Which seat does the director like to sit in when watching movies? What is it like for a director to watch a movie with his family?
People often ask, where does your director like to sit in the cinema when watching a movie? I remember the president of the American Motion Picture Association came to visit ten years ago, and I asked him the same question. He held back his answer and asked me instead. I smiled and replied, I must sit in the first row on the right. He wondered why. I said that film directors need to look back at the audience's reaction. Whether the audience is crying or laughing during a scene, whether they are concentrating or playing on their mobile phones, it is only there that it is clear at a glance. Once, the Film Association held an annual screening of a movie. Rows of viewers were all in tears. The light reflected on the screen made the tears form a bright line, which was truly a spectacle. Therefore, to check whether the play has achieved the preset effect, the front row and the side are the best positions. Later, I gradually got used to it. When watching other people's movies, I often choose that seat.
If you want to hear feedback about the movie, you have to learn from the founder. The experience of Bu Wanchang, the first-generation director in China, is that he has to wait until the movie is over. When the lights come on and the audience gets up, the director should blend in with the audience, move out at the slowest pace, and stretch his ears to listen to the audience. What, "It's so funny", "So-and-so's acting is awesome", "I'm in tears", these are definitely the truth, write them down and analyze them later. As for those symposiums, due to various humanities and sophistication, you can only listen to them and forget them.
Some people also like to ask, what is it like for a director to watch a movie with his family? I think about it, when I watch various Kung Fu Masters Once Upon a Time, I will always recite the words: stand-in, myself, myself, stand-in, stand-in, stand-in, stand-in, stand-in...myself! Because a large number of martial arts stand-ins are always used in making movies, the large panoramic scenes where the audience cannot see the face are all done by stand-ins, and only professionals can easily tell the difference. Later, my family members were so disturbed by me that they were no longer moved by watching romantic movies, and started discussing with me whether the tears in the corner of the actor's eyes were sodium hyaluronate eye drops.
There are actually many skills in watching movies. For example, there are always viewers who are late and try to get in in the dark. I often feel bad for them. The best thing to do is to stand on the sidelines for a while and wait for the next day scene. Movies can be divided into day and night scenes. Night scenes are a nightmare for the film crew. They have to stay up all night to finish shooting. Of course, they are also a nightmare for latecomers - they cannot see clearly when walking. However, movies cannot always be night scenes, and the director always wants to change the atmosphere for the audience. As long as latecomers wait patiently for the next day scene, they can walk to their seats without hesitation, because the venue is already lit up.
In the director's opinion, the movie is nothing more than a hypnosis. The cinema is a large empty box with a white cloth hanging on it. When the lights are dimmed, the audience cries and laughs at the shadows on the cloth. They feel uncomfortable, happy, frightened, and warm for an hour or two. When the light came on, it was still the same white cloth, with nothing else. It was like a dream, like dew or lightning. It seems that the only difference is that the soul seems to have been cleansed. You say, if this is not hypnosis, what is it?
I have participated in several of the largest A-class film festivals in the world and participated in competitions. Almost every film festival has a section that pays tribute to classics. I remember there was a classic documentary titled "From Mao Zedong to Mozart", which was shot by foreigners in China. I hadnāt seen it, so I took my VIP pass to find the film schedule. It is much easier to sit in the cinema and enjoy the film festival watching time than to participate in the competition. This is a documentary that has won an Oscar and a special award at the Cannes Film Festival. In 1979, when Sino-US relations were warming up, a film crew followed the world-famous violin master Stern on his visit to China, using the camera to unveil China. A typical "West looking at the East". Western audiences must be curious that in a large Eastern country, there are actually people learning Western music, including many violins and oboes. If you were to go to another continent and find people learning Peking Opera there, would you shoot more scenes? Stern visited Beijing, then transferred to Shanghai, and naturally went to the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, the palace of music. I grew up in a family home in Shangyin, so I was familiar with and surprised by all this. I also seemed to understand that watching this film was actually a subconscious choice. Familiar composers, performers, music prodigies, and familiar buildings appeared in front of us.As the movie was coming to an end, suddenly, I spotted my mother in the movie. You know what it feels like, a "buzzing" sound in my mind. Although my mother's camera flashed by, that was my mother. I could quickly distinguish her among hundreds of people. That's what she looked like back then, in her forties, with the typical glasses and hairstyle of that era, almost exactly the same as the Chinese female diplomats in the newsreel of Nixon's visit to China. At the end of the film, my mother appeared again. This was an academic conference to receive Stern. As an interviewer at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, my mother sat directly behind Stern, opposite a group of leading professors in the Shanghai music industry. I really wanted to push the audience next to me and tell them everything I saw, but they couldn't understand me. Even I want to laugh, this is just a fantasy.
Back in China, I asked my nearly 90-year-old mother, did you know that the Oscar documentary filmed you? My mother said, God knows, at that time reporters from TV stations often came to take pictures. Who took what pictures, I canāt remember. (Liangshan)
