Golden Flower premiered in the city.

Yesterday was the last day of the screening of Beijing's Olympic bid film "Golden Flower in the City". After the premiere of The Banquet, I got up early and arrived at the gate of Beijing New East Coast Cinema in Wangfujing before 8: 30.

I have attended the premieres of many new films, but in my ten-year media career, it is rare to see the "red veil" quietly unveiled like "Golden Flower". There were no crowds or flowers around, and only about 3,220 spectators were allowed to enter after a strict "clean body". Without the splendor of "the city is full of golden flowers", it is a bit as quiet as "the dawn here is quiet" I also seem to have become an underground worker before liberation. Send a text message to the other party on the way to confirm, and then "meet" at the door. I said that everyone knows the "middleman" to get tickets. After a strict security check, I walked through a long aisle and was taken into a luxurious small hall that could only accommodate less than 100 people (I heard that the audience eligible for screening tickets were basically robbed on the Internet.

After watching the movie for two hours, my heart was full of ups and downs. The words "shock and excitement" were far from describing my feelings at that time. It can be said that "Golden Flower" has completely ended the "naive era" of domestic commercial blockbusters, just like a boy who is always naughty and constantly causing trouble, and finally grows up and is no longer worried by adults. To some extent, "Golden Flower" is the most hearty performance of Laomouzi since "Living", and it is definitely the best film of the master in ten years.

Judging from the storyline, The Golden Flower in the City and The Night Banquet, which are being shown, are like "twins born of one mother" after adaptation, although one is based on Cao Yu's classic drama Thunderstorm and the other is based on Shakespeare's Hamlet. They are really alike: they all happened during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period when political power changed frequently, and they were all intrigued by the king and queen. But it happened that "apricot branch" was taken to the East Palace of the Prince next door. The climax of the plot focuses on an extravagant banquet and the ending is a tragedy. The main characters are all dead-but judging from the fluency of the narrative, the old man is obviously taller than Xiaogang Feng, and the old man is like rice on the pot cover-he finally took it out. The previous Heroes and House of Flying Daggers were naive and crude. Especially at the end of the film, Jay Chou, the second prince who wants to save his mother through rebellion, draws his sword and commits suicide in front of his beloved mother, which is even more emotional and touching. Xiaogang Feng, who set foot in the field of costume films for the first time, is like a miss weaver-she is always in a hurry, unable to grasp the rhythm in the first half of the banquet, too many branches and vines, her mood is not full enough, and her lines are neither fish nor fowl, which always keeps the audience from playing. If it weren't for the tense climax and unexpected ending, this banquet would probably be Xiaogang Feng's "last supper".

Judging from the characterization, Jinhua is flesh and blood, and all of them are as plump as Yang Guifei's figure. Contrary to the symbolization and modeling of the main characters in Hero and House of Flying Daggers, especially Chow Yun Fat and Wang He played in the harem, they are all contradictory complexes. Obviously, Wang was born out of the feudal parents in Thunderstorm. He is ruthless: he abandoned his married wife in order to marry Princess Liang. Later, he accidentally discovered that his ex-wife had remarried to his doctor, so he sent a knife and axe to kill his family. He still resolutely learned that the queen was having an affair with the prince born to his ex-wife, and he actually learned from Pan Jinlian to cook medicine-secretly poisoning his current wife in an attempt to drive her crazy; He is hypocritical and selfish. He obviously abandoned his ex-wife, and he hypocritically told the prince how much he missed her, including the bedroom where he lived was exactly the same as when his ex-wife was there. There are many extravagant court ceremonies in the film, which undoubtedly exposes the hypocrisy of this arrogant emperor. But Zhang Yimou did not simply regard him as a heinous villain. In the film, on the one hand, we can see that he is a bit like a shrew to his two wives-he doesn't mean it, but he always has a father's love for his son, especially the big prince played by Liu Ye. In the second half of the film, the eldest prince Liu Ye was suddenly killed by the psychologically unbalanced little prince, and I obviously noticed the pain of Wang. At this time, Chow Yun Fat captured the rich inner world of the father. He is your brother! "This is in line with the general mentality of feudal emperors: a wife is a dress that can be changed frequently; Son is Xiang, don't break it.

The queen played by the palace is called another "Fan Yi" in the inner court of the deep palace. She is a depressed patient and is a "political couple" with Wang. She couldn't get the love that a wife deserved for a long time, and finally fell in love with the big prince. However, under the pressure of feudal ethics, the other party always wanted to escape from time to time, so it became a spewing volcano and a "detonator" to ignite the powder magazine of this small feudal court. In the film, we can see that in the end, she went crazy uncontrollably, and even provoked the filial second prince Jay Chou to launch a mutiny. Finally, she set herself on fire and destroyed others, including her son and lover. This woman who has been longing for true love but can't find it is undoubtedly the most tragic central figure in Golden Flower. In this "pot struggle", the ultimate destruction of a woman is not only the core theme of Golden Flower, but also the theme that Zhang Yimou is best at controlling. Hanging the Red Lantern, which won him numerous praises overseas, is the originator of this kind of theme, but today, fifteen years later, "Chen" and "Golden Flower" have replaced the "red lantern", but the internal "core" remains unchanged (Wang is Chen Jiazhu, and the fourth wife sings the lotus). In this sense, it is not an exaggeration to call "The Golden Flower in the City" the "Ancient Palace Edition" of "Hanging the Red Lantern High".

The most remarkable thing about Jinhua is the performance of the actors. The performances of Liu Ye, Jay Chou and Jin Chen are all in place. Of course, the best stars are two emperors-Chow Yun Fat and Gong Li. Chow Yun Fat, who reached middle age, was obviously fat and was no longer as brave as Mark, but his position as the eldest brother in Chinese film made him show his domineering power. Coupled with his height of 1.83 meters, from the appearance, Chow Yun Fat is very comfortable to play the king. Chow Yun Fat's early performance was "free" and emotional, which may be related to his long-term role as a rebellious hero and a grass-roots nobody. In this play, his performance is "closed" a lot, more expressionless and self-defeating, which can stand the scene very well, especially after watching countless sharp eyes in the world, he is often thoughtful, just like a sparrow on Dongting Lake.

I appreciate Gong Li's performance in this film. Her performance is thought-provoking and worthy of repeated chewing by the audience. There are many close-ups of Gong Li in the film, and we can clearly see the face of a woman whose desire has never been satisfied. She is depressed and forbearing, waiting for the outbreak all the time. Although she wears gold, silver and heavy makeup, she can't make her lonely and empty mind get a moment's peace. Gong Li's performance is mature and experienced. Compared with her, Zhang Ziyi in "The Banquet" is too "little jasper". If Gong Li is a deeply rooted "queen" in the Golden Flower, Zhang Ziyi is at best like a jealously jealous "concubine" in the banquet, while Sister Zhang plays a good role in the banquet, but she still lacks some aristocratic spirit and demeanor.

Because they are the same theme, the same story, the same huge investment, the same luxurious behind-the-scenes lineup, and the same mind of fighting for the Oscar, it seems that Golden Flower and Banquet are doomed to be like the encounter between Zhou Yu and Kong Ming from the beginning-no one refuses to accept anyone. I think in this PK, Jinhua is likely to come from behind (although the film will not be able to compete with it until1mid-February)