One day in 2021, Xia Peng took Wu Ershan to the bar. The bar was buzzing with high-frequency sound, light, and electricity. Wuer treated him kindly for a while, then went to pay the bill, "You go ahead and play, I'll leave first." It was only five minutes since he came in. After a while, he told Xia Peng that the special effects for the fight between Zhang Chulan and Zhang Lingyu were processed to have a high-frequency feel.
At that time, they were preparing the movie " Under the Stranger ". Wu Ershan was the director and Xia Peng was the executive director. Wu Ershan set a tone for the movie: watching "The Trilogy of the Gods" is like going shopping. Museum, watching "Under the Stranger" is like disco. At that time, the filming of "The Trilogy of the Gods" directed by him had been completed and was in post-production. The two projects progressed in parallel and eventually went in completely different directions.
Among Chinese directors, few have such a single-minded interest in fantasy themes as Wu Ershan. From " Painted Skin II " to "The Secret of the Dragon" to "The Trilogy of the Gods", the elements of other worlds have always been filled with his works. He also has a strong passion for visual spectacle and is keen to explore different technical methods and visual styles for each fantasy story to create fresh audio-visual experiences. This time, injecting the disco temperament into this Chinese comic story that is popular among "post-00s" is his understanding of the current aesthetic trends of young people, and disco is only the most superficial level.
Superhero movies are very common in foreign movies. In the past decade or so, Marvel has risen rapidly by creating a superhero universe. But whether it is Marvel or DC, whether it is Iron Man or Superman, whether it is the audio-visual carnival of "Avengers" or the dark temperament of "Justice League", the original animation basically only provides characters and stories, and the audio-visual language is still that of traditional movies. techniques. But Wu Ershan is not satisfied with this. He hopes to create a unique film language, which makes "Under the Stranger" contain many audio-visual elements that are not commonly seen in theaters.
Holding the crown of "peak Chinese comic", what kind of style did the movie "Under the Stranger" create?
Concept design drawing of the movie "Under the Stranger". Picture of this article/provided by interviewee
How to shoot "Qi"?
Wu Ershan encountered a problem: how to shoot "Qi"? Qi reads qì, which is the ancient character for "qi".
In the basic setting of the movie "Under the Stranger", living bodies are inseparable from a kind of life energy called "Qi". People who can perceive and control this energy are aliens, and Qi will be transformed into various forms. Such abilities. Zhang Chulan, a male college student who has supernatural powers but is unwilling to enter the alien world, forms an alliance with Feng Baobao, a mysterious girl who has lost her memory and is looking for her life experience, and is involved in the dispute between alien sects.
Almost all the fighting scenes in the story are Qi versus Qi. The Yang Five Thunders mobilize the energy of the heart and lungs, blasting out lightning and thunder; the energy released by the Golden Light Technique is like a flame, covering the whole body; the Prajna Palm has the power of evil charm to stir up people's hearts; the Twelve Labor Love Formation stirs up the twelve meridians through sound waves, until It makes people crazy; usury Qi loans can absorb and lend other people's Qi... Qi is the core of the alien world and the key to establishing the visual language of the film.
This imaginative world of Qi originated from a young man's fantasy. More than ten years ago, a Beijing young man who worked as a chef, security guard, and other odd jobs wandered around until he was about 30 years old. In order to find a serious job, he participated in an art tutorial class and then started drawing comics. At first the submission was rejected, then it was tepid, and finally the third work was officially published. He invoked Taoist culture, extracted elements from it, and borrowed the allusion of "meeting a stranger in the mountains" to create a world of strangers. In February 2015, " Yiren " (later renamed "Under One Person") was launched on Tencent Animation. Later, this cartoonist named Mi Er jumped to the front line.
has been serialized since 2015, and "Under One Person" has exceeded 30 billion views. It is the leading Chinese comic IP popular among comic audiences in the past ten years. Before the film was released, the comic "Under One Man" had been adapted into an animated film and a live-action series.
In the movie story of "Under the Strangers", it is four alien organizations that are causing waves under the surface of the peaceful world. The villains are omnisexuals who are unwilling to be bound by the rules of the alien world. Four of them are called the "Four Crazy".A courier company named "Everywhere" is actually a management organization that maintains the order of the alien world and maintains the balance between the alien world and normal society. There is also Tianyimen, a well-known and upright sect that has been passed down for thousands of years, and Tianxiahui, an emerging non-governmental organization that has developed rapidly with the backing of a 100-billion-dollar conglomerate. In the original comics, the world will gradually expand, linking up with countless characters and grievances in the past.
"In our movie market, there is no such genre as Chinese style superpowers." Xia Peng said that the "Under One Person" comic provides a blueprint, "I think this should also be a genre that young people like."
Superheroes Most of the movies have a concise and clear theme of the confrontation between good and evil. Although "Under the Stranger" also ends with a battle between good and evil, the villain is obviously far from the ultimate "big boss", and there are also a lot of plot clues buried in the story. This movie is obviously just the beginning. In the specially designed barrage at the end of the film, a fictional audience comment was also made: "Is it time for the second film to film the Alien Conference?" The Alien Conference is the most important martial arts competition in the original story.
In this story with a huge world view, which characters and story lines does the movie choose to extract, and ultimately, what theme does it want to convey?
Wu Ershan said that all the surreal settings in fantasy movies will ultimately explore people's spiritual growth and emotional truth. This is the foothold of the story. In "Under the Stranger", the emotional past of Feng Baobao and Xu Xiang's family, as well as the story of Zhang Chulan and his grandfather depending on each other, these two sets of family stories moved Wu Ershan. He believes that a core clue of the entire movie is these two people. Emotional connection with loved ones.
Dance in the theater
In the end, Ur made good use of extremely brilliant colors and rich soundtrack to create a blockbuster-level "Qi". Whether in comics or cartoons, this effect is difficult to achieve. In the
movie, different colors are used to distinguish different Qi, which is extremely gorgeous and exaggerated. Zhang Chulan and Zhang Lingyu, who came from the same martial arts school, had a fight between the Five Yang Thunders and the Five Yin Thunders. The Five Thunders of Yang come from the heart and lungs, showing bright red and white colors, and the Five Thunders of Yin come from the liver and kidneys, showing dark cyan and black colors. When the two sides are fighting, the entire picture is filled with two tones, accompanied by strong light flashes. Wu Ershan said that every time the skills are mobilized, the first thing you see is that the meridians all over the body light up, which is not found in the original work. By grafting the theory of meridians and the five elements, the movie gives Qi a more concrete operating mechanism.
Paired with color is music. Each main character is equipped with exclusive music. When it is their turn to show off their skills, the music will become louder, like a dazzling music video. The strong sense of modeling and comics runs through the highlight scenes of the movie "Under the Stranger". When
Wu Ershan discussed with the music producer, he proposed to create a new music structure of mashup and collage, mixing completely different music styles on the entire sound track to form a current listening experience. "The entire music concept It's a bit like a DJ playing for you." The mix and collage of music also enhances the sense of animation and weakens the realism and violence of each action and fighting scene.
In 2021, a group of young actors entered a training camp. The most important training subject was martial arts. In order to give texture to the large number of action scenes and present a Chinese style, the main creator selected specific boxing types for different martial arts and hired professional martial arts coaches for training. Hu Xianxu , Wu Jiakai practices Bajiquan and Bagua Zhang, Narnaqian specializes in Tongjiquan and Fanziquan, Naran specializes in Snake Quan, Lan Xiya learns Tai Chi, and Li Wanda masters all kinds of boxing techniques... Try to use as many types of boxing as possible It fits the character's personality and the style in the original work. For example, Feng Shayan's punching style in the original work is fast and somewhat similar to Tongjiquan and Fanziquan. The charming image of Xia He is not consistent with the feminine and lingering temperament of Snake Fist. And together.
Naran, who plays Xia He and the femme fatale Daji in "The Trilogy of the Gods", not only has to learn boxing but also pole dancing, which is the most homework.The actors had a 3-hour acting class in the morning and a 4-hour martial arts class in the afternoon. After the long training camp, Li Wanda won the first prize in the women's Bajiquan in the youth group of the Beijing Traditional Martial Arts Championship, and Lan Xiya's Taichi gained "the temperament of a master" Everyone has learned several boxing techniques.
has trained the "Fengshen Proton Team" training camp model, and this time has trained a qualified "Inhuman Girl Team".
When the movie starts filming at the end of 2021, the actors will perform all the action scenes themselves. The set of "Under the Stranger" was densely packed with wires. In this comic story, characters are always flying all over the place. The main creator needed to restore those imaginative stop-motion comics into shots, and he had to be imaginative from shooting to post-production. "The difficulty lies in the advance anticipation and coordination during shooting. There are so many anti-gravity and surreal scenes, many of which have never been seen before." Xia Peng said, "Actors need to train a good sense of balance and strength, and the actors have achieved this. , the photography also needs to be very accurate. The more action scenes you do, the more risk of injury you will have. We should try to do as few action scenes as possible. "
For example, in comics, a person is often kicked around like a pinball. Bounce from this wall to that wall. In the movie, Feng Shayan beat Zhang Chulan like this in a hotel. Wia lifted the actor Hu Xianxu and flipped it back and forth, and the entire scene was shot in one shot. Looking back, Xia Peng felt that this scene, which was not too big, was one of the most difficult scenes and "required very precise design."
Nowadays, most movies are shot with multiple cameras. The same performance can be shot from different scenes and angles for later selection and editing. "The Trilogy of the Gods" was shot by five or six cameras at the same time. But the movie "Under the Stranger" was shot with a single camera, and only one frame was shot at a time. Because comics are all about wide-angle effects, every movie lens is also wide-angle. It can only accommodate one machine at a time, and other machines are very difficult to shoot. It's easy to appear in the picture and get confused.
Single-camera shooting slowed down the pace of filming. The two teams of "Under the Stranger" started working at the same time. Wu Ershan and Xia Peng were each responsible for one team, and a total of 192 shooting days were spent. "This is the price of pursuing this style, and it is also the only way." Wu Ershan said, "If we don't shoot this way, every picture will not be beautiful, tense, and have a sense of comics. That is, every shot must be like Everything painted feels like a well-designed one."
In the past few years, Xia Peng has occasionally looked back at some genre films that he has watched before. The impression that the films were very fast-paced now seems to be very slow. "The drama progresses. The rhythm is very slow, and when you talk about one thing, you just talk about one thing, it’s very monotonous.” It’s not that the movies have changed, it’s that the people have changed. He found that the pace at which he received and processed information became faster. This is the impact of the times on everyone.
What about the mainstream readers of animation, those young viewers who grew up in the age of information explosion? They are bound to take in information and process it faster, so "Underworld" offers a faster pace and more intense drama than the average movie. Xia Peng said that the turning points in each scene are more intensive, new characters appear frequently, and no scene is straightforward.
Wu Ershan said that every scene is very rich and full of entertainment elements. Whether it is action scenes or comedy scenes, they are all done to the extreme, and fashionable and cool elements can be seen everywhere. "I hope the audience will feel like they have attended a big party when watching the movie, listening to two hours of music of various styles, and participating in two hours of disco, carnival and carnival." He said, "I hope that young audiences will enter Cinema, have a hearty audio-visual experience. "
poster of the movie "Under the Stranger".
From "Fengshen" to "Alien"
Director Wu Ershan's most high-profile project in recent years is "Fengshen Trilogy". It took nine years from the project establishment to the release of the first part. The film is still in post-production. Last summer, " Fengshen Part 1" followed a box office curve of opening low and rising high in theaters. As word of mouth continued to ferment, the box office finally jumped to 2.6 billion yuan, and it was jokingly called "lifted out of the ICU."
"The Trilogy of the Gods" will not only bring a mythical epic trilogy that cannot be ignored to the Chinese film market, but also at the film production level, Wu Ershan, who is "technically controlled", will also use this project to explore the film industry and cutting-edge technology. . Judging from the response to the first film, his exploration has gained recognition. Within a year, "Fengshen Part 1" was released in many overseas countries, bringing a Chinese-style blockbuster with world-class production standards to the international market and winning many awards.
As the first new work to start shooting after "The Trilogy of the Gods", Wu Ershan more or less applied the experience of "The Trilogy of the Gods" to the movie "Under the Stranger". Wu Ershan said that one of the most important inspirations is the training of actors. "Based on the step-by-step scientific training, the final performance of the actors is beyond our imagination. Everyone has great potential, but you need to Give actors precise methods and guidance." Similar to "The Trilogy of the Gods", the movie "Under the Stranger" also stars a group of young actors. They are as clean as amateurs. Such long and solid physical training and performance training are no longer enough in the high pace of today's film and television industry. Common.
Some of the filming techniques first used in "The Trilogy" were also used in "Under the Stranger" to create unique visual effects, but the two themes actually have completely different visual qualities. "The Trilogy of the Gods" presents the mythical world in a highly realistic way. The characters, animals, fairy beasts and other characters all pursue realism. Even the virtual non-human characters such as Lei Zhenzi must have a realistic texture. On the contrary, "Under the Stranger" pursues a high sense of form and imagination based on the background of the human real world.
For example, Zhang Chulan’s golden light technique finally uses the effect of the sun’s corona to present a sense of energy and light. Xia He's Prajna Palm emitted sparkling powder and turned into a lotus. "This is not an absolute technical difficulty, but it especially requires artists in the visual effects department to have this kind of beauty, creativity and ideas." Wuershan said.
In the past ten years, domestic animation has entered a period of rapid development. Several IPs similar to "Under One Person" were born and gained loyal followers. The adaptation of the movie "Under the Stranger" may provide an idea for the filming of live-action Chinese comic movies.
After actor Shang Tielong put on makeup that made his nose and ears one size larger, when Mi Er arrived at the set, he saw Zhang Xilin "alive" for the first time in his painting. He was stunned: "The dimensional wall has been penetrated." Some characters The degree of "face-to-face" is amazing, but adaptation that follows the rules of film creation is also necessary. The famous scenes of the original work have basically been preserved. During the script research and preliminary editing stages, they also asked some people to conduct questionnaires on the plot. Based on famous scenes and audience feelings, the rest is film-level production, which is a space for film creators to play.
"I think this type of movie is the style of movie that is most in line with youth culture." Wu Ershan said that he would have wanted to watch such a movie when he was 20 years old, but he didn't have it at that time. Now it is a kind of compensation. . But younger audiences are being lost in theaters, and there are more and more ways to entertain, especially on the small screen. "The essential function of movies is entertainment. I think fewer young people come to theaters because there are more ways to satisfy this demand." Xia Peng said, "So the movie "Under the Stranger" is about being fun."
Nowadays, more good reasons are needed to bring young people back to theaters, such as new film language, new story rhythm, and new movie-watching experience, but this is by no means all.
Reporter: Ni Wei
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