Recently, a symposium themed “Flowers—The Triumph of Fiction and Narrative Art” was held in Shanghai. The symposium invited four guests, Cheng Liang, co-director of the TV series "Flowers", Li Weichang, vice president of Shanghai Literature and Art Publishing House, writer btr, and Zhang Pingjin, professor of the Chinese Department of the School of Humanities of Tongji University, to discuss the popularity of "Flowers". The charm under different paths of literature and film and television narrative.
Symposium scene
"Flowers" had already caused a wave of discussion in the literary world when it was published. This time, with the broadcast of the drama "Flowers", Jin Yucheng's works have once again entered everyone's sight.
As the publisher of "Flowers", Li Weichang, vice president of Shanghai Literature and Art Publishing House, said: "The influence of a TV series on a book is immeasurable. It took less than 20 days after the series of "Flowers" was launched Within a short period of time, it has driven the sales of nearly 300,000 copies. And this number is still rushing forward, which can be said to be full of stamina." At the same time, the growth of the work "Flowers" in the field of digital reading is also very obvious. On the digital reading platform Tomato Novels, it has reached a peak of over one million readers.
Back to the beginning of writing "Flowers", "When Jin Yucheng started writing on the forum, his ID name was 'Du Shang Pavilion'. Because he wrote in Shanghai dialect, he just wrote one or two paragraphs , someone started to reply. Soon Teacher Jin discovered that readers of some paragraphs kept replying, while readers of some paragraphs did not respond so well, so he began to consciously make adjustments, and so on, until finally published, a total of He wrote more than 300,000 words - this is a very good writing method for online novels. The response and encouragement from readers on the forum were also the most important thing he thought he was able to write." Li Weichang introduced during the discussion, "So Teacher Jin later spent It took a long time to restructure and personify that part of the forum network, and adjust the events and time. We will see that in his story, the two timelines have been interspersed, presenting a chapter one after another. Structure."
Cheng Liang, co-director of the TV series "Flowers", also plays Jingxiu in the play.
Talking about his reading experience of the novel "Flowers", Cheng Liang believes, "I clearly feel that it relies on one story after another, "It is composed of small chapters." Therefore, before joining the crew of the "Flowers" TV series, Cheng Liang was also reflecting on whether such a structure could be restored in a film and television drama. "Later, I also asked my family who had watched "Flowers" "The elders in the north of the TV series, they clearly said that they would be attracted by some of the business wars and stock plots on Yellow River Road. Relatively speaking, the parts of Tokyo at night in "Flowers", including some of the conflicts in the Shanghai market, I think Audiences across the country may not be able to get those points."
"So what I understand about Director Wong Kar-wai's intention in filming is that he used the Yellow River Road as the face, and the night Tokyo, the city life, as the lining, and combined punches to attack." Cheng Liang explain.
Speaking of the characters in the film and television drama "Flowers", Zhang Pingjin shared: "The one I admire more is Lingzi. There is a saying in the original work of "Flowers" that Shanghai women have the characteristics of three words - Zuo, Si, Jing, this This is most vividly reflected in Lingzi; Miss Wang, I think she has more of a little person character, closer to the grassroots nature of Hong Kong and a spirit of struggle; Li Li has a sense of mystery, and I think she is very beautiful, with a kind of The richness of static."
Cheng Liang, who participated in the filming of "Flowers", said that Ma Yili, who plays Lingzi on the set, is also very stubborn. She always holds her breath and never admits defeat.
Stills from "Flowers". Ma Yili as Lingzi
Time is the most complex part presented in the work, and it is also the word mentioned most frequently by the guests during the discussion. Obviously, both the original work and the series, "Flowers" are trying to recreate the time in Shanghai's memory in the 1990s.
"Things in the 1970s and 1980s were very stable. The imprint of the times and the image of the world were stable. The 1990s happened to be a time period with various elements mixed together, which was very complicated. The pictures of the 1990s were in time After settling down, a more wonderful sense of conflict will emerge."According to Cheng Liang's recollection, Director Wong Kar-wai spent a lot of effort to restore the scenes of the year during the filming process.
"For example, the office of '27 on the Bund'. I don’t think I have ever seen such a detailed scene. All the seals and replicas of everything in this scene are almost everything that could be found in the Bund Financial Institution at that time. "
Cheng Liang also said that Director Wong Kar-wai's work was extremely meticulous. He not only invited several of the Five Golden Flowers from "27 on the Bund", but also invited many veterans of Shanghai Film Studio as consultants on site. For the wooden handle of a spittoon, the filming can be stopped and the carpenter can re-carve it on the spot. It is through their continuous debugging and polishing of this work that such shots can be presented. It can be said that this film and television series is also It’s accumulated over time. “This kind of breathing and this texture are different. "Wong Kar-wai also put a lot of effort into character creation. For example, in order to highlight Miss Wang's boundless energy, "he suggested that Miss Wang should not only eat all the time, but also shake her legs while eating. "
Stills of "Flowers". Tang Yan plays Miss Wang.
btr believes that both Jin Yucheng and Wong Kar-wai are very good at using the media they are familiar with to achieve a very unique style.
For example, in the film and television drama "Flowers", Wong Kar-wai's use of mirrors Use, "This drama places great emphasis on using mirrors to achieve the effect of overlaying images and using mirrors to show people's inner activities. Sometimes as an audience, you only realize after looking through the mirror for a long time that this is a scene shot in a mirror. For example, A Bao is Using his left hand to pick up the food, you can tell that it was taken in a mirror, and the mirror also caused the scene mise-en-scène. "
" As a Shanghainese, this film touched many of our memories of the 1990s. The 1990s was a prosperous time. If many things were not said, written, or recorded on film and television, we might have forgotten them long ago. "Btr also said that the book and the series bring people back to the past in different ways. "The whole life scene has a natural sense of familiarity. "
Zhang Pingjin shared "Flowers" in the context of Shanghai-style literature: "In the context of Shanghai-style literature, the most famous and representative literary work in modern times is "Biographies of Shanghai-style Flowers". We often compare "Flowers" with "Biographies of Shanghai Flowers". Teacher Jin Yucheng recreates the core texture of Shanghai culture in contemporary times from the perspective of language and culture. The TV series "Flowers" and the novel "Flowers" are like parallel universes, but both parallel universes have created their own different and unique aesthetics, and at the same time they are closely related to the entire Shanghai culture as a literary and artistic source. There are borders. "
Stills of "Flowers". Hu Ge plays A Bao
Zhang Pingjin also believes that the change from A Bao to Mr. Bao in the TV series "Flowers" embodies the rhythm of the transformation of Shanghai's urban civilization and our entire society in those years. came out - precisely in those few years, society showed a spurt of development, all kinds of things were entering, all kinds of memories were resurrected, and all kinds of dreams began to fly... "Flowers" provides some of the new things that emerged in that era. Symptoms, in this work there are people looking down from the third floor of Zhizhen Garden, some looking up from the third floor, and some looking up from the bottom. Various social class characters have appeared, For us to recall, imagine, and feel that era.
Li Weichang also commented: "Flowers" 10 years ago was a story of "Flowers", and "Flowers" 10 years later is the twin swords of Wong Kar-wai and Jin Yucheng Perfect combination.
Today's "Flowers" is like a universe, with rich imagination space, providing us with countless angles to approach it and talk about it. A turn, a look back... including 57 classic old songs interspersed in it, are all talked about by everyone. Outside of the drama, returning to this work, it should be a story worth telling and worthy of being given imagination to everyone.
