Chapter 131 Tribute to Jiang Heng's "Kung Fu"

At a celebration banquet, Jiang Heng met too many people, talked too much, and drank a lot of wine. He didn't get up the next day and slept until after ten o'clock.

After getting up, I went downstairs to have lunch, and then drove to the crew.

"Good morning, Director Jiang!"

"Ok!"

There were voices greeting him all along the way. Jiang Heng just nodded and said "hmm", then went straight to the set that had been arranged in advance according to the shooting plan, and found that everyone was waiting for him.

"Sorry to have kept you waiting for the entire morning!"

"It's okay, Director Jiang, it's okay!"

Everyone has spoken up to come out to film, but there are many cases of actors acting like big shots and being late.

Jiang Heng invested in this play himself, so it certainly can't be counted that way.

The crew had been working on a very classic "battle in the rain" scene in the recent filming of "The Matrix 3" for more than a week, and almost everyone was exhausted.

Jiang Heng didn't come in the morning, so everyone was so happy that they couldn't contain themselves because they had a rare chance to relax.

Everything is ready, the actors start working.

In a studio full of blue screens, Wu Yizu, who plays the male lead, and Yuan De, who plays the villain Smith, both wore waterproof suits first, and then costumes.

There are robotic arms on their waists that allow them to be fixed in a specific position in mid-air and perform movements.

Inside the studio, water was spraying out at a rate of almost one ton per minute, and almost everyone in the studio was wet.

With Jiang Heng's shout of "action", the robotic arm moved, first putting Wu Yizu and Yuan De into the air, and then letting the two meet and attack each other.

Then Wu Yizu made a falling motion, and Yuande, under the control of the robotic arm, flew downward in circles.

"Crack!"

After the shot was taken, Jiang Heng took a look and felt that the movements were still a little bit poor, so he repeated it again.

A few hours later, after this shot was finished, the two of them fought on the ground in the rain.

There were many people dressed the same as Yuande at the scene this time. In the finished film, there were several rows of identical Smiths, which was quite creepy.

During the filming, the crew selected eighty people with a similar body shape to Yuan De, and used superb makeup techniques to make them look like "Smith".

Another 150 dummies were prepared, with faces made of silicone and painted on, and they could be controlled by real people to make their movements, making them look real.

After this scene, the filming of "The Matrix 2" and "The Matrix 3" was completed, and the relevant shots of "The Matrix 2" had already been subcontracted out for special effects.

Because this time Jiang Heng invested exclusively, the number of shots subcontracted to special effects companies in the United States, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea and other countries was less than one-fifth of the entire film.

A small number of shots were given to his company Beijing Good Times, and the rest were handed over to overseas shell companies and completed by Jiang Heng's "super microcomputer".

The special effects shots in the third film are basically the same operation, and this alone can save a lot of production costs.

Just as we finished our work with the crew, Zhou Xingxing came again.

The post-production of "Kung Fu" was completed long ago, and the copyrights in Japan, South Korea, Southeast Asia and other places have also been sold.

In mainland China, Bonna Films is responsible for the film's distribution.

Because Zhou Xingxing is so famous and has a strong market appeal, Bona does not plan to spend too much money on publicity and promotion, but only use the conventional promotional mode of posting posters on buses, subways and cinemas.

The premiere was scheduled relatively late, on September 9, very close to the National Day holiday.

However, because it was jointly produced by iQiyi, Youku, and Tencent Pictures and Star Pictures, the premiere was on a grand scale.

The program was still recorded and hosted by CCTV Film Channel, and there were many guests present, most of whom came for Jiang Heng's sake.

After all, Stephen Chow is in the entertainment industry and doesn't care much about social etiquette.

Perhaps because he learned from Jiang Heng, Zhou Xingxing did not refuse to play the entire film at the premiere, and thousands of guests and audiences saw the entire film of "Kung Fu" for the first time. Feng Xiaogang's role as the boss of the Crocodile Gang was really brilliant.

After the movie was over, Jiang Heng couldn't help but praise it.

Feng Xiaogang smiled modestly and thanked Jiang Heng for the recommendation.

Because of Jiang Heng's appearance, Feng Xiaogang in this life no longer has the reputation of being a great commercial film director. Who makes him second?

Although every film made money and achieved a total of 30 to 50 million, the gap between his performance and Jiang Heng's was too large, so no one praised him anymore.

The box office was not impressive and there were no awards. Feng Xiaogang was very humble at the moment, but he did not have the airs of Chen Kaige.

"Director Jiang, I'm planning to make a movie about a thief protecting migrant workers. Are you interested in coming and playing a cameo role?"

Jiang Heng smiled, waved his hands and said, "Forget it. Shooting two movies in a row really exhausted me. You don't know how busy I have been recently. I can fall asleep as soon as I lie down! I plan to take a good rest for half a year from now on and not shoot any movies!"

Feng Xiaogang felt embarrassed when he heard this, but he couldn't persuade him any more.

He picked a time to ask Zhou Xingxing, but Zhou Xingxing also refused, which really made Feng Xiaogang angry.

Because Jiang Heng was in the limelight at the moment, he didn't know what to say, but he said that Zhou Xingxing was not kind. I participated in your "Kung Fu", and I invited you to make a guest appearance in my movie but you refused. It was really not kind.

Zhou Xingxing heard about it later, but did not respond, and the matter just passed.

But in the blink of an eye, it was National Day and "Kung Fu" was officially released.

Soon, veteran movie fans discovered that the film paid many tributes to Jiang Heng's films, the most typical of which was the scene where Tiancan and Dican fought against the three masters of Pig Cage Village.

The armored and knife-wielding ghost general transformed by the sound wave power of the strings is almost exactly the same as the scene in the inn in "Lion Camel Ridge".

If there is any difference, it is that when they were in the inn, Tang Seng and his disciples had more faces and were more realistic.

Because the special effects in the movie "Kung Fu" didn't cost that much money, it looked more like a "copycat version".

"Wow, Stephen Chow actually used content from Director Jiang's work!"

"This is a tribute to "Lion Camel Ridge"!"

“There are so many tributes to classics in this movie!”

"Wow, there's also this technique of dropping from the sky, Director Jiang has used it many times in his films!"

"too excited!"

“Kung Fu is really pretty!”

Because of the influence of Jiang Heng's topic, theaters scheduled the film on a large scale, and the box office of "Kung Fu" in this life was significantly better than that in the previous life.

Judging from the box office trend, it will be no problem to exceed 200 million.

This will also be the first Chinese-language film in the mainland film market to have a box office of over 200 million yuan, apart from Jiang Heng's works.

For a while, talk of the revival of Chinese-language films was everywhere.

Hot money began to flow in and more projects began to be established.

An investor went to see Zhou Xingxing and asked him when he planned to shoot his next film and what the subject matter would be.

Zhou Xingxing said that he would not consider it in the next two years.

An investor asked Jiang Heng when the next part would be filmed and what it would be about.

Jiang Heng said he would not consider it within half a year.

An investor asked Chen Kaige the same question, and Chen was very passionate. He first recited a poem and finally said that he wanted to shoot "The Monkey King 2".

The copyright of the novel has been purchased, and the original author has been invited to participate in the adaptation, and plans to invest 400 million yuan in the filming.

Finally, he said contemptuously, it is not difficult to shoot a mythological special effects blockbuster!
(End of this chapter)