Rebirth of Chinese Entertainment from the Oscars

In late February, locust flowers bloomed all over Beijing.

White petals drifted down from the trees, landing on the sidewalk, on the tin roof of the bicycle shed, and in the narrow alley Su Chen always passed on his way to the film set. A faint, sweet fragrance mingled with the slightly dry breeze characteristic of early summer, making people unconsciously slow their pace. Su Chen didn't slow down. He had been on set for over twenty days straight, sleeping only five hours a day, yet he walked faster than anyone else. Not out of anxiety, but out of focus. So focused that he forgot the scent of the locust blossoms.

Today we're filming the final, crucial scene of the entire movie—Liu Jianguo covering Wang Xiulan's face with a pillow.

This scene was scheduled for the end of the filming schedule, a deliberate arrangement by Su Chen. He needed You Benchang and Wu Yanshu to bring the emotional buildup from the entire film to complete it. This is the same principle behind putting the ice rink scene at the end of "Black Coal, Thin Ice"—the longer the actors immerse themselves in their roles, the more precise the weight of the final scene will be.

The announcement was made at 7:00 AM. Su Chen arrived at 6:00 AM.

The set was still empty. The props in the living room had been rearranged according to his instructions—Wang Xiulan's wheelchair had been pushed to the bedroom window, the curtains were half-drawn, and the morning light slanted in through the glass, casting a softly edged band of light on the sheets. On the bedside table was an enamel mug with a fake lily in it, its petals slightly yellowed, a find from a flea market by the props team. Su Chen took the fake flower out of the mug, examined it, then put it back in, adjusting the direction of the petals so that the yellowish tinge was facing the camera precisely.

He stood by the bed for a moment, then picked up the pillow from the bedside table. The props team had prepared three—one was a regular down pillow, soft but supportive; another was a buckwheat pillow, firmer and with an unnatural angle; and the third was a prop pillow they made themselves, filled with a special material that would leave a slowly rebounding dent after being pressed. Su Chen chose the last one. He turned the pillow over to check the stitching, making sure there were no loose threads that would reflect light in the camera's view, then put it back in its original position, parallel to the edge of the blanket, with a deviation of no more than a finger's width.

He finished all the preparations by 6:30. Assistant director Zhou Qing went through the call sheets with each department for a final check. The camera crew had set up the tracks in the bedroom, but Su Chen went over and dismantled them. Cinematographer Lao Ma was adjusting the white balance; seeing Su Chen dismantle the tracks, his hand paused on the adjustment knob, and he didn't say anything. He had learned not to ask questions when Su Chen was taking things apart—every time Su Chen dismantled a piece of equipment, he would always give a more accurate reason afterward.

"This scene doesn't need tracks," Su Chen said. "Fixed camera positions. Three cameras—the main camera at the foot of the bed, facing the headboard; the secondary camera at the bedroom door; and the third outside the window."

"Outside the window?" Old Ma paused for a moment. "The windowpane will reflect light."

"What I wanted was reflection. The camera outside the window shoots through the glass, without wiping the glass or adding a polarizing filter. Let there be a little dust on the glass, a little reflection. When the audience sees this scene, they don't directly see what's happening on the bed, but rather they're seeing it through a layer. That layer makes the image unreal, like a memory or something more vague than a memory."

Old Ma was silent for a moment, then nodded. He remembered what Xie Fei had told Su Chen before filming began—"Your camera has to be quieter than the actors." Now he understood. Quiet didn't mean stillness, it meant not disturbing. Even the dust on the glass was left on, so that the camera wouldn't be more alert than the audience.

At 7:15, You Benchang and Wu Yanshu arrived.

They entered the room together. They hadn't come separately; they came together. You Benchang wore a slightly faded dark blue shirt, the collar unbuttoned, revealing an old-fashioned white undershirt underneath. Wu Yanshu wore the floral nightgown Wang Xiulan wore throughout the latter half of the film, with a thin blanket draped over it. Her hair was neatly combed, done by You Benchang. Su Chen didn't know if they had arranged to come upstairs together beforehand or if they had just happened to meet at the door. He leaned towards the former. This on-screen couple had already developed some habits off-screen that didn't require deliberate maintenance.

Su Chen went over today's scene with them. There was no demonstration, no emotional direction, only directing: Wang Xiulan was lying in bed, and Liu Jianguo was sitting beside her. The two had a very brief conversation. Then Liu Jianguo picked up a pillow and covered Wang Xiulan's face. The camera didn't cut; it just kept shooting. It filmed until his hand loosened, until his expression went blank, until he got up to close the window, draw the curtains, lock the bedroom door, and then returned to bed, lying down next to his wife.

After listening, You Benchang remained silent for a long time.

"Director Su," he said, "I'd like to have a talk with you."

His tone made Su Chen realize that this wasn't a request that could be answered immediately. It wasn't the kind of casual chat about "how to direct the blocking in this scene," but a deeper, more serious matter that needed to be addressed. Su Chen glanced at his watch, then pulled up two chairs and placed them by the living room window. Sunlight streamed in from the window, casting a bright square on the floor between them.

"Ms. Wu," Su Chen said to Wu Yanshu, "you should rest for a bit. I'll talk to Ms. You first."

Wu Yanshu nodded, sat down in her wheelchair, and took out a thermos and the script covered with sticky notes from her cloth bag. She turned to today's scene, gently tracing the lines she had marked in red with her fingertip, her lips moving silently.

You Benchang sat in a chair, his hands folded on his knees. His fingers were thin, with prominent knuckles, and the edges of his nails showed the dry, peeling skin common in the elderly. He tapped his knees lightly with his fingers, not out of impatience, but more like giving his fingers a command—it was time to speak.

"Director Su, Xiulan and I have been living together in the film for almost a month now." You Benchang used "Xiulan," not "Teacher Wu" or "Wang Xiulan." He paused, seemingly thinking about what to say next and how to say it in a way that would make the young man in front of him truly understand.

"I want to tell you about my understanding of Liu Jianguo." He cleared his throat. "Liu Jianguo was a middle school music teacher who taught music his whole life. He taught hundreds of children, some of whom later became musicians, some became music teachers, and some didn't achieve anything but at least learned to sing a song in his class. He didn't do anything particularly great in his life, but he felt he had lived a very fulfilling life. He wasn't a short-tempered person. The only time he ever hit someone was many years ago when a student in his class threw a stone at his window, and he chased after the student and slapped him. That was the first and only time he ever hit someone. Afterwards, he went home and cried. Wang Xiulan cooked him a bowl of noodles. The two of them sat in the kitchen and ate the noodles. They didn't say a word."

Su Chen listened quietly. He didn't interrupt, nor did he say, "This isn't in the script." He knew the habit veteran actors had when they were deeply immersed in a role—they would construct a complete, even larger, memory of the character in their minds than the script. Most of these memories would never be filmed, but they determined the quality of every line, every glance, every pause. The director's job wasn't to stop this process, but to leave enough room for it.

"So when he was about to do this to her—" You Benchang looked at the pillow on the bedside table, his voice still steady, as if he had rehearsed this scenario hundreds of times during countless sleepless nights, "he wasn't killing her. He was doing something he had never done in his entire life. Something that went against his entire personality. He had to do it, but after he did it, he couldn't live on. Not because he would go to jail. Because his personality couldn't withstand it. After he did it, he would be empty."

You Benchang separated his hands on his knees, then slowly crossed them back together.

"I want to portray this feeling. Not anger, not despair, not pain. It's emptiness. It's the emptiness of not even regretting a decision after it's been made."

  This book was first published on 101 Reading Network, a super considerate platform where you can find it at 101m.m. We provide a reading experience with error-free and orderly chapters.

Su Chen looked at You Benchang's wrinkled hands, clasped together on his knees. Liu Jianguo's hands had done so much in the film—playing the piano, keeping time for his students, peeling oranges for his grandson, washing his wife's face, feeding her, and wiping her clean when she lost control of her bladder. Everything these hands did for this slowly dying body was gentle, patient, and full of love. Now, these hands were going to grab the pillow. A gentle, taciturn old teacher, in his twilight years, had learned to kill with a pillow.

"Teacher You," Su Chen lifted his gaze from the hands, "what do you think he'll say after he's done?"

You Benchang thought for a moment: "Say nothing. Talking is just making excuses for yourself. He doesn't deserve to make excuses for himself."

Su Chen moved his chair a little closer to You Benchang, his knees almost touching the other's. This distance was just right for a director and actor who had been working together for almost a month—close enough to completely trust each other's voices, yet far enough to still have their own breathing space.

"I've been thinking about what this movie is really about. Last night, a phrase came to mind—'delayed farewell.' Wang Xiulan's body had already left before she died. She couldn't take care of herself, couldn't speak, and couldn't recognize him. The person Liu Jianguo was taking care of every day was no longer the woman he had married. But he couldn't say it. He had no words to express it. So he kept putting it off. In the end, the pillow was a full stop."

He paused, his voice becoming very low, as if speaking to You Benchang, or perhaps confirming something to himself.

"But a period is never part of a story. A period is when you have to decide at some point—the story is over. Then you put down your pen."