1979 Golden Age

When Chen Qi and his companions arrived at the entrance of the studio, it was still being set up in a mess.

Thomas saw them first and greeted them warmly: "Chen! Welcome to visit the studio. Who are these people?"

“They are all first-class scholars and are very interested in your films.”

"Welcome, welcome, please come in!"

The old men of the Zhu family walked in excitedly, and suddenly they felt a darkening in front of their eyes. After a few seconds, they looked ahead and whispered, "Oh my god!"

Just see the scene:

The air was filled with smoke, and on both sides were dozens of Arhat statues with ferocious faces, and eight extremely exaggerated dragon-shaped pillars. The palace maids and eunuchs stood with their hands hanging down in strange robes. Empress Dowager Cixi was half-lying in a heavy mountain of clothes with a pale face and red lips, and there was a pot next to her.

A few people went forward to take a look, and found a partially dead turtle stewed inside...

“This, this, this!”

Zhu Jiapu's eyes widened, but he didn't utter a single curse word in front of so many people. He just said, "Didn't you say you were going to make a documentary-style movie? What kind of information did you use to set this up?"

"The Yiwan Palace is filled with magical colors!"

"This is so wrong. The Arhat statue and the Panlong pillar—are these made of several elements? And why is there a pot?"

Seeing that they were getting anxious, Bertolucci came over to explain: "We have referred to a lot of information, but artistic creation requires imagination. This is the scene that Bo Yi saw. He was young at the time, and in his eyes—"

After saying a lot of things, he finally said: "This is called art!"

"I'll teach you—"

Wang Shixiang had a straightforward temper, so the Zhu family hurried to stop him, after all, he was a foreign guest.

This is actually the style of "Fu Manchu", full of smoke and magic. And this scene is exactly what the art director of "The Last Emperor" found from different temples and integrated together.

Zhu Jia was more polite and was still arguing with Bertolucci on verbal theory, but Chen Qi quietly walked to the side, grabbed a young translator by the neck, and asked, "Who is your insurance specialist?"

"Brother Qi, you can't tell me!"

"I'll keep it a secret for you!"

"I really can't tell you! Thomas is very sensitive about this."

"I'll give you one last chance!"

"The bald guy with glasses is called James!"

Chen Qi took a look and found the target. It was a white man in his forties. He stood aside very low-key as if it had nothing to do with him, but he had a pen and paper in his hand and took notes from time to time.

"Hi, James!"

"Mr. Chen!"

James was stunned. He didn't expect someone to greet him. Chen Qi smiled and said, "You must be very bored supervising the crew every day. Do you have time to have a few drinks? The wine in Beijing is very good."

"Thank you for your kindness, but I am at work and cannot go out."

"I know, I know! The Last Emperor was filmed with a loan from the bank, so the insurance company sent you here."

"you?"

"It's not a secret. You can find out by asking around. Actually, your job is not easy. These great European art directors are very willful and have their heads full of strange ideas. Overspending is common."

“That’s right!”

James thought he had really inquired about it and said in a sympathetic tone, "Who says it's not true? $25 million is a huge sum of money. They sold the pre-licensed rights to the film to dozens of countries before our company was willing to insure them."

"That's very risky. It's going to be very hard for you to stay here for half a year. Let's go have a drink when we have time and we can talk later!"

Chen Qi said briefly and quickly left James.

The staff nodded vigorously. Italians are nothing! This guy is the one who built the building for the Beijing Film Studio!

Just at this moment, the quarrel at the Zhu family had ended, and everyone was trying to endure it with a bad look on their faces.

"Xiao Chen, go, go, go! Let's go back, this is so terrible!"

"Hey, what's going on?"

"Go out and tell it!"

After they left the studio, Wang Shixiang was the most angry. He said, "Look at what is this set up? It looks like the underworld. And you want to take this abroad? Once foreigners see it, they will say that we Chinese people look like ghosts! That's it!"

"He didn't listen to our suggestions, and when he got anxious, he just did art!"

"We may not understand the art of film, but we think we have some understanding of various aspects of the Qing Dynasty. He is obviously wrong!"

"Anyway, I just can't understand this Italian! It's bad luck. I won't come next time!"

"Don't worry, don't worry!"

Chen Qi tried to persuade him gently and fanned the flames: "This movie is a long process to shoot. No one knows what story it is about until the final product is out. Maybe there is a deeper meaning behind it? Then we are wrongly blaming others.

In my opinion, since we have a car, you might as well come more often and observe more scenes. This is also objective and fair, don’t you think? "

The old men pondered for a moment and said, "That makes sense. We really don't know what the movie will look like until it's finished."

"I'm not coming, don't count me in."

"I'm free these days. Xiao Chen, if you don't mind the trouble, would you like a car to pick you up?"

"Oh, what's so great about this? It's my honor to meet you all. Italy is so proud of this!"

The reason why no one jumped out to criticize "The Last Emperor" is because everyone only got a glimpse of it and didn't know what the movie was about. It was only after it was filmed and shown in China that it attracted a lot of criticism.

But it was of no use then.

"ha!"

Chen Qi saw off the old gentlemen and couldn't help laughing.

The key lies in the insurance commissioner James.

The United States has a very complete film insurance system, which is so detailed that it covers everything from actors, directors, films,

Everything from costumes and makeup to delays, overspending, and even plane crashes, obesity, drowning, burns, etc. can be insured.

For example, in "Tomb Raider", the film company bought a huge insurance policy for Angelina Jolie. If she injured a finger, the insurance company would have to pay $130 million in compensation.

The insurance company sent someone to supervise the entire process and opposed her doing it herself, using a body double or computer special effects.

There is also a female star who bought insurance for her thin waist. If it increases by 4 inches, she will have to pay a claim. The insurance company sent someone to help her maintain her figure, reminding her to pay attention to diet and exercise, etc.

The same is true for "The Last Emperor".

The 25 million dollars was loaned from five banks. The banks required the film company to purchase insurance. If the loan could not be repaid, the insurance company would pay it back. The insurance company is not stupid. Why did they accept your order?

So the film company sold the pre-authorization of the film first, and then the insurance company would insure it. James was responsible for supervising the crew to prevent them from overspending and failing to complete the film.

Chen Qi felt that the matter had inadvertently developed in a ridiculous and funny direction - he loved watching fun the most.