Chapter 617: Chapter 614: A Second Bloom (4)
It was impossible to tell that these two people had just been dissing each other and backstabbing each other.
Moreover, before the shooting started, when Director Sun Wujiu was explaining the scene to the two actors, Xia Siyu and Bo Yan seemed to have a quarrel over a trifling matter, and even their assistants started to join the fray.
Anyway, Wei Jingjing and Song Fengzhi also didn’t see eye to eye. Song Fengzhi felt that her own ‘Brother Yan’ came from a well-off and upright family and was better than Xia Siyu in every way. How annoying it was for her to use the fact that she was a girl to stir up trouble every day. Wei Jingjing, on the other hand, was more self-aware, knowing that Xia Siyu was simple-minded and hot-tempered and not easy to provoke. But so what? Her own daughter was, of course, outstanding in every way. All the other pigs coming to hog the cabbage—no matter how handsome—were still pigs. They could dream on if they thought they could bully her daughter!
Moreover, both Wei Jingjing and Song Fengzhi knew about the relationship between their artists and the other party. Out of old grudges as well as considerations for the hidden relationship, it was beneficial for them to appear hostile on the surface.
But as soon as filming started, all those emotions automatically retracted. Bo Yan and Xia Siyu seemed to instantly forget about these arguments and immediately got into character.
At the beginning of the film, the two find themselves on the day of great change, where initially everyone proceeded in an orderly manner.
Xia Siyu and Bo Yan were both students from the same university. He was the ‘Golden Phoenix’ that flew out of a mountain village, and she was the daughter of an intellectual family, both studying under her parents who were university professors. Young men and women, in the prime of their lives, talked not of romance, but of political consciousness and building the country. Despite having a common goal, they actually had a fondness for each other.
The film studio had set up a campus scene, in an era that was in late spring, with flowers blooming like brocade and trees lush and green. Flowers were easy to handle; they could be cultivated in a greenhouse and then transplanted.
The first scene was very simple. Under the warm sunshine, Bo Yan and Xia Siyu encountered each other on campus. Without a single line of dialogue, they just looked at each other in the crowd, exchanging a slight smile.
Of course, while it seemed simple, in addition to the two of them, the scene required cooperation from other actors and extras. Sun Wujiu, having a background in cinematography, had a natural knack for camera movement and composition. The first scene had to captivate the audience. How the camera was handled, how the shots connected, and the cuts required meticulous arrangement.
Moreover, this scene was likely to set the tone for the entire film. After that initial smile, the whole film would descend toward a nadir. How to go about capturing this pivotal opening became particularly important. Despite perhaps needing only a few minutes of screen time in the final film, it might take a week to shoot.
However, Sun Wujiu had long been prepared. Bo Yan and Xia Siyu might have prepared for this film for several months, but for Sun, since he started writing the script, he had already been preparing for decades. He had a very complete vision of the camera shots in his mind and had long drawn out the storyboards. When it came time to shoot, all they had to do was follow his directions.
This also leveraged the advantage of having actors and the props team prepare in advance. As soon as shooting commenced, all the extras, actors, and props were in place. Even the flowers were brought in with several pots in full bloom, making the scene design exceptionally perfect.
But for the same scene, even if the actors’ performances were perfect, many takes were needed.
However, no matter which take, the moment in the crowd when Bo Yan spotted Xia Siyu and their eyes met was absolutely radiant and filled with tender affection.