Unboxing, Director!

Chapter 189

The premiere of "The Lobster" was held at the Beijing Century Theater.

The auditorium and sound equipment here are quite professional, and it is also the preferred venue for the premiere of major contemporary art films.

Therefore, in a sense, being able to premiere here means that the director has a certain status in the industry.

After Lu Jiang's "The Lobster" was nominated at Cannes, China Film Group decided to hold the premiere there.

In a sense, Lu Jiang has had a place in the mainstream art world since then.

However, at that time, Han Sanpin, Situ Zhaodun and others were protecting him, and the fact that the premiere was held here still raised questions among some industry insiders.

But after he actually won Best Director, the doubts basically disappeared, and Lu Jiang finally became a respectable mainstream filmmaker, a great director, and a leader of the new generation of directors.

Of course, there are still some doubts so far, such as the "substitute director" issue mentioned before, but these doubts will soon disappear.

That said, today's premiere is the largest in the mainland Chinese film industry since the beginning of the 21st century.

It's not that the event was particularly high-profile or that it garnered much industry attention, but rather that there were an exceptionally large number of attendees.

The reason is naturally due to Lu Jiang's popularity. In addition, besides Lu Jiang, F3 and others will also be attending the premiere today.

Lu Jiang hasn't held any fan meetings or similar events in a long time, and F4 hasn't appeared together for a long time either, so this premiere became a "major event" in the fan group.

It was summer vacation, and the college entrance examination had just ended, so the premiere attracted many young fans, some of whom even traveled from all over the country under the guise of tourism. According to feedback from the fan group, more than 3,000 people were expected to attend the premiere.

Excluding the 1,200 who had votes, the rest were all "powered by love".

Lu Jiang learned about this in advance from various fan groups. He expressed surprise and emotion, but he knew he couldn't stop everyone from coming, so he decided to take the opportunity to spoil his fans.

Fan Binbin gave a great idea on how to pamper his fans: besides holding a small meet-and-greet after the premiere to chat with them up close, share his upcoming schedule, and give away autographed materials, etc.

You could also hold a small entrance ceremony before the premiere, just like the Cannes premiere red carpet entrance ceremony, inviting celebrity friends, media, and fashion industry professionals to attend, so that fans who didn't get tickets can also take the opportunity to see other stars and enjoy a different kind of red carpet.

Lu Jiang thought the suggestion was very constructive and that it was worth considering.

Because this premiere originally included a segment introducing the guests, which is the traditional format of a large conference.

The host introduced the guests on stage, saying, "Today's guests are so-and-so," and the guests stood up, the audience applauded, and then the next guest appeared.

It was official, and respect was shown, but it didn't really make a difference.

Therefore, Lu Jiang felt that it would be better to take this opportunity to change it to a red carpet entrance ceremony.

Anyone who walks the red carpet gets plenty of exposure, with autographs, photos, and interviews all provided – it's beneficial for everyone.

However, this needs to be notified in advance, otherwise, if everyone shows up without makeup and starts taking pictures, it will only offend people.

Fortunately, Fan Binbin had already thought of this, so after learning of Lu Jiang's support, she immediately called her celebrity friends again to extend invitations under the name of Dawn.

Lu Jiang had assumed that people would be relatively conservative about this.

After all, red carpet culture is not popular in the current Chinese entertainment industry.

In the original timeline, it wasn't until major awards such as the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festival in 05 that red carpet appearance ceremonies were officially held, and at that time, people didn't pay much attention to styling or anything like that.

After that, Fan Binbin and others began to make their mark on the international red carpet stage, and the fashion industry and business atmosphere in mainland China also began to take off. The red carpet segment of various events then became an important part of the event, and the red carpet gradually came into line with international standards, becoming a show where female stars competed to outshine each other.

However, Lu Jiang underestimated Fan Binbin's influence. In this timeline, although the overall red carpet culture had not yet reached the level of the original timeline in 05, Fan Binbin's dazzling appearance at Cannes two months prior had already popularized international red carpet culture ahead of time.

With this foundation in place, the invited celebrities, upon learning that there would be a red carpet at the premiere of "The Lobster" and that many media outlets would be present, began to make preparations in advance.

In addition, some celebrities who were not invited also requested to attend through various connections.

Clearly, there are far too few formal red carpet opportunities in the Chinese entertainment industry right now, and female stars are already desperate for them.

The number of these actresses wasn't large, so Lu Jiang had Fan Binbin accept all of them and extended formal invitations.

This can be seen as an intentional delegation of power to Fan Binbin, allowing her to take on some household responsibilities, since she is better at fashion than Lu Jiang.

After the invitations were sent out, the celebrities who received them all said they would dress up carefully, and some even hired stylists to design a special look for them.

Upon seeing this, Fan Binbin immediately contacted several fashion media outlets, preparing to make the most of his connections and facilitate some collaborations.

Lu Jiang isn't worried about the specifics of how things will go. Fan Binbin isn't fighting alone anymore; after returning from Cannes, she started building her own fashion team, and he believes she'll achieve good results this time.

After the fan meeting was announced in the fan group, the fans were deeply moved. So when the premiere day arrived, the fans outside the Century Theater were a huge, uncountable crowd.

This caused celebrities like Zhou Xun, who came to show their support, to gasp in surprise.

Zhou Xun has attended movie premieres before, but none have been as lively as today.

Lu Jiang's popularity is simply phenomenal.

However, this is something that celebrities would love to have.

Thanks to Lu Jiang and Fan Binbin
"Next up is Zhou Xun, welcome Zhou Xun."

"Zhou Xun is an old friend of our director, Lu."

As temporary hosts Liu Yan and Li Bin announced the names of the participants, fans watching outside the red carpet barrier cheered.

Reporters in the media area were flashing their cameras, and some experienced ones had already started directing Zhou Xun to "look here."

Zhou Xun has seen the world in Cannes, and although she wasn't wearing haute couture, her look was still carefully styled.

She remained calm and composed when facing fans and reporters.

Stepping onto the red carpet, waving to the crowd, and then calmly arriving at the autograph wall, he quickly wrote his name under the words "The Lobster Premiere".

They then went to the media area and struck a few poses.

The on-site photography conditions were also quite professional, so the resulting photos are sure to be good; it's clear that Lu Jiang put a lot of thought into it.

Not bad!

After a one-minute photo session, Zhou Gongzi went to the interview area and quickly spotted many familiar media outlets.

Major media outlets such as BJ TV, Princess 6, Enlight Media, Sina, and NetEase all made an appearance.

Lu Jiang really has a lot of influence!
Zhou Gongzi was very satisfied, and thus became even bolder during the interview:

(End of this chapter)