Who are you calling "little fresh meat"? I'm the king.

Chapter 783 Does Not Affect (23)

Uh… Shen Yan admitted it directly!
This is also true.

In fact, "Pan Jinlian" was rejected by Venice, and then the San Bath Film Festival extended an invitation to it...

Then Pan Jinlian went to participate!

In fact, many international film festivals want to pave the way for Chinese-language films.

After all, the size of the Chinese-language film market is undeniable, and in recent years, Chinese buyers have been ubiquitous at major film festivals…

In fact, any Chinese-language film nominated for a San Sebastián film is guaranteed to win an award—Xu Jinglei's "Letter from an Unknown Woman" won Best Director, and Chen Kaige's "Together," which was rejected by Cannes, won Best Actor at the San Sebastián International Film Festival.

Actually, Ning Jing also won the Best Actress award at the Saint Basil Awards for her role in "The Lanterns," back in 94!
Many media outlets came to interview Shen Yan…

They didn't care about any past grievances between the two; in fact, they were hoping he would hurl more insults so they could generate traffic and double their performance bonuses for the month.

Shen Yan lived up to expectations and immediately launched into a tirade:
"If you talk about Spanish football, I'll definitely sing your praises, but if you talk about the San Basil Film Festival... that's just a small-town award, its prestige and influence are not even comparable to the Golden Rooster Awards!"

(Then why did you disagree with the inclusion of "I Am Not Madame Bovary" in the Venice Film Festival's main competition?)

"Can I think 'I Am Not Madame Bovary' is not up to standard? Do I have the right to tell people not to watch it? If I do, why can't I tell them not to watch it?"

(What do you think of director Feng Xiaogang?)
Shen Yan thought for a moment and then praised him directly: "I think Director Feng is amazing! You should know that since 'The Crow and the Sparrow,' Chinese films have basically only had two mainstream comedy forms left—satirical comedies and slice-of-life comedies. Then, the emergence of Feng's New Year's comedies in the late 90s undoubtedly expanded the scope of Chinese comedy films."

However, he can only be considered a master of many things, not the originator.

The cultural soil that nurtured him includes, in recent times, films like "The Troubleshooters" and television series like "I Love My Family."

Going back further, we can trace it back to the 30s, with Shanghai urban comedies such as "City Scenery" and "Street Angel" by left-wing director Daniel Wu and Yuan Muzhi, and "Crossroads" by Shen Xiling.

These examples all share a common thread: they are not merely simple comedies for the common people; they all implicitly contain social criticism of the politicization of everyday life.

The 90s, the era of films like "The Troubleshooters," "I Love My Family," and Feng Xiaogang's New Year films, is becoming an increasingly distant memory.

They wear the guise of urban comedy and, on the surface, seem to strictly adhere to its formal requirements. However, their spiritual content constantly overflows the boundaries they have defined.

Originally, the joy of civic comedy came from the repetitive satisfaction of ordinary people's daily lives.

From a dramatic perspective, civic comedy should be static and conservative, meaning that the initial tranquility is broken by a sudden event, and the ending returns to the solution and the initial balance.

In this type of comedy, the characters don't need to grow or learn from their mistakes; they always fall in the same place. This simple and straightforward character design allows for maximum recognizability, thus ensuring the continuity and stability of the plot.

But the pursuit of "The Troubleshooters," "I Love My Family," and Director Feng goes beyond simply making the audience laugh.

They are all complex enough, a complexity born from a deep understanding of the wisdom of ancient Chinese literati—a subtle touch, profound meaning in concise words.

But this is also the biggest reason why his films can't go global—foreigners don't understand them!

"In addition, Director Feng probably looks down on comedy, which caused him to quickly lose his audience in the era of true mass entertainment."

“I admire Director Feng. His strength is not in how high his directing level is, which is actually not that high, but in his skill in balancing the ‘two satisfactions’ seesaw. The so-called ‘two satisfactions’ are the satisfaction of the people and the satisfaction of the veteran cadres… Director Zhang Yimou is a bit lacking. For example, when he was making ‘To Live,’ he went too far. He didn’t get the measurements right and almost strained his back. After all, he was a step behind in skill.”

(Then why do you think "I Am Not Madame Bovary" won't make it into the main competition at Venice?)
"I have complete faith in Director Feng's abilities! He's just not good enough! He doesn't possess exceptional cinematic expression skills..." After a pause, Shen Yan added, "What he tries to express is far outdated! And... as a director, he doesn't have his own unique visual style..."

……

Shen Yan was relatively restrained and didn't curse... In fact, the poetry whiz, like Director Feng, wanted to express something in the film that was far behind the current mainstream audience.

They could vaguely sense this, so they began to preach, because their thoughts and works were still stuck in 2000, while times had changed.

Since ancient times, it has been believed that literature should convey moral principles. The form of artistic expression is art, and the ideas expressed in artistic works are also art. Unfortunately, the ideas expressed by these once great directors are outdated and stale. They are not only detached from the current mainstream culture, but also consider themselves superior and do not pay attention to the twists and turns of ordinary people's stories and individual spiritual explorations.

From a director's perspective, Feng Xiaogang's biggest problem is a lack of talent!

The film's narrative pacing is rather disjointed, feeling more like a compilation of short films, lacking a cohesive overall feel. It's somewhat like an extended version of a TV series or a compilation of best-of episodes. "The Dream Factory" is one thing, but you could treat it as a collection of short sketches...

And at that time, he had only recently started making movies!

"Assembly" and "Aftershock" also give the impression of being a combination of two short films.

The intention was to make a serious film like "1942," but it turned out to be a disaster from beginning to end, with excessive sentimentality that backfired, and the pacing and focus were out of control...

Then… the media and reporters went to interview Feng Xiaogang… who said, “Director, let the film speak for itself! I will invite him to see ‘Pan Jinlian’!”

This time... Shen Yan didn't bother to respond!
He simply posted on Weibo, "Congratulations on the box office success of 'The Big Shot 3'... It's estimated to break the National Day box office record. Thank you for your support..."

He's busy filming a movie!

By the way, Fan Xiaopang's fans came and besieged him, demanding that he change his tune and acknowledge Fan Xiaopang's status as an international star...

Shen Yan ignored him completely…

……

October 5th, the crew of "The Rebel" having lunch.

After hanging up the phone, Shen Yan sat down to continue eating. Song Jia, who was next to him, asked, "Who was that?"

“My agent…” Shen Yan smiled, “He told me that ‘The Big Shot 3’ is going to surpass one billion yuan at the box office today!”

"...That amazing?"

Song Jia was surprised: "What about the final box office?"

"I estimate it will exceed 20 billion..." After a pause, Shen Yan continued, "With such high box office numbers, I don't even want to end this series!"

"The end? Why the end?"

"Let's call it a day while we're ahead..." Shen Yan sighed. "Mainly, it's not a good idea to continue filming..."

"Oh," Song Jia seemed to remember something and asked softly, "You have a conflict with Director Feng?"

"No…"

"Then why were you all hurling insults at me so harshly the other day?"

Shen Yan asked in confusion, "...I didn't insult him, I was just stating the facts!"

(End of this chapter)