Exploiting Hollywood 1980

During the script rehearsal, Ronald used the trick he learned from Coppola and asked someone to record all the actors' rehearsal dialogues with a video recorder. Later in the evening, Ronald watched the video with the director of photography overnight to figure out the problems that would be encountered during the formal shooting.

The problem with this movie is that the dialogues between the many actors must be coordinated tacitly. Drama films capture the audience's attention mainly by relying on the tension between the plots, making the audience unconsciously want to know what happens between the characters until the end.

Ronald watched the video overnight, and his biggest experience was that the more actors there are in a scene, the more difficult it is to arrange the camera and guide the actors to perform well.

For a scene between two people, as long as the chemistry between the two is good and the emotions are in place, the audience will be moved. But for a scene between three people, there are six times more problems to deal with. The chemistry between a and b, between b and c, and between c and a must be in place.

And when the camera moves between the three characters, it must be accurately connected. Ronald was overwhelmed just thinking about it.

When Stanley Shanley wrote the script, he did not consider how the movie would present such a complex actor scheduling. After all, this was his first movie.

Before this, Ronald had only dealt with complex scheduling caused by large props. For example, the F-14 Tomcat fighter. With the assistance of the manufacturer's engineers, there would always be a way to make the big toy move in the camera according to Ronald's ideas.

But the difficulty of managing people is much higher than that of dealing with huge machinery. How to deal with these multi-person scenes is a huge challenge to test the director's ability.

Another problem is the setting of the number of people to shoot. This movie has a lot of indoor scenes. When shooting in a small indoor space, when there are more than two people, the shooting position can only be determined when you arrive at the scene.

For several scenes between two or three people, Ronald quickly discussed with the director of photography David Watkins according to the cooperation of the actors to find the appropriate shooting position, and then marked it in the on-site photos taken by art director Philip Rosenberg.

In the entire script, more than 90% of the scenes can be completed through simple design, and the remaining few scenes are very difficult. Ronald, the director of photography and the art director all feel very tricky.

Among them, the two group portraits are the most difficult.

The first scene is when Johnny, the fiancé, successfully proposes to Loretta, played by Cher. Loretta comes to the bakery where Ronnie, the fiancé's long-lost brother, works, to invite him to the wedding.

This scene is about Ronnie, played by Nicolas Cage, who makes his debut by narrating himself. This requires Nicolas Cage to have an acting explosion so that the audience can quickly recognize the poor man who accidentally cut off half of his palm because he was distracted while talking to his brother.

In this way, the audience will understand his hatred for Ronnie and his sudden love for Loretta.

Not only should the audience fully like this messy-haired Italian youth, but they should also see that Loretta is very fond of his sudden passion.

If this scene is not well shot, and the audience only thinks that Ronnie, played by Cage, is disgusted, then the scene where Loretta spends a night with him under the influence of the supermoon will not be convincing.

So Cage's almost crazy acting style is very suitable for this scene,

but the difficulty of this scene also lies in the fact that it is a scene in an open space. In the bakery, first there is a female salesperson played by Diane, who leads Loretta, the audience's sight, into the bakery scene of the bakery.

Then there are two old Italian couples who come to buy bread. Ronald agreed to let Martin Scorsese's parents play the role.

The relationship between many characters must be explained clearly, and the scenes of the two male and female protagonists must be continuous. Whether it is camera movement, camera position, or performance, it puts forward high requirements.

"I am in the bakery at the corner of 502 Henry Street in Brooklyn. As long as a few edits are done, the visual continuity of the audience will not be a problem."

Even so, Ronald is still very worried about the connection and rhythm of multiple actors. He specially ran to the real bakery and watched it for a long time with the director's viewfinder.

Several people are still blocked by several large bread baking ovens and bread fermentation equipment. But if the scene is set in the studio, it cannot restore this real scene. Especially this shot, there is also a shot of the heroine pushing the door from the outside to the inside. Real shooting saves countless things than setting up the scene in the studio.

If the scene of this bakery is just what makes Ronald worried. Another round table scene in Loretta's kitchen at the end made Ronald worried all the time. He instinctively resisted and didn't want to deal with it.

This is 19 Cronberry Street in Brooklyn Heights, a common house in Brooklyn, located at the junction of the Italian community and the Irish community. The two-story building, the red exterior wall, and the railings outside the gate made of twisted iron sheets make it recognizable as Brooklyn.

If Ronald had some ideas in the previous scene, he had no ideas at all in this scene.

At the beginning, only Loretta and her mother Rose were talking in the kitchen. Mother Rose saw that her daughter was in love and sighed.

Then the father joined in. When he talked to his daughter about her marriage, his lover was accidentally exposed.

Then Loretta's aunt and uncle came to see the cash she had taken yesterday and not deposited in the bank. The family first joined the extended family discussion, and then the family of Ronnie, who had watched the opera "La Bohème" with Loretta and was smitten with him, came to meet his girlfriend for the first time.

Finally, the old grandfather came down from upstairs and solved his son's affair problem.

Finally, everyone happened to meet Loretta's fiancé, Johnny, who was back from Italy. Because his dying mother returned to health after seeing him, Johnny thought he was contaminated by Loretta's bad luck and wanted to break off their engagement with her.

Many characters will appear in the whole scene, many clues will develop here, and finally they will be solved in a super powerful ending.

"How do we arrange the camera position?" Ronald looked at the director of photography. The two looked at each other for a long time, confused.

This scene, and all the scenes, were written by screenwriter Shanley according to the rhythm of a Broadway play. But a movie is not a drama, and it is impossible for everyone to see the whole scene in one scene.

Ronald made sure to put in multiple cameras to capture close-ups of everyone, over-the-shoulder dialogue scenes, and some overall dialogue.

But if the camera angle is slightly wrong, it is inevitable to see other cameras through the camera. The angles are set strictly according to the design. If the actors improvise a little, they will come out of the camera or be brought to other cameras.

Ronald played the videotape of the rehearsal at the scene. He stood left and right, but could never find a suitable route that could take everything into consideration.

Moreover, there are so many characters in this group show, and it is impossible to follow the design strictly according to individual emotions.

If the actors are too concerned about their positioning and angles, the interaction between the actors and the particularly smooth emotions will be destroyed.

In short, are you willing to be a gangster for the sake of a good show? In order to ensure quality, it is the most credible performance method that does not pursue improvisation. Ronald must make a difficult decision.

Finally, David Watkin, the Oscar-winning director of photography for "Out of Africa," spoke.

"Ronald, I think you still need to find the actor's chemistry and the rhythm of the dialogue first, and then we can design the camera location."

"Reason?" Ronald frowned, squatting on the ground, trying to find a camera angle from the long Italian dining table that was parallel to the eyes of the actors sitting at the table.

"Well, this is life. We always have to find something that we can grasp first. Instead of pursuing the best of both worlds, it is better to find one first.

Anyway, your ending scene is mainly the result of the performance between the actors. "

"David, what you said makes sense." Ronald put down the viewfinder, and he understood that what Watkin said was the correct idea.

First, through on-site rehearsal, everyone can reach the best performance state, and then according to their movements, different camera positions are designed.

However, Ronald's shooting method has always been to shoot through the dream scene and work backwards to the scene.

He always prepared the shots for each scene at the beginning of filming.

For him, this approach of not making separate shots first, but deciding on the shooting and editing details based on the actor's condition at the filming site, always felt a little unsafe.

"Listen to me, Sidney Pollack did this all the time when they were filming, Dustin Hoffman, and Jessica Lange; Meryl Streep, and Robert Redford, I’ve seen him countless times before shooting for half an hour, and he still hasn’t decided on the camera location or positioning.”

David Watkin mentions the two films directed by Sidney Pollack, "My Lady" and "Out of Africa", which were both box office and critical successes.

Neither of these two movies has a big concept, but the plot and the wonderful performances of the actors put the audience into the scene, and finally won the Oscar.

"Just do it like this." Ronald had no choice but to do it. This was a scene beyond his directing experience. What did a wise ancient man say? "If you drive to the front of the mountain, you will definitely

In a blink of an eye, the day of filming began, and Ronald looked at the Metropolitan Opera House at Lincoln Center at the intersection of Columbia Street and 61st Avenue.

Ronald rented the exterior streets here for a day and a half.

Xueer appears at the beginning of the movie. She is an accountant who works part-time and prepares taxes for people. In middle age, her husband died in a car accident. In Italian culture, widows are very unlucky, and men who have other choices generally will not have a formal relationship with a widow.

What she came to this time was a small company outside the Metropolitan Opera House, where she helped her boss organize tax returns.

The opening shot shows the exterior wall of the opera house with posters for the newly released opera "La Boheme". Trucks from the Italian-controlled Truck Drivers Union were unloading at the back door of the Opera House.

Loretta has gray hair and a weathered face. She looks like a single woman who has to work hard to support herself and has no time to dress herself up.

The part-time flower shop owner finally gave Loretta a bouquet of unsold red roses.

Loretta, played by Cher, looked at the red rose. Although her mouth was unforgiving, she still showed the unique smile of a woman who sees a red rose. She picked up the flower and smelled it first.

"cut!"

On the first day of shooting, Ronald did not arrange any particularly difficult shots. He just asked the team and actors to start with easy shots to find the feeling and run in the team.

During the break of shooting, Cher asked her personal hairstylist to re-arrange her gray hair.

Others can not bring it, but the hairstylist must be brought.

Cher is proud of her long black and shiny hair, and she wants to enjoy the care of her personal hairstylist anytime and anywhere.

The hairstylist Ronald found could not do it himself, so he could only inform the other party of the effect he wanted to achieve and let Cher's personal hairstylist arrange it. Only he can touch Cher's hair.

Next, we have to switch to shoot a shot of Cher walking on the road outside the opera house wall like a withered old aunt.

This opera is "La Boheme", which is the famous opera of Pavarotti that Ronald knows. This is the opera that Loretta and Johnny later went to see together.

Discover the way over the mountain. ”

“David Watkin, Philip Rosenberg, stage design.

Julia Taylor, on-site director.

…

Ronald Lee, flashlight operator. ”

In addition to the big title “La Boheme” on the poster, the crew members also wrote their names on the poster of the opera in the movie.

Of course, this was an arrangement by Ronald, so that those staff members who could not appear on the screen had a chance to proudly point at the screen and shout to their families, that is, my name.

However, the work of these staff members in the crew has been turned into a particularly important position. Let their families be happy.

And in order to cooperate, Ronald also changed his position to the least noticeable "flashlight operator".

While making a joke of himself, he also promoted his own flagship product.

“I say, have you worked with Ronald before?”

Cher asked Olympia Dukakis, who played her mother, during a break in the shooting.

“No, what’s wrong?” Dukakis was surprised. The director’s authority is even greater on Broadway. He had never heard of openly talking about the director behind his back on the set.

“I always feel like I made a mistake. My last movie, The Witches of Eastwick, was shot with Jack Nicholson.

My next movie, the male lead is Liam Neeson and Dennis Quaid, both handsome guys. In this movie, look at Nick's messy hair. "

"Hahaha..." Dukakis laughed so hard that he fell backwards. Nicolas Cage's appearance really looked like a fool. He even wore dentures for the role, typical Italian-style rotten teeth.

The two played sisters in the crew. In fact, the age difference was only a little more than ten years, but they got along very well.

"I said, have you acted in Ronald's movie before? I feel that he doesn't guide our acting. "Cher whispered to Dukakis, this is what she really wants to discuss.

"No, but the director is the person who knows the script the most. We just need to cooperate with the director and act out the character's reaction well." Olympia Dukakis is an old-school Broadway style, and the director is always right.

"I'm afraid we've made a bad movie. My performance is not as well thought out as the last movie. Every shot has a special design. It seems that I'm just acting casually here. Ronald also called it out."

Dukakis shrugged helplessly. This is also where she was a little dissatisfied with Ronald. There was no meticulous work on every shot. It seemed that just acting casually like this could meet his requirements.

"Very good, your directing method is really natural. Cher hardly needs to act too much. Your casting is really great, and the effect of the true color performance is very good. "

On the other hand, the photographer David Watkin praised Ronald highly, saying that he was worthy of being Scorsese's disciple. When making a movie, casting is a hundred times more important than acting.

This is Scorsese's creed. If there is no synthetic candidate, he would rather not shoot.

"Hahaha, I also think Julia Taylor is very good."

"Hey, this is a marble wall imported from Italy. Let your people be careful." The manager of the Metropolitan Opera House saw Ronald's staff tearing off the posters on the wall and began to remind them that the tape they used to fix the posters seemed to leave an ugly mark on the marble.

"How could this happen? Don't you know that different walls require different tapes to avoid leaving marks?" Ronald pulled the head of the props over and asked him what was going on.

"The Metropolitan Opera House is just making a fuss. We have always done this. If there is anything that needs to be cleaned, isn't it included in the rent?"

"Well, you make a phone call. "Ronald suddenly had an idea in his mind, and he asked the head of the props team to find the prop expert of Daydream.

They found in the hardware chain store that different tapes were needed to deal with different materials. Anyway, this is a very small market. As long as they purchase tapes with similar raw materials, and then produce specific tapes and put their own company's brand on them, Hollywood film studios will definitely like to see the tapes classified into different categories.

In this small market, their own production capacity can supply everyone, and a slightly higher price can also make those high-purchasing managers happy.

Anyway, editing tape is also tape, and prop tape is also tape. Maybe it can be made into a small monopoly business.

Soon, the staff of Daydream sent a set of tapes with the labels cut off and marked in different categories. The props team used them and found them to be very useful. When dismantling the scenery, they just had to tear them down.