月度归档： 2025 年 5 月

Special feature of 1905 film network Have you ever wondered how long a movie can last?

Du Qifeng’s film only took 19 days, and won the Academy Award and the Golden Horse Award for best director.

It took only half a month for Liu Zhenwei to take emergency photos of Wong Kar-wai, and it became a generation of classics.

　

Han Han filmed for more than 80 days and earned 1.046 billion box office.

　

It took richard linklater 12 years to shoot, and finally won the Golden Globe Award for best film.

　

What I want to talk about today is the closing film of Cannes International Film Festival. It took 17 years to finish, and it has become a public case in the film history. Near the opening of the film festival, the film is still riddled with lawsuits, which can be said to be quite eventful.

Terry gilliam, the director of this film, is detached from Hollywood and European critics. His image style is unique and full of imagination, and everyone who has seen his films knows his madness.

The story of the new film Who Killed Don Quixote focuses on Toby, an advertising director, played by adam driver. In the 21st century, he traveled back to the 17th century and returned to the Spanish village where he had stayed, and found the works adapted from his school days. One of the villagers firmly believed that he was Don Quixote and that Driver was his servant, Sankoh Panza, and they took an adventure.

The film itself is really unusual. The director uses flashback to blur the boundary between reality and fantasy, which makes the audience fall into great madness. But behind this is actually some messy creation and a full-fledged shooting cycle. The final harvest is also a bipolar evaluation.

"Village Voice" believes that "gilliam made us feel his madness and pulled us into the crazy and beautiful world he created."

Variety believes that "this is what the director’s fans fear most, because it is clumsy, confused and chaotic."

So, in these 17 years, what happened to Who Killed Don Quixote?

1989: The Origin of Don Quixote

Terry gilliam read Don Quixote by Cervantes in 1989 and decided to try to adapt it. The film has the same name as the novel.

In 1990, he signed an agreement with Phoenix Film Company, and sean connery was negotiating to play Don Quixote. Nigel hawthorne and danny devito are also discussing the roles of Don Quixote and Sankoh Panza. But in the end, because of the low budget, gilliam withdrew from the project, and this movie became a wish that he always wanted to complete but could not.

At that time, the production company used director Fred Schepisi to replace gilliam, and the leading role was changed to john cleese and robin williams. However, this plan was cancelled in 1997.

1998: Change the title of the film and rewrite the script.

Later, gilliam resumed cooperation with screenwriter Toby Grisoni, and the film was renamed "The Man Who Killed Don Quixote". In this version, the protagonists are not Don Quixote and Panza, but Toby.

Toby lives in the 21st century, and his name comes from Grisoni. He met Don Quixote through time. This technique draws lessons from Mark Twain’s "Breaking into King Arthur’s Palace by mistake" in 1889.

　

In 1998, terry gilliam’s other film "Fear of Las Vegas" premiered in Britain, and he also announced that the next film was Don Quixote. Having lost confidence in Hollywood, he decided to make a new film in Europe, with the location in Spain, and the budget was reduced from 40 million dollars to 32.1 million dollars.

Gilliam invited jean rochefort, his "perfect Don Quixote", to play the leading role, and French actor Reshef studied English for seven months. John Denip played the role of Toby, with his girlfriend vanessa paradis as the heroine.

2000: Bad luck for the first shooting.

In September 2000, the film officially started shooting in Badenas, northern Spain. On the first day of filming, F16 fighter planes flew back and forth in the air, damaging the recording. The next day, flash floods broke out, important equipment was damaged, and the color of the scene changed.

After the crew searched for some new equipment to resume shooting, on the fifth day, when Reshef was ready to perform, he was suffering from prostate disease and his expression was very painful. Subsequently, Reshef went to Paris to see a doctor and was diagnosed with double disc disease.

In the next few days, the crew has been filming other parts, including several scenes of Depp, but no one knows when Reshef will come back. Finally, the project stopped in November 2000.

The director joked that it was "one of the most troublesome movies in history", and it seemed that heaven and hell were united in contempt of gilliam’s Who Killed Don Quixote. The words "disaster", "collapse" and "bad luck" always revolve around this terminated project. The German insurance company claimed that it brought them a loss of 15 million dollars, and then took the copyright of the script as collateral.

It is worth noting that the documentary "Help! Don Quixote caught fire unexpectedly and was shortlisted for several film festivals.

2005: Butterfly Effect under the Lack of Economic Support

In 2005, gilliam once again showed his interest in this unfinished project, hoping that Gé rard Depardieu would play Don Quixote. However, due to various unfavorable influences before, it is difficult for him to get financial support from the film company.

During this time, he tried to make other films, but they all met with problems, including Nicolas Cage’s The Defective Detective and Good Omens, whose novel adaptation was darker. During the production, there was a conflict with producer Varnstam, and long-term cooperation photographer nicola pecorini was also fired.

At the Munich International Documentary Film Festival in 2006, gilliam revealed that there was still a play in this project, and the producer Jeremy Thomas was very interested. In August, he said that the legal dispute of the film had been solved and he planned to remake the film completely.

2008— 2012: Depp or Ivan? Stupid can’t tell the difference.

In 2008, gilliam resumed film preparation. In January 2009, the script was rewritten. Later, it was reported that in November 2009, gilliam had finished the remake of the role of Don Quixote, and refused to disclose the names of the actors.

In December, he released news that robert duvall would play Don Quixote, and Depp would still play Toby. But by this time, Johnny Depp had signed a contract with Disney, which was questioned. Depp said he wouldn’t take time out of his hectic schedule to play Don Quixote.

On May 17th, 2010, it was said that ewan mcgregor played a role in the film. On September 5th, gilliam said that there was a problem with the funds a month and a half ago, so the filming was postponed again.

By 2012, Duval had always kept in touch with gilliam, and said, "We rewrite the script every year, and you will be happy to see Don Quixote return with a new look in the saddle". But at this point, ewan mcgregor is not in the cast.

2013— 2015: The actor died and the project was shelved.

In November 2013, director gilliam appeared at the Venice Film Festival. He told Variety that he was trying to remake Don Quixote himself. "I just want to finish it and take it out of my life."

In January 2014, gilliam said on Facebook, "Don Quixote’s dream has started again. Can we see that old bastard on horseback come back this year?" In an interview with Empire, he said that on September 29th, 2014, the film will start shooting in the Canary Islands. Spanish producer Adrian Guerra will provide the funds.

In August, when gilliam was interviewed by The Wrap, he said that the script had changed a little, and the story was contemporary, focusing on the harm that movies did to people. In the film, "Some people were crazy, some became drunkards, and some became prostitutes".

In September, gilliam confirmed that john hurt played Don Quixote instead of Duval. Then in an interview with Rolling Stone, gilliam said that he had encountered some minor problems. He said, "I wasted too much time on this matter. If you shoot it, you will be as crazy as Don Quixote. This decision is crazy and unreasonable. The smart people around me told me to give up, but I know they are all reasonable people. "

In December, the film announced that jack O’Connell had decided to play Toby.

In December 2015, due to the diagnosis of pancreatic cancer in john hurt, the film production was interrupted again. On January 27, 2017, Hutt died. In October, Reshef, who was originally chosen as Don Quixote, died.

2016: Funding problems lead to film stagnation.

In February 2016, gilliam talked with Portuguese producer Paulo Branco at the 66th Berlin Film Festival. At this time, he needed a budget of 16 million euros. The latter promised to give him money in September to start filming for 11 weeks.

At this time, the starring lineup changed again. adam driver played Toby, Mike Palin played Don Quixote, and Olga Kurylenko played the heroine. According to reports, Driver’s salary is 610,000 euros, while Palin’s is 285,000 euros. Gilliam hired his daughter Amy as the production director. The new story is basically consistent with the final presentation.

But before long, the problem came again. Blanca wanted to take control of the whole project, but gilliam chose to comply, because he saw the former’s successful project in david cronenberg. However, Blanca seems to feel gilliam’s disgust for himself.

Before the Cannes Film Festival in 2016, Amazon decided to quit because Blanca was a producer. The representative said, "We don’t want to communicate with him any more."

Blanca cut the original budget and reduced Palin’s salary to 100 thousand euros, which angered the latter. He also told gilliam that the project needed a real producer and appointed himself as the leader. He tried to replace Palin, give up 35mm equipment and shoot with digital equipment, at the same time threatening gilliam.

Because gilliam did not accept any conditions after the change, the final funds could not be put in place and the project was stagnant. This also led to gilliam’s heart attack.

2017— 2018: After the successful killing, there are twists and turns.

In March 2017, "Who Killed Don Quixote" started shooting again, and the role of Don Quixote was changed to jonathan pryce. He worked with gilliam on Brothers Grimm. As early as 2000, when the project was first launched, Press was one of the cast members. He wanted to play the role of Don Quixote for 15 years.

Gilliam said that the budget of the film was not as much as expected, and the whole crew was very eager to finish it. "It has been too long since I wanted to shoot it in 1989. The experience of thinking, imagining, writing and rewriting is terrible, but the interesting thing about the film is that at some point it has begun to shape itself. This is a very different movie. It seems to be doing my job. I just stick to it until the end. "

On June 4, 2017, "Who Killed Don Quixote" was finally finished after 17 years. In November, gilliam revealed that the editing was about to be completed, but it still needed several months for post-production of visual effects, sound and music.

However, there was an episode in which during the filming in Portugal, the crew was accused of destroying public property, including Christian monasteries. However, gilliam denied these allegations and said that all we did was to protect the building. It was later ruled that it was only responsible for insignificant damage.

What is even more unexpected is that the film is approaching the release and there are twists and turns. Paulo Branco, the former producer, said that the agreement signed with gilliam in 2016 was still valid, and he owned part of the rights and interests. Without his consent, the film could not be released. This lawsuit will affect the screening of Who Killed Don Quixote at the Cannes International Film Festival in 2018.

The final judgment of the case will be announced on June 15th, which was later postponed to 18th. On May 7, a hearing was held on whether the film could go to Cannes, and on May 9, it was allowed to be shown as the closing film at the film festival.

The organizing Committee of the film festival responded by saying, "The film festival is purely about choosing works of art.. First of all, we must reach an agreement with the film director. This is the case here. Past experience has made us aware of the litigation and risks we will face, but when we made this decision, no one objected. "

As the director himself said, "People like Roman ruins because they can’t see them. You can only imagine them."So gilliam always thought that his film would be better than expected. He finally turned his imagination into reality.

Wen | Zero One

In recent years, suspense drama is a force that can not be ignored in the refinement of Chinese drama. In 2017, after "White Night Chasing Murder" started the creative upsurge of fine suspense drama, the production level of domestic suspense drama continued to improve, and it also strived for innovation in the storyline. With the continuous improvement of the audience’s aesthetic level, suspense drama has become synonymous with texture and word of mouth, and as the most promising type of Chinese drama, it has been paid more and more attention by the industry.

By April 2024, Youku announced that it would upgrade the suspense theater to the "White Night Theater", and at the beginning, it threw out two "Wang Fried" in succession.

At present, The Twilight Fire is coming to an end. The story focuses on the black and white human nature and the plight of women in the acquaintance society, and sets the tone of the works with high-quality audio-visual language and poetic details.Since its launch, "The Twilight Fire" has not only caused a hot discussion on social platforms, but also promoted the cultural tourism fever of Wuyuan, Jiangxi Province during May Day. A large number of tourists named to punch in "Steven Zhang’s home and Tanya’s home in the play" …

The craze triggered by "The Twilight Fire" is still at its peak. On May 6, the second work "New Life" of Youku White Night Theater came again.Sina overlapping old waves”。 Directed by "Put All Your Eggs" director Shen Ao, Freshman is a novel with distinctive features: an unconventional development of "the first man is dead", a gripping plot, a thorough dismantling of the panorama of the multi-faceted fraud bureau, and an interpretation of social humanity … Freshman is only 10 episodes long, but the suspense of the story is still rising, which has been heatedly discussed by the audience on social networks.

As the vanguard of Youku White Night Theater, Twilight Fire and New Life not only successfully widened the boundary in the exploration of suspense+,but also wrote a stunning opening for a new chapter in the quality of Chinese opera.

Judging from the audience’s feedback, the most direct reason why "New Life" was full of topics once it was broadcast may be that it closely followed the key spectacle element of "deception", and it was unconventional in personnel design, narrative and structure, forming a highly novel overall look and feel.

As the director’s bid for the Olympic Games said, "Different from filming in the past, filming can communicate with the audience in an eloquent and subtle way, providing sufficient expression space for the creators". "Freshman" gives full play to the advantages of drama form to focus on the social issues of "anti-fraud", presents the protagonist’s "crime of information difference" in a jigsaw puzzle narrative, and renders the drama-chasing experience with great suspense.

In the play, Fei Ke, played by Jing Bo Ran, has five different identities in front of five people, which amazes the audience.He was able to fool people not because of IQ crush, but more because he grasped the weaknesses and desires in the depths of human nature:

Facing the greedy boss Chen Shufa and his lovely daughter, Fei is a mature and decent invisible "official second generation"; Facing the financial elite Cheng Haoshi, Fei Ke has become a self-motivated younger generation, taking care of the family and bringing strong psychological satisfaction to Hao Cheng in the carefully created relationship; In front of Su Qian, a white-collar worker, Fei Ke became a youthful and sincere infatuated little suckling dog, which made Su Qian seem to have returned to the time of young love …

The brilliance of "New Life" does not stop at the moment when the scam is revealed, but the close connection with social issues behind the intersection of these multiple scams. Fico’s scam is based on his profound insight into human nature, and the emotional tension in his story not only makes the audience’s back cold, but also arouses the audience’s strong enough emotional resonance-This resonance is not limited to suspense and deception itself, but is related to the deeper thinking behind many issues such as marriage, workplace, wealth and identity.

What makes the audience want to stop is the suspense that "New Life" has always maintained. Although several parties have mostly told their experiences of being deceived since the four episodes, there are many foreshadowing and discrepancies in the details, and the audience will realize that these stories are probably not the original appearance of the story, just like the script killing the game.

The suspense of "New Life" does not come from mystification or suspense, but closely follows the positioning theme of "information gap suspense", which gives the audience a strong motivation to participate in the process of "solving puzzles" with the characters in the play.

As a cinema film crew, the main creator has also given "New Life" excellent image texture, showing good aesthetic quality in the use of light and shadow, color matching, scene layout and so on. This further strengthens the suspense atmosphere of the fast-paced and high-reversal plot, which makes the audience immersed in it.

Up to now, from the typical "Snowstorm Mountain Villa" memorial service at the beginning to the more complicated images of Fei Ke and the "deceived" with the development of the plot, the truth pieced together by fragmented narrative is still incomplete. The unique "game sense" setting and plot promotion ensure that even after revealing some puzzles, there are still new suspense coming one after another, which continues to raise the audience’s expectations for the follow-up plot.

Looking back at the development of domestic suspense dramas, we will find that the audience’s quality evaluation criteria for suspense dramas are more "compound". At one time, the focus of the public was on the scale, visual impact, or the twists and turns of the plot. With the improvement of the overall production level of domestic dramas, suspense dramas have gradually become the pioneer theme for creators to explore the advanced image language and profound theme expression, and at the same time, the audience’s requirements for suspense dramas are much higher than other types. Therefore,The more you upgrade, the more involved you are.

Reading Entertainment believes that there are some commonalities in the direction of the upgrading of different domestic suspense masterpieces in different dimensions-first, the level of the story in the suspense mystery itself, which is not strong enough, and other expressions will often become mysterious; The second is the continuous improvement and innovation in the expression of film and television art, such as the deep integration of lens language, color texture, aesthetic concept and different subdivision themes; The third is to stick to social issues and be closer to the topic of things that the public feels and experiences; The fourth is to pay attention to the darkness and light in the depths of human nature, which is also the inexhaustible source of emotional resonance of suspense dramas.

These elements do not independently determine the level of drama, but complement each other, just as no matter how high the image texture is, it cannot cover up the lack of suspense or values of the work, which has been a lot of cases in the past few years. A suspense masterpiece often needs to have multiple advantages at the same time, and it is particularly prominent in one point.At present, with the overall production level of Chinese drama greatly improved, whether suspense drama can closely follow social issues and tap human care will increasingly become the key point of "competing for the best".

Looking back at the two new works of White Night Theater, the focus of New Life on social issues of fraud has given birth to a high degree of discussion, while the texture root of the just-concluded Twilight Fire lies in the brand-new picture constructed under the fusion of multiple innovative elements, so as to bring the audience an immersive experience with a high degree of integration of senses and emotions.

In the director’s lens, Qingshui Town, which is quiet and gentle in appearance, has its natural and simple side, but the tone and lens of the series also imply the oppression and occlusion of the acquaintance society. In the case of killing her husband at the end of this century, the group figures in the play have the evil of greed and ignorance from the secular and human nature, and also have the light from the poetic world and the juvenile spirit to confront them, and different emotions are mixed, which outlines the deep scars of human nature behind the mystery of the case.

According to media reports, Liu Qiong, deputy director of the Literature and Art Department of People’s Daily, commented on Twilight Fire: "Suspense is the overall shell, and the murder case with clear clues seems to be unexpectedly restored to a series of social problems, such as long-term domestic violence in marriage, exam-oriented education, the way out for young people in small towns, and so on. All the changes are behind resistance to pressure. "The Twilight Fire" wraps everything in the flow of life, and the intertwined world, the foggy women’s issues, the hidden emotions in adolescence, and the truth of the rumor siege … are all slowly developing in the seemingly daily narrative. "

Indeed, multiple social issues are condensed, the highly suspenseful plot is progressive, and it is full of poetic aesthetic texture style. The Twilight Fire is also a brilliant work in domestic suspense dramas with frequent boutiques. As the film title "The Twilight Fire" implies, the power of hope conveyed by the "light" in the story is both small and firm. The Twilight Fire is not only a suspense drama, but also a philosophical dialogue about the in-depth exploration of human nature. It has not lost its temperature in the coldness of suspense and led one of the directions of artistic creation innovation in the suspense track.

Youku once mentioned that White Night Theater will "explore more profound social issues, show more profound human care and provide a more immersive drama experience on the basis of typed lens language". And judging from the first two works,Behind the murder case in a small town, The Twilight Fire presents a variety of human nature, focusing on "showing more profound human care", while the new life presents fraud in a different way by "discussing more profound social issues".

Different from the suspense creation of the game sense in Freshmen, The Twilight Fire is a work that is more inclined to emotional expression and artistic expression to create a sense of atmosphere, but the common feature of the two is to choose a new way. Although the styles and themes are quite different, both works are rare suspense dramas with high suspense, image texture and ideological depth. The opening of White Night Theater is amazing.

In the era of mobile Internet, the discussion on the value of long video content has experienced several ups and downs, with multiple content forms emerging to compete for traffic and increasingly diversified user needs. However, in recent years, the influence of big dramas and variety shows has increased, and the irreplaceability of long video quality content has been repeatedly confirmed.However, in the process of forming this industry consensus, it also puts forward more requirements for video platforms and quality content creators.
So what should be done in the creation of Chinese opera? Combined with the development trend of fine dramas in the past two years, Reading Entertainment believes that at least three important directions can be summarized:

First, creators and platforms should understand users better, and the content should be closer to users’ lives and emotions, so that the audience can realize that it is related to me, instead of pursuing "high and low" on the cornerstone of the topic; Secondly, we should continue to improve the artistic quality, widen the gap with other diversified entertainment forms, and "roll up" the aesthetic and audience experience; Thirdly, it is necessary to further improve the ideological level and reach breadth of the works. On the whole,Need to be closer to the audience, but also closer to the art, breaking up instead of sinking.

According to the film list released by Youku before, White Night Theater also has a number of suspense dramas: Snow Maze was first produced by Zhang Yimou as the producer of online drama, directed by Lv Xing who directed the Crime of Unlicensed, starring Johnny, Zhang Yu and Wang Ziqi, focusing on the story of the anti-drug police in the northeast snow area; "Sandstorm" is directed by the famous film director Gao Qunshu, written by Zhao Dongling, starring Duan Long and Wang Qiang, and tells the story of serial murders in the border town; "The Past by the Waters" was produced by Cao Baoping, starring Guo Qilin and Wu Zhenyu, who fought with many forces in a tropical foreign land …

It is not difficult to find that the common feature of the list of films to be broadcast in White Night Theater is that it has assembled a film-level ingenious cast and powerful actors, and the texture background of the series is guaranteed, but it is constantly innovating in theme and type, which is not limited to the common criminal investigation story context in the past.While maintaining high-quality production, we should closely connect with social reality and explore the depth of human nature, so as to meet the audience’s increasing aesthetic demand for content, and realize the fine and diversified development of Chinese opera through differentiated paths.

In the track of mystery drama, which is constantly involuting, from The Longest Day In Chang’an in "Chasing the Murder in a White Night" to the "White Night Theater" today, the development course led by Youku is just the process from "twilight fire" to "rebirth". Nowadays, the road to the quality of Chinese opera is constantly expanding, and Youku is still the leader.

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