China News Service, Hangzhou, October 2 (Qian Chenfei and Xu Qiaochu) Four years ago, when Gu Xiaogang, a native of Fuyang, Hangzhou, was "reunited" with his hometown, this city that was encumbered by the fate of the times gave him a big impact , Wanting to grasp the little city atmosphere remaining under the reinforced concrete became the starting point of his creation.
Four years later, as a young director, Gu Xiaogang once again "reunited" with his hometown. His first feature feature film "Spring River Plumbing" with his hometown as the background also made a lot of waves in the movie circle.
"Spring River Plumbing" is the closing film of the 58th "Film Critics Week" section of the 72nd Cannes International Film Festival, and it is also the first time that a Chinese language film has been selected as the closing film of this section.
The film tells the family story of the family relationship of the four sons of Gu’s mother after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in the context of Hangzhou’s renovation to welcome the 2022 Asian Games.
"Spring River Plumbing" is Gu Xiaogang's debut, and it is also his confession to his hometown.
"This is the first time I have experienced such a huge change in reality. In the past, Fuyang was not connected to railways. The Hangzhou-Huangzhou high-speed rail made it integrated into the Yangtze River Delta. The subway that is about to open will incorporate Fuyang into the urban area of Hangzhou, building an Asian Games The venue is waiting to be shown to the world in 2022. In the face of changes, I want to present the era I live in."
"Spring River Plumbing" Photo courtesy of the respondent
During the script creation period, "fireworks" was the taste Gu Xiaogang wanted to express. He interpreted the style of the market from multiple angles.
He said frankly that most of the actors in "Spring River Plumbing" are relatives and friends around him.
While the amateur actor brought Gu Xiaogang creative convenience and creative space, it also made the filming face very big challenges.
"For example, the sister-in-law in the movie. We spent a year shooting her. During this time, she was always afraid of the camera. When the camera was turned on, she became particularly unnatural to drink her saliva." Gu Xiaogang and his team thought of many methods in actor training. , But it is time to find the most effective.
"One day we were shooting until the early morning, and the actor was very tired. At that time, she was in a very relaxed state, watching TV and speaking lines very naturally."
Like the problems encountered by most young directors, the lack of funds almost made the film die.
"In the beginning, we relied on loans and borrowed money to subsidize the funding gap. Due to issues such as the approaching repayment date of online loans, the filming schedule was interrupted several times." Gu Xiaogang recalled that until the second year, we passed through China. Cinéfondation-Wu Tianming Youth Film Special Fund Youth Director Summit Venture Capital, Beijing International Film Festival Venture Capital, "Chunjiang Plumbing" found suitable funds, began to enter the supplementary filming and finally completed the film.
This kind of intermittent shooting is not entirely useless. The spare time gives Gu Xiaogang and his team a lot of thinking time.
How to use the perspective of Chinese movies to tell Chinese stories and express the charm and vividness of Chinese culture?
Gu Xiaogang tried to establish an aesthetic concept belonging to traditional culture.
"Just like the English name of this movie "Dwelling in the Fuchun Mountains" ("Fuchun Mountain Residence"), we want to build a sense of landscape in the whole movie, city, people and nature, it is like In a landscape, people are very small, and various stories are happening. Just like Mr. Huang Gongwang’s creation of this famous painting took four years to collect materials, we also experienced a long stepping point in the first year. , Making a movie is not anxious." He said.
In Gu Xiaogang's view, aesthetics is the most intuitive impact and feeling.
Movies are very similar to Chinese landscape paintings, both presenting a scene. He uses traditional painting methods to integrate with movies, placing traditions in the present, slowly laying out long scrolls of ink and painting, and applying aesthetic characteristics such as scattered perspective to the pictures.
"In order to embody this concept, we designed a 12-minute long lens in the film and took 2 summers."
Gu Xiaogang.
Photo courtesy of the respondent
Gu Xiaogang's "long scroll aesthetics" also contains many traditional Chinese cultural elements, which he believes is also the reason why the film can achieve good overseas communication effects.
"If traditional culture is not handled well, it will be formalistic and contrived. We have spent a long time making the tradition'visible' and'invisible'. The film incorporates a lot of folk customs and Confucian culture, and in the way of expression The above has sunk into the lives of ordinary people and strives to interact with nature. For example, the people in the film will release their lives and pray for blessings, which is the embodiment of this concept.
"Spring River Plumbing" is only the first volume of Gu Xiaogang's three-volume feature film "A Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains".
"In the last two volumes, we will continue the way of displaying Chinese landscape paintings, shifting positions based on the flow of the Qiantang River. For example, the second volume will take the Asian Games as an opportunity to bring Hangzhou’s changes and development in the past ten years to the screen, and draw the south The picture scroll of the market expresses the charm of Chinese aesthetics." Gu Xiaogang said.
(Finish)