Conquer America, Start with a Boxing Champion

At this moment, Hopkins suddenly noticed a sound of breaking wind in his ears, and a red fist shadow in the corner of his eyes hit him hard in the direction of his head at an unexpected speed.

"Back throw!"

Hopkins suddenly remembered Link's killer move, which Link had only used once in the Olympic finals, knocking down Cuban champion seed Aragon with one punch.

It was also this punch that made many people know Link and know that he had a powerful killer move.

Hopkins also knew this move, but Link rarely used it in the past ten games, and he almost forgot it.

Seeing Link's killer move coming, Hopkins had two choices, one was to dodge quickly, but he was too close and might not be able to dodge, and the second was to exchange punches for punches, and to exchange injuries for injuries.

After thinking for less than 0.01 seconds, Hopkins swung his fist and hit Link's face hard.

Bang!

When Hopkins' fist hit Link's face, Link's fist also hit Hopkins' cheekbone hard.

The huge punch hit Hopkins' face like a lead ball hitting the beach.

The left side of Hopkins' cheek suddenly sank down, and the surrounding skin fluctuated layer by layer. His head and neck were thrown to the right fiercely, and the sweat on his face and head also shook out. The braces also flew out of Hopkins' open mouth.

Hopkins seemed to be knocked out by the fist. His head led his upper and lower body, staggered one step to the right, and fell to the boxing ring with a plop.

"Yes!"

"Long live!"

When Hopkins fell, thousands of people in the audience stood up suddenly and cheered.

Link was hit on the forehead by Hopkins' fist, took two steps back and hit the ropes, and then steadied his feet.

"10, 9, 8, 7, 6"

The referee squatted beside Hopkins to check the situation and counted down to ten.

When the count reached 5, Hopkins stood up with his fists on the ground, but his head was hit hard and his body could not keep balance. As soon as he stood up, his feet unconsciously tilted to the right, hit the ropes, staggered and squatted down again.

The referee counted down to 8, but Hopkins still couldn't stand up.

The referee announced the end of the game and raised Link's fist in the middle of the ring. The audience cheered loudly, and the sky sprinkled a burst of colorful ribbons.

Amid the cheers of the crowd, the presidents or vice presidents of the four major boxing organizations hung four middleweight gold belts for Link.

Two years after entering the boxing world, Link became the champion of the four major organizations and the first dominant professional boxing champion in Asia.

In this game, Link and Top Promotion earned a total of 18.5 million US dollars. According to the original agreement, the income of a single game exceeded 10 million, and the profit was divided into 80% and 20%.

Link finally earned 14.8 million US dollars in this game. Although Hopkins lost, he earned more than 10 million US dollars in appearance fees and profit sharing afterwards.

——

After the game, Link took Zhang Zilin, who came to serve as his assistant, to Tokyo for a few days, and also held several boxing promotion activities and fan meetings. He flew back to Beijing on the 10th.

Domestic media and audiences responded more enthusiastically to his becoming the champion of the four major organizations.

On the day of the game, CCTV5 simultaneously broadcast the event and invited national team head coaches Zhang Chuanliang and Zou Shiming to comment on the game.

According to statistics afterwards, the highest ratings of this game reached 31.86%. Although it is not as high as the more than 90% during the Spring Festival, it is also the first in sports program ratings, 5 percentage points higher than the ratings when Link won the 5000m and Liu Xiang won the 110m hurdles in August last year.

When replayed in the following days, the ratings still maintained above 2%.

Because the impact of this game was so great, Link held three press conferences after returning to China, and also accepted interviews from 16 media including CCTV Channel, "Huaxia Youth Daily", "Kyoto Evening News", "Huaxia Sports Daily", "Southern Weekend" and so on.

In addition, under the arrangement of the State Sports Bureau, Lin Ke successively held boxing exchange meetings in Kyoto, Shanghai, Chengdu, Xi'an, Guangzhou, Hong Kong Island, Taiwan Island and other places to spread boxing knowledge and techniques.

Lin Ke was so busy that he had time to join the crew of "Golden Armor" in late July.

"Golden Armor" is adapted from Cao Yu's drama "Thunderstorm", and the story is set in the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period.

It tells the story of the ruler of the Later Tang Dynasty who returned from the war and found subtle changes in the court. The queen and the eldest prince had an unethical love, and the eldest prince fell in love with a palace maid who was suspected to be his sister.

The king sent the imperial physician to assassinate the queen. In order to save his mother, the queen's son, the second prince Yuan Ke, decided to launch a mutiny. In the end, the contradictions inevitably broke out, and everyone paid a painful price in the struggle for power.

Yuan Ke, played by Lin Ke, is a prince with an Oedipus complex, foolish filial piety, and no choice in the film.

Compared with the movies Lin Ke played before, this role is relatively simple.

"Actors, take your positions. All crews, get ready."

"Scene 31, 1st shot, start!"

At the set of "Curse of the Golden Flower", Zhang Yimou shouted while sitting in front of the monitor.

Zhou Runfa, wearing a golden armor, walked in with his generals.

"Your son, I greet you, father! Your son is overwhelmed with fear that your father will come in person!"

Link, wearing silver-gray armor, knelt on one knee and saluted, his eyes flickering with an inexplicable look.

Zhou Runfa led his men past him, and with the help of the generals, he sat on a stool and looked at him expressionlessly.

Link's expression returned to calm, and although his body remained motionless, he gradually showed a hint of nervousness.

"Not bad, not bad!"

Behind the monitor, Director Zhang saw the footage from the camera and nodded with satisfaction.

Before filming started, he was originally worried that Zhou Runfa's acting skills were too good and that a newcomer, Link, would not be able to take on the role.

After watching Link's performance, he felt relieved. Link's acting skills were very good. Facing an old drama star like Zhou Runfa, he not only caught the ball steadily, but also performed with ease. Regardless of his demeanor, movements, and micro-expressions, Not like a new guy at all.

"Ka! Next game!"

The next scene is a sword duel between the king and the second prince Yuan Ke.

Director Zhang originally planned to use a stunt double to shoot, but after seeing the moves designed by martial arts instructor Cheng Xiaodong, Link decided to do it himself. He only practiced for three days and was able to do better than the martial arts stunt double.

When dancing with the sword, every move and style, open and closed, looks very powerful and domineering.

This also caused Cheng Xiaodong to have to redesign the fighting moves so that Zhou Runfa and his substitutes could sit still on the stools.

Every time you take a shot of Link, try to get your whole body into the shot and not miss his every move.

Zhou Runfa, on the other hand, only took pictures of parts of the scene each time, including his face, arms, and sword.

Use stillness to show the bravery of the king.

Dang, Dang, Dang!

After a fight, the second prince's long sword was thrown away by the king, and it clattered to the floor.

"My father, Shenwu, is no match for my son."

Link looked at the long sword that fell on the ground, with a trace of regret in his deep eyes. He quickly restrained himself and knelt down before the king.

Zhou Run put his sword on his neck, and Link remained motionless, lowering his head slightly with a more respectful expression.

"Back then, I sent you to the frontier to hone your skills. It seemed to be the right thing to do. I came here just to make you remember that the mistakes you made in the past, everything in the world, I gave to you, are yours. If I don't give it to you, You can't steal it."

Zhou Runfa said coldly.

"My father's teachings will be remembered by my sons and ministers."

Link bowed slowly.

"Follow me back to the palace!"

"Click!"

"Passed!"

"Get ready for the next one!"

Director Zhang shouted excitedly.

Before the shooting started, the director's team expected to shoot for two days, but it took only half a day to shoot all the shots, which not only saved a lot of time, but also a lot of money.

It was such a good idea to cast Link to play Yuan Ke.

Director Zhang fanned himself and nodded repeatedly while looking at the camera in the monitor.

"Is this filming finished?"

asked old partner and producer Zhang Weiping.

"You came just in time. This is a shot that was just taken. What do you think of it?"

Director Zhang nodded and replayed the previously filmed scenes.

From the moment the king enters the door, to the confrontation and sword fight between the two sides, to the moment the king leaves.

Zhang Weiping sat aside and read it again, frowned, and asked Director Zhang to play it again.

After watching it for the second time, Director Zhang smiled and asked how it was?

"Is this Link really a newcomer?"

Zhang Weiping asked in surprise.

"I have filmed several music videos and made a cameo appearance in Wang Xiaoshuai's movie, but I have never acted in other movies."

"amazing!"

Zhang Weiping couldn't help but admire.

When I watched it for the first time, I found that Link was able to catch Zhou Runfa's scenes steadily. No matter in acting skills or aura, he was not suppressed by Zhou Runfa in the slightest.

This made him feel that Link was very talented in acting and was born to be an actor.

But when I watched it the second time, I had a different feeling.

Generally, talented actors like to use their true colors when performing, and the characters they perform are similar to their own personalities.

But Link is not the same. He does not appear in character, and the character he plays is different from himself.

For example, in real life, Link comes across as a relatively strong character who would rather bend than bend. When playing this role, he can well express the humility, fear, nervousness, and deep-hidden ambition of the second prince in front of the king.

Also, Link likes to make habitual movements during performances.

It may seem a bit inexplicable at first, but his movements are well integrated into the character and scene, making it look very real.

This is very rare.

This kind of meticulous performance method cannot be achieved by many veteran actors, but Link, a newcomer, can perform it accurately.

This made him wonder, is this Link an old actor or a new type of talented actor?

"Lao Zhang, I'm going to add some scenes for Link, what do you think?"

Director Zhang asked, fanning himself.

"I agree!"

Producer Zhang Weiping nodded without hesitation.

Link is handsome, famous, and has a large number of fans at home and abroad, which is a box office appeal.

Now that we see that Link has such great acting skills, not adding a few more scenes would be a waste of salary and the opportunity to finally invite Link.

"Add a few more scenes and let Link and Zhou Runfa be the co-leading actors."

Zhang Weiping suggested.

Director Zhang nodded.

Before designing the script, the role of the second prince was prepared to be played by popular stars. Jay Chou, Wang Lihong, Huang Xiaoming, Lu Yi and others were all under consideration.

It's just that most of the popular stars' acting skills are poor, and their lines are not good either.

When designing the script, many lines and scenes were deleted to reduce the difficulty of the character.

Judging from Link's performance just now, the current scene is too simple for him. If more highlights and dialogues are added, and Link can interact with Zhou Runfa and Gong Li, the movie will definitely be more exciting.

Thinking of this, Director Zhang couldn't help but get a little excited. He threw down his fan and asked his assistant to find three screenwriters to increase the difficulty of Link's scenes.

——

After Link finished filming, he took off his sweaty armor and chatted with Fa Ge, who was also changing clothes. After Fa Ge became a hit with "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" in 2000, he chose to enter Hollywood, but it was not very successful. .

However, he is also the most successful actor in Hollywood after Jackie Chan and Jet Li.

Fa Ge's salary for this drama was 40 million yuan, which was more than the combined salaries of Link and Gong Li.

Fa Ge is much thinner than he looks on the screen, and he is not in good spirits after leaving the camera. After taking off his armor, he chats with Link while blowing on the air conditioner.

Ask him who he learned his acting skills from, he is very good.

Link modestly said that he thought about it while watching the movie.

Fa Ge said that being self-taught is even more impressive, and asked him to practice his acting skills more, and his future achievements may be higher than those of the older generation of actors.

After filming, Link went to the set manager and asked what the plans were for the afternoon. The weather was too hot for the crew, and the smell of paint in the newly built studio was too strong. He had a headache from smelling it too much.

The set recorder said that he had two shots for the afternoon scene and could finish it around three o'clock.

Before he could leave, Director Zhang took him to the office next door, personally made him a cup of jasmine tea, and said he was going to add a few scenes and some lines for him.

Link asked how much to add.

Director Zhang said he was not sure, there must be more than now.

Link said no and will go to the Olympic Stadium in Helsinki, Finland, on August 8 to participate in the 10th World Athletics Championships.

Before the game, he returned to the capital for training ten days in advance.

I don’t have that much time to film on the set.

Director Zhang said it would not affect him and he could wait until the game was over before filming his scenes, which would not affect his training.

Link found it troublesome, not only was it troublesome to go back and forth for filming, but it was also not good to delay the progress of the crew.

It's just that Director Zhang is more enthusiastic and sincere, and everything he says will be done according to him, making it difficult for him to refuse.

After nine days of filming in Hengdian, Link returned to the capital at the end of July to train and prepare for the 10th Track and Field Championships.

In this World Championships, the Chinese track and field team sent a total of 36 athletes to participate in 22 events, including 16 men and 20 women, including Liu Xiang, Sun Yingjie, Xing Huina, Shi Dongpeng, Wu Youjia, etc.

Link has 6 events, including shot put, javelin, 1,500 meters, 3,000 steeplechase, 5,000 meters, and 10,000 meters.

The task given to him by the national team is to guarantee two gold medals and a reward of 200,000 yuan for one more gold medal.

Link said he tried his best.

"Are you going abroad to compete again? You haven't even had a few days off this year."

In the apartment, Zhang Zilin looked at the TV and leaned on his shoulder and said.

"Would you feel wronged by being my girlfriend?"

Link asked while stroking the girl's long hair.

"No, my grandfather said that when you compete outside, it's like going abroad to fight, sacrificing your life and blood for the country, and competing for honor. I am a member of the military, how can I not even understand this?"

Zhang Zilin rolled his eyes at him.

"good!"

Link laughed.

Zhang Zilin smiled slightly, rested his head on his chest, and put his long legs on his legs, making a very comfortable posture.

Link touched her hair, and before the 12 episodes of "Legend of Sword and Fairy" were finished, the two entered the bedroom. (End of chapter)