was at the scene of the Golden Rooster Awards ceremony. Ju Wenpei won the best original music award.
Maybe many viewers are not familiar with Ju Wenpei. In recent years, Ju Wenpei has basically been doing behind-the-scenes work. For example, this award is to make original music for "Gutian Bugle".
But my biggest impression of Ju Wenpei comes from the classic small-cost comedy "Starting Now" starring Fan Wei in 2008. Although
has been seen two or three times, it is still so funny.
"Starting Now" should be the best domestic comedy after Ning Hao Crazy Stone. However, after the film was released on the National Day file that year, the box office was not very good, and it only received 6.66 million box office. The box office of
is estimated to be at a loss, so director Liu Jiang and heroine Ju Wenpei basically have no chance to make a movie afterwards. It's a pity to think about it now, because although this movie has a lot of flaws, the overall laughter is still very strong, especially the scenes of Fan Wei, which are really funny. I think this is the best domestic comedy in the years since Ning Hao's "Crazy Stone". Of course, "Crazy Racing" in 2009 and "Thailand" in 2012 are even better comedy movies.
However, during the period from 2003 to 2008, domestic comedy films basically had very few impressive works, and "Starting Now" should be regarded as the general among the dwarfs.
Let me give you a comprehensive analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of this movie, and why it lost the box office that year.
1. Advantages of "Departure Now" as a comedy
The aspect of "Departure Now" I admire most is that its comedy design is really thoughtful, and it won't make people feel embarrassed or ridiculous. It's not like those domestic third-rate comedies, which rely on shit, piss, and exaggerated movements and expressions to tickle you.
For example, even Wang Baoqiang's many performances in "Thailand" are actually such low-level techniques.
The whole movie "Starting Now" basically does not have such exaggerated expressions. It uses this kind of scene design to make jokes. It is really advanced and very good. The comic effect can be seen in the first shot of
"Starting Now". It was a bathroom pool. A fat guy with a back-up tattoo was taking a bath, and then three people came in suddenly, apparently looking for someone.
didn't find anyone, and the three left. The fat man continued to take a bath with peace of mind. Then suddenly a man came out of the pool, and he was shocked. The beginning of
is very interesting. The beginning of the
movie also set the tone of the whole movie. I will not reveal the specific plot. Anyway, the main joke of this movie is chasing the scene, with various misunderstandings and various unexpected contrasts. Comedy movies are mainly of this kind of routine, but the key is whether you can play new ideas.
Let’s take an example. After Fan Wei’s clothes were gone in the movie, he became a young man. The crew head played by Liu Hua borrowed his costume, which was the uniform of the ancient head-catcher. It’s also very funny. The police said, this is a colleague, and another policeman said this is a senior.
Right, this is also a joke made by scenario design.
Of course, the key to "Starting Now" being an excellent comedy is the actor, especially the starring Fan Wei. He is a bit like Ge You, which is the kind that makes you laugh all of a sudden, is the kind of stubbornness.
Fan Wei became famous as a sketch actor, and the most famous image is probably the "Jie Ge Se" clip in "A World Without Thieves".
is this kind of feeling, looking honestly, very honest and honest, not bad. There are too few scenes in "A World Without Thieves", which affects Fan Wei's performance.
In "Starting Now", Fan Wei is like a fish in the water, showing the kind of honest people who are stubborn. A lot of the laughter is hidden in Fan Wei's faintness.
Fan Wei plays the role of a middle-aged man doing business abroad, Cui, whose wife is divorced. He is about to take a taxi to go abroad. He meets the drunk heroine, played by Ju Wenpei, in a taxi on the road. He kindly sent Xiaoxia home, but the other party's clothes were dirty. Seeing that the flight time was still early, Old Cui washed clothes in the girl's bathroom alone.
As a result, Xiaoxia woke up drunk and found that there was a strange man in her house, of courseVery scared.
kicked Lao Cui outside the door.
Then we watched Fan Wei stand alone at the door with a dumbfounded look. This kind of honest person's stubbornness and the scenes he encountered have formed a very strong humorous effect.
This is how the advanced comedy is played. The character and story of the characters must be perfectly integrated, because the development of the plot and the development of the situation create jokes. In addition to the actor Fan Wei, the performance of the heroine Ju Wenpei is also remarkable in this movie.
, especially her combination with Fan Wei, is very wonderful. Fan Wei belongs to the kind of middle-aged man, the kind of Yan La Biao; the heroine played by Ju Wenpei is young and lively, and the combination of the two has produced a lot of funny jokes.
The scene in the bathroom between her and Ju Wenpei mentioned above is like this. There are many more behind
.
In short, there are not many spoilers. Let's check it out. It's really fun.
and the emotional drama between Ju Wenpei and Fan Wei is also quite fun. In a movie of more than an hour, the process of two people from not knowing each other to getting acquainted and finally coming together is not abrupt at all. This is very difficult.
A comedy movie can make the audience feel funny, and it is really funny, which is very good. Judging from this aspect, few domestic comedies can surpass "Starting Now".
2. Why did "Start Now" fail at the box office?
is still a funny comedy in general, and I'm sorry for the quality of this movie at the box office.
We see that in the 2008 Chinese movie rankings, "Departure Now" only ranked 64, with a box office of only 6.66 million.
, the best domestic comedy at the box office this year, is the summer cottage comedy "Nine Perfections". The film director is Li Xiang’s husband, Wang Yuelun, starring William Li, Huang Yi, Deng Jiajia, and Dao Ge Liu Hua in the supporting role.
"Perfect and Nine Beauty" is actually a lot of funny points, Deng Jiajia's line "Bungee, you bungee" is still very fun.
However, as a comedy, neither the male protagonist William William nor the female protagonist Huang Yi have any comedy cells. The whole movie story is completely patchwork and nonsense. Although there are many laughs, the whole story is really sparse.
However, this movie was considered a dark horse in the summer season and won 50 million at the box office. In 2008, this was a great achievement. Even the box office of "Hold Call" starring Louis Koo and "The Beauty of the Country" starring Andy Lau was not as high as "Nine Beauty".
Oh, everyone noticed that there was also a "Peach Blossom Luck" starring Ge You that year. It was a terrible film. With Ge You's super popularity, it actually had 30 million box office.
So, compared with these two comedies, "Departure Now" is really wrong. Regarding the quality of the movie and the degree of laughter, "Peach Blossom" is a bad film, just to make money under the banner of Ge You; "Perfect and Nine Beauty" although it has some laughs, it is very copycat and vulgar, and it is not good. As a result, both of them had very high box office, but "Departure Now" didn't even have a box office of tens of millions, and the loss was serious.
Because of the outstanding box office of "Perfect and Nine Beauty", Wang Yuelun continued to shoot a "Panda Hero" the following year. This time it really broke the skyline.
also failed at the final box office, and Wang Yuelun finally stopped coming out to toss.
However, Wang Yuelun still had a sequel film, the director of "Starting Now" Liu Jiang, and the heroine Ju Wenpei basically no film was made.
Speaking of the reasons, I think it will be in 2008. The box office of a movie is mainly based on the popularity of the leading actor and the publicity and hype, which is not too much related to the quality of the movie.
, like "Crazy Stone", completely relies on excellent quality to break through. It requires good luck and the movie is really good to have hope.
"Departure Now" does not have the quality of "Crazy Stone", nor does it have the popularity of "Peach Blossom" Ge You, and even the two leading actors of "Perfect Nine Beauty" are very famous. Fan Wei alone cannot hold the box office.
In addition, our audience, in 2008, the aesthetic level was not as high as it is now.
In fact, in 2008, there was another movie that suffered particularly badly. It was directed by Cao Baoping."Li Mi's Conjecture" starring Zhou Xun, Zhang Hanyu and Deng Chao.
This is basically Zhou Xun’s best acting film, and has won numerous awards. But in the end, the box office was just over 10 million, which is undoubtedly a loss.
So in 2008, the environment of the domestic film market was not very good. Really good movies may not be able to sell. In fact, this situation has continued for many years.
The Wang Qianyuan we mentioned earlier, "The Piano of Steel" shot in 2011, is really a classic of domestic films, even the China Youth Daily and other media have reported it. How about the final box office? It's only 6 million, which is not as good as "Starting Now".
In short, many of the best domestically produced films have been buried in those years.
"Same Day Departure" was unsuccessful at the box office, and Ju Wenpei rarely appeared in movies afterwards. Because she is the host of the movie channel, she later starred in some main theme movies, but there was no response, and then she retreated behind the scenes.
Sometimes the fate of an actor is like this. Once a drama is on fire, you can go on smoothly by seizing an opportunity; if the opportunity is not seized, there may be no future.
So "Starting Now" is really a pity. Such a funny and fun movie has such a bad box office. When it is released now, how can it start at 500 million, and 1 billion is not a problem.
I think, what we can do now is to watch these movies more, discuss and discuss more, so that these movies do not sink in the Internet.
As long as we have been watching and discussing, then the life of these movies will always exist. The most feared thing about a literary and artistic work is that no one pays attention to it, that is really lost in the dust of history.
So, if you have time, please go to "Starting Now" again, and also to watch "Li Mi's Conjecture" and "The Piano of Steel" which were once buried good domestic movies.
