I’m a Director, I’m Not Bad

Chapter 150: 148. Ripples of Time

Chapter 150 148. Ripples of Time

January 4, 2007.

Bingxu year, Gengzi month, Wuxu day.

Advisable: getting married, starting construction, breaking ground, praying for blessings, offering sacrifices, building, breaking ground, and erecting beams.

8:30 am.

In the studio.

Xu Xin looked at the scene where various fruits and tributes were being placed in front of the altar, his eyes were a little empty.

"Brother, what are you thinking?"

Hearing Yang Mi's voice, Xu Xin turned his head and saw that he had finished his makeup, wearing a small dark blue suit with a single ponytail, a knee-length skirt underneath, and a pair of black cotton trousers on his legs socks and small leather shoes.

If the long skirt can be replaced with a JK pleated skirt, it will be a replica of a JK high school royal sister.

However, I have to admit that this school uniform is still very beautiful.

Especially those two slender legs.

Maybe it's because of the long Achilles tendon? In short, her calves are really something people never get tired of watching and playing with...

Seeing Xu Xin's eyes, the girl smiled slightly:

"Is it beautiful?"

"beautiful."

The two of them didn't have any intimate actions.

Even in the crew these days, it seems that they have deliberately kept some distance.

The purpose is to prevent any scandal from spreading.

But in fact, the hotel room in Taichung is face-to-face...go whenever you want.

After being praised, the girl rubbed her hands together.

If it was normal, Xu Xin probably would have covered it up already. But at this moment, he just handed over the very strange thing in his hand, at least the self-heating bag that he hadn't seen in Hengdian so far.

"It's not that cold anymore."

Unconsciously, the girl spoke with a Wan Wan accent.

The character is positive and round.

Then he tilted his head:

"Just wondering what you were thinking."

"I don't think about anything... my mind is quite empty."

Xu Xin answered truthfully, and then asked a rhetorical question:

"Where is Sister Zeng?"

"Come over in the afternoon..."

Zeng Jia returned to the mainland on New Year's Day.

After Yang Mi finished speaking, she said:

"Thirsty? There is hot coffee over there. May I bring you a cup?"

"No...you go and prepare, I will stay by myself for a while."

"good."

After the opening ceremony, the crew will officially start the filming. She knows that her boyfriend needs a calm process.

After all, strictly speaking, this is his "first" movie.

It's just that he looked a little numb just now, so I came here to care. Now that she was sure it was all right, she withdrew.

Xu Xin continued to stare at the table arranged by the staff in a daze.

He didn't know what he was thinking.

Logically speaking, this time should be nervous + excited.

But there is no such thing.

He wasn't nervous, and even had a strange indifference.

It seems that everything is logical.

This should be considered "confidence" tentatively, right? But... in this indifference, he has a kind of... very strange discomfort.

Not uncomfortable.

It was an inexplicable urgency.

The movie has just started shooting, but he is already thinking about how many people will see the easter eggs he designed in the script.

This feeling is inexplicable, but he has to admit that he feels very refreshed when he thinks of a group of people scratching their heads at his movie. But I thought about it carefully while being very refreshed... This movie has just started shooting, and there are a lot of problems in the later stage, such as soundtrack, dubbing, editing, filming, etc., and I feel very uncomfortable...

How can it be so slow!

This kind of inexplicable discomfort combined with that kind of can't wait and all kinds of emotions, unconsciously stirred up a mess in his heart.

Forced him to instinctively light a cigarette.

"Hoo..."

With a puff of smoke, I immediately felt much more comfortable.

At this time, Zhang Xunwei came to him:

"Director, can we start?"

"..."

Xu Xin turned his head to glance at the camera wrapped in red cloth, and nodded:

"Um."

…

"Mr. Li, what kind of **** do we worship? Mazu? Bodhisattva? Buddha? Sanqing? Guan Erye?"

"...???"

Standing in front of the altar, Li Pingdong was stunned when he heard Xu Xin's words.

The crew started worshiping Mazu? Still worship Bodhisattva?

What a strange unfolding this is.

So he quickly shook his head:

"It's Mekshin!"

"…understood."

Xu Xin nodded, and then looked around. At this moment, whether it was Yang Mi, Jay Chou, Gui Lunmei... or other staff members, they were all waiting for him with solemn expressions.

He took a deep breath, took a step forward, walked to the altar, took out three sticks of yellow incense, put them in front of the candle and lit them, and then retreated.

Standing at the front of the crowd, at this moment, he doesn't have the pride of being the leader or being the only one.

Some are just humble and wish for the future.

With incense on top of his head, he prayed softly:

"The **** of the machine, bless us with a smooth start, and the crew's shooting is safe and smooth."

After he finished speaking, when he bent down, everyone followed his rhythm and bowed three times to the camera behind the altar.

After three bows, the incense was inserted into the incense burner.

Xu Xin personally bypassed the camera and uncovered the red cloth:

"Everyone, good work!"

"Wow la la la la la..."

After all the staff applauded spontaneously, Xu Xin nodded:

"Clear the venue and prepare to start filming."

…

The actor in "The Unspeakable Secret" is still short of Huang Qiusheng. It's not that he is late, but that his family is sick and has to be with him for two days, so he joined the group two days late.

Except for him, everyone else is also present.

The actor Xu Xin of the crew didn't care, the audition was all done by Jay Chou. And his audition is also very own style.

The so-called own style is to be able to use your own people and never use others...

For example, the supporting roles of the students are almost all Nanquan mothers, for example, those who play the teacher are basically those who participated in the production of his album.

Actually, these are nothing.

Because these people don’t play important roles, they all serve as transitions.

enough.

Although Xu Xin is a director, he is not the kind of self-centered person. Director Zhang said that if you want to be in this circle, you must respect some rules of the game.

He thinks so.

The shooting plan of the film is also very simple. First, all interior scenes are shot in the studio, and the winter vacation here starts around January 15th. When the interior shooting is completed and the students are on vacation, the big guys will go to various outdoor shootings one after another.

Xu Xin plans to finish filming before the end of January.

The Chinese New Year is very late this year, and February 18th is the 30th day of the Chinese New Year.

The filming was completed at the end of January, and I returned to Yanjing directly with the negatives.

Your own movie must be edited. So the editing will be done in the mainland, but the soundtrack will be here.

Now the first scene is Ye Xianglun walking into the old piano room by himself after visiting the campus with Qingyi and parting ways, and then hearing the sound of the piano, searching all the way, and found Lu Xiaoyu.

Although it is one scene, it has to be divided into three sections to shoot.

The first paragraph is a fixed camera position, filming Ye Xianglun to enter the door. The second segment is a slide track shooting, following Ye Xianglun to find the sound of the piano, and giving a close-up of the set space. And the third paragraph is a close-up of him looking for the sound of the piano.

If it is put in a movie, it will only be five or six seconds, maybe ten or so seconds.

But in fact, it takes at least half an hour to start shooting.

Because the light needs to be changed in the middle, slide rails should be laid, camera positions should be transferred, etc.

Filmmaking is such a cumbersome thing.

Xu Xin's position is to sit in front of a few monitors placed outside the set, and the things shot after a while will be transmitted in real time.

But this time he is not in front of the monitor, but at the gate of the set.

The on-site staff were busy all the time, while Jay Chou stood next to him, looking like a student who was asked to order.

"For a while, come in from here, don't poke your head in, but push the door normally, wait and see and then listen, attracted by the singing, and start to walk in step by step... Teacher Li."

Xu Xin placed the camera behind the door for the first scene.

The door panel of this piece has been removed at this moment, because if it is not removed, the camera position cannot be turned.

The door panel itself is movable. After shooting the shot, a few props will move the door panel forward. It doesn’t matter if you are doing some shadow processing at that time.

Looking at Li Pingdong who was sitting in front of the camera, Xu Xin said:

"For a while, the camera pans according to his rhythm. After he stands still, his eyes look forward. Your camera shifts a little at a constant speed to give a panoramic view of the entire set."

"OK."

Li Pingdong expressed his understanding.

Xu Xin nodded:

"Well, be nice."

"…Um!"

Jay Chou took a deep breath and nodded heavily.

Then, as the camera positions and lights were all arranged, the staff left the scene.

After Xu Xin returned to the outside of the set room, he looked around at the people around him...everyone had three-point curiosity and three-point exploration on their faces.

I don't know if I want to see the director's skills, or what.

but…

It doesn't matter.

Looking at his bright-eyed girlfriend full of encouragement for the last time, he sat on the director's seat.

Then he waved to Zhang Xunwei who was on the side:

"Awei, bring a notebook and sit next to me."

"OK."

As the assistant director who has been following Jay Chou since his first MV, although Zhang Xunwei didn't know what this director Xu was going to do, he still nodded, took his work notes, and sat down with a chair.

Xu Xin picked up the walkie-talkie, stared at the fixed camera screen that had already started to transmit the screen and said:

"Jay Lun is ready, Ji Ji is ready."

After speaking, after waiting for a while, a voice rang through the intercom:

"The record is ready."

"Okay, get ready to play the board, camera number one fixes the camera, the first scene of the first act, everyone cheers."

The voice fell, and no one responded.

Just a slate with 1-1-1 appeared in Li Pingdong's camera.

""SECRET" Act 1 Scene 1, Three, Two, One, ACTION!"

"Snapped!"

The game record hits the board and is taken away.

After about a second, the pearly white was mixed with a little blue primer, and the door that looked very European from the pattern to the handle was opened.

Jay Chou, who had been "educated" by Xu Xin for half a year on how to play Ye Xianglun, got into the mood very quickly. After opening the door, he first showed half of his face, and after half a second of hesitation, the whole person walked in.

Xu Xin's requirement for this picture is that the lighting is dim, with dark blue background light and warm yellow as the base.

It embodies the picture of the classical years.

Therefore, the texture of the whole picture looks very quiet.

When Jay Chou made a gesture of standing at the door and looking forward, the camera panned slowly.

The floor full of mottled traces of time, the warm yellow lights in the music classrooms on both sides, and the blue halo outside the skylight in the corridor leading to the second floor immediately highlighted a kind of grace and tranquility of the years.

It looks quiet, mysterious and...that kind of classical beauty.

Um.

Xu Xin nodded slightly.

Not only him, but everyone else, no matter the staff or Jay Chou's "friends", nodded unconsciously.

The staff of the crew saw the color harmony of the picture.

The highlight is the warm yellow lights on both sides of the melancholy blue.

is the finishing touch.

But those who are engaged in music are more emotional. Those who pay attention to feeling immediately taste the tranquility and elegance in this picture.

great.

This is the common cognition of all people.

At this moment, several people including Lin Mike, Huang Junlang and others suddenly heard a sentence:

"Awei, record it. In the panning camera, you should hear a gentle piano sound. It should not be so complicated, solo."

After Xu Xin finished speaking, Zhang Xunwei, Huang Junlang, Lin Mike and others were taken aback...

Zhang Xunwei has never seen the director actually on the shooting scene. While filming, he has already started to conceive the soundtrack...

Shouldn't the director of the soundtrack do this job?

Why does your old man take care of this job?

But Huang Junlang, Lin Mike... especially Lin Mike, as Jay Chou's queen arranger and producer, it is absolutely not wrong to say that his musical quality is the highest among these people.

After hearing the words of Director Xu, various classical piano solo scores immediately appeared in his mind.

Chopin?

Berlioz?

Or… a deeper Bach?

Beethoven?

After thinking about it, he instinctively told him that it would be better to use Chopin's Ballade No. 1 in G minor...

The peaceful piano sound slowly rippling in my ears...

Recalling the static picture again...

Well, Ballade No. 1 in G minor is a good fit!

After he nodded slightly in agreement, he was immediately surprised.

Looking at the young man sitting in the chair...

He also knows music?

…

"OK, pass."

As the screen freezes, Xu Xin, who didn't know what he said surprised the music players behind, picked up the walkie-talkie and yelled, and then continued:

"Laying the slide rails."

After about ten minutes, the dismantled door panels and slide rails were all laid.

Shooting continues.

Jay Chou walked through two rooms in the corridor synchronously with the camera.

Sliding rail lens shooting is completed.

Then, the camera was set up on the stairs, giving a high-angle top-down shot.

The first Easter egg buried by Xu Xin, that is, those wooden floors turned into musical notes, appeared in the camera.

After returning to his original position, Jay Chou stepped on the wooden boards with musical notes, looking around, and came to the innermost room step by step.

The third act ends.

In the fourth act, close-up shots begin.

In the old piano room, a close-up of the door, after making a look-and-see action:

"OK, let's go, Lu Xiaoyu is ready."

Hearing this, Gui Lunmei hurriedly put down the script, arranged her clothes in front of the two art directors, and after confirming that there was no problem, she went directly to the set of the old piano room.

Here it is about Jay Chou walking into the old piano room, and Lu Xiaoyu who just "passed through" met him for the first time.

Soon, the camera seat was set up, and Xu Xin sat in front of the monitor again.

In this scene, Ye Xianglun and Lu Xiaoyu, who entered the old piano room, met for the first time. Lu Xiaoyu planned to hide the piano score in the bookshelf behind the door, but Ye Xianglun didn't notice anyone at first, when he saw the bookshelf behind the door After there were others, he was suddenly taken aback.

This is the first time the two met.

In the close-up shot, Ye Xianglun gently pushed open the door of the old piano room.

After looking around, he found no one, so he subconsciously wanted to open the door and walk in.

His gaze was first placed on the layout of the old piano room, from right to left slowly. And when he saw Lu Xiaoyu who was fiddling with books next to him...

"Well!"

He subconsciously took a step back...

"Crack."

Suddenly, Xu Xin stopped shouting.

Both Jay Chou and Gui Lunmei were taken aback.

This scene...no problem.

But Xu Xin walked to the old piano, which was where Li Pingdong's camera was.

After looking at the screen and thinking for a moment, he suddenly said:

"Props, come on, move that desk lamp. Jay Chou stay still, put your arms up."

"…so?"

Standing at the door, Jay Chou crossed his arms in doubt.

Xu Xin nodded:

"Yes, props, attach the lampshade to his arm."

Soon, after the lamp was moved to a suitable position, Jay Chou asked suspiciously:

"Won't this be a hindrance?"

But Xu Xin ignored him, but looked at the picture in the camera and said:

"You go back to the original position, and you are doing the startled action just now. Remember to touch the desk lamp."

"...?"

Although Jay Chou couldn’t figure it out, he still did it honestly. After taking a small step, he turned his head to the left:

"Well!"

With a small jump, his elbow touched the desk lamp, causing it to shake violently.

"Props, move a little bit, I want the desk lamp to shake slightly."

The prop standing next to it was adjusted again.

Jay Chou did the same, but this time, he happened to shake the desk lamp slightly.

"Um."

Xu Xin nodded in satisfaction, and walked directly to the side of the two.

Mainly facing Jay Chou:

"After a while, you still make the movement of observing and then being startled. Remember to touch this desk lamp lightly, you know?"

"Uh... ok. But can I ask why?"

Obviously, he didn't quite understand Xu Xin's intentions.

Gui Lunmei, who was standing on the ladder and didn't come down, also looked at a loss.

She also wondered why the director had trouble with a lamp.

"It's easy."

Seeing that the actors have doubts, the director naturally has to solve them:

"The color on Lu Xiaoyu's body does not belong to this period of time. I will use the desk lamp to give it many times later. You can understand this desk lamp as the time that belongs to Lu Xiaoyu. Originally, it was frozen. But it is precisely because You suddenly walked into the old piano room and became the first person Lu Xiaoyu saw when she traveled across... In other words, you "invaded" her time, triggering a chain effect, and only then did the overall story follow. Do you understand? Time is a river, and when you touch a desk lamp, it’s like dropping a stone into the calm river. Ripples on the surface of the river trigger a series of subsequent changes. Understand Got it? It's called a hint."

"..."

Jay Chou is 100% sure, he never thought about it when he designed the script and the scene.

So I couldn't help but say:

"Does anyone think of doing this?"

"Don't underestimate the artistic pursuit of those who like movies."

Xu Xin said with a smile:

"Okay, ready to start, the one just now is good. But you don't want to poke your head and look like a big sneaky mouse. Just observe normally, push the door, half body in..."

After correcting Jay Chou's movements, Xu Xin turned to look at Li Pingdong again.

Li Pingdong knew what he meant, and he wanted to remind himself to deal with possible distortion or zoom problems when the lights flickered for a while.

So nodded:

"clear."

"…Um!"

After all, it is an old world.

A big guy is a big guy.

is different.

Xu Xin returned to the monitor with emotion.

Shooting resumes and starts.

…

Ye Xianglun finally came to the old piano room.

The door of the old piano room is ajar.

Through the glass, he found that there seemed to be no one inside.

no one?

Where did the piano sound come from?

He showed a surprised look. Then he involuntarily put his hand on the concealed doorknob, pushed it lightly, bent half his body and walked into the old piano room.

A single piano is placed in the middle of the whole room.

This piano room looks very old and old.

But the sound of the piano that once echoed in this piano room can be vaguely heard from the portraits of the masters hung on the wall.

Elegant and deep.

His eyes moved from Beethoven, to Chopin, and then to Bach...

Every master's face is full of traces of time.

Sight slowly moved to the left, moved.

The master was removed, the piano was removed, and finally he saw an old bookshelf and…

"Well!"

The moment he met the eyes of the girl with a black scarf wrapped around her neck and who seemed to be dressed a little weirdly, he inevitably took a step back, and accidentally bumped his arm against a desk lamp standing next to him.

The light from the desk lamp flickered.

Those are ripples in time.

Slowly rippling.

Belongs to the first stroke of this super time and space magic campus love story, and it begins like this.

…

Jay Chou is in good condition.

Xu Xin is quite satisfied.

Maybe it was due to sufficient preparation time, or because this is his "own" story.

It seems very handy to grasp the role of "Ye Xianglun".

But in the final analysis, his foundation is still a little weaker, and his performance is still a little fluctuating.

But that's okay.

Don't be afraid if you have a father by your side.

It will definitely help you sort out clearly.

In the morning, the crew shot about two scenes...

The first paragraph is the first encounter between Ye Xianglun and Lu Xiaoyu.

And the second paragraph... is more torturous.

No way, mainly...

According to Yang Mi, it is...

Huang Junlang is too ugly...

I don’t know why Jay Chou designed such a look. He has afro curly hair and a headband wrapped around his head. The combination of the handsome-looking bullet head and the two of them seems to be wrong no matter how you look at it.

Don't talk about other people, Huang Junlang is so ugly by himself.

The old piano room itself has a very blurry mirror. After taking a look at the shape, Huang Junlang muttered:

"Wow, how can this person be so ugly."

This made everyone laugh.

Getting Jay Chou can't play the piano anymore...

In addition, this buddy has never acted before, and his lines are very blunt.

There was no other way, so Xu Xin had to help him with the transfer.

Teach sentence by sentence, learn sentence by sentence.

Happy to mention two sons.

Moreover, A Lang played by Huang Junlang has a second timeline foreshadowing, which is the correction fluid he was holding in his hand when he first met Ye Xianglun.

The correction fluid was written in the hiding cabinet. After writing "The coach is a fool", when he went out, A Lang put the correction fluid in his chest pocket. And then when Lu Xiaoyu and Ye Xianglun were playing four-hands, the music teacher walked in and also opened the cabinet.

Because he thought Ye Xianglun was in love and wanted to find that girl. But because he couldn't see Lu Xiaoyu, he only saw the words written in correction fluid, and left a helpless sigh:

"You students, it's really..."

Here, a staggered technique is used to make the audience think that they have encountered Lu Xiaoyu at first glance, but in fact the teacher cannot see her, but only sees the line left by A Lang.

The script of "The Unspeakable Secret" was written by Xu Xin, one by one inadvertently buried threads were quietly dropped, and finally it became a turbulent undercurrent hidden under a long seemingly calm river.

The first day of shooting in the morning mainly consisted of these two scenes.

Huang Junlang did waste some time...

But it's kind of fun.

At least Xu Xin thinks so.

When it was time to eat, he also received his own lunch box.

Braised pork rice, plus an egg.

Some vegetables.

No one is picky about anything... Eating box lunch is actually a very normal thing. What's more, this crew is not a big investment of hundreds of millions like Director Zhang.

Its total cost, including the later soundtrack, publicity and so on, is only 70 million Taiwan dollars.

Converted to about 18 million.

Yang Mi's salary is 1 million, and Gui Lunmei's salary is 2 million. Huang Qiusheng's price is one million, while A Lang's and A Bao's are several hundred thousand.

The total remuneration and the expenses that need to be paid to the crew are about 5 million.

The remaining 10 million yuan is all production fees and related publicity fees.

Xu Xin brought over twelve million.

Jay Chou took six million.

However, the two of them never made it clear whether the movie was a box office share or a loan.

Xu Xin didn't care, but Jay Chou was thinking that if the movie loses money, then it will be changed to a loan. If you make money, you share it.

In short, I will definitely not let my friends lose money.

So although the box lunches of the film crew are not bad, they definitely have nothing to do with luxury.

However, after eating, Xu Xin immediately noticed something different.

People here...do not rest.

When I was in Hengdian, perhaps due to the hot weather, Director Zhang would always arrange a 2-3 hour break at noon.

But not here...

After Xu Xin finished his meal, he put down his chopsticks and went to smoke outside the studio.

But when he came back from smoking a cigarette, he found that... Zhang Xunwei had already started to arrange the shooting plan scheduled for the afternoon.

Xu Xin looked surprised.

Don't these people rest?

And at this moment, Yang Mi came over:

"Finished smoking?"

"Hmm...do you not rest at noon?"

Hearing this, the girl shook her head:

"I was a little puzzled just now, so I went over and asked Mr. Li."

"...how do you say it?"

"Ms. Li was quite surprised to hear that our place is still the same as on weekdays..."

The girl looked at the busy crowd and whispered:

"He said that this may be the last point in the Wanwan movie circle that once served as the dignity of Hong Kong and Taiwan movies..."

"Well…"