Preach in words. - Don Tears
After the peak of the 70s and 80s.
Every ten years, Hong Kong films decay by one point, which of course is also in line with the law.
With the mid-1990s, Jackie Chan, Chow Yun-fat and Jet Li, a ceiling-level actor, left Hollywood, and the rivalry between the two decades of "double Monday Cheng" slowly came to an end, and other actors who had been suppressed before began to shine.
Zhou Xingchi, as the only remaining giant, is as strong as ever, and every time he shoots, he can stand out from the crowd.
If you look at it from the perspective of historical box office data, the inflection point of Hong Kong films in the 1990s actually began in 1992.
This year is known as the "Year of Stephen Chow", when he single-handedly won the top five box office charts, broke his box office records twice in the same year, and the last place in the top ten box office lists also exceeded 30 million, that is, "Police Story III. Super Police" directed by Tang Jili and starring Jackie Chan.
After 1995, the last place in the top ten list fell below 20 million, and by the end of the century, it almost fell below 10 million, and after 1998's "The World dominated the world" won 41.53 million at the box office, the annual crown figures for two consecutive years were quite unsatisfactory, with Stephen Chow's "King of Comedy" in 1999 less than 30 million, and Andy Lau's "Lonely Man and Widow" in 2000 was only 35 million.
The entire film circle began to panic, and "bailout" became a hot word.
In this context, "Infernal Affairs", which gave birth to the collection of four major film emperors, included three "veteran film emperors" Zeng Zhiwei, Huang Qiusheng and Liang Chaowei, as well as a "new film emperor" Andy Lau. The film successfully created a police classic, but also spawned a number of follow-up works, such as "Black and White Forest", "Black and White Road" and some unknown small-cost works, and then the undercover genre is endless.
In 2002, "Infernal Affairs" was released, and it won the annual championship of the year with 55.05 million box office, barely reaching the level of "God of Gamblers 2" and "Red Fan District" in the middle of the last century, but the film market did not get any boost, and the downward trend was the same as ever.
Unlike "Infernal Affairs", which shouts "rescue the city", the silent Zhou Xingchi is almost single-handedly supporting the overall situation.
He made three shots in the 2000s, won three annual championships, and broke records twice, including "Shaolin Soccer", which exceeded 60 million for the first time, a year before "Infernal Affairs", and "Kung Fu" set a new record three years later.
Therefore, the theory of "saving the market" of infernal affairs is not very sufficient, on the contrary, on the basis of the historical accumulation of Hong Kong films, it is more commendable because of the exquisite newness of the script and the change of performance ability and technique. In particular, Liang Chaowei's performance has left a strong mark in the history of Chinese film.
As we all know, the script of "Infernal Affairs" was inspired by Wu Yusen's "Changing Faces".
Mai Zhaohui put forward the initial idea, and wrote a complete script, sent it to Zhuang Wenqiang, Zhuang Wenqiang revised it and sent it back. Later, Liu Weiqiang proposed to add a clue that the gangster was undercover, and this idea strengthened the script again, but the classic plot of Wu Yusen's "Hot Hand Detective" ten years ago was originally brought to the pot, and it is not known whose idea it was.
With the script in place, the next challenge is investment.
In fact, Hong Kong movies have always been characterized by small-cost operations, so they are not elaborate in terms of scenes and costumes, but this is actually a long-term drawback of Hong Kong films, which is rough and not exquisite enough. At this point, "Infernal Affairs" is a good start, and after another ten years of "Cold War", the rigor of the script and the elaboration of the production have gone one step further.
Going around, Hong Kong Huanya Film took the shot and finalized the project with an investment of more than 20 million yuan.
Many parties worked together to forge this classic work of police bandits.
Less than a decade later, Infernal Affairs II came online in the line of fire.
And just two months later, Infernal Affairs III returned.
A year later, almost all three films in the original series were released.
This speed may only be achieved by Hong Kong movies.
Compared with the first part of the series, the prequel "Infernal Affairs II" is more like a gangster epic.
The plot is centered on the Ni family of the gang in Tsim Sha Tsui, although the idea of mutual undercover infiltration in the first part is continued, but the perspective focuses on the internal struggle of the gang, and the police drama is more like an auxiliary, taking a back seat.
It is said that this is a "hurry" film because in just a few months, from the creation of the script to the shooting and to the finishing of the film, and it is almost two sequels at the same time, even in Hong Kong, which is known for its efficiency, it is quite jaw-dropping.
Therefore, on the basis of the first borrowing from Wu Yusen's "Hot Hand Detective", the second part is more biased, or too late to do more originality, and the main structure in the middle directly "pays tribute" to the 1972 American gangster movie "The Godfather", which is also the reason why many people say that Wu Zhenyu's performance has an "imitation" component.
But look at the problem in two parts.
If you count from the release of the world's first film "Landhay Garden Scene" in 1888, the birth of the film has exceeded a hundred years, during which there are countless classics and master actors.
Has anyone ever heard of something that can make an actor's performance the pinnacle of imitation alone?
In addition to the two protagonists of the first part, the main creative team retained all the others, and joined Liu Jialing, Wu Zhenyu and Hu Jun, Zhang Yaoyang, Liao Qizhi five actors, and the core is Huang Qiusheng and Zeng Zhiwei, and the screenwriter gave them a large number of tension and dramatic conflicts.
But the end result was reversed.
Wu Zhenyu plays the role of the fourth rank, mainly anti-guest.
And "Infernal Affairs II" gave Huang Qiusheng a plot design similar to the first Liang Chaowei.
The one-man show in which Huang Zhicheng's (Huang Qiusheng) boss Lu Qichang (Hu Jun) was killed was completed by Huang taking a minute and a half to complete, crying and beating his chest, but far less shocking than the first Liang Chaowei's 20 seconds. Huang Qiusheng himself is also known for his acting skills, but the comparison between the two is really a high judgment.
Tsang also faces a variety of tests of choice, including the impactful role of losing a loved one.
Wu Zhenyu replaced Liang Chaowei in the first part with a dedicated creation and overwhelmed the audience.
He is like a machine with precision computing power, turning every frame into his personal stage in a very limited appearance time.
This ability is only possessed by a handful of actors in Hong Kong.
In this movie, he completely lost the neurotic, vulgar, or tyrannical performance mode in "Ancient Puzzle Boy", "Burst Policeman", "Gunfire", "Juliet and Liang Shanbo", and a new Wu Zhenyu came out.
His performance is calm and restrained, but it is also unmatched in precision, which is called true "creation".
And the role of Ni Yongxiao, the original intention of the screenwriter is actually marginalized, and all Wu Zhenyu needs is to go through the motions and point to the end.
Judging from the combing of the scenes, Wu Zhenyu probably accounted for less than thirty minutes of the two-hour movie, and most of them were fragmented and group plays, and there were only six coherent scenes, which was not a one-man show, which was the reason why his character "went through the stage" above.
But the strength of his acting ability is therefore more prominent.
Therefore, in this "Infernal Affairs II.", Wu Zhenyu, who ranked fourth in the cast list, was nominated for the 23rd Academy Awards.
Before the results came out, he was dressed in a pink Tang costume and was determined to win, but in the end he was very popular and lost to Andy Lau of "Big Guy".
But what was more distressing was that he still had to stand up and hug Andy Lau, sit down, and then continue to smile at people with a slap on the wrist.
Years later, he said in an interview that attending the awards ceremony requires acting skills. If it is your own award, if it is an opponent to win the award, how to do it, in fact, it is full of bitter experience.
Then it took thirteen years for him to get his next nomination.
This year's Wu Zhenyu came with the fringe theme "Turbid Water Rafting".
Good luck and bad luck are actually fate.
And your efforts.
In fact, everyone can see it.