Chapter 322

Many people know that painting cakes is a skill bosses are born with.

But many people don't know that, in a sense, a director is also the boss of a film crew. Everyone on the crew is their employee.

Why does everyone want to participate in a big director's film?

Because that is a real, tangible cake; they can smell the aroma without anyone having to say a word, and they want to take a bite.

But for a film by a newcomer director like Liu Bige, the cake is like the moon reflected in water or flowers in the mist—visible, but untouchable. Therefore, many great directors, when starting out, are able to lead a group of people to make a good film from nothing largely because their surging passion and fanaticism can infect others and stimulate their creative abilities.

Liu Bige is a man of surging passion; he sometimes possesses the fanaticism of a poet.

So, when he said something that sounded overly "inconceivable," Lu Yan He only hesitated for a moment before deciding to become a loyal "believer."

He himself is a rational person, hard to easily trust others' words or be brainwashed, but by nature, he also believes in the power of the spirit, and that people exert different levels of power in different mental states.

Liu Bige uses *Sanshan* to stimulate the actors of *Late Spring*, hoping that under the stimulation of *Sanshan*, they can deliver better performances.

*Late Spring* is a film that, at this stage, doesn't seem to have a very bright future in any aspect. It can be said that if these actors had other choices, they might not necessarily choose this film. After all, apart from the male lead Lu Yan He, this film has almost nothing to attract actors.

In fact, just because Lu Yan He can see that the script for *Late Spring* is good and sees the talent in Liu Bige, it doesn't mean others can see it too.

Not every actor has such vision and ability.

Many times, a director must use this kind of speech-like, morale-boosting method to motivate the actors and the rest of the crew.

To make everyone believe that this will be a good film, and believe that once this film is made, it will become a representative work in everyone's acting career.

Only with such an atmosphere can everyone's subjective initiative be mobilized to the greatest extent.

The next day, the sun was bright; it was a very pleasant day.

Lu Yan He was suddenly notified that the scene for the grand finale had to be moved to today.

He was stunned.

Before this, *Late Spring* had always adopted a chronological shooting method, allowing the actors to slowly enter their characters' states along with the plot.

Why suddenly shoot the ending scenes today?

The other actors felt equally surprised and puzzled.

After Liu Bige gathered them, he explained: "The weather is great, it matches the weather I envisioned. I want to try shooting a version first. Don't have any psychological pressure; if it's not shot well, then we won't use this version and will continue shooting later."

Hearing Liu Bige say this, everyone nodded.

Lu Yan He said: "But, doesn't the script say the ending part takes place in a heavy rainstorm?"

In the rainstorm, these young people, after experiencing a summer, are facing separation, each harboring their own thoughts, silent and still. The characters' states and relationships are closely tied to the rainstorm outside the classroom.

Liu Bige said: "I've always had an idea. I want this scene of everyone separating to happen on a beautiful, sunny day, with a light breeze and faint clouds, where the world looks like everything is normal. That is the kind of feeling I want to present."

Lu Yan He pondered for a moment and roughly understood what Liu Bige meant.

But Yan Lingyu didn't understand, slightly frowning, and said: "Director, the reason the script sets the surrounding environment for the final separation scene as a rainstorm is actually to reflect a state of falling apart through this terrible weather, right?"

At the end of the film, these young people, from meeting to becoming familiar, finally have irreconcilable conflicts. Not only does the tutoring class end—a physical end—but they also face an emotional end.

Liu Bige nodded: "When I wrote the script before, that was indeed the idea."

Yan Lingyu asked: "Then why change it to a beautiful, sunny day? I feel... this seems like it would weaken our emotions."

Liu Bige didn't answer Yan Lingyu, but looked at Lu Yan He.

"Yan He, what do you think?"

Lu Yan He shook his head: "I haven't fully figured it out yet, but many images can emerge in my mind. That is, for us, some things have happened over this past period, but for this world, the things that happened to us are actually very insignificant. We feel our world has changed, but at the same time, this world hasn't actually changed at all. But it is precisely this contrast that creates a sense of fragility, where everything looks normal on the surface, but many things have already collapsed inside."

Liu Bige started to laugh.

He nodded and said: "You understand the feeling I want."

Yan Lingyu and the others still seemed to half-understand, their faces showing confusion.

But actors don't have to figure everything out before they can perform.

Acting is essentially a feeling.

Many genius actors don't need to analyze; they act entirely on intuition, crushing many technical actors. That is the reason.

Although Yan Lingyu and the others didn't quite understand what Liu Bige and Lu Yan He were talking about, it didn't hinder their understanding of their own characters, nor did it hinder them from being able to perform their confusion, hesitation, melancholy, and helplessness in such a sun-drenched classroom.

After Liu Bige had them shoot several takes, he stopped.

The actors didn't know why he suddenly stopped and were somewhat puzzled.

But Liu Bige just stayed by himself to the side, not knowing what he was thinking about.

He Qingqing asked in a low voice: "What's wrong with the director?"

Lu Yan He glanced at Liu Bige's back and said: "He's probably thinking about something. Let him think quietly by himself." He Qingqing sighed lightly and said: "I don't know why, but the scene just now made me feel particularly uncomfortable inside, as if I were really about to separate from you all."

"Yeah." Wang Jing nodded, "After entering the situation, I almost couldn't control myself from shedding tears; I held it back for a long time."

Lu Yan He heard them say this and smiled lightly.

Liu Bige is really good at finding actors.

The actors he finds, if nothing else, have empathy skills stronger than the last; they are all emotional types.

The benefit of finding such actors is that as long as they understand and believe, it's easy for them to get into character.

Three actresses, three completely different styles.

Yan Lingyu is cold, taciturn, and has excellent grades; He Qingqing is sunny, enthusiastic, and extroverted; Wang Jing is insecure, introverted, stubborn, and persistent.

All three actresses have a certain degree of similarity to the characters they play.

In Lu Yan He's view, among the three actresses, the one who acts the best is Wang Jing. Her emotions are the most extreme, yet the most restrained; there is a kind of sophistication to it. However, her role in this film is relatively less central, with only two explosive scenes, where the emotions are sharp and shocking.

But from an industry perspective, perhaps the one with the most star power is Yan Lingyu. She is beautiful, generous, and has an outstanding temperament, like a white swan.

Lu Yan He often couldn't help but imagine what kind of actors they would become in the future while acting with them.

And then, use this to reflect on himself.

After about fifteen minutes, Liu Bige suddenly seemed to have figured something out, came back abruptly, and said: "For this shot, I want to film a long take."

His sudden statement made everyone stunned.

Then, Liu Bige detailed how he wanted to shoot it.

Simply put, he wanted the camera to start with He Qingqing, film her first, then follow her gaze to Wang Jing, from Wang Jing's look at Yan Lingyu, the camera would then shift to Yan Lingyu, all the way to Lu Yan He, letting the camera complete an arrow-like movement among the five people to present their relationships, which are still intact on the surface but have actually already begun to collapse.

"Don't use lighting, I want the most normal natural light," Liu Bige said.

Thus, according to his idea, they had to rearrange, clear a track for the camera to move, then test shoot, look at the effect of the test shoot, and arrange the lighting positions according to the new camera path.

However, according to Liu Bige's idea, using only natural light without setting up other light points, shooting in one go like this, some shots would become dark.

This is something the technical department needs to discuss with Liu Bige.

Lu Yan He and the others couldn't do anything at this time, so they could only sit in their seats, acting as models for lighting tests, letting them adjust again and again to find the best-looking angle for the shot.

"Good-looking" here refers to the good-looking nature of the film shot, not the good-looking nature of the actors themselves.

This process is actually very dry and boring.

Because they couldn't lower their heads to play with their phones, they had to cooperate with the photographer and Liu Bige's requirements from time to time, doing some actions to see the effect shot in the camera.

Acting is actually full of basic work like this.

As a result, after this day, Liu Bige only managed to set up the camera movement path and the actors' line-of-sight positioning for this scene.

Everyone felt exhausted, only Liu Bige's two eyes were as excited as light bulbs, full of anticipation and excitement for the official shooting of this scene.

Lu Yan He smiled and said: "I know you thought of a great shot, but you're being too exaggerated, calm down a bit."

Liu Bige said: "I increasingly feel from the bottom of my heart that our film will be a great film."

Lu Yan He: "I've always felt that way, never doubted it."

Liu Bige was stunned.

Lu Yan He said: "I know that in order to boost everyone's morale, you said a lot of things you might not have been so convinced of yourself, but I have always believed in what you said, and I also know that you can definitely do it; you have that ability."

Liu Bige didn't expect Lu Yan He to trust him so much.

This left Liu Bige astonished.

"Really?" Liu Bige looked at him in disbelief.

Lu Yan He: "Really."

Liu Bige smiled, "Alright then, being encouraged by you like this, it seems I can't afford not to do it well."

Lu Yan He: "Cut it out, haven't you been throwing your whole self into this film from the very beginning? Don't act like you're being forced."

"Because I'm afraid of failure," Liu Bige said, lowering his head and smiling lightly.

Lu Yan He looked at him.

"In film, failure is the norm; success is the miracle."