The night was dark, and there were few people and cars on the street.
In Cao Ye's view, Beijing at this time is the most attractive. The streets were quiet, the crowd of people in Wuyang dissipated, and the city showed its original outline, thick and arrogant.
Cao Ye didn't know where he was going, so he left the car in Su Shi and planned to let the driver drive back tomorrow. Before the question of "where to go" had been clarified in his mind, the two legs seemed to make a decision before the brain.
He realized that he was walking towards Yin Fourth Street. There is a bar he opened on that narrow narrow street. Since it opened three years ago, it has not made a profit until now, and it has always been in a state of loss. In fact, he didn't expect it to make money—otherwise, who would be stupid enough to open a speakeasy in that cul-de-sac, and the location obviously didn't want too much attention and harassment.
Huang Ying, the owner of the bar, often frowned because of poor management in the past two years. After realizing that Cao Ye didn't care whether it was good or bad, Huang Ying really just like Cao Ye said, let it grow savagely. .
Hey, don't mention it, after Huang Ying let go of his hands and feet and let it lose money, this bar actually developed such a charming shadow.
Absurd, isolated, self-defeating, it's loved by filmmakers and directing students who are obsessed with indie films. For a time, it actually lost as much as it did before.
Okay, let's go take a look, it's been a long time anyway.
Less than two kilometers away from Yin Fourth Street, Cao Ye walked slowly all the way, and it took only half an hour to reach the destination.
The word "burning", which is made into a flame effect, stands at the end of the narrow street. If passers-by accidentally break into this blind alley, they will feel puzzled.
This bar called "Burning" is built underground, and you can see the clue of the entrance when you get close. If you want to enter the bar, you have to walk through a long, narrow, dark spiral staircase.
In Huang Ying's words, this staircase makes people doubt life.
In the words of those directors, this staircase is so fucking good for long takes.
Cao Ye heard the faint sound of music coming from the speakeasy, as if someone was singing Cui Jian's "A Piece of Red Cloth".
"It makes me feel comfortable
It makes me forget that I have nowhere to live
you ask me where to go
I said I'd go your way"
He vaguely recognized that the man had sung these lines. It was old enough, but something strong enough never went out of style.
He took out his mobile phone and called Huang Ying. The beeping sounded for a while, but there was no answer there. It is estimated that it is busy now.
Cao Ye lowered his head and called up the chat page from the screen, and sent Huang Ying a message: "The key." Then he put the phone back in his pocket, found a wooden bench by the road and sat down, leaning his head on the back of the chair. , closed his eyelids and listened to the looming melody coming from the ground.
—
"Sister Huang Ying, have another drink."
"Don't drink, don't drink," Huang Ying looked down at the message sent on the phone half an hour ago, and jumped off the high stool, "The boss is looking for me, I'm sorry, you guys have fun."
"Mr. Cao is here?" Everyone at the table looked up at her.
"Yeah, is Uto's key with you? Give it to me first, and come back to me to get it later if you want to use it."
"Oh, here I am." A boy took out the key from his pocket, stood up and stretched his arms, and handed it to Huang Ying across the table, "Why did Mr. Cao come so late tonight?"
"How do I know?" Huang Ying took the key.
"You won't be able to sleep because of "Darkest Choice", will you?" A boy across from him said with a smile.
The students sitting around the table laughed in agreement, and the girl next to the boy patted his arm: "Crow's mouth."
Huang Ying had already walked to the stairs, and when she heard this, she turned around and smiled, "Worry about your own film, go ahead."
Huang Ying supported the uneven wall with her hands and ran up the stairs in three steps.
There are two completely different worlds on the ground and underground. The outside is clean and peaceful, completely different from the noisy and noisy atmosphere in the bar. Huang Ying took a deep breath, turned out of the stairs, and saw at a glance sitting on a long wooden chair, looking up. Cao Ye is asleep.
And the tramp who slept as soundly as he was sitting on the other side of the wooden chair.
What a spectacle. Huang Ying couldn't help but want to laugh as she walked a few steps.
She stood two meters away and admired this picture—under the dim street lamp, a delicate playboy from the inside to the outside and a homeless man in a poor suit were sitting on both ends of the wooden bench, and the two even had the same posture, thighs and legs. Separate, arms folded at lower abdomen, head resting on the back of the chair. There is a strange sense of harmony in this picture.
Huang Ying chuckled, raised her phone, aimed the camera at the two, and pressed the camera button.
The moment the flash came on, Cao Ye frowned slightly, then raised his hand to cover his eyes, just woke up, his voice was a little hoarse: "What are you doing?"
"Shh—" Huang Ying immediately raised her index finger in front of her lips, then pointed at the homeless man beside him, and said in an angry voice, "Don't disturb people's dreams!"
"Then why are you disturbing my dreams?" Cao Ye lowered his voice despite the displeased tone in his voice.
He got up from the wooden bench, raised his wrist and looked at the time: "I just saw the news, so busy tonight?"
"The group of students who filmed "Mandala" finished today, and they insisted on taking me to drink together," Huang Ying walked with him to the security door a few meters away, pressed the button of the key, and the security door slowly rose. He rose to a position of about one meter, and did not move.
"This door is broken. They were filming the scene a few days ago and accidentally hit it with a car." Huang Ying walked over, squatted down, palms up, and tried to push the door up, but her voice changed a little because of too much force." … fully automatic becomes semi-automatic.”
"I'll come," Cao Ye bowed down and pressed his palm against the lower edge of the security door. As soon as he pushed the door up, he patted the dust on his hand, "Why didn't you tell me earlier, I'll have someone come over and replace it."
"Hey, is this trivial thing still bothering you?" Huang Ying said with a smile, and walked in behind him, "I have made an appointment for a maintenance master, and the master will be here in two days... By the way, why did you think about it in the middle of the night? Want to come to Uto? It’s not really because of the recent film, can’t you sleep?”
"Yeah," Cao Ye walked straight to the innermost small theater and pushed the door to enter, without Huang Ying leading the way, "I was so worried that my hair was about to fall out."
"Really or not?" Huang Ying looked at the top of his head, "I didn't see it... Isn't it all rumored recently, that Liang Sizhe might come to make up the film?"
"Do you believe it?" Cao Yeruo said casually, raised his hand and pressed the switch on the wall to turn on the ceiling light in the room.
There was a square table in front of several rows of seats, with a dozen or so Blu-ray discs piled up in a mess. "Looking at the River", "The Wind Rises", "Liang Sheng's Dream"... He picked up one of them and looked at the cover: "Are those students Liang Sizhe's fans?"
"Isn't it, I like it very much," Huang Ying said with a smile. "From the director to the cameraman to the lead actor to the makeup artist, as soon as you chat with them about Liang Sizhe, they can drag you to chat for a long time without stammering."
"Just the ones who filmed "Mandala"?"
"Yeah, the funniest thing is that they got a fake Liang Sizhe from nowhere!"
"What the hell?" Cao Ye didn't understand, and looked up at Huang Ying.
"It's a boy who looks a lot like Liang Sizhe ten years ago, but he looks alike, his temperament and acting skills are far from good. They gave the boy the most important role and let him appear in various In the unobtrusive scene, I said that I would like to pay tribute to Senior Liang Sizhe!"
Cao Ye looked at her without words: "..."
Huang Ying couldn't stop laughing. She took out her mobile phone and flipped through a photo from the album and put it in front of Cao Ye: "Don't believe me, do you think it looks like it?"
"Where's the resemblance?" Cao Ye took the phone and looked at the screen, frowning slightly, he really didn't see the resemblance.
"It's quite similar, you can't expect to be exactly the same!" Huang Ying came over and took a look.
"It's a long way off." Cao Ye returned the phone to Huang Ying eagerly.
"It's really the same thing? Liang Sizhe's face is so valuable."
Cao Ye didn't answer. He sat in front of the screen of the main control computer, holding the mouse in his right hand, trying to find a popcorn chip to hypnotize him.
Huang Ying is naturally diligent, and she never sees a messy table top. At this time, while putting the disc back into the box, she asked Cao Ye, "Liang Sizhe will help you with the movie "The Darkest Choice"? The two of you used to have such a good relationship."
"Who knows," Cao Ye looked at the screen, "...Why is there not a single movie in it?"
"By the way, the machine was infected with a virus a few days ago, and the system was reinstalled. I'll copy a few copies for you later, but if you want to watch it tonight, you can only choose from these few discs."
"A virus?" Cao Ye looked up at her, with an indescribable expression on his face again, "Isn't this machine disconnected from the Internet?"
"Yeah, but this time it wasn't a network attack, it was a virus on the hard disk," Huang Ying also looked helpless, "I don't know which student has a virus on the hard disk."
"Okay, the virus..." Cao Ye raised his hand and pinched his eyebrows, "This is too unreliable, I will call someone to come and change the equipment later."
Cao Ye had to go to the square table again, and quickly messed up the discs Huang Ying had just sorted out. He wanted to find a film that was not starring Liang Sizhe, but he picked them all up. "Liang Sizhe" three words.
"Why is it all played by Liang Sizhe?"
"A disc found by Liang Sizhe's fans... What, you don't want to watch him play?"
Cao Ye casually made an excuse to perfunctory: "When I saw him, I remembered that "The Darkest Choice" is still waiting for reshoots, which will keep people from sleeping?"
"Oh... this one was not played by Liang Sizhe." Huang Ying found a disc and handed it to Cao Ye.
Before Cao Ye spoke, she quickly added, "It's just Liang Sizhe's guidance!"
Cao Ye listened and looked at the cover of the CD with no expression.
He knew about this film. After Liang Sizhe won the Cannes Best Actor Award, almost all the audience were waiting for him to return to the mainland Chinese film industry to show his talents. In two years, a film that was neither applauded nor well received was released without a word, which is "Liang Sheng Zhu Meng".
- It seems that apart from this one, there is no other better choice right now.
"That's it." Cao Ye said, took the disc and walked to the front of the main controller, put the disc in, and clicked to play.
The title of the dragon jumped out on the screen, and Cao Ye found a seat closest to the main controller and sat down. Fingers fumbled to press the button on the side of the leather chair, put the backrest at a suitable angle, leaned down with the back, and half-lying looked at the screen. The leather chair is very wide and soft, and it is very comfortable for people to sink in. It is a good place to sleep.
"Then I'll withdraw," Huang Ying walked to the door and touched the switch with her finger, "Is the light off?"
Cao Ye gave a vague "um".
The door closed, the screen began to enter the picture, the camera zoomed out, and on the distant and blurred stage, the two theatrical actors sang duet with their voices raised:
"If your brother Liang is undecided, the younger brother will be the matchmaker for you—"
"Brother Xian is a matchmaker for me, but I don't know who the daughter is?"
The song is Yue Opera "Liang Zhu".
The lower part of the screen gradually shows the behind-the-scenes staff of the film:
Producer: Liang Sizhe Xu Yunchu
Producer: Bai Mingze
Director: Liang Sizhe
Starring: Xu Xiaohan Qiao Rui
…
Then the lens slowly zoomed in, gradually becoming clear from blur, and the distant and bright stage was also shrunk to one side of the TV screen. The camera pans, and a woman in her forties is squatting in front of the TV, staring at the screen in a trance, holding the remote control in her hand.
"Mom—" A young girl's voice came from outside the camera, "Did you wash the dress I bought yesterday? Mom—"
"Oh," the woman returned to her senses, her expression panicked for a moment, but quickly recovered, she lowered her head and pressed the remote control button to turn off the TV screen, and stood up, "Come here..."
Immediately followed by some short trivial pictures of parents.
Literary film, and the style is deeply influenced by Cao Xiuyuan.
Cao Ye quickly set a general tone for the film in his mind.
Cao Xiuyuan's shadow can be seen everywhere in the transition skills and shooting techniques, so that Cao Ye can't concentrate on the story itself - however, the story seems to be lackluster, full of a lot of trivial and mediocre details, which makes people seem restless.
The flat and straightforward rhythm makes people sleepy, no wonder the box office was dismal when it was released in the first two years - how can audiences have the patience to watch such a film these days
Cao Ye turned his face and leaned on the back of the leather chair, closed his eyelids, stopped looking at the picture on the screen, and slid his body downward to make himself more comfortable, and then forced himself to sleep.
I have to say that this film is quite suitable for hypnosis by the parents' short words and external voices.
Drowsiness was like a slow tide, slowly covering his nerve endings, the dream surrounded him, and the closed small theater suddenly turned into an empty theater.
The lights were dim, and there was still sewage left by a previous crew on the pitted ground, reflecting the various lights in the theater.
Cao Ye and Liang Sizhe stood back to back, Liang Sizhe was topless, his shoulder-length hair was tied behind his head, and the ends of his hair rubbed against the back of Cao Ye's head, making him feel a little itchy.
Not far away, Cao Xiuyuan behind the camera said, "Take off your pants, too." There was no tone of voice between the words.
It should be said to the two of them, but Cao Ye didn't move. Liang Sizhe bent down and took off his trousers, holding them in his hands.
"Don't take it in your hand." Cao Xiuyuan said again.
Everyone behind the camera looked at them, but no one stepped forward to help Liang Sizhe take his pants.
I'll get it for you. Just as Cao Ye was about to say this, Liang Sizhe raised his hand and threw his pants onto the ground not far away.
dirty. Cao Ye thought.
A dazzling flashlight lit up at them.
That seemed to be the beginning of everything.
No, it started earlier.