Brief introduction of Shanghai legend

Through the narration of 18 Shanghainese of different ages, this paper shows the changes of this bustling city in the past hundred years. The narrators include old Shanghainese such as Wei Wei, Fei (the daughter of Fei's mother) and Du's daughter, and new generation Shanghainese such as Chen Danqing and Han Han. Among them, Zhao Tao will interpret a story of finding a lover and string together the whole documentary in this "plot" way.

Shanghai, a city with ups and downs, is a pier where people come and go. There used to be revolutionaries, capitalists, workers, politicians, soldiers, artists and gangs everywhere. There are also revolutions, wars, assassinations and love ... 1949, a large number of Shanghainese went to Hongkong and Taiwan Province Province. Looking for the memory of Shanghai in Shanghai, Taipei and Hong Kong, the personal experiences of eighteen people, like eighteen chapters of a novel, tell us the story of Shanghai from 1930 to 20 10. Shortly before the Cannes Film Festival, The Legend of the Sea was still in the post-production stage. Jia cut his film and cut it into an eye injury, which delayed the progress again and again. Finally, the film arrived in Cannes as scheduled and appeared in the "One Concern" unit of 16. The shooting technique of the film is similar to A Story of Twenty-four Cities. One of the main lines allows 18 people who are closely related to Shanghai's politics, economy and cultural history to tell their legendary stories, and the outline of Shanghai's century-old history emerges from their words. Another clue is that Zhao Tao plays a strange woman wandering in the city. In an exclusive interview with Netease Entertainment, Jia explained why the creative technique of interweaving reality and reality was adopted in a pure documentary. "The type of documentary in China is too monotonous, and it is another taste to shoot it with a feature film." The Legend of the Sea is called a tribute film for the Shanghai World Expo, with the vague labels of "official" and "publicity". Jia explained that this is just a misunderstanding from the outside world. He just "created by the opportunity of the World Expo, and his role is not to promote the World Expo and Shanghai". After the film was finished, many cities invited him to create Legend for himself, but he said he didn't want to make any more documentaries. "I don't want to label and serialize the legend. This film consumes too much energy for me. I just want to make a play. "

On the Development of Documentary from The Legend of the Sea;

China documentary is too monotonous to produce a series of "Urban Legends".

Netease Entertainment: The Legend of the Sea is interspersed with clues that can travel through time and space among 18 interviewees, but the role played by Zhao Tao is weakly related to the plot. How did you come up with the idea of using a person with no clear identity and actions as a clue to connect the dialogue?

Jia: This part is what they are most interested in, and this method is also a development of documentary. This character is an elf. This elf has a good relationship with these eighteen people. These eighteen people can talk and have a chance to tell their memories. This elf represents thousands of people who can't tell their stories. What about their stories? That's why I implanted this magical element into the movie. This is also a sudden inspiration, which is particularly easy to feel in Shanghai, especially when walking on the Bund. When you see those old buildings empty, you will imagine/kloc-they were there more than 0/00 years ago. Cities come and go, life and death, so many stories have happened. After adding this faint clue, the verbal comments received were even more unexpected, and many media felt that this was the development of documentary.

Netease Entertainment: Do you think Legend of the Sea has created a new method of documentary?

Jia: Documentary is a very open medium, but most people understand it with a fundamentalism, that is, real people and real events must happen in front of the camera, with overexposure, virtual focus, hand-held shooting and shaking pictures; However, movies are the carrier of aesthetics after all. China documentary has developed very well in recent years, but the genre is still relatively monotonous. They are all social realism, tracking the past ten years and showing the changes of a family. It's a documentary, but it's still monotonous. In fact, there can also be very dramatic documentaries, such as Haneda Airport Sports, which was filmed by Japanese documentary director Ogawa Shinsuke, and it is very similar to Akira Kurosawa's drama. I just want to break everyone's preconceptions about documentaries and have more imagination and experiments. The use of drama films is to match the space, to have touching lyricism and a different flavor. I've been trying to make a few films in this way. I think my early films, such as Xiaowu, hand-held photography and on-site snapshot, have done well. After shooting for more than ten years, I think we can use a new method.

Netease Entertainment: It is said that Legend of the Sea is a gift film of the World Expo. Is its relationship with the World Expo an image propaganda film?

Jia: Some people think that Legend of the Sea is an image film of the World Expo, which is a misunderstanding. Two or three images of the World Expo were taken by other directors. The Legend of the Sea is a work taken by the opportunity of the World Expo. Its function is not to promote the World Expo or the city of Shanghai, but a work of art about Shanghai. During the World Expo, people can learn about the memory of Shanghai, and the whole creative process is completely free. Accurately speaking, The Legend of the Sea is a resident film of the World Expo and one of the exhibits of the China Pavilion.

Netease Entertainment: The Legend of the Sea continues the creative technique of A Story of Twenty-four Cities. Will you always use this method of character interview combined with fictional plot to make documentaries?

Jia: Many people ask me to make similar movies, because many cities want to shoot the same Legend, but I won't shoot it again in the short term, so it will become a promotional film mode, and I don't want to label and serialize it. This film has consumed too much energy in the past two years. I want to make a feature film instead of a documentary for the time being.

"Ignorance" Zhao Tao big-name interviewee: Imagination saved Zhao Tao. Shanghai legend is a celebrity story meeting.

Netease Entertainment: Zhao Tao said that she didn't know what she was doing when she made this movie, because you didn't give her any hints or scripts. Why do actors perform in complete ignorance?

Jia: Because many of the spaces photographed this time are once in a blue moon, such as the renovation project of the Bund, which has been completed, I estimate that it will not be started again in 50 years 100. According to my work experience, I need an actor, and it is possible to develop a clue. When shooting space, I can put characters in it. On the one hand, she can naturally bring these spaces out, and also make some preparations for some important plots behind. When editing, it only exists as a light clue, and there is no need to rob the part that the characters have been to, unlike the half of "Twenty-four Cities". So the most important thing is to let her wander around the city at first, until the end of the film, the audience knows that she is an elf from the past. But this is a great challenge for actresses. She must imagine the scene by herself. I think she plays very well, which is also related to her dancing skills. Her dancing body and unique imagination make up for many shortcomings of her performance without fulcrum.

Netease Entertainment: There are typical scenes of ordinary people's lives in Shanghai in the movie, but most of the interviews are celebrities, even Han Han is no exception. What are the criteria for selecting these people?

Jia: The biggest feature of Shanghai is that almost all important people in modern China are inextricably linked with this city. It is wrong to shoot the legend of this city without looking for historical parties or their families. This film is not about a Shanghai citizen's daily knowledge of the city, but about the legendary experience of the city. Even as a worker's representative, he made a film with director Xie Jin.

Netease Entertainment: Have you considered that the awareness of these characters is helpful for the promotion of movies?

Jia: I didn't think too much about communication when shooting. The most important thing is to consider what kind of characters I can find to tell my memory vividly. This film is not a review film, but a personal story film. The role of this person is not how much public awareness he can have, but how complicated his history is, how much historical information he can connect in series, and how charming his language is.

Netease Entertainment: Restoring the original appearance of history with the narration of characters is also something that many TV programs are doing. What is the fundamental difference between your film and this common TV production method?

Jia: There is a big difference between movies and talk shows. If you watch it on TV, it is difficult to concentrate so many people in a relatively concentrated space. The film is a whole. It has 18 chapters, the characters interact with each other, and it is filmed with film: the choice of space and the movement of the lens. When the characters are projected on the huge screen, the subtle expression changes are presented when the characters are interviewed, and the narrative of the characters is combined with the poetic space.