Chapter 289 Oscar Nomination for Best Original Score

Just after Xu Feng hung up the phone, Zhou Yan received another call from Han Sanping.

As soon as the call was connected, Han Sanping excitedly said, "I have good news for you."

Zhou Yan pretended that he had not received the news yet and asked, "What good news?"

"The list of nominees for the Berlin Film Festival has come out, and "The Chorus" is shortlisted. Also, "Sense and Sensibility" for which you composed the music is also shortlisted."

Zhou Yan said happily, "That's great."

Hearing Zhou Yan's answer, Han Sanping became puzzled, "Your reaction is not right."

"What's wrong with my reaction?" Zhou Yan asked strangely.

"You are too happy."

"Ah?"

What kind of words are these? Isn't it normal to be happy when hearing good news?

"Did you already know the news and deliberately act here for me?"

Zhou Yan gave Han Sanping a thumbs up from a distance, "Brother San, you really have insight into people's hearts."

Indeed, he acted a little exaggerated just now, which was not in line with his character setting.

"If you know, you know. It won't affect my happiness. I will also go to the film festival this time. We will go together later."

"I may be late and I will definitely miss the opening ceremony."

Han Sanping did not ask Zhou Yan what he wanted, but just said, "Okay, I will go with Mr. Xu first."

...

The news that "The Chorus" was shortlisted for the Berlin Film Festival was quickly reported in the newspapers, and the coverage of this time was very wide.

Yanjing TV even spent ten minutes to introduce the movie "The Chorus".

Many filmmakers were very moved when they saw these news. It's really incomparable. Zhou Yan's shortlist for the Berlin Film Festival once attracted more attention than some news about film festival awards.

In recent years, because of Chen Kaige and Zhang Yimou, Chinese people have become more aware of film festivals, but in the final analysis, ordinary audiences don't pay much attention to film festivals.

They only care about whether the movie is good and whether it is worth buying a ticket to the cinema. Whether the movie wins an award does have an impact on them, but not much.

And most audiences can't tell the difference between the three major film festivals.

In the past, some films that won the three major film festivals would receive relatively high attention, but some are still not well-known. For example, Director Xie Fei, who had criticized Zhou Yan in newspapers before, won the Golden Bear Award with An Li the year before last.

However, Xie Fei's winning of the Golden Bear Award did not cause much splash, neither did it give him a higher status in the international film industry, nor did it bring a qualitative leap in the box office revenue of the film.

When "Scented Soul Girl" and "The Wedding Banquet" were put together, many people had only heard of the latter.

As for those films that were only shortlisted for the film festival, let alone, many viewers have never heard of them.

From this incident, we can see why the Berlin Film Festival hopes to invite Zhou Yan to participate in the film festival. Directors like An Li, Zhou Yan, Chen Kaige, and Zhang Yimou will have a very positive impact on the film festival when they participate in the film festival.

If Zhou Yan had not been shortlisted this time, the Berlin Film Festival would not have been able to gain such popularity in China.

This time, five Chinese-language directors were shortlisted, in addition to Zhou Yan and An Li, there are Yan Hao, He Ping, and Edward Yang.

But when the news reported the Berlin Film Festival, the focus was on Zhou Yan, followed by An Li, and then mentioned the other three directors.

He Ping and his team actually benefited from it. If it weren't for Zhou Yan, many media wouldn't even mention them.

When a person is famous, there will be a lot of gossip. Zhou Yan was nominated, and there was such popularity. Many people must be dissatisfied.

Some "anonymous" articles appeared in some newspapers and magazines, satirizing that the reason why "The Chorus" was nominated for the Berlin Film Festival was because Tomson Film Company was good at operation.

Some people also said that the Berlin Film Festival nominated "The Chorus" for "vulgarity" because it was completely because of the good box office performance of the movie.

Some people even threatened that "The Chorus" could only be nominated, and it might be empty-handed, unless the Berlin Film Festival set up the Best Film Soundtrack Award for Zhou Yan overnight.

This kind of comment is also very interesting. Even if they question Zhou Yan's movies, they still won't question the level of Zhou Yan's film soundtrack.

Just a few days after the Berlin Film Festival shortlist was announced, on January 25, new news came that the Oscar nomination list was also announced.

"Sense and Sensibility" performed very well this time, and was nominated for a total of eight awards, including the Best Original Score Award (Drama Category).

As soon as this news came out, the domestic media went crazy.

Although it was only a nomination for Best Score, it was of extraordinary significance.

Let alone which is more powerful, the Oscars or the three major film festivals, the public awareness of the former is not comparable to that of the film festivals.

Moreover, things are rare and valuable. There are many Chinese films that have won film festival awards in recent years, but it is not often that a Chinese appears in the Oscar nomination list.

In fact, some Chinese have won Oscar awards before. At the earliest, Huang Zongzhan won the Oscar for Best Cinematography in the 1950s, and won it again in the 1960s, winning the Best Cinematography Award again with "Hede".

In the 1980s, Wu Hanrun won the Best Supporting Actor Award, and Jiang Daoge also won the Best Visual Effects Award in the past two years.

Even the Best Original Score Award has been won before, by Zhou Yan's senior classmate Su Cong, who graduated from the Composition Department of the Central Conservatory of Music.

In 1987, Su Cong won the Best Soundtrack Award for "The Last Emperor". At that time, Su Cong had just graduated from Yangyin a few years ago and was in high spirits.

But when these people won the award, they had either obtained foreign nationality or had taken root abroad.

Zhou Yan is a serious Chinese, and he has no experience of studying abroad, so this time Zhou Yan was nominated, which can be regarded as a breakthrough.

This illustrates a problem: Chinese people do not have to go abroad to compete for these awards.

And the situation between Zhou Yan and Su Cong is different this time. Back then, Su Cong only participated in the soundtrack of "The Last Emperor" and was responsible for very little content.

When most people mention the soundtrack of "The Last Emperor", the first thing that comes to mind is Neon's Ryuichi Sakamoto.

Zhou Yan scored the soundtrack for "Sense and Emotion" this time, and he was the real leader. He completed all the compositions alone.

After being shortlisted for two major awards in succession, Zhou Yan's phone calls were flooded during this period, and they were all called by friends, everyone congratulating him.

But these phone calls are a burden to Zhou Yan, because he is so busy at the end of the year.

The rehearsals for the party are getting more and more tense. At the school, the students are also busy with the performance of their semester works. No matter how busy Zhou Yan is, he does not want to leave behind the students' homework.

Therefore, he also takes time to help students with their semester homework.

In addition, as the assistant to the principal, although the principal does not assign him tasks, he cannot always stay away from people. When he has nothing to do, he has to go to the school to check his face and participate in important meetings.

Many media wanted to invite Zhou Yan to participate in the recording of the program, but Zhou Yan refused.

Even Yanjing TV station, which had a very good relationship with Zhou Yan, wanted to give Zhou Yan an exclusive interview, but Zhou Yan did not agree.

It was during this busiest time that Huo Siqi called Zhou Yan and said that Zhang Xinyan and Yuan Heping, the directors of "The Kung Fu Boy", wanted to meet him.

Zhou Yan had said before that he had time to meet with Zhang Xinyan and Yuan Heping, but he never had the chance. Now that they took the initiative this time, Zhou Yan could not refuse, and "The Kung Fu Boy" has Qizhi's investment, so Zhou Yan agreed.

On the evening of February 2nd, Zhou Yan met Yuan Heping and others at Mingxuan Restaurant.

Without Huo Siqi's introduction, Zhou Yan could recognize Yuan Heping and Zhang Xiyan, and they could also recognize Zhou Yan.

Although Yuan Heping is a well-known martial arts instructor, he is relatively small and looks quite lean. Zhang Xinyan is a bit taller, a bit fat, and wears thick black-rimmed glasses.

After meeting Zhou Yan, the two of them also congratulated him one after another. They also knew about the Berlin Film Festival and Oscar nominations.

"Director Zhou, I have wanted to visit you for a long time, but I have never found a suitable opportunity. This time I took the liberty of asking Mr. Huo to help contact me. I will disturb you a lot." Zhang Xinyan said with a smile.

"Director Zhang is so polite. You two are seniors in the industry. It is an honor for me to have the opportunity to learn from you face to face. I should have taken the initiative to visit you, but I have been busy with mundane affairs recently. No chance."

"understand."

The four of them exchanged a few words and then took their seats.

After chatting for a while, Zhou Yan roughly understood the reason why they came to Yanjing this time.

"The Karate Kid" will be released in Hong Kong early next month. They came here to discuss the film's release and distribution in the mainland.

Zhou Yan couldn't help but sigh, as expected, starting a business on his own was troublesome, and they had to do such things themselves.

Fortunately, Zhou Yan doesn't need to worry about these things, otherwise just these messy things would be enough to give him a headache every year.

Zhou Yan could also hear in his words that both Zhang Xinyan and Yuan Heping had high expectations for the movie "The Kung Fu Boy" and believed that the movie would definitely achieve relatively good results after it was released.

Zhou Yan secretly sighed. Although he had not paid attention to the box office performance of "The Karate Kid" in his previous life, based on his experience, this movie would not do well at the box office.

With Yuan Heping and Zhang Xinyan in charge, the movie's martial arts aspects are definitely good, but the story is too cliche.

If it were ten years ago, the movie might have achieved good results.

But now it is the mid-1990s, and what the audience likes is completely different from what it was ten years ago. It is difficult to arouse the interest of the audience with this kind of old-fashioned martial arts movies.

In fact, many directors have realized this, and no one has made similar movies in the past few years.

It's not hard to guess what the audience likes to watch. You can see it by looking at the box office rankings in recent years.

However, Zhang Xinyan said that they have their own persistence and aesthetics, so they are still making such movies.

Zhou Yan did not reveal his thoughts to them because he knew that these words would not help the film's performance and would also make them unhappy.

If you teach someone a thousand times, they won't listen, but if you teach someone something, they will.

After the movie is released and the box office performance is not good, they will reflect on it themselves.

Later, during the third round of drinking, Zhang Xinyan clinked a glass of wine with Huo Siqi, and then said, "Heping and I have another idea. It just so happens that Mr. Huo and Director Zhou are both here, so we just want to share this idea with you two."

Huo Siqi put down his wine glass and said with a smile, "Director Zhang has some ideas, but it doesn't matter. There are no outsiders here."

Zhang Xinyan nodded, "Wu Jing is a pretty good young man with great potential, and it would be a waste to make a movie about Tai Chi, so we are thinking of making another TV series."

Zhou Yan narrowed his eyes when he heard Zhang Xinyan talking about filming a TV series. If he guessed correctly, Zhang Xinyan should be talking about "Tai Chi Master".

At that time, the reason why Zhou Yan agreed to invest in "The Kung Fu Kid" was also because he was interested in "The Grandmaster of Tai Chi". Now that Zhang Xinyan mentioned it, he was naturally very concerned about it.

Huo Siqi didn't quite understand what Zhang Xinyan meant, so he asked, "Does Director Zhang mean that we, Qizhi, need to invest in your TV series again?"

Zhang Xinyan smiled and waved his hand, "Mr. Huo, you misunderstood. What I mean is that after the release of "The Kung Fu Boy", the income will not be shared with you for the time being. You will use the money to shoot TV series. At that time, the investment ratio will be According to the situation at the time of "The Kung Fu Kid", nothing will be changed about the division, what do you think? Of course, there should be extra money later, and we will still divide it."

"No problem." Huo Siqi agreed readily: "Money is dead when you put it in your hands, but it is alive when you use it. In fact, when I invested in our movie, I didn't want to make any money. It was mainly to follow the lead. The two directors should be friends. Since you have plans for the future, I will definitely support it.”

Then Huo Siqi looked at Zhou Yan again, "Our third child is here, don't worry, he is of the same mind as me and will definitely support you unconditionally."

Zhou Yan smiled and nodded, "Brother Siqi can make the decision on these matters. I not only trust the two directors, but also brother Siqi."

Seeing Huo Siqi and Zhou Yan so happy, Zhang Xinyan and Yuan Heping were also very happy. They stood up with wine glasses and said, "Thank you, Mr. Huo and Director Zhou, for your support. Heping and I toast you two. I hope we can continue to cooperate."

After finishing a glass of wine, Zhou Yan asked, "Director Zhang, do you have any ideas for the script of your TV series?"

"The script has been finalized and brought here, but in the hotel, if you two have an idea of ​​what to do, we can show it to you tomorrow."

Huo Siqi smiled and said: "You don't have to show it to me, just show it to the third child. He knows these things better. After reading it at the end, the third child can give me the results."

Zhang Xinyan looked at Zhou Yan again, and Zhou Yan nodded and said, "That's okay, then, Director Zhang, please go up to my studio tomorrow."

"no problem."

…

After drinking and eating, Yuan Heping and Zhang Xinyan returned to the hotel. Huo Siqi, who was drunk, put his arm around Zhou Yan's shoulders and said, "Third brother, I know you are busy recently, but you still need to worry more about this matter."

"Brother Siqi, don't be polite to me. Qizhi is the company of our three brothers, and I should do these things."

Huo Siqi burped, "I feel relieved after hearing what you said. The second brother and I don't know much about film and television, and our vision is very different from yours, so investing in these projects requires you to pay more attention. Check it out. But don’t worry, as long as you point the direction, my brother will help you overcome other difficulties.”

"I know that the success of Qizhi depends mostly on Brother Siqi's operation."

"Those are all small things that complement each other." Huo Siqi waved his hand, and then said with a smile, "Lao San, you will be alone when you go back. How about I take you to enjoy the nightlife?"

Zhou Yan smiled and shook his head, "Forget it, I'm too busy these days. Let's get together again when we have time."

Rejected by Zhou Yan, Huo Siqi curled his lips and said, "You brothers from the old Zhou family are all boring."

"Isn't my eldest brother very interesting?" Zhou Yan joked.

Huo Siqi sneered, "Zhou Yu was just a talker at first. He gave up on the battlefield with real swords and guns. Now he is married and has become a henwife, which is even more boring. In the scene in Jinling, I am better than He knows them all.”

"I'll go see it with you when I have time."

"Okay, forget it tonight, I'll go back and have a good sleep." Huo Siqi waved his hand and asked the driver to take him back.

…

The next morning, Zhang Xinyan and Yuan Heping came to Zhou Yan's office with the script of "Tai Chi Master".

Zhou Yan probably read the script once, and the story was slightly different from the "Tai Chi Master" he had watched, but it was not much different.

After reading it, he nodded, "The script is very good, the plot design and character settings are very good."

"Director Zhou thinks it's good, so we'll be more confident." Zhang Xinyan complimented.

In fact, it was quite unexpected that Zhou Yan met Zhang Xinyan these two times, because in Zhou Yan's previous impression, Zhang Xinyan should be the kind of chivalrous director.

After all, Zhang Xinyan has made so many martial arts films, including "The Yellow River Hero", but after getting in touch with him, Zhou Yan found that director Zhang is quite sophisticated.

Generally speaking, Zhang Xinyan is already over 60 this year and is a veteran in the industry. It is difficult for him to put down his dignity in front of a backward player like Zhou Yan.

But Zhang Xinyan didn't have any baggage at all, and his attitude towards Zhou Yan was quite respectful.

Zhou Yan thought for a while and asked, "Is the hero of the movie definitely Wu Jing?"

"Well, it was mainly filmed for him, so naturally he is the leading actor."

Zhou Yan nodded and asked, "What about the heroine? Has she been finalized?"

At this time, Yuan He suddenly said, "As for the heroine, we have one..."

Yuen Woo-ping had not finished speaking when Zhang Xinyan interrupted him, "There are several candidates for the female lead, but I am not very satisfied with any of them. I wonder if Director Zhou has any recommendations?"

Zhou Yan looked at Zhang Xinyan and then at Yuen Woo-ping. He knew that the female lead had probably been chosen.

But Zhang Xinyan was quick-witted and did not say anything final, just to leave some room for Zhou Yan.

Zhou Yan smiled and said, "I do have a candidate, that is our Zhou's actress Chen Hong, what do you think?"

Before Zhou Yan introduced Chen Hong to participate in "Comrades: Almost a Love Story", she also successfully got the role of Xiaoting, and the filming of the movie is about to start.

Calculating the time, when "Comrades: Almost a Love Story" is finished, Chen Hong will be able to come to film "The Grandmaster of Tai Chi".

The core of the TV series "The Grandmaster of Tai Chi" is Wu Jing, but the TV series is indeed very popular, and it must be a good thing for Chen Hong to play the female lead.

"Is it the Chen Hong who played Diao Chan?" Zhang Xinyan asked.

Zhou Yan nodded, "Yes, it's her. I just suggested it. Whether to use her or not depends on the two directors."

"I understand. We will arrange an audition for her."

At this time, Yuan Heping said in a muffled voice, "To play the leading female role, you need to choose martial arts routines and swordsmanship for a period of time, at least two or three months."

It can be seen that Yuan Heping was a little unhappy about Zhou Yan's intervention in the casting of the leading female role.

Zhou Yan said with a smile, "Director Yuan, don't worry about this. Chen Hong can cooperate with any requirements. In addition, I am also optimistic about this script. Regardless of whether "Kung Fu Kids" can make money later, we will invest in this TV series. If you agree, we can even increase the investment ratio. In other words, you don't have to invest, and we can pay for it all."

Hearing Zhou Yan's words, Zhang Xinyan's eyes showed a hint of joy.

The company he and Yuan Heping formed is now short of money. If Zhou Yan is willing to invest, it will naturally be the best for them.

Even if "Kung Fu Kids" makes money, they actually want to keep the money and do something else.

Zhang Xinyan was also feeling emotional. Zhou Yan was determined to support Chen Hong and was willing to offer such conditions.

In his opinion, Zhou Yan was willing to invest money because he wanted Chen Hong to be the heroine.

But he didn't know that even if they didn't use Chen Hong, Zhou Yan would still invest in them.

Letting Chen Hong be the heroine was just a matter of convenience.