Chapter 454: The Jinx Director

"Someone is wary of you."

Chen Ziyan said to Lu Yan He.

"Wary of me... what?" Lu Yan He asked, "Popularity?"

"No, wary of the international influence you present," Chen Ziyan said, "Although we all know that this doesn't come entirely from you, others don't see so many things. They only see that every film you participate in is shortlisted for top international film festivals."

Lu Yan He: "However, being shortlisted for top international film festivals, what would others be wary of?"

"Wary of your increasing right to speak," Chen Ziyan said, "The film and television industry is not just film and television companies and production staff; it also has various associations, organizations, and various interest parties behind it. Look at director Wang Zhong, a Best Director award at the Xitu'er International Film Festival made his status in the country soar, directly entering the ranks of top big directors. All the top film activities in the country in the past year will definitely invite him to attend. You are the same. Your resume now belongs to the best among male actors, only missing a real big award. When you win a Best Actor award overseas, you will directly enter the top male actor club—although some people say you have already entered, without a big award, it is ultimately not true to the name."

"This is not the most critical point. Besides, you are also a director, a screenwriter, and a producer. Think about it, from "Rouge" to "Lost on Journey," your script made Chen Bige win the top film festival Best Actress trophy again, returning to the peak of her career, made Huang Kai successfully enter the film circle, and had a well-received screen character, and also made a completely newcomer Wang Dashan popular."

Chen Ziyan continued: "You want to film "Love Letter," Luo Yuzhong, a top big shot in the industry, came to supervise you personally, Liu Bige, a director who won the Venice International Film Festival Jury Grand Prize, came to be your cinematographer, Chen Bige broke the habit of taking plays, and entered the new group to play the female lead for your new film less than half a year after leaving the group. Director Wang Zhong also brought the artistic director of the Hexi Film Festival, Ventour Robert, to visit your crew. These things are repeatedly reminding people in this circle that you have formed a force that cannot be underestimated. If you want to do something, you have a very powerful force to help you."

Lu Yan He gradually realized what Chen Ziyan was talking about.

"Is it that tall trees attract the wind?" Lu Yan He asked.

"No, it's the emergence of a new force that inevitably affects the interests of other interest groups," Chen Ziyan said, "For you, this is just a circle of friends, but for others, it means a new threat. If you are popular alone, it only creates competition with other artists, but you are not. HP's Asia-Pacific head Tom White prioritizes purchasing your projects, and others' projects can only be ranked behind. Your long-term cooperation framework with Beijiguang Video inevitably affects others' cooperation with Beijiguang Video. Who gets priority for funds is a matter of extreme interest. The "Friends" reunion that even Jingtai couldn't do, you managed to do, and clearly, the actors of "Friends" trust you more and are closer to you."

Lu Yan He was silent.

"Now, do you know why others are wary of you?" Chen Ziyan said, "It's not just tall trees attracting the wind, it's also the innocent being guilty of possessing a treasure."

Lu Yan He took a deep breath.

"Then what should I do? Should I try to make fewer good works in the future?"

(Note: The source text contains garbled characters here, likely a typo or encoding error.)

"Of course not," Chen Ziyan rolled her eyes at him, "I'm just reminding you that your current situation and status have undergone huge changes, so the attacks from others on you in the future will probably be more and more biased toward situations like this time, saying that you are greedy for other people's things, or accusing you of being unworthy of your position. In short, they must pull you down from this altar."

Lu Yan He: "Then what do you mean, Sister Ziyan—"

"What I mean by saying so much is that I hope you won't be provoked by these people's words, stand up and admit that they are right, saying that you really don't have the influence that everyone says is so exaggerated," Chen Ziyan said, "The golden clothes that others put on you, don't take them off yourself. Since many people have raised you to this position, what you have to do is not to go down from this position, but to stand as firmly as possible in this position."

Lu Yan He suddenly realized.

Chen Ziyan is worried about his "moral cleanliness" again, and wants to explain it, making himself "clear."

"..."

"Sister Ziyan, I don't think I'm that naive now." Lu Yan He never had such a thought from beginning to end.

"That's good." Chen Ziyan smiled at him.

Lu Yan He knew it when he saw the smile she revealed; she didn't believe his words.

—You are still very naive.

Her meaning was written clearly on her face.

"..."

In the afternoon, Lu Yan He and Chen Siqi went to the cinema to watch a film that had just been released, called "Behind the Golden Clothes." This is a drama film, talking about a tailor who secretly delivered intelligence in the background of war and intense situations during the Republic of China period. It is similar to a biographical film, but this is a fictional character, without a historical prototype, using the style of filming spy war to film the character's story.

The box office of this film in the summer season is not very good, with only 6 million on the first day, and it only rose to 8 million on the second day.

This film is indeed not suitable for the summer season where commercial films gather.

However, the word-of-mouth of the film is very good. Lu Yan He also knew about it after seeing Zeng Qiao recommend this film in his circle of friends.

In the cinema, basically everyone came to watch the "Myth Returns," which has the best box office performance recently, a costume fantasy blockbuster released at the end of July, released for nearly two weeks, and has already got 1.5 billion box office. Under the sweep of this film, other new films such as "Jedi Escape" and "Assassinating the Ming Dynasty" were swept to the second tier. The box office cannot be said to be very bad, but it cannot be said to be the winner of this summer season. As for the older films released earlier, the market potential of "Angry Crow" has been squeezed out, and "Lost on Journey" currently only has a daily box office of a few million, basically only able to be fixed at the position of about 640 million.

Lu Yan

When buying tickets online, there was no one else in this row, to prevent Lu Yan He from being recognized by others.

However, there were not many audience members in the cinema.

Lu Yan He took a rough look; there were only about a dozen people.

"Why did *Behind the Golden Garment* choose to be released in this time slot?" Lu Yan He asked, puzzled.

Chen Siqi said, "Probably because *Behind the Golden Garment* doesn't have any big stars; they are all veteran actors. Even if it were placed in a minor slot like the Mid-Autumn Festival, it still wouldn't be the kind of cast that could attract audiences into the cinema. It's better to place it in the summer slot, where the base market is large enough. With proper promotion and operation, it can still secure some box office. The production cost of *Behind the Golden Garment* certainly won't be very high. If it can reach a box office of over 30 million in theaters, it should actually be able to break even. Looking at its premiere, it should be able to reach nearly 20 million in the first weekend. With good word-of-mouth, it might be able to sustain a long run and achieve profitability during its theatrical release."

Chen Siqi is now even more knowledgeable about film promotion and distribution than Lu Yan He.

She ponders a lot and often writes reviews on the film and television commentary section of the *Jump Up* self-media platform. What she writes most about is actually analyzing the operation of a film from the perspective of economics and the market. This is what she is interested in herself; writing these articles is less about writing for others to see and more about her writing down her own thought processes and conclusions.

After Chen Siqi said this, Lu Yan He felt it made a lot of sense.

The male lead of *Behind the Golden Garment* is Feng Shuo, a veteran actor basically known to everyone who follows the film and television industry, but in terms of fans and popularity, it really can't be said that he is very famous. And apart from Feng Shuo, none of the other participating actors are big-name stars or traffic stars; they are all actors with a certain degree of recognition but relatively few fans.

With the release of such a film, the initial data is certainly not going to be very good. Coupled with the fact that it is a pseudo-biographical subject, and a pseudo-biographical subject without a real-life prototype, once the audience learns a little about it, they basically won't choose to walk into the cinema.

In this situation, the choice of the time slot is really not that important. What is important instead is how to "trick" as many audience members as possible.

Ten minutes after the movie started, someone suddenly came over.

She was also sitting in this row.

Seeing this, Lu Yan He immediately lowered his head and made room for the person to pass.

When the other person passed them, she said a soft apology and sat down two seats away from Lu Yan He.

Lu Yan He turned his head to take a look; by the light from the screen, Lu Yan He could clearly see the other person's profile.

It was a woman of about forty years old.

Lu Yan He raised his left hand, propped it against the side of his face, and blocked it slightly.

During the two-hour movie, there was almost no communication between Lu Yan He and Chen Siqi—

This film exceeded both of their expectations; it was completely devoid of the boredom or dullness they had initially thought it might have.

The entire story was very compact, and the pace was fast.

The story is about a tailor in Donglin City who, because of his excellent skills, is highly welcomed by all the ladies in the city and therefore frequently enters and exits the mansions of various dignitaries.

One day, the tailor was going to the home of an adjutant to measure his wife for new clothes, but on the way, he was hijacked by two people, one named Li Mazi and the other Ma Chengquan, who threatened him into bringing them inside. His apprentice was kept as a hostage by Ma Chengquan, while he took Li Mazi into the adjutant's mansion. Li Mazi wanted to go in to steal something. Under his cover, Li Mazi successfully obtained the item he wanted to steal without any danger.

Unexpectedly, that same night, Li Mazi knocked on the door of the tailor shop, severely wounded. They had been exposed, and his companion Ma Chengquan had already sacrificed himself. He had managed to escape with great difficulty, was critically wounded and dying, and shoved a cloth bag he had stolen into the tailor's hands, begging him to deliver it to the Ruyi Inn in the west of the city.

The tailor wanted to stay out of it and not get involved in this muddy water, but he didn't want this person to die in his tailor shop, so he went to find a physician late at night. Not long after he went out, he saw a team of people surrounding his tailor shop, and the leader was unexpectedly from the adjutant's mansion. They had come to look for the stolen cloth bag—and that cloth bag was still tucked in his bosom.

Before the tailor had time to think, he saw his apprentice being dragged out; when the apprentice couldn't answer where he was, he was shot to death—the fourteen-year-old child was an orphan he had picked up. Even with a gun pointed at his forehead, he was so nervous that his legs were trembling, yet in such a situation, he refused to say where his master was.

The gun went off directly.

The tailor's eyes were bloodshot from the shock of this scene, and he wanted to rush out, but the sight of Li Mazi being carried out from inside made him regain a little bit of calm. Only then did he understand his situation, knowing that once he appeared, he would definitely meet the same fate of being killed as his apprentice. Li Mazi was taken away by the people from the adjutant's mansion, and the tailor could only sneak to the Ruyi Inn.

But when the tailor cautiously arrived at the Ruyi Inn, he happened to run into it being surrounded by another group of people. Only one person escaped, and when he was being hunted, the tailor saved him. The tailor told him about his situation and gave the cloth bag to Xu San.

In order to survive, the tailor had to escape Donglin City to avoid the search by those people. And the person the tailor saved, Xu San, also had to escape Donglin City as soon as possible to deliver the item. As the two tried various methods, they became more and more familiar and close to each other. The tailor looked at the young Xu San as his own son who had passed away early, and Xu San also learned some needlework from the tailor, saying he wanted to mend his clothes, which he did for several days.

However, the guards in Donglin City were too strict, and there was simply no way to get out. At this time, news suddenly came that the Revolutionary Army had been defeated at Huyi Pass, and the city was filled with lively cheers. Xu San was anxious, saying he had to leave the city immediately, even if he died trying. The tailor said that being so reckless was just going to his death. The two had a big argument and parted on bad terms.

The tailor's tracks were discovered, and he was caught by the adjutant's men. The adjutant interrogated him about the whereabouts of the list. The tailor guessed that the so-called list was probably the thing Li Mazi had stolen from the adjutant, which was in that cloth bag, but he gritted his teeth and said nothing, only saying that he didn't know anything about any list. The adjutant asked again if he knew Xu San, and he only said that he didn't know any Xu San at all.

This is actually a story about a small person against the backdrop of a turbulent situation.

Because he had seen the movie *The Message*, Lu Yan He had roughly guessed what Xu San would do later when he saw Xu San learning needlework from the tailor—in this world, especially in spy dramas, there had been no precedent for using needle and thread to embroider information on clothes to pass on intelligence.

When he saw this, Lu Yan He basically already knew how this movie would end.

Xu San definitely had to die. Only when he died could the list on him be recovered by the adjutant, and the "list code" on his clothes could be passed on in the form of a corpse.

But how should the character of the tailor be written? What Lu Yan He didn't expect was that the day after the tailor was caught, Xu San was caught by the adjutant. The adjutant interrogated Xu San about where the list was. Xu San would rather die than submit, but his tracks from yesterday had been investigated, and he was found at his hiding place. After the adjutant got the list, he killed Xu San directly and prepared to kill the tailor as well, but his wife stepped in and saved the tailor's life, keeping him in the mansion specifically to make clothes for her. Thus, the tailor became the adjutant's wife's exclusive tailor.

However, the situation of the war suddenly began to change slowly. On the day the Revolutionary Army entered Donglin City, the adjutant's mansion was surrounded immediately. The tailor, as the tailor of the adjutant's mansion, was detained together with them. Until the evening, an officer suddenly took him away. Just when he thought he was going to be killed, he was brought in front of a familiar piece of clothing. It was Xu San's clothes.

The officer asked him if he knew a person named Xu San.

The tailor didn't speak. For so many years, no matter who asked him, he acted as if he had never known this person named Xu San.

The officer asked him if he was literate.

The tailor still didn't speak.

The officer suddenly pointed to the clothes in front of him and asked him if he recognized these clothes.

The officer took out a palm-sized strip of cloth from the interlayer of the clothes, with a few lines of words embroidered on it.

The officer said that what the tailor helped Li Mazi steal from the adjutant's mansion was a spy list, which recorded the list of rats the adjutant had planted in the Revolutionary Army. At that time, both Li Mazi and Xu San wanted to deliver this list to the Revolutionary Army as soon as possible to clear out these rats.

And besides that list of rats, there was also Xu San's account of being hunted, then saved by the tailor, and the two of them trying to leave the city together. Xu San wrote on it that if the tailor was still alive when the Revolutionary Army entered the city, please have the superiors express gratitude on his behalf.

Only then did the tailor know why he had been dragged into the life-and-death crisis of that year.

Near the end of the film, Li Mazi, whom the tailor thought had long since died, was found in the dungeon of the adjutant's mansion. He had actually been imprisoned below for all these years and had even been treated by doctors hired by the adjutant, who wanted to pry more intelligence out of his mouth.

The tailor watched the emaciated Li Mazi being sent to a car by his companions, and the car drove away. He turned his head and looked at the clothes in front of him, his mind recalling the time he was in trouble with Xu San, hiding in a mansion, with Xu San clumsily learning needlework from him. Because they were afraid that lighting a lamp would attract attention, they could only do this work under the moonlight.

The tailor scolded him for being so particular about mending clothes at a time like this.

His young face actually revealed a hint of a shy smile.

This is what he said at the time: "My father was also a tailor, but I rarely had new clothes to wear. Every time my clothes were torn, he would mend them for me. I asked him why he didn't make me new clothes to wear. He said, in such hard times, how could there be so many new clothes to wear? Sometimes, it was actually just a tiny hole, and I felt it was no big deal, but he saw it and would definitely make me take it off and mend it for me. I said this was too much trouble, it would be better to wait until there were a few more holes and mend them all at once. He said, the torn places must be mended in time; if you don't mend them, the hole will get bigger and bigger, and harder and harder to mend, and maybe when you want to mend it, you won't be able to."

The tailor stared blankly at the clothes in front of him. Many soldiers were coming and going around him, but no one noticed this person staring blankly at a piece of clothing, and no one knew what he was thinking behind his blank gaze.

The film froze on this scene, and then the ending song played.

"It's been a long time since I've seen a movie like this in the cinema."

Lu Yan He heard a girl in the front row say to her boyfriend.

"Yeah," her boyfriend said, "it was quite moving to watch."

Lu Yan He let out a long sigh, and while the lights in the screening hall hadn't been turned on yet, he said to Chen Siqi, "Let's go first."

Chen Siqi nodded.

Just as the words fell, the woman sitting on Lu Yan He's left suddenly stood up as well, wanting to pass through first.

Lu Yan He had no choice but to let her pass first.

However, she stopped right beside him.

"Are you Lu Yan He?" she asked in a low voice.

Lu Yan He was startled; ah, he had been recognized?!

He whispered, "You've mistaken me for someone else; I just look a bit like him."

"Don't pretend, you are definitely him; even your voice is the same." This woman said very firmly, and then, she said something that shocked Lu Yan He, "I am Zhou Changying, the director of *Behind the Golden Garment*. It's quite a coincidence to run into you here."

Both Lu Yan He and Chen Siqi were stunned by this incredible coincidence.

Watching a movie, and you can even run into the director of this movie.

However, what Lu Yan He and Chen Siqi didn't expect even more was that twenty minutes later, Zhou Changying would directly propose in the car that she wanted to shoot a sequel to *Behind the Golden Garment* and asked if Lu Yan He was willing to invest.

Lu Yan He was very confused.

Regarding such a matter, Lu Yan He and Chen Siqi would of course not give an answer immediately. They chatted briefly with Zhou Changying, exchanged contact information, and promised to reply after thinking it over. Only then did Zhou Changying leave.

Once the person left, Lu Yan He and Chen Siqi looked at each other.

Chen Siqi said, "I searched online, she is not a liar; she is indeed Zhou Changying."

"Uh, my brain is a bit messy right now, I haven't reacted yet, why... would she suddenly ask me to invest?"

"Probably because everyone thinks you are very rich?" Chen Siqi asked.

"I'm not rich enough to dare to invest in a movie," Lu Yan He complained.

Film investment is a big gamble.

Chen Siqi said, "The production company for *Behind the Golden Garment* is Ruyi Films. Why does Zhou Changying want to make a sequel, and why doesn't she go to Ruyi Films? Could it be that they are unwilling to make a sequel?"

Lu Yan He: "I feel like I need to find Sister Ziyan to help me ask around."

Chen Siqi nodded: "Mm."

On the way to the restaurant by car, Chen Siqi kept sitting in the passenger seat, using her phone to search for information about Zhou Changying.

"This Director Zhou, her experience is really bumpy," Chen Siqi said to Lu Yan He while looking at her phone.

"What's wrong?" Lu Yan He asked.

"The film companies she has been with, except for the Ruyi Films she just collaborated with, have all collapsed," Chen Siqi revealed an incredulous expression, "Some media directly called her a jinx director."