After much hard work, "Love Letter" was completed three days before the Chinese New entire crew cheered excitedly the moment Lu Yanhe announced the completion of the filming.
Of course, the reason they were so excited and thrilled was that they could go home for the New Year.
It was Chinese New Year, and although the New Year's Eve dinner that Zhao Yuheng had prepared at the beginning was not used, Lu Yanhe still asked Zhao Yuheng to give out the red envelopes that he had prepared for everyone on New Year's Eve to everyone as usual.
Lu Yanhe was particularly moved.
"This is my first time as a director. Now that the film has been completed, I still feel like I'm dreaming. I feel like I just finished filming this movie without knowing what's going on." He said with a smile, "It's different from being an actor. I find that when I'm a director, I sometimes don't feel like I'm actually doing anything, because every specific job has to be done by everyone, and I'm only responsible for making requests. I think everyone has complained about me in their hearts."
Everyone at the scene laughed.
"But it seems that being a director is like this, at least that's how I feel. You have to be demanding, you have to be picky, you have to meet the standards that I want, and you have to demand everything that appears in the camera, from the actors' performances to the changes in light. Otherwise, once you feel that you can make do with something, it won't be a problem anymore."
Lu Yanhe took a deep breath.
"I am especially grateful to have met you all in my first film as a director. With your help, we were able to complete this film together. I know many people say that film is the art of directing, but only after being a director do you know that a film cannot be completed by a director alone." Lu Yanhe said firmly, "Our filming has come to an end. We still have to do post-production and then release the film. Then, we may have to go to film festivals and participate in many award ceremonies. This is not the end of our gathering. Let's meet again in the future!"
Chen Bige put a hand on Zhang Ruozhi's shoulder and said, "Tsk tsk, Ruozhi, look at how talkative this mouth is."
Zhang Ruozhi smiled shyly.
She said: "The director seems to be very good at everything he does."
"You're right, he really is a monster." Chen Bige laughed, "After the filming was completed, you went back to school?"
"Yeah." Zhang Ruozhi nodded, "Second year of high school."
Chen Bige thought for a moment, "Maybe this movie will be released when you are in your third year of high school? Or after the college entrance examination?"
"Maybe." Zhang Ruozhi nodded.
"Will you apply to an acting school?" Chen Bige asked.
Zhang Ruozhi starred in "Love Letter", so it is natural for her to become an actress in the future.
She shook her head and said, "I don't have that idea now."
Chen Bige: "That's good too. Study hard, just like Lu Yanhe. If you can get into a good university, you will have more choices in the future. Don't worry about missing out on some opportunities. If you really want to be an actor in the future, come to me or Yanhe, and we will help you find opportunities."
Zhang Ruozhi was flattered and bashfully hummed, "Thank you, sister."
Chen Bige looked at the shy girl Zhang Ruozhi and touched her face lovingly.
"Also, you must be careful and don't let some boys trick you too early." Chen Bige said, "You will meet many excellent boys in the future, do you know?"
Zhang Ruozhi's cheeks turned red with embarrassment.
-
Call it a day, pack up, go home.
During the Spring Festival travel rush, all kinds of tickets are hard to buy.
When Lu Yanhe returned to Yuming exhausted, it was already the 29th day of the lunar year.
Yan Liang has returned to his hometown.
Li Zhibai also returned home.
Lu Yanhe will still go to Chen Siqi's grandparents' house to celebrate the New Year this year.
They won't be performing on the Spring Festival Gala this year, so they will sleep there overnight.
Because there were no strange, unfamiliar relatives visiting, it was actually quite comfortable to spend the New Year at Chen Siqi's grandparents' house. There was no discomfort of having to greet all kinds of strangers.
Chen Siqi's cousin Jiang Huadong was also very funny. He secretly handed him a stack of his photos and said, "Brother Yan He, please sign each photo for me. My parents are too stingy and are very stingy with my pocket money. I will sell your autographed photos to my classmates to supplement my pocket money."
And he is so confident.
After the Chinese New Year, on the second day of the New Year, Lu Yanhe returned to Yuming with Chen Siqi.
Chen Siqi still stayed in the hotel and refused to go back.
This year, they did not choose to travel abroad for vacation, but instead rested together in a hotel for a few days.
Both of them were really tired and needed a good rest.
On the fifth day of the Lunar New Year, Lu Yanhe took Chen Siqi to attend their high school reunion.
More than thirty students came, forming a grand group.
I haven’t seen many of them for three or four years.
This was organized by Li Pengfei and his team. When he was in high school, Lu Yanhe was not very familiar with many of his classmates, and the few he was really familiar with never lost contact with them. This time, when he met everyone, Lu Yanhe felt a deeper sense of intimacy than when he was in school.
Maybe people are just like this. When they meet again after separation, they always have a sense of "reunion after a long separation".
They went back to No. 13 Middle School together and took a group photo in front of the school gate.
The school was empty, with only an old man as the gatekeeper.
The old man saw them taking a photo at the school gate and asked them who they were.
They said they were students who graduated four years ago.
The old man immediately smiled, but when asked if he could go into the school to look around, he shook his hand and said firmly, "No."
This is a man of principle.
The classmate pushed Lu Yanhe out and said, "We are really graduates of No. 13 Middle School. Look, here is Lu Yanhe, an outstanding graduate of our school, a big star. You must know him, right? I'm not kidding you!"
When the old man saw Lu Yanhe, he said, "It's true."
Everyone thought they would be allowed in, but the old man said, "Even Lu Yanhe can't go in! No one else is in the school right now, so no one can go in!"
We can only let it go.
It is rare for Yuming to be so sparsely populated.
Many people went back to their hometowns for the New Year and have not returned yet.
In the end, everyone went to KTV and sang until the early morning before going home.
-
The Spring Festival passed just like that.
Another year.
The senior year has also come to the last semester.
Since they didn't have classes anymore, they didn't have to go back to school so quickly. Lu Yanhe and Chen Siqi looked at houses first and planned to rent another one in Ziyuan Bridge.
The house types in Ziyuan Bridge are similar, but the rent has increased a lot - Lu Yanhe suspected that they were being ripped off.
After all, people all over the country now know that they are definitely not short of money.
In fact, considering their income, it is quite incredible to the agent that they still want to live here.
Although the houses here are expensive, they are only for ordinary people. In the eyes of the real estate agent, with Lu Yanhe and Chen Siqi's current net worth, they should have lived in the top residential area that can only be glimpsed in TV dramas.
This place can only be called a high-end residential area.
Lu Yanhe and Chen Siqi picked and chose, and in the end they were not satisfied with the house, but the price.
When the agent knew this, he couldn't believe it.
"The houses here are very popular. If they are put on the market, they can be rented out very quickly."
"We can pay off the house in two years. Besides, the rent here is not cheap. I don't believe you that it can be rented out quickly." Lu Yanhe said, "I have lived here for almost four years. I know that there are always some houses in this community that are vacant all year round and cannot be rented out."
intermediary:"……"
I forgot that this person is also a permanent resident of this community.
"The rent is indeed a bit higher than when you rented it, but the whole market is going up, not just our area."
The agent's tone also sounded a bit aggrieved.
He thought it was just a little bit more than the market price.
After some final negotiation, the price was reduced a lot and both parties signed the contract with satisfaction.
When leaving, Lu Yanhe murmured to Chen Siqi: "Why do I feel like we were still ripped off? When signing the contract, he didn't feel any pain at all."
Chen Siqi smiled and said, "If he really didn't make any money, he wouldn't have signed with us. It's good enough to just do it."
Lu Yanhe nodded.
As soon as the house was rented, Lu Yanhe and Chen Siqi started another thing: decoration.
The rented house only has hard furnishings, no soft furnishings.
So, they also need to buy a lot of things.
Lu Yanhe and Chen Siqi spent three days visiting the furniture market and buying pots, pans, and utensils before they finally decorated the house.
You can’t move in right after it’s done, the furniture needs to get rid of the odor, and of course, Chen Siqi also has to go back to school.
The house they rented was right next to the house owned by Lu Yanhe, Li Zhibai and Yan Liang. This was Building 17 and that was Building 18, right next to each other.
Li Zhibai and Yan Liang were surprised to learn that Lu Yanhe and Chen Siqi had rented a house next door.
"Damn, we thought you were going to move away soon and be separated from us forever." Li Zhibai said.
"You're exaggerating. Even if I didn't rent in Ziyuan Bridge, but rented somewhere else, it's still in Yuming. How can it be far apart?" Lu Yanhe said, "We can still make appointments often."
"With the nature of our work, even if we live in the same house, it's hard for us to see each other more than a few times a month, let alone not living together." Li Zhibai said, "Especially when playing games, if we don't live together, it's hard to make an appointment just to play games together. So if you live next door, of course it's okay. I can open the window and call you and you can hear it."
There was visible happiness on Li Zhibai's face.
Lu Yanhe then realized that Li Zhibai and Yan Liang had secretly been worried about the possibility that he would move away soon.
But these two people never told him about it.
Although it is said that friends do not have to live together all the time and spend every day together to be friends. However, for the three of them, they have lived together since they were fifteen years old, and it has been almost seven years now. After such a long time, it is not so easy to separate. No one would say something like "I can't bear to leave you" in a sticky way. For boys, such straightforward emotional expression is almost impossible, but these words do not need to be said, and they are tacitly understood.
"We need to celebrate this." Li Zhibai said immediately, "I think we should go out for a meal."
Yan Liang: "Let's have a meal. It's rare that the three of us are here now and haven't joined the group yet."
"When will you join the group? Do you have any arrangements?" Lu Yanhe asked.
Yan Liang shook his head and said, "Not yet this year. I filmed several dramas last year. I won't be joining the crew in the first half of this year. I will probably go to record a variety show as a regular guest."
"I am still reading the scripts. I have a lot of them in stock now, so I am not in a hurry to join the crew," said Li Zhibai.
Lu Yanhe: "So am I the only one who is busy as a dog this year?" "You go ahead and get busy first." Li Zhi smiled.
"It's because you have so many sequels to shoot." Yan Liang also said.
In fact, there are not many sequels that Lu Yanhe is going to shoot, just one "Seventeenth Floor".
The two films, "Burning" and "The Mist", mainly occupied his schedule this year. Especially "Burning", a film took nearly three months to shoot.
Of course, this has something to do with the fact that this movie is set as a blockbuster with many large-scale scenes, which are indeed difficult to shoot.
Moreover, during these nearly three months, Lu Yanhe did not have a scene every day. But after filming so many scenes, Lu Yanhe was finally able to film at a normal pace.
-
Lu Yanhe has action scenes in "Burning Fire", but not many.
This is mainly an oriental fantasy film that constructs a world of rituals.
Lu Yanhe is the only main actor who has not yet finalized his look. Because he was filming "Love Letter" and did not have time to join the crew for the finalization of his look.
That day, Lu Yanhe passed by.
What Lu Yanhe didn't expect was that it would take him more than an hour to do the styling. From hair to makeup - this was the role that took Lu Yanhe the longest to make up. Lu Yanhe was almost numb from sitting so much that he just needed a nap.
Lu Yanhe’s identity in the movie is a student at a magic academy.
They told him that his look was already relatively simple and did not involve any special effects makeup.
For some actors who have special effects makeup, the makeup time is at least three hours.
This is what fantasy blockbusters are like, there are many "inhuman" beings in them.
Lu Yanhe looked at some of the makeup photos of other actors and had a general understanding of the style of these characters in the movie. This is a costume fantasy film with very oriental elements. Indeed, it feels like a Chinese blockbuster.
However, from the styling to the texture of the costumes, you can also see at a glance how much effort the crew put in. Costume dramas are the easiest type of drama for the audience to see whether the quality is good or not. How much investment was made and what standards were achieved can all be seen at a glance.
Fortunately, the movie "Burning" did not become one of those shoddy industrial films.
Ten thousand people also arrived behind.
Ever since Lu Yanhe decided to take on the film "Burning Fire", Lu Yanhe has talked with Wanrenhai many times. They have met privately and chatted online. They have talked a lot and have become quite familiar with each other.
The director, who has a somewhat "creepy" name, is actually a very friendly and funny person.
As for Lu Yanhe's styling, Wanrenhai looked him up and down for a long time, raised several issues, and asked the styling team to redesign Lu Yanhe's look.
These are all very detailed places.
In "Burning Fire", the character Li Wushang played by Lu Yanhe is like a character in every epic or legendary story, a "growing" young character.
In many stories, such a character is often the first-person protagonist.
However, in "Burning Fire", the first-person protagonist is set as a man seeking revenge, the character played by Shang Yongzhou.
But Lu Yanhe still has a lot of scenes in "Burning Fire", which is almost the same as in "Road to Glory". The two of them can almost be said to be the two male protagonists of this movie.
Moreover, if "Road to Glory" is about two people appearing in parallel in a main line, in "Burning Fire", the first half is basically about the two of them each having their own line, sometimes intersecting, sometimes separating, with each carrying half the burden.
However, because Lu Yanhe had never made a commercial blockbuster, and the box office results of the movies he starred in in the past were all stable at hundreds of millions of box office, his salary was much less than Shang Yongzhou, and he could not get a share of the box office. Shang Yongzhou could.
This is why Chen Ziyan told Lu Yanhe at the time that he must make a commercial blockbuster.
As an actor, if you don't want to join the top paid actor club, you can of course continue to make your own movies without having to consider your identity and image in the market. Like Lu Yanhe, he can continue to make movies like "Late Spring" and "Road to Glory" and take hundreds of millions of box office. Compared with their production costs, it is a big hit and a miracle. Lu Yanhe's halo will continue.
However, if Lu Yanhe wants to enter the top paid actor club, he must star in a movie with a box office of over 1 billion or 2 billion, or even a work that ranks among the top 20 in film history. Box office results are always the biggest asset for an actor to negotiate for pay, not shock and surprise in the industry, not how many awards he has won.
The film project "Burning Fire" is one of the top projects in China. There is nothing much to say about Lu Yanhe's choice of it. The director is good, the script is good, the production company has spent money to improve the production quality, and Shang Yongzhou will act with him, so he doesn't have to bear the pressure of the box office alone.
Even if such a blockbuster project fails, the blame will not be directed at him directly.
It may not be very kind or boastful to say this, but this is the reality.
Chen Ziyan also had to consider that if a blockbuster failed, it would not be fatal to an actor, but it would definitely not be a small matter, even for an actor of Lu Yanhe's level. Lu Yanhe was starring in such a blockbuster for the first time, so it would not be a good risk. If Shang Yongzhou was used, if the film was successful, Lu Yanhe's role and setting would bring him great benefits. If it failed, he would not be the first to bear the brunt of the blame.
If she really spoke out all these twists and turns in her heart, it would certainly seem that she didn't trust Lu Yanhe that much, and wasn't so upright. She actually calculated the interests so clearly. To put it bluntly, she wanted to take advantage of the benefits and didn't want to bear the consequences - but in reality, this is the standard for an agent to accept projects for his or her artists.
Shang Yongzhou accepted the leading role on his own initiative, and he was not tricked or forced into it by anyone else.
All actors who take over the role must bear its responsibilities.
Chen Ziyan was just weighing the pros and cons.
-
"I'm actually quite surprised that you're willing to act in 'Burning Fire'."
In the evening, Wanrenhai had dinner with Lu Yanhe, and Wanrenhai said this to Lu Yanhe.
"I was worried before that you might not be interested in this kind of blockbuster." Wanrenhai laughed, "You've starred in so many art films before."
"That's because I haven't had a good blockbuster script like 'Burning Fire' come to me before." Lu Yanhe also made a little commercial boast, "I am willing to act in any type of movie, but sometimes the scripts sent to me are really not good to watch. The script is so perfunctory that even if you were to shoot it, I would feel powerless to save the situation. I don't know why many commercial films that come to me are scripts like this."
Wanrenhai smiled.
"Although everyone is using the word "blockbuster" to describe "Burning", I actually want to act in "Burning" for a very important reason. Director, I have always been interested in this kind of fantasy story with Chinese traditional culture as the background. Just like martial arts works, it creates a world that may not exist in reality. I mean Qinggong and martial arts." Lu Yanhe smiled, "Creating such a world based on reality is just like watching the world's top ten unsolved mysteries when I was a child. For a new world that cannot be found in the real world, there is a natural curiosity and yearning for it. Moreover, I have always felt that our domestic Chinese-language films have never had a representative fantasy film, so after seeing "Burning", I felt a kind of excitement that I have been waiting for a long time."
This is indeed a slight exaggeration of his true feelings.
But the essence did not lie, and this is how Lu Yanhe views "Burning Fire".
If he didn't think the movie could be made well, he wouldn't have taken it.
Wanrenhai said: "This kind of movie, especially with the current production budget. In the past, the technology was not mature, and I thought it could not be made. Now that the technology has finally matured and our domestic market has grown, it may be able to support such a large investment, so I dare to do it."
Even directors are afraid of failure.
Lu Yanhe smiled.
He can also understand Wan Ren Hai very well.
It was only after I became a director myself that I realized how much pressure a director faces when a movie fails.
When he was an actor before, he had never faced this issue so directly. When shooting the movie "Love Letter", the investment was so small, Lu Yanhe often had to face some specific shooting problems such as additional budget, or a scene not being shot smoothly may cause problems in the arrangements for the next few days. These are still some specific problems. The most terrible thing is the pressure of "what if the movie fails and cannot sell at the box office."
Forget the losses—that’s what Lu Yanhe really thought at the time. At worst, he would lose money himself, and at worst, he would pay back the money to every investor out of his own pocket (this idea was also very naive, but he thought so at the time to calm his anxiety). Lu Yanhe was more afraid of something, that he would fail and betray everyone’s trust in him.
Chen Bige was the lead actor in this play. If a play in which he was the lead actor failed, it would also affect Chen Bige's reputation. Not to mention, there were so many people who came to help. If money could be used to settle the debt, he could sell everything he had to pay it back, but he could not pay back these favors and the trust others had in him.
Even "Love Letter" is like this, not to mention "Ten Thousand People's Love Letter".
It doesn't matter what he does, but if he fails, maybe no film company will dare to hire him to make a movie in the next four or five years.
It's that serious.
-
Before Lu Yanhe joined the crew to film "Burning Fire", Zhong Benshuo came to see Lu Yanhe happily.
"Squid Game" has been on Maxine for more than two months and its popularity remains.
Maxine's stock price also soared as a result.
The global popularity of "Squid Game" has exceeded everyone's expectations for the show, including Jong Bon-seok himself.
Zhong Benshuo couldn't help but sigh in his heart, how foresighted he was in valuing and befriending Lu Yanhe. He had long forgotten that there were actually some unpleasant things between him and Lu Yanhe.
This time, Zhong Benshuo came to ask Lu Yanhe about the progress of the second season of "Squid Game".
The overseas streaming rights for the first season of Squid Game were not authorized by Lu Yanhe, but by Northern Lights Video. The copyright for the first season is not in Lu Yanhe's hands, but in Northern Lights' hands. However, according to information known to Zhong Benshuo, the copyright for the second season of Squid Game will be shared by Lu Yanhe and Northern Lights Video, which means that Lu Yanhe can also influence the result of which streaming media the second season is licensed to.
Zhong Benshuo knew very well how close Lu Yanhe was to HP. The short film "Night Run" was snatched away by HP. Later, several of Lu Yanhe's plays were also booked in advance by HP, and Maxine had nothing to do with him.
If the second season of a drama like "Squid Game" was pre-empted by other places, then Jong Ben-seok could just send his resignation letter to his boss's email.
Lu Yanhe quickly figured out the purpose of Zhong Benshuo's visit.
In fact, Zhong Benshuo still doesn't know Lu Yanhe well enough. If Maxine hadn't made such a fuss, Lu Yanhe wouldn't have rashly changed the platform for the second season after the success of the first season.
Changing to another platform means giving up the foundation of previous success. After all, although there are many people who have membership accounts on two platforms at the same time, there are also many people who only watch dramas on one platform.
Just like after JK Rowling and Warner collaborated on the first Harry Potter movie, there must have been other companies that wanted to poach the sequel with high-value contracts - the rights to develop the sequel to Harry Potter have always been in the hands of JK Rowling, not Warner. However, in this case, JK Rowling did not choose to cooperate with another film company, but instead collaborated with Warner on eight films and also created a series of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.
Why many people with bad relationships can still continue to cooperate - because they have common interests.
The same is true between Lu Yanhe and Zhong Benshuo.
But Lu Yanhe didn't intend to let Zhong Benshuo feel at ease so soon.
He just hesitated and refused to say that there would definitely be a second season for Maxine. He only said that the script had not been written yet and he had not thought about it.
What Lu Yanhe didn't expect was that Zhong Benshuo offered a very exaggerated number.
"This is not for Squid Game, it's for you, Lu Yanhe." Zhong Benshuo said, "As long as you agree to give the subsequent broadcast rights of the Squid Game series to Maxine, Maxine will pay you 50 million US dollars in creative service fees."
Fifty million US dollars is about three hundred million RMB.
Even Lu Yanhe was shocked by this number.
Is this... the dizzy feeling of being hit by money?
"Yanhe, you have always known that our Maxine is sincere in wanting to cooperate with you." Zhong Benshuo said, "This creative service fee is not only paid to you to obtain the subsequent broadcasting rights of "Squid Game", but also to express our appreciation to you. I still say that if you are willing to tailor a drama for Maxine, you will get a unique treatment in this world, which you can't get anywhere else."
Lu Yanhe: "..."
He looked at Zhong Benshuo, hesitated for a long time, and wanted to ask, is their Maxine so rich?
Of course, Lu Yanhe knew that the money these streaming platforms gave was extremely exaggerated.
In both worlds before and after the time travel, streaming media seems to play the role of "local tycoon" - it's not that they are local, but that they really give money as if it is not money.
Amazon offered Phoebe Waller-Bridge, the star and screenwriter of Fleabag, a three-year cooperation agreement with an annual salary of 20 million US dollars. The most exaggerated thing is that Amazon renewed her contract even though she did not make any series for Amazon in these three years.
Not to mention, the two sequels of "Knives Out" directly brought "007" Daniel Craig a salary of up to $1 million.
Sometimes, Lu Yanhe also wondered when he would be able to sign such a contract.
Unexpectedly, without any warning, Zhong Benshuo came with such an agreement.
It's simply a money-giving agreement.
The 50 million US dollars does not include the normal procurement costs for the sequel to "Squid Game". It is called "Creative Service Fee". To put it bluntly, it is a goodwill check written by Maxine to Lu Yanhe.
Lu Yanhe took a deep breath silently, so as not to appear too "inexperienced". He remained calm, unmoved, and as steady as a rock.
"Mr. Zhong, I admit that you and Maxine are indeed very sincere in your attitude."
Lu Yanhe looked at Zhong Benshuo and said word by word, "But before the official preparations, we are not in a hurry to decide who will be the sequel to Squid Game."
Zhong Benshuo finally asked the question.
"Yanhe, what do you want?" Zhong Benshuo said, "We can't let Squid Game fall into the hands of others."
Lu Yanhe blinked his eyes. No attitude or emotion could be seen on his face, only a polite smile: "Let me think about it carefully, and you should continue to think about it carefully. We can talk about this issue later." (End of this chapter)
