1979: The child's mother is a celestial being.

Chapter 100: The Charge at the Press Conference (Seeking Monthly Tickets!)
"Hey, Jia Hui, are you there? Your old classmate is here to see you."

Hearing the familiar voices, Liang Jiahui came out of his newly opened La Bouche magazine shop. Seeing that it was Liu Dehua and Xu Jingjiang, he smiled and said, "What brings you two here?"

All three were students of TVB's 10th Acting Training Class. When they graduated last month, Leung Ka-fai refused to sign the eight-year contract offered by TVB and claimed that he could no longer make a living as an actor. So he used his college major to start a girls' fashion magazine.

Currently, he is the only person in charge of this magazine, but to bring an issue of the magazine from idea to publication, it still needs to go through multiple steps such as interviewing, photography, editing, attracting advertising, and printing.

These steps may seem complicated, but they are actually not simple at all.

Leung Ka-fai now feels that opening "La Bouche" immediately after leaving TVB was a bit hasty. If it weren't for the considerable sunk costs of the initial investment, he would definitely be backing out now.

However, Liu Dehua and Xu Jingjiang were unaware of Liang Jiahui's thoughts. They were only surprised and impressed to see their former classmate actually starting a magazine.

“Wow, Ka-fai is something else. No wonder he’s a college graduate. He can become his own boss after leaving TVB. We can’t do that. We have no education and no family background. The only options are to become a star and try our luck in the future, or we can only work in a factory doing manual labor.”

"What kind of boss am I? I'm just a startup kid. Actually, it's good that you guys chose to debut. Maybe one day you'll become famous when the opportunity comes. When that day comes, I'll come to interview you. Don't say you don't know me."

"Haha, no problem, no problem..."

Xu Jingjiang, who rarely speaks, noticed that Liang Jiahui was carrying a camera on his back, and suddenly asked, "Jiahui, are you going out?"

“Yes.” Liang Jiahui didn’t hide anything and took out a newspaper from his pocket. “Today, the leftist film that won the Jury Prize at the Cannes International Film Festival and sold its overseas rights for $673.5 million held a press conference. I’m also planning to go and see if I can find some material. After all, my magazine hasn’t even officially opened yet. If this continues, I won’t be able to pay my water and electricity bills next month.”

"Are you going to join the left?" As TVB artists, Lau Tak-wah and Tsui King-kong were quite sensitive to the word "leftist".

"Yeah, do you guys want to come along?"

"To be honest, I'd like to go, but I'm worried I'll get scolded if the company finds out."

"Go if you want to. How will the company know if you don't tell them? And even if they do know, you're just going to join in the fun, so what's there to be afraid of?"

After hearing Liang Jiahui's words, Liu Dehua and Xu Jingjiang exchanged a glance and asked each other:

"What do you mean, are you going or not?"

"I'll go if you go."

"Then let's go."

Following the address provided in the newspaper, the three soon arrived at the venue where the leftists were holding a press conference for the film "Andhadhun".

"Wow, it seems there are quite a few people here."

When they arrived, there was only half an hour left before the press conference was scheduled to start, and they found that the venue was already almost full.

There must be at least one or two hundred people.

All three of them were taken aback by the spectacle.

It seems that in their minds, a film premiere held by the left should not have this kind of influence.

“Most people were probably drawn here by the dazzling success of ‘Andhadhun’ at the Cannes Film Festival,” Liang Jiahui said, making a reasonable guess after leading the two to a seat.

And indeed, Liang Jiahui's guess came true.

Even though the Cannes Film Festival Jury Prize might not be as prestigious in Hong Kong, the $673.5 million prize is still quite impressive.

So many people actually came out of curiosity to join in the fun.

Of course, since it was a film press conference, there were quite a few reporters present. In addition to the left-wing reporters and the invited neutral reporters, there were also quite a few uninvited right-wing reporters at the scene.

These right-wing journalists also kept their eyes on the guests who came. For example, as soon as Zhang Guorong came out, they surrounded him.

"Leslie, why did you show up at the press conference for a left-wing film?"

"Can't I just come and watch the fun? Do I have to report to you just because I'm here?" Although Zhang Guorong had prepared himself for being recognized by reporters before he came, he was still very unhappy with the questions from the right-wing reporters, so he retorted directly.

The right-wing reporter was stunned by the rebuttal. By the time he realized what was happening and tried to set a trap for Zhang Guorong, the latter had already moved to the front row.

"Isn't that Zhang Guorong?" Liu Dehua turned around and asked the two of them.

"It's him."

"Why is he here?"

"I heard that Leslie and Miao Jinfeng have a good relationship, so I guess he came to support her."

"What does this have to do with Miao Jinfeng?"

"Don't you two keep up with the news from outside the company? Miao Jinfeng also starred in this movie, 'The Tuner,' and she was even... umm, you know what I mean?"

Liu Dehua and Xu Jingjiang shook their heads and said, "We've been training a lot lately and haven't really paid attention. Jia Hui, could you tell us more about it?"

Liang Jiahui had only spoken halfway with the two when a person appeared on the stage in front of him, and the previously noisy venue suddenly fell silent.

"Hey, hey, hey, can anyone in the back hear me?"

Chen Fusheng stood on the stage and first tested the microphone.

After receiving feedback that the microphone volume was fine, he started immediately, even though there were still a few minutes before the press conference was scheduled to begin.

Moreover, there was no host; he was the sole protagonist of this press conference.

"Okay, I'm quite surprised and delighted to see so many friends here."

"I guess most people don't know me yet, so let me introduce myself first."

"I am not a host. My name is Chen Fusheng. I am the initiator of today's movie press conference, as well as the director, screenwriter and male lead of the movie 'The Tuner'."

"First of all, I would like to thank the media friends who came today, and also thank every guest present..." "Before coming here, I heard that Hong Kong's film industry has a pivotal position in all of Asia. Here we have the most discerning audience and the most professional media. It is an honor for me to bring our work to Hong Kong, and also a test."

"Many of you here might be wondering, what is 'The Tuner' about?"

Simply put, it tells a story about seeing and being seen...

Chen Fusheng didn't start by causing trouble; instead, he first introduced his film according to the normal procedure of a movie press conference.

Next came the Q&A session with reporters.

"Hello Mr. Chen, is it an exaggeration or true that your film 'Andhadhun' sold its overseas rights for $673.5 million at the Cannes Film Festival? Why was it able to sell for such a high price? Thank you."

"Of course we have no reason to fabricate data, because such data can be easily found if someone wants to. As for why 'Andhadhun' sold for such a high price, it's because everyone who has seen it says it's good. Moreover, our film has no viewing barriers. No matter where you are from, as long as you are a human being, you can enjoy it and won't find it boring. So, I urge Hong Kong audiences to go to a left-wing cinema after our film is released tomorrow. You won't lose out or be cheated with a movie ticket; you'll only be buying a two-hour thrilling movie experience. Trust me, you definitely won't regret it."

Below, Shi Hui was amused by Chen Fusheng's witty remarks on stage.

"This Xiao Chen, I don't know where he got all these little words, he just keeps coming up with them, it's hilarious."

“I suspect it was his own idea,” Miao Jinfeng echoed, after all, the man on stage was a recognized talent.

After a few questions, the microphone was passed to a right-wing journalist.

The other party was clearly prepared, having dug a pit directly:

"Mr. Chen, after listening to your introduction of the film, let me summarize briefly. It seems that your film is about a protagonist who pretends to be blind to spy on other people's secrets, thus getting involved in a disgraceful incident. I can't help but wonder, does this character setting, which uses deception as a means, convey a hypocritical and justified value system? Will such a film, if shown in Hong Kong, have a negative influence on young people? Or is there some hidden metaphor behind it?"

"Okay, thank you for the reporter's serious question, but I'll still answer it anyway."

Chen Fusheng said, "Pretending to be blind and lying are indeed the core plot of our movie, but if you directly equate the characters' behavior with conveying hypocrisy and rationality, it is a complete misattribution, sophistry, distortion of the truth, and blatant fabrication."

"Why does the protagonist in my film pretend to be blind? It's actually to explore a more universal question: when people use pretense to face the world, what do they see—the truth or what they want to believe?"

"I won't go into too much detail here, since none of you have seen the movie yet. As for its impact on young people, I believe that young people in Hong Kong are independent individuals who can think for themselves. So a good movie doesn't give them a standard answer, but rather sparks their thinking. This kind of thinking cannot be defined by simple good or bad. But since our movie can be shown in Hong Kong and even has its overseas rights bought by many countries around the world, it means that it is not problematic."

Immediately afterwards, another 'little right-winger' got the microphone.

"Hello Mr. Chan, since you also acknowledge that Hong Kong's film industry is full of vitality and competitiveness throughout Asia, doesn't that mean that our model is actually more correct?"

This question caused a minor disturbance at the scene.

Many people looked nervously at Chen Fusheng on the stage, worried that he might say something wrong.

After all, this issue involves very sensitive topics.

Chen Fusheng could have chosen to skip this question by saying it didn't fit the theme of today's press conference, but he didn't.

"Your question is the same as the previous reporter's; you're using a fallacy of equivocation."

Since the other party always likes to use this trick, it seems reasonable for him to give an irrelevant answer next, right?
Then Chen Fusheng took out a bottle of perfume he had bought at the Davidson store yesterday from his pocket. To make sure everyone could see the brand clearly, he had taken a picture of it beforehand, which was then displayed on the big screen behind him.

Does anyone recognize what this is?

"Perfume, Davidson perfume," someone in the audience answered.

"That's right, this is a Davidson perfume. It was a gift I received when I first came to Hong Kong. But I'm not very knowledgeable about perfumes, so I didn't recognize it when I first opened it. I just thought the smell was a bit strange."

"As everyone knows, the most annoying thing in summer is mosquitoes. I just took this thing and sprayed a little into the air. To my surprise, a mosquito died right in front of me not long after."

"Oh, that's when it dawned on me. So this little gadget is for killing mosquitoes. So every night before I went to bed, I would spray it in the room. Although the smell was a bit strange, the mosquito-killing effect was really good."

"Until this morning, I heard Sister Miao Jinfeng say that mosquitoes in the summer are very annoying and mosquito coils are not very effective. So I strongly recommended this 'mosquito repellent liquid' that someone gave me to her. And guess what happened?"

"Sister Miao held up the mosquito repellent I recommended and said that it was a gift she had asked someone to give me before. It was a very expensive perfume that cost 999 yuan a bottle. When I heard the truth, I was stunned."

Chen Fusheng recounted his story on stage, and apart from a few people who knew the inside story and realized he was telling a story, most people in the audience felt that he was recounting an experience, a real experience.

Why am I telling this story?

"It's because the prosperity of the capitalist world is only superficial; it's the prosperity of capitalists, while the ordinary people beneath the surface actually live a very hard life."

“Like this bottle of perfume in my hand, before I knew it was perfume, it was just a decent mosquito repellent, probably only slightly more expensive than regular mosquito coils. But when capitalists packaged it as a luxury perfume, even though it was still just a ‘mosquito repellent,’ its price skyrocketed by tens or even hundreds of times.”

"So I'd like to ask that reporter, do you think this business model is deceptive? Is it superior?"

After Chen Fusheng finished speaking, the room fell silent.

Everyone genuinely thought he was just telling a story, sharing a self-deprecating experience.

But now, many people have realized that it seems he was just answering the reporter's question the whole time.

But upon closer reflection, it seems he's using this story to completely destroy the Davidson perfume brand.

Miao Jinfeng and Zhang Guorong exchanged a glance. The former's eyes were full of surprise, while the latter's eyes held not only surprise but also a hint of awe.

Zhang Guorong felt awe because, in addition to having heard of Chen Fusheng's exceptional talent and witnessed his youthful arrogance, he had now personally witnessed Chen Fusheng's ability and skill in completely destroying the reputation of an international brand with ease.

"He's amazing!" Liang Jiahui and the other two exclaimed in unison.

This sentiment also resonated with many people on the field.

If some people initially underestimated Chen Fusheng's age, now everyone looks at him with a mixture of apprehension and a touch of respect.

Even after telling this story, Chen Fusheng still had a faint smile on his face.

Seeing that no one asked any questions, he continued with the program: "Finally, I would like to thank the well-known Hong Kong brand Baleno for sponsoring our film. Next, please enjoy a one-minute clothing advertisement that I directed for them."

(End of this chapter)