Chapter 532: Difficulty of Filming

Canada, crew of "The Revenant".

The cinematographer of The Revenant is Emmanuel Lubezki, a famous master of natural light. He has won the Oscar for Best Cinematography for the third consecutive year. Just for inviting him, Rising Star Pictures paid a considerable fee.

But Lubezki's skills really impressed Gu Wei and Leonardo. The use of natural light alone can show his skills.

In the early stages of filming, Gu Wei planned to use 35mm and 65mm film.

But due to border control, the film had to be checked through an X-ray machine, so I had to use a digital camera.

For this reason, Gu Wei was a little depressed from the beginning of filming.

But Lubezki's arrival solved this problem.

"Although the tolerance of digital cameras is not as large as that of film, in scenes shot under low light, digital cameras can show the scene very well, and there is not much noise, which was impossible when shooting with film in the past."

It was not just talk. After Lubezki’s adjustment and shooting, Gu Wei saw the perfect picture on the monitor and was instantly conquered by him.

"As expected, every profession has its own specialty."

Gu Wei has been in the crew for more than a month at this point, and when asked about his biggest feeling during the filming of this movie.

It can only be described in one word: "fake".

That’s right, apart from the natural background and lighting, more than 90% of the props in this movie were created through makeup and props.

There are not many extras in "The Revenant", but every extra has to put on makeup.

Therefore, the workload of makeup artists is extremely heavy, and even with more than 40 makeup assistants, it still cannot meet the demand.

Sometimes, extras even have to wait from early morning to late at night in makeup just to wait for a shot, and they cannot eat or drink freely because they will have to put on makeup again if they move even a little.

But even though it was so hard, the extras had no complaints at all. This was all thanks to the three conditions that Gu Wei promised everyone when he chose the filming location.

Firstly, everyone received extra pay starting in early February.

Secondly, Gu Wei fulfilled his promise and selected the actor with the best acting skills from the extras and gave him a role with a few lines.

As for the "fake", it refers to the actors' makeup, including the scars on Leonardo's character, the bear, and the disemboweled horse, all of which were made using special effects and synthetic rubber.

"Director, get ready."

The crew's logistics manager walked over quickly and reminded.

"Well, we'll start shooting in five minutes. Let's cherish this hour or so." Gu Wei said. Although winter had passed in the Rocky Mountains in April, it was still cold. As soon as he opened his mouth, thick white mist came out.

Due to its proximity to the North Pole and the cold weather, there are only one to two hours of sunlight a day. Even when shooting on the back of the mountain, the sky is still dark during the day.

When the temperature dropped to 0 degrees, the Master Prime wide-angle zoom lens had some problems with the zoom and focus lenses, resulting in the inability to zoom and thermal shift of the lenses.

This phenomenon did not improve even after a few weeks of filming, so the crew could only shoot specific shots between noon and 1 p.m. every day while there was still sufficient light.

The scene to be filmed today is the one where the protagonist, played by Leonardo, falls off a cliff on horseback.

This shot was taken three times, which took a total of five days. In the middle, either the weather was gloomy or the light was insufficient, so the ideal effect was never achieved.

Gu Wei took his eyes off the monitor, stood up and walked out of the tent. He raised his head slightly, and a ray of sunlight shone through the thick branches.

“Hopefully today’s weather will last a little longer.”

Five minutes passed quickly, but everyone, including makeup, props, and extras, were always ready. When the light came, they worked meticulously to complete the shoot in one take.

However, things don't go as planned. Since the angle of the sun is very small, there are only a few hours of light every day. You often need to wait for the right sunlight, which takes a whole day. And the light only lasts for about half an hour to an hour. Just like in sunset photography, the beautiful moment always passes quickly.

"Begin!" As Gu Wei shouted loudly, the hearts of the entire crew instantly jumped.

Some people have even prayed secretly in their hearts, hoping that the filming can be completed smoothly this time.

.........

In China, the box office of "Lost in Thailand" and the currently popular "Seattle" combined is nearly 2 billion.

Coupled with the recent promotion of several domestic films, the popularity has reached its peak.

This made many filmmakers sigh that the world is developing too fast, and suddenly a box office of 200 or 300 million is no longer something they can show off.

At this time, the Hollywood media New York Entertainment News suddenly did an exclusive interview report on the Chinese film market. The content of the report was that after the box office explosion last year, the Chinese film market has now become the second largest box office market in the world.

It is true that foreign monks are better at chanting sutras. The same data and words of praise would be reported by mainland entertainment media.

Netizens can't help but make a few sarcastic remarks, such as Wang Po selling melons like a self-promoting, but as soon as it comes to Hollywood, everyone immediately becomes impressed.

For netizens, no matter which industry, as long as they can catch up with Japan, South Korea, Europe and the United States, it is something to be proud of. Although the mainland film market is still far behind Hollywood, being able to surpass the island country still sincerely inspires a wave of national pride. For filmmakers, when the market is good, they naturally have to seize the opportunity to do a good job of publicity.

As a result, the Hollywood imported blockbuster "Iron Man 3", which was scheduled to be released during the May Day period, began to be released in major cities in the mainland.

Especially at the publicity event in the capital.

After the movie's lead actor Robert Downey Jr. showed up, the atmosphere immediately became lively.

Then mainland actor Wang Xueqi gave out candied haws and knelt down to worship the little Iron Man.

After creating enough hype, they invited several big-name stars, and then they started to promote each other commercially, and that was it.

Regardless of the publicity effect, the mainland actors’ servility was portrayed vividly.

Even Gu Wei from the Canadian crew felt depressed after seeing the news report. It seems that I have been improving the presence and status of Chinese directors and actors in Hollywood, but you guys just kneel down.

At the same time, "Special Identity" also started its publicity and promotion work in a high-profile manner.

Zhao Wenzhuo, Jing Tian, ​​Wang Qianyuan and others, except Wu Jing who is filming in Thailand, have frequently appeared on major talk shows under the leadership of director Wu Ershan.

After the Sina and Guangguang programs were over, they turned their attention to the Sixth Princess.

Wuershan is quite familiar with this host. He can be seen on TV shows and sometimes at film festivals.

As for talk shows, the most important thing is question and answer, and to brag a little and promote how great one's own movies are. If you don't go to the cinema to watch them, you will regret it for the rest of your life.

As for things like differentiated promotion, the audience doesn’t understand, but when it comes to bragging, the audience and netizens will naturally understand.

Of course, most of the talk on the show is about interesting things that happened during the filming, such as how carefully the movie was shot on location, how much effort the actors put in, etc.

There is actually nothing explosive about this kind of publicity, but the Sixth Princess doesn't care about these things.

On the other hand, seeing other movies being promoted in full swing and making a lot of headlines, we naturally cannot show weakness.

Afterwards, Zhao Yanzi was invited by Sina Entertainment to do an exclusive interview.

On the show, Zhao Yanzi recalled her youth and made many golden sentences during the interview, saying that youth is cruel.

Afterwards, he set a goal and started competing with "Special Identity".

The general meaning is that youth is beautiful, this movie is not to be missed, and men and women of all ages should come and support it. We are confident that we will get the box office revenue when the movie is released, and other movies will not be our competitors.

I have to say that this person is really bold in speaking out. As soon as the report came out, there was a lot of boasting on the Internet. I don’t know if it was really comments from netizens or hired internet trolls, but many people directly praised her for being neither humble nor arrogant, and for her heroic qualities. She did not show any fear even when facing the movies produced by Xingchen Film and Television Company.

Coupled with the media's exaggeration, fans and moviegoers from all sides started to attack each other again.

...

The crew of "The Revenant".

The filming was still going on. Gu Wei was staring at the monitor at this moment, hoping to get it right in one go.

But the opposite happened. Due to the large number of NGs in recent days, Leonardo showed obvious nervousness when shooting this shot.

"Ka!" When Gu Wei shouted this, everyone understood that all their work today was in vain.

After a while, Leonardo and Tom Hardy dragged their tired bodies to Gu Wei and said sorry directly.

"Gu, believe me, I will be at my best tomorrow..."

Before Leonardo finished speaking, Reid came to Gu Wei and whispered something to him.

"Huh? Really?" Upon hearing that, Gu Wei's eyes immediately lit up.

"That's right, boss!" Leon said with a smile looking at the other party.

“Leon, Tom, you’ve been too nervous lately, I think you should take a break.

How about this, the crew will have a few days off, you guys should adjust your status, maybe you can give me a surprise then." Gu Wei looked at the two of them and said in an unquestionable tone.

"But, Gu..." Leonardo was a little confused. It was not uncommon to be in bad condition during filming. If he took a few days off when he was in bad condition, then he thought that the filming of this movie would have to wait until next year to be completed?
"Don't say buts, it's settled." After saying this and ignoring everyone's shocked expressions, Gu Wei took Reid and strode out of the tent and trotted to a nearby place.

"Leon, did we make the director unhappy?" Tom Hardy was a little panicked at this moment.

"No, it should be Crystal who is here." Leonardo said with certainty based on his experience as a veteran and Gu Wei's performance just now.

...

(End of this chapter)