Chapter 475

Since the Shanghai Film Festival was live-streamed and news media were on-site, anyone who followed the award knew Liu Tianxian had won the Golden Goblet Award for Best Actress.

Major portals and self-media outlets also published illustrated reports on the award ceremony.

This is the advantage of a major award ceremony—there's never a lack of exposure.

So while Liu Tianxian was being interviewed by reporters, news of her winning the Golden Goblet Award spread across internet media at an incredible speed.

With today's level of internet development, dissemination is extremely fast—it took barely a moment to go viral across the entire network.

Anyone with a phone or computer could see news of Liu Tianxian winning the Golden Goblet Award, along with high-definition images of her standing on the glittering stage, holding up the Trophy.

Some netizens who hadn't been paying attention specifically went to Bilibili, Youku, iQiyi, Sohu, and other video platforms to search for Liu Tianxian's live footage.

Creators had already cut clips, isolating the segments where Liu Tianxian received her award.

Chinese netizens move fast at everything—if there's money to be made or traffic to be gained, it happens in minutes.

Foreign winners don't attract Chinese attention, but Liu Tianxian brings her own traffic—she must be followed.

Some fans, watching Liu Tianxian's excitement from the moment she won to her stumbling speech on stage, felt happy for her and deeply moved.

Those who closely followed her knew how difficult her journey had been; winning this award was recognition of her years of effort.

More fans flooded into Liu Tianxian's Weibo, leaving comments under her post.

"Congratulations! Congratulations!"

"It feels like a fairy descended from heaven—who else could deserve this award?"

"Wow! Sister finally won! It's been hard—flowers everywhere!"

"She's a true immortal sister, consistent for over a decade."

"Congratulations, baby—your hard work and talent are finally seen by more people. Looking forward to even more brilliant performances."

"Wife, you're amazing! Totally deserved."

"Baby, you're awesome der!!"

"."

These comments each had thousands of likes, some over ten thousand, and the total number of comments was surging, reaching over a million.

It's easy to imagine how many people flooded into Liu Tianxian's Weibo—it was a traffic explosion.

Because all the current heat and attention were focused on her, whether they loved her or hated her.

Her Weibo follower count rose to 49.83 million, surpassing all other actresses in the industry, though still far behind Luhan, who broke a Guinness record this year.

Yet all internet heat now concentrated on Liu Tianxian, and this massive surge instantly topped trending charts.

Hashtags like #LiuTianxianWinsGoldenGobletAwardForBestActress#, #LiuTianxianMomIWonIt!, and #LiuTianxianThanksPrincipalForFiveYearsOfCompanionshipTheyAreTogether# dominated the top ten trending lists on Weibo, Baidu, and Toutiao.

It became the hottest news item of the moment!

The heat generated by Liu Tianxian winning the Golden Goblet Award for Best Actress overshadowed all other current trends—it was ahead of everything else.

Mainly because no one expected her to win; there had been zero signs beforehand.

Now Liu Tianxian was adorned with honor, viewed with new respect by many, having won a mainstream award.

Amid the roaring public discourse, after finishing her interview, Liu Tianxian returned to the award ceremony venue—the atmosphere remained solemn and formal.

The Best Actor award had just been given; Bai Yu sadly did not win the Golden Goblet Award for Best Actor.

Liu Tianxian winning Best Actress made it unlikely Bai Yu would get Best Actor, but the Best Actor award went to a Thai actor for the film The Last Executioner.

The award ceremony was now more than halfway through.

The award being presented on stage now was Best Director, causing Xue Xiaolu to sit up straight—she might win it.

But she was disappointed—the Best Director award went to a Greek director for the film Little England.

Xue Xiaolu sighed, disappointed.

Fang Hong saw Liu Tianxian arrive and quickly cleared her seat, being overly attentive: "Oh my, the Best Actress has arrived—quick, sit down, sit down."

"Stop being so silly," Liu Tianxian laughed, sitting beside him and glancing around.

Everyone's eyes were fixed on the stage awards; no one paid attention to them—even if they did, they'd say nothing, just look.

"Now that you're Best Actress, you're smiling nonstop—overjoyed, right?" Fang Hong chuckled at her.

"Haha, not at all," Liu Tianxian's smile was unmistakable, her tone slightly coquettish.

Her hand gripped his, fingers entwined—her mood was truly beautiful.

She looked past him toward Xue Xiaolu and asked Fang Hong: "Didn't Teacher Xue win anything?"

"No, a foreigner won it," Fang Hong said.

Liu Tianxian looked again at Xue Xiaolu—they were separated by a person, Fang Hong, so she had to lean forward to see.

She saw Xue Xiaolu's face held traces of melancholy and comforted her: "Teacher Xue, don't lose heart—there's still a chance. There's still one last award left."

The Best Film award hadn't been given yet.

Flower Bouquet hadn't applied only to the Shanghai Film Festival—it had applied to other awards too.

"I'm fine—I've calmed my mindset," Xue Xiaolu said.

Someone had specifically comforted her; it warmed her heart—no one else had said anything like this to her.

"Still, hold on to hope—what if we win?"

As Liu Tianxian spoke, the two women exchanged a smile—the final major award, Best Film, was being presented, and Gong Huang was presenting it alone.

A single person presenting such a prestigious award was still very grand.

Gong Huang was elegant and intellectual, composed and graceful; each sentence she spoke was translated by an assistant, and her remarks were lengthy.

The guests listened quietly, watching her.

After explaining how the judging was fair and unaffected by outside influence, Gong Huang added: "Now I will present the Best Film award for the 17th Shanghai International Film Festival."

She paused here, smiling meaningfully at the audience below.

This made the nominees tense—Xue Xiaolu, Liu Tianxian, and even Bai Yu all held their breath, eyes fixed on Gong Huang on stage. This was a team award—if they won, all of them could go up.

"A Bouquet-Style Love!" Gong Huang suddenly raised her voice and announced the winner.

The venue immediately erupted in gasps, and Zhang Guoli exclaimed: "Winning twice in a row!"

"This is already the second time this film has won an award." Chen Chen was also surprised.

Thunderous applause rang out across the hall! Liu Tianxian's almond-shaped eyes went wide, and she covered her mouth in disbelief—she had actually called it right, they had won.

"You jinx." Fang Hong teased.

"What jinx? It's a magpie's mouth, obviously." Liu Tianxian gave him a light smack, her heart happy too. She stood up and hugged Xue Xiaolu: "Congratulations, Teacher Xue."

"You should be congratulating us—this award belongs to all of us." Xue Xiaolu was happy too, but this award really did belong to the team.

Xue Xiaolu then added: "Little Fang was right—you really are a jinx, haha."

Liu Tianxian laughed "haha" as well, knowing it was a joke about her mouth being prophetic.

By now the lights and cameras had already found Xue Xiaolu's seat—Liu Tianxian, Fang Hong, Bai Yu and the others were all in that row.

Apart from Fang Hong, everyone else stood up.

Xue Xiaolu and Liu Tianxian hugged each other, then thanked everyone around them who offered congratulations.

At that moment they were the most dazzling presence in the room.

Bai Yu was a beneficiary too, but he looked rather dim by comparison—no helping it, he wasn't famous enough, his status wasn't high enough, people didn't pay him much attention.

Xue Xiaolu shook hands with Fang Hong: "Let's go up together."

"I won't go up, you all go—this award was always yours." Fang Hong said.

"Isn't it all thanks to you?" Xue Xiaolu said.

"It's not thanks to me, it's thanks to your own hard work." Fang Hong's words were modest.

This gave Xue Xiaolu immense comfort—the Principal was truly selfless, giving all the glory to them.

If the Principal went up, the spotlight would inevitably fall on him most—his status and position demanded it.

Beside them, Liu Tianxian tugged Fang Hong's hand: "Let's go up together."

"You all go up, whether I go or not doesn't matter—compared to me, you need this glory more." Fang Hong said this seriously.

At his status, winning an award like this no longer mattered to him.

But Liu Tianxian and the others were still essentially actors, still stars—they needed this kind of award recognition more, the spotlight should be on them.

Hearing him say this, the three no longer insisted, and together they walked onto the stage. Liu Tianxian couldn't help being moved—this man always gave the best of everything to her.

This sincerity made her inexplicably touched.

Perhaps this is what it means to support each other through thick and thin, to know and stay with each other.

Grand music filled the venue, the lights followed them all the way onto the stage, and on the big screen behind the stage, clips from "A Bouquet" were playing.

Gong Huang held a Golden Goblet Award and certificate in her hands, smiling as she handed the Trophy to Xue Xiaolu.

She said: "Congratulations on making a wonderful film."

"Thank you, I was just lucky." Xue Xiaolu said modestly.

It really was luck—the script wasn't written by her, nor did she assemble the crew.

Gong Huang smiled, then shook hands with Liu Tianxian and Bai Yu, offering her congratulations, before walking off the stage and leaving it to them.

Chen Chen was still in that white dress, holding the microphone: "A Bouquet moved the whole world, and it moved us Judges too."

She then handed the microphone to Xue Xiaolu, signaling her to give her acceptance speech.

"Thank you to the Shanghai Film Festival for giving us this award."

Xue Xiaolu lifted the award in her hand slightly and said sincerely: "Actually, this award should have gone to Little Fang, because he put a lot of effort into this film too, gave me a lot of guidance and inspiration—you could say without him, there would be no this film."

She spoke a sentence, then paused, needing to wait for Chen Chen to translate into English.

Then it was Liu Tianxian's turn. She said: "I'd still like to thank the organizing committee, thank the Judges for giving us this award, and thank Shanghai, thank you!"

What she had to say, she had already said earlier.

Next it was Bai Yu's turn to give his acceptance speech. He said: "Thank you to the organizing committee and the Judges for recognizing us, and thank you Principal for giving me this opportunity—without him, I wouldn't have been able to act in such a great film, thank you!"

After speaking, he bowed toward Fang Hong's direction, looking quite reserved. And the fact that he got to act in this film was indeed because Fang Hong had chosen him.

Warm applause rose again from below the stage.

But those watching them in their high-spirited state—some had unpleasant expressions, not uttering a word.

These people were of course Feng Kuzi, Yu Pangzi and the like—winning Best Actress was one thing, but they also took the Best Film award.

It was as if Yu Tu's film was not only critically acclaimed but also a box-office hit.

And those young actresses, looking at Liu Tianxian, couldn't help feeling jealous—the higher Liu Tianxian climbed, the smaller they would seem.

Someone was bound to compare them together, simply because they were all young actresses of the same tier.

Everyone in the entertainment circle has their own thoughts, and different ones at that.

Liu Tianxian and the others went backstage to be interviewed by reporters.

The award ceremony continued, and finally all the Judges took the stage—first led by Gong Huang, followed by Judges from China, South Korea, Japan, United Kingdom, Iran, Denmark and other countries appearing one after another.

They stood in a neat row on stage, and were presented with bouquets of flowers.

After that a short film was played, and then the main cast of Transformers: Age of Extinction took the stage.

It seemed they had their connections, managing to promote their film as the grand finale of the Shanghai Film Festival.

After that, Chen Huilin performed a song.

Finally, the Deputy Director of the General Administration gave the closing speech, and with that, the Shanghai Film Festival came to an end.

Although the film festival had ended, the aftermath and the uproar had not—it was only just beginning.

(End of chapter)