"Dawn of the East" focuses on the historical process of Shanghai's liberation: adopting new faces and exploring new expressions

TV dramas with major revolutionary historical themes focus on the historical process of Shanghai's liberation

Adopt new faces, explore new expressions

　　Our reporter Li Xiazhi

　　The major revolutionary historical TV series "Dawn of the East" has recently been broadcast on CCTV's prime time. The drama reflects the major historical events that took place in Shanghai in a panoramic manner during the liberation of Shanghai. It has carried out a useful exploration on the creation of major revolutionary historical dramas.

　　"Dawn of the East" is adapted from the book "Battle Shanghai" by the late writer Liu Tong. The original work won the special award of the 15th "Five One Project".

The play centers on the thrilling history of the liberation of Shanghai in the past year, and tells a panoramic story of the Communist Party of China's liberation of Shanghai, taking over the political power, adhering to the "people first" ruling concept, relying on the broad masses of the people with strong ideals and beliefs and political wisdom, to liberate The story of Shanghai and stability of Shanghai.

　　The play is co-operated by director Gao Xixi and screenwriters Long Pingping and Qin Qin.

During the creation, the director and screenwriter made new attempts on the relatively familiar major revolutionary historical themes: the series deviates from the creation rules of traditional era dramas according to the timeline, and progresses side by side with spy wars and revolutions, based on strict compliance with historical facts. In addition, it adds a lot of tension unique to spy war dramas.

　　At the beginning of the series, the peace talks between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party are tense, and peaceful liberation is imminent. People with ulterior motives from all walks of life gather in Shanghai, intending to catch the Communist Party by surprise.

Li Bai, the prototype of the protagonist of the classic work "The Eternal Wave" and the liaison officer of the Communist Party of China, calmly sent out the last intelligence during the tense search, generously sacrificed, and the selflessness and dedication of the older generation of revolutionaries were conveyed through the screen, shocking the audience Moving.

　　"What sets this drama apart is that it is not only a combat structure, but also a management structure. Because it is the first time that the communists are faced with such an answer sheet, they have to take an 'examination' in the city. The communists How to solve the people's livelihood problems in Shanghai and even the whole country with the interests of the people as the first consideration from a refined perspective, and how to take the first step in governing a large city under the circumstances of internal and external difficulties, these aspects are what we hope to perform well and transparently. The performance is detailed." Gao Xixi introduced that in terms of specific narrative strategies, the play uses a three-layer structure of "strategic layer, tactical layer, and war layer" to present this period of history, making the play not only have a deep and heavy historical texture, but also Full of ups and downs and exciting dramatic tension, the audience can see how the local Shanghai at that time and how the Communists built a battered Shanghai into a brand new city of new China.

　　According to reports, the script creation of the play started in 2019 and will start in March 2022.

141 scenes, 161 main actors, 5,000 sets of costumes, 75,950 props, a huge amount of special effects production, and 4K/50 frame high-definition technology shooting brought several times the usual rendering time, all efforts are aimed at maximizing Restore this heart-pounding glory days.

　　In terms of the selection of actors, in addition to the special actors familiar to the audience, the play also adopted many new faces to play important roles.

Gao Xixi revealed that the principle of selecting the main actors for "Dawn of the East" is "to have both form and spirit, and to focus on gods".

The representative of them is Chen Yi, an older generation of revolutionaries interpreted by actor Zhang Jiayi and the first mayor of Shanghai after the founding of the People's Republic of China.

The economist Ji Nanyin played by Liu Tao, the mayor's secretary Lu Xiuyuan played by Li Zefeng, and the undercover Tian Guoli played by Qiao Zhenyu are also quite interesting.

　　"Dawn of the East" provides new ideas for the creation of major revolutionary historical dramas with a brand-new face and narrative method, and also improves the overall attractiveness of such themes.

Since the broadcast of the show, it has ranked first in the attention of Kuyun at the same time for three consecutive days. On December 28, the national live broadcast ratings peaked at 1.8357%, and the ratings in 64 cities were 0.92%, ranking first among all CCTV channels at the same time. .

　　Along with the progress of the plot, "Dawn of the East" will successively show complex economic wars, showing all major historical events such as the battle of silver dollars, the battle of grain and cotton, the elimination of enemy agents and the battle of typhoons, and the end of the "big bombing" crisis. The concept of "Shanghai will support the whole country in the future" will gradually emerge.

　　"'A national game of chess' is a unified deployment relationship of 'a game of chess' at a deeper level. It is because of this institutional advantage that we can see that Shanghai, which has recovered its vitality after the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea, has never stopped providing economic support to the whole country." Gao Xixi In my opinion, this is exactly the meaning of the title of the show, "We will tell how a team of the Communist Party stood at the height of 'a national game of chess' and created a miracle that changed the old look of Shanghai."

　　"Beijing Daily" December 30, 2022, Page 11