prospects of Lin's Pictures and proves that they did not follow the wrong boss.

"Thanks to the successive successes of "An Autumn's Tale" and "The Rich and Powerful", otherwise Shaw Brothers would never have agreed to our offer so easily." Tao Yushu said with a thankful tone.

She had long realized the importance of controlling the cinema chain, but before, the Lin Group's funding was too small to support them in setting up the cinema chain.

After the ban order from the Hong Kong and Kowloon Freedom Federation was announced, Tao Yushu realized that whether he could control the cinema chain belonging to Lin was a matter of life and death for Lin and was imminent.

But she did not act rashly. Instead, she waited until her two films, "An Autumn's Tale" and "The Rich and Powerful", became big sellers before approaching Shaw Brothers.

She knew very clearly that if she had gone to Shaw Brothers in desperation when the ban order was just issued, even if she could have taken over Shaw Brothers' cinema chain, she would have to pay a high price.

Although there is some premium now, it is at least within a reasonable range.

The most important thing is that she also tied the skinny Shao to Lin's chariot.

In Tao Yushu's eyes, Shaw Brothers didn't even need to do anything. They just needed to quietly serve as a mascot.

What she is doing now is to deeply practice the words of the great man:

Make fewer enemies and more friends.

"What are you going to do next?" Lin Chaoyang asked.

Tao Yushu pondered and said, "Now that we have the cinema chain, we should proceed steadily. This year, the company will produce more than 10 films, and next year there may be more. There are too many things to do.

I heard from Ah Du that the internal fighting in Xinyicheng is getting more and more intense, we can poach more of their people. "

Lin Chaoyang couldn't help laughing. Tao Yushu seemed to be addicted to poaching people.

But it doesn’t matter. The relationship between Lin and Cinema City has basically broken down anyway, and the other party still owes them several million in overseas revenue from “A Better Tomorrow” and has not paid them yet.

While the internal strife in Cinema City continues, we must dig out what needs to be done.

"I also heard..."

Tao Yushu's eyes sparkled as he said, "Princess Jin may want to split up the family."

The nominal boss of Princess Gold is Lei Juekun of the Lei family, but its parent company is Kowloon Development Group. The shareholders come from the shareholders of Kowloon Motor Bus Company and their descendants, including the four major families of Guo, Wu, Yu and Lei.

In 1980, Lei Juekun established the Golden Princess Cinema Chain, which specializes in showing Chinese-language films, based on several of his own cinemas, including the Red Sound, Rock Sound, KTV and Huasheng. He then rented or contracted with more than a dozen cinemas.

Later, in order to better develop the cinema chain, he began to get involved in the field of film production and supported Cinema City. Since then, Golden Princess has developed smoothly.

It has formed an integrated industrial chain of production, distribution and theaters, and has made a lot of money in recent years.

Under this "good situation", Golden Princess' shareholders Feng Bingzhong and Chen Rongmei gradually became dissatisfied with being small shareholders who could only receive dividends.

Recently, JY from Taiwan Island, seeing that the overseas funds hidden in the film market are gradually becoming abundant, has begun to think about setting up its own independent business.

“Feng Bingzhong and Chen Rongmei had previously been secretly in contact with Miss Fang in order to acquire Shaw Brothers’ cinema resources.

They already control 10 cinemas themselves. If they take over Shaw Brothers' cinema chain, that would be 20, making it the fourth largest cinema chain in Hong Kong.

And I guess their ambition is definitely not just to operate cinemas, but to use cinemas to get involved in film production and distribution, copying the path of Golden Princess.”

Lin Chaoyang nodded slightly after listening to her analysis.

“Money is the key to success. Although the film industry is not a big business, if you can achieve the market scale of Golden Princess and Xinyicheng, the annual revenue from local and overseas markets will be at least 500 million, which is equivalent to the size of a listed company above a certain scale.

Even if they are wealthy, it is normal for them to be tempted. If they really become independent, both Golden Princess and Cinema City will probably suffer a great loss of vitality!"

Lin Chaoyang's tone was meaningful. In fact, he knew very well that Princess Jin's separation was one of the important reasons for the disintegration of Cinema City.

Tao Yushu said happily: "Yes, this is a good thing for us. I want to get in touch with both of them."

Lin Chaoyang joked, "We have snatched over Shaw Brothers' cinema chain. Aren't you afraid of being hated by them? Why are you actively looking for them?"

Tao Yushu said: "If Shaw becomes Lam, we can still cooperate."

"They may not be willing to cooperate with Lin."

"They are afraid to cooperate with us because they are worried about the ban from the Wandao side. Wouldn't it be better if they don't use the Lin family's name?"

Tao Yushu had previously asked Tao Yumo to register several shell companies, including a film company in a joint venture with Shaw Brothers, which on the surface had nothing to do with the Lin family.

Lin Chaoyang gave a thumbs up and imitated Master Tang, "Great! Really great! Comrade Yushu has made every possible plan!"

Tao Yushu smiled and gave him a charming look.

Two days later, Lin Chaoyang finally finished writing the novel and immediately contacted Dong Qiao of Ming Pao Publishing House and Li Shifei of Huacheng Publishing House.

Li Shifei was in Guangzhou, and he had always had to go in person to get Lin Chaoyang's manuscripts. He had to go from Guangzhou to Shenzhen first, and then cross the border to Hong Kong, so Lin Chaoyang had to wait for two days.

After Dong Qiao learned that Lin Chaoyang had finished writing a new book, he didn't even make an appointment to meet him, but ran to his house as soon as possible.

What makes him so active is, of course, the ridiculously good sales of his novel.

In the past few years, Ming Pao Publishing House has successively introduced several novels by Lin Chaoyang, including "The Death of Van Gogh", "The Chess Master", "Crossing the Guandong", "The Truman Show", and "Parasite".

Even the lowest-selling work, "The Chess Master", has sold more than 7 copies since its publication, and the sales of the remaining works have exceeded 10 copies.

And as time goes by, these works did not gradually become unpopular like ordinary works, and the long-tail effect was unexpectedly good.

Take "The Death of Van Gogh" as an example. The sales volume in the year of publication was less than 2 copies, but now the total sales volume has exceeded 12 copies.

In addition to the quality of the novels themselves, the biggest reason for this change is that Lin Chaoyang's reputation in Hong Kong is growing, which has made many readers interested in his old works.

If you count carefully, the sales of several of Lin Chaoyang's works are already extremely high among the many books published by Ming Pao Publishing House.

Not to mention compared with pure literary works, it is not inferior to many popular literary works.

After all, Hong Kong is a very small market.

Therefore, Dong Qiao is of course positive when new works are published by writers who can make money for the publishing house.

The day after he took the manuscript, Li Shifei arrived in Hong Kong.

After receiving the manuscript, Li Shifei found a hotel to stay in so that he could do a preliminary review of the novel and then communicate with Lin Chaoyang in person.

Two days later, Li Shifei found Lin Chaoyang and frowned when he entered the room.

"You've been here for quite some time, why don't you say anything?"

Li Shifei sat on the sofa in silence since he entered the room. Lin Chaoyang waited for him for a long time, but he didn't speak. Finally, Lin Chaoyang couldn't help but ask a question.

Li Shifei hesitated for a moment before saying, "Chaoyang, I don't like your Big Times!"

"Not optimistic" is a euphemism. He has been an editor for more than 30 years and has his own judgment on literary works. What he actually meant was "not optimistic".

Hearing this, Lin Chaoyang's expression was not surprised. After a while, Li Shifei asked him: "Chaoyang, don't you think... your novel is a little too popular?"

“It’s a little more popular.”

Lin Chaoyang's forthright response caught Li Shifei off guard.

When engaging in creative work, it is sometimes inevitable to fall into misunderstandings.

After reading Lin Chaoyang's new book, Li Shifei was impressed by the wonderful characters and story.

But in his opinion, the brilliance of these characters and stories is largely due to the abandonment of narrative and structural considerations.

This kind of novel is easy to read, but not literary enough.

He originally thought that Lin Chaoyang was not aware of this problem, but after hearing Lin Chaoyang's answer, he realized that Lin Chaoyang might have done it on purpose.

Li Shifei looked at Lin Chaoyang in confusion, "Chaoyang, with your current fame and status, you can actually write this novel in a more sophisticated and refined way."

"Old Li, we have known each other for so many years, so let's not use such polite words. Do you want to say something more 'high-level'?"

Li Shifei answered Lin Chaoyang with silence, his eyes revealing confusion. He really wanted to know why Lin Chaoyang wrote that.

“In fact, it is very simple for me to write this way. My book is based on the stock market, which is not available in China yet.

Many people don’t understand what stocks are. If I don’t write in a simple way, do you think readers will have the patience to read on?”

Li Shifei still finds it hard to let go. "Readers can also adapt to works. Are the works of Joyce and Faulkner easy to read? Aren't they popular now?"

Lin Chaoyang shook his head, "Lao Li, I don't know if you agree with my idea.

In my opinion, the popularity of serious literature or pure literature in our country in recent years is not a normal phenomenon, but the result of many years of repression. "

"Your idea makes sense, but..."

Lin Chaoyang did not give Li Shifei a chance to speak, and continued: "So in my opinion, we can't always hope that readers will be willing to read those difficult and obscure works.

You can express your own highbrow ideas, but they must not be too highbrow. Instead, you should find a way to appeal to both the elite and the masses.

In the first two months, I returned to Yenching to give lectures to students at Lu Academy and talked a lot with those students.

I don’t know if it’s my illusion, but I find that our creators are becoming proud, and some of them have even begun trying to act as teachers to the common people.

Do you know how much Mr. Lao She achieved in the field of novels? But what did he do after returning to China? "With the current cultural level of some working people, reading novels may be somewhat difficult," but "watching plays is not so troublesome," said Mr. Lao She in the preface to his selected plays.

Therefore, he gave up the field of novel writing, which he was best at, and turned to the field of drama creation. From 1950 to 1965, he wrote a total of 23 plays.

Lao Li, I want to ask you, do our writers now have the same awareness as Mr. Lao She?"

Lin Chaoyang's face was calm, but his tone was sonorous and powerful. At the end of his words, Li Shifei felt embarrassed and his face turned hot.

Although Lin Chaoyang's words just now did not directly criticize him, they were more like criticism than anything else.

Li Shifei was not angry about this. Instead, he kept silent and began to reflect on himself.

To be honest, is "Big Times" well-written?

Very wonderful!
Each character is flesh and blood and vivid. The plot of the novel is centered around family feuds and stock market turmoil, with ups and downs and full of dramatic tension.

There are also many clever foreshadowings that echo each other, which are amazing.

For example, Fang Zhanbo’s father Fang Jinxin once asked Luo Huiling what to do when you like a place but don’t like the people there.

Luo Huiling’s answer was to drive them all away and become the boss there.

This sentence was fulfilled in Fang Zhanbo's later revenge process. This foreshadowing made the plot more coherent and added depth and layering to the story.

Li Shifei believes that The Big Times lacks literary quality and looks at it more from a textual perspective.

Judging from the plot alone, "Big Times" is far more exciting than most contemporary novels.

Apart from that, the novel is also not inferior in terms of ideology and critical thinking, and can even be said to be quite outstanding.

The novel's profound insight into human nature, its criticism of the gap between the rich and the poor and the stratification of social classes, and its reflections and discussions on the fickleness of fate are profound.

“The stock market is a human game. The stock market is dead. It will not fight with you. The opponent that the stock market faces is human.”

"Ask yourself, if you were going to die tomorrow, what would you do and where would you be, to spend your last day there until you die."

Even though he had only read it once, Li Shifei had already memorized many of the thought-provoking dialogues.

There are also those vivid characters, the evil but righteous Ding Hai, the lovable little Jew, the seemingly crazy but wise Ye Tian...

No matter whether they are main characters or minor characters, even if they only appear a few times, in Lin Chaoyang's writing, these characters are full of their own unique charm, making people unforgettable.

Li Shifei was previously short-sighted and only considered the literary quality of the novel. Now that his mind has expanded, he was surprised to find that "Big Times" actually has so many advantages, and he suddenly felt enlightened.

Coming back to his senses, he looked at Lin Chaoyang again, and for some reason he suddenly felt like he was looking up to a mountain.

He thought back to what Lin Chaoyang had just said, and realized that Lin Chaoyang was already one step ahead of his contemporaries in terms of creative writing.

As the saying goes, great ingenuity does not come in the least bit of work. Perhaps The Big Times embodies Lin Chaoyang's creative concept.

As the thought flashed through his mind, a look of guilt crossed Li Shifei's face.

"Chaoyang, I'm so ashamed! After listening to what you said today, I realized that I seem to have gone astray in the past two years.

We are so busy pursuing metaphysical ideas that we ignore the most fundamental things in literature."

Lin Chaoyang quickly waved his hand, "These are just my personal opinions."

Li Shifei said: "It doesn't matter if it's just one person's opinion or not, as long as it makes sense. Now that I think about it, you have always been implementing your own ideas.

Just like "The Chess Master" a few years ago, when it was first written, it was criticized for being too vulgar and having obvious erotic undertones.

But now it seems that it couldn’t be more realistic.”

Li Shifei brought up "The Chess Master" as an example mainly because the presence of this novel has been so strong in the past two years, even stronger than the year it was first published.

It can be said that the harsher some people criticized "The Chess Master" back then, the more painful it is for them to be slapped in the face by reality now!

As time goes by, the value of "The Chess Master" continues to rise.

Not only has the sales of the novel skyrocketed, but the adapted movie is also re-released every year.

When Li Shifei thought of this, he couldn't help but superstitiously believe that Lin Chaoyang did have some ideas.

In "The Go Master", Jiang Nansheng faced off against nine Japanese players alone. In reality, Nie Weiping actually achieved eight consecutive victories in the China-Japan Go Challenge.

Now that the third tournament has begun, is winning nine games in a row still a problem?
While the two were talking, another guest came to Lin Chaoyang's house.

Lin Chaoyang introduced the other party as Dong Qiao from Ming Pao Publishing House, who was responsible for the publication of The Great Times in Hong Kong. After a few pleasantries, Li Shifei asked curiously:

"Brother Dong, have you seen Chaoyang's Big Times? What do you think?"

Dong Qiao immediately clapped his hands and said, "Great!"

Li Shifei felt that his reaction was a bit exaggerated, so before he could ask "what's good about it", Dong Qiao took the initiative to continue.

“So far, this is Chaoyang’s third work about Hong Kong society, but each one has a different ingenuity.

"The Truman Show" is constructed on the basis of fantasy, while "Parasite" is an extreme description of the lower class.

This film, Big Times, can be said to fully capture human nature. It is different from the completely dark and cruel film, Parasite. Although it is critical, it also has a greater compassion for all living beings. "

Dong Qiao did not talk a lot, but his words were concise and to the point, which made Li Shifei look at him with new eyes.

"Well said! Brother Dong's evaluation hits the nail on the head!" Li Shifei praised.

"Thank you for the compliment, brother!" Dong Qiao smiled and bowed to Li Shifei.

The two of them took the opportunity to exchange their views on "Big Times". The more they talked, the more excited they became, and they actually left Lin Chaoyang aside.

When the two of them had finished chatting, Lin Chaoyang invited them to dinner and finalized the publishing matters before seeing them off.

After the publication of the new book was completed, Lin Chaoyang felt relieved and began to help Tao Yushu share some of the company's affairs.

During this period of time, Lin's Pictures has been unprecedentedly busy.

"The Rich" was released 24 days later and grossed 2780 million, ranking second in the 1987 Hong Kong film box office rankings. The first place was "Dragon Brothers" starring Jackie Chan.

Director Johnnie To's "Ah Lang's Story" has been completed and will be released soon;

Wong Jing's "The King's Avatar" is currently being filmed, Ann Hui's "Parasite" is about to start shooting, and then there will be "God of Gamblers", "The Saint of Gamblers" and "The Cast of Gamblers".

Overseas releases and revenue settlement of movies, integration of cinema resources, new film plans of many film companies that have registered recently...

Lin's Pictures has been dealing with so many things recently that even Tao Yushu, the king of volumes, feels a little tired.

"We are short of people!"

That afternoon, after Tao Yushu finished the meeting, he rubbed his forehead and sighed.

Some time ago, she was only thinking about using radical expansion to fight against the ban from Taiwan Island, but she somewhat overlooked the fact that the foundation of Lin's Pictures was too weak, and now the shortcomings of insufficient talent reserves have gradually emerged.

Just when she was having a headache, there was a sudden urgent knock on the door.

"Come in!" Tao Yushu said with his eyes closed.

"Mrs. Lin!"

Tao Yushu opened his eyes and saw Zhou Xingchi's panicked face. He asked, "A Xing, what happened?"

Seeing that Tao Yushu seemed to be in a bad mood, Zhou Xingchi hesitated and said slowly: "Mrs. Lin, have you heard about it?"

"What did you hear?"

"The Hong Kong and Kowloon Freedom Federation...issued a ban on me!"

As Stephen Chow spoke, his lips were slightly pursed, as if he felt a little aggrieved, but more of it was panic.

Tao Yushu frowned and looked cold when he heard this.

"They didn't give up, but unfortunately they were a little slow to react," she said to herself.

Seeing that Stephen Chow seemed to be frightened by the ban order, Tao Yushu did not blame him, as he was just a young man after all.

"Don't worry. The company's films will be released as usual. Their ban will not affect your filming."

After comforting Zhou Xingchi, Tao Yushu asked again: "Who else did they name?"

"No more, I'm the only one!"

Tao Yushu's brows twitched slightly, and after a little thought he understood the trick of the Hong Kong and Kowloon Freedom Federation.

They are now specifically naming Stephen Chow, of course, because the previous ban was not very effective, and they want to escalate the ban to make some Hong Kong film companies and actors afraid to take action.

But now there are more and more companies, actors and directors cooperating with Lin Pictures. If they were all named at once, it would be tantamount to pushing all of them to the opposite side.

However, Stephen Chow is not very famous and is a contracted artist of Lam Films, so it is most appropriate to use him as an example to scare the monkeys.

"Got it. Don't feel pressured about this matter. The more they suppress you, the more we will support you.

These days, several screenwriters in the company are writing a script called "Invincible Lucky Star".

The filming will start next month and you will play the leading male role.

Besides, after Wang Jing has finished filming "The King's Avatar" and "God of Gamblers", he will film "The Saint of Gamblers", and you will also be the male lead."

Upon hearing Tao Yushu's promise, Stephen Chow was overjoyed and immediately forgot about being banned.

"Thank you, Mrs. Lin. I will definitely do my best in filming!"

Tao Yushu nodded, "Okay, let's go out first."

"Yes."

After Stephen Chow left, Lin Chaoyang walked into Tao Yushu's office.

“How was the conversation with them?” she asked.

Lin Chaoyang smiled easily, "No problem. They are all good at writing scripts. I gave them an outline of the script and we can come up with a framework after discussing it for a while."

"Ah Xing just said that the Freedom Association called him by name, and I told him about "Invincible Lucky Star" and "God of Gamblers."

Lin Chaoyang nodded and said nothing.

Tao Yushu asked again, "When do you think they will be able to finish writing the scripts for those action movies? I am a bit worried about the casting issue now. We need to find a few action stars with some fame. If we use newcomers, it will definitely affect the box office."

"The actor issue is easy to find. I asked Zhang Xinyan and he suggested we look for Jet Li who played in Shaolin Temple. He is well-known in Hong Kong but doesn't have many movies to shoot right now.

And Liang Xiaolong, he has no movies to shoot right now."

Jet Li became famous in 82 because of "Shaolin Temple". After that, he starred in movies such as "Shaolin Kid" and "Shaolin North and South", which received good responses, but this also restricted his acting career.

Last year, he directed and starred in an action movie called "Chinese Hero", but it was such a flop that even his mother couldn't recognize it.

He is a little out of date now and has returned to the mainland. I heard that he was sick.

Liang Xiaolong became famous in 81 for playing the role of Chen Zhen in "Heroes of the East", and played Chen Zhen again in "Chen Zhen" in 82.

A few years ago, he visited the mainland on behalf of Hong Kong. Because he made some patriotic remarks, he was banned by the Taiwan side and forced to write a "confession", but was rejected by Liang Xiaolong.

Since then, Liang Xiaolong has no more movies to shoot and his name has disappeared from the Hong Kong film and television circles.

(End of this chapter)