Chapter 17

"China Film Group invests five million, wants twenty-five percent."

"Enlight Media two million, fifteen percent."

The shares were quickly determined, and they would come back the next day to sign the contract.

Enlight Media had actors under their banner; this vice president also wanted to ask Lin Nan about confirming actors, but Lin Nan brushed it off.

The next day, at the same place, everyone brought their legal teams to review the contract and confirm the investment proportions.

The news was officially out: a youth fantasy film with a twenty-million budget.

Lin Nan was dragged to school, where teachers from all four years of the Acting Department bombarded him with one message: don't follow those unreliable seniors who graduated long ago and achieved fame, running off to the neighboring school whenever there's a script—it's become a joke.

Lin Nan could only respond with a chuckle; this was just a fantasy film he was using to solidify his foundation. If he were to do a big production later, one aiming for awards, he would have to apologize to the teachers—the quality next door was indeed a bit better.

"Your scenes shouldn't be many. Let Director Zhao help adjust them; come back quickly, I've saved the lead role for you."

"Ah, really? Hahaha, I'll go find him right away."

Lin Nan ultimately chose Yan Danchen to play Meng Lijun, which also shut the teachers' mouths.

Since he could get Yan Danchen, it seemed he could also mention Old Zhu for the Eight Prince role.

"Director Zhao, do me a favor. Their scenes aren't many anyway; why don't you also adjust Shu Chang's scenes..."

"You really are a handful. Alright, alright, it's just a matter of these two days."

Lin Nan himself had finished his tasks twenty days early on *Lotus Lantern*. Originally, the two directors were going to shoot until May, but with Lin Nan added, it was indeed much faster.

"It's me. Come find me after filming wraps," Lin Nan said to Shu Chang.

Zhu Yawen, it was just a matter of a single sentence. The two were best friends; Lin Nan would look out for him whenever he could.

Having called Miss Liu's best friend to film, he had to tell Miss Liu, lest there be trouble again.

"Their crew finished nearly a month early. She's your best friend anyway, charity begins at home. Hey, hey, don't curse."

Letting Old Zhu play Xiang Qianjin was passable; he was still quite fresh at the moment.

Shu Chang would play the band's former lead singer. Lin Nan gave the music director position, Tan Ziming, to Shanghai Film Group, and the rest of the supporting roles were packaged to Enlight Media, who were very happy with that.

On April 1st, the crew officially began filming.

Yan Danchen with shoulder-length short hair was another kind of beauty. "With the mindset of an elderly person, criticize the young ones, be a bit harsher..."

This film was a typical low-budget production. Its characteristic feature remained the premise, and this film could be remade infinitely—you could play it in any region or country. Lin Nan was very confident in selling the rights; in his past life, this film had its rights bought for adaptation and remakes.

Lin Nan immersed himself in the crew, planning to finish in a month, while outside, the hype surrounding *The Return of the Condor Heroes* had reached the skies.

The first person rumored to play Yang Guo was Xie Tingfeng, which was quickly denied by Master Jin. Then it was Chen Bolin, Nie Yuan, Huang Xiaoming, and others. There were even more rumors for the actress playing Little Dragon Maiden: Zhou Xun, Jun Ji-hyun, Zhang Baizhi, Wang Fei, Jiang Qinqin...

It was practically a bloodbath. During a break, Lin Nan joked with everyone, saying that Producer Zhang was playing a flashy game—whoever had the most fame, whoever was popular, he would latch onto them, and you couldn't even investigate it deeply when it was over.

"Put in some effort, finish filming quickly so everyone can go on holiday," Lin Nan shouted.

This was met with eye-rolls from everyone. As actors, who would want a holiday? They wished they had work every day and could clone themselves.

Lin Nan's crew was very harmonious. With an urban setting, location scouting was convenient. When reporters visited the set, they were received very politely, mainly because the *House of Flying Daggers* crew had beaten up visiting reporters shortly after starting production at the end of last year, poking a hornet's nest and leading to criticism from all sorts of media.

Although *House of Flying Daggers* had wrapped by now, one could still see domestic tabloids picking at that crew from time to time.

The company receptionist called Lin Nan to say they had received an invitation for him to attend the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festival in the second half of the year.

Lin Nan thought about it; it seemed this was the last time the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers would be held together. After this year, they would split up. The Hundred Flowers would be every two years, so the next one would be the year after next. The Golden Rooster would be once next year, and the one after that would be the year after next.

Stimulated by Zhang Yimou's *Hero*, China Film Group was stubborn and started aiming for big productions. They hit it off with the equally pretentious Director Chen; rumor had it they were busy with that film that would take ten years to understand.

Lin Nan had the people at the company help him reply that he would attend the film festival. The key was that Shanghai Film Group had ideas and wanted to let *Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind* and *Return to Youth* try their luck; China Film Group and Enlight Media had the same intention.

Lin Nan didn't care; he would just treat it as expanding his network.

Due to national conditions, the old men at the Golden Rooster would definitely not look favorably upon him. The Hundred Flowers might be worth a try, but little did he know that even Director Feng was being toyed with by the Golden Rooster.

"Comrades, speed it up. In September, I'll take you to the Golden Rooster and Hundred Flowers Film Festival," Lin Nan simply shouted to the crew.

"Really?"

"Director Lin keeps his word."

Regardless of whether they won an award, attending a film festival was beneficial for actors or directors; it was a rare occasion to build connections and secure resources.

"Being madly pursued by three men of different ages and types, what are your thoughts, Ms. Meng Lijun?"

During a break, Lin Nan teased Yan Danchen.

"Hmm, enjoyable, very interesting," Yan Danchen said without hesitation.

"However, in real life, I don't like those younger than me." As she said this, she scanned the people present who were younger than her and laughed like a goose.

"But young boys just love big sisters," Zhu Yawen added.

"Old Zhu, is that sentence of yours decent?"

"It's you who's being indecent!" Yan Danchen retorted at Lin Nan instead.

Amidst the bickering and play, the crew had spent nearly twenty days, and the film only had some finishing work left.

In his spare time, Lin Nan also kept an eye on the films released in the first half of the year. In this day and age, it was rare for the audience and film critics to have the same aesthetic, but unfortunately, the latter held the power of discourse, and many were still from government agencies or related units.

Anyway, Lin Nan didn't have a deep impression of these films, or had no impression at all, but the reviews were truly good. Of course, the better the reviews, the worse the box office.

Most of the directors of these films were veterans; the money to make the films came from above, but they rarely broke even, yet they never tired of it.

At first, Lin Nan didn't know why, until one day he accidentally heard someone mention that these old men held the knives for the film festivals, and he understood instantly.

On the last day of April, the final scene of the crew: Meng Lijun donates blood and turns back into an old woman...

"Director Lin, you're a typical quick-shooter. I heard *Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind* also took about a month," Yan Danchen said.

Everyone else in the crew nodded along.

Lin Nan didn't want to refute it; the facts were as they were. This kind of film wasn't going to the three major European festivals. It was a commercial fantasy film; did they expect Lin Nan to shoot it like an award-seeking film?

For the wrap-up banquet, Lin Nan specifically booked a nice hotel in the capital. There was still plenty of funding left, and none of the investors asked much. By the time the filming was halfway through, the producers from the three parties had all left; everyone understood what that meant.

The wrap-up banquet was very luxurious. The reporters who arrived didn't distinguish between you and me; once they sat down, they were one of us, just eat and drink.

The next day, online and offline media published articles.

"The film *Return to Youth* wraps up smoothly; Director Lin Nan thanks the crew members."

"Talented director Lin Nan, new film *Return to Youth* is about to meet the audience."

"Twenty-million commercial fantasy film, *Return to Youth* held a wrap-up banquet in Beijing recently; China Film Group, Shanghai Film Group, and Enlight Media are all producers."

Looking at the overwhelming news, almost all of which were positive, Lin Nan felt those red envelopes were worth it.

Although the Film Academy didn't object to freshmen and sophomores joining crews to film, there really weren't many who could ask for so much leave to leave school.

In the Acting Department, Liu Yifei was in a class of her own, and now it seemed there was an additional Zhu Yawen.

Lin Nan was a bit special; he was from the Directing Department and was filming a movie, so the academy would only support him, and he had also looked after so many alumni.

"Old Zhu, I have to hurry back to school. Unlike you guys in the Acting Department where passing is enough, if I score 60, I might not even be given a pass."

Zhu Yawen just thought Lin Nan was bragging and ignored him, but he did need to hurry back to school.

After the break last semester, he had hardly returned to school. In February, he joined the *Lotus Lantern* crew, and then immediately came to the *Return to Youth* crew.

In three months, the semester was already half over, and in the blink of an eye, sophomore year was almost finished.

If you ask who among Chinese film directors is the most restless, it has to be Zhang Yimou. He is unbelievably prolific; *Hero* and *House of Flying Daggers* one after another, and during this time he was also organizing the Olympic closing ceremony performance.

At the end of the year, he was going to start another one, *Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles*. Lin Nan really admired his energy.

During the May Day holiday, Lin Nan chose to slack off for a few more days. Liu Yifei often urged him to visit the set; he heard that after Shu Chang wrapped up on Lin Nan's set, she went to visit the set.

"Sister, let me rest for a few days. The Directing Department's exams are much harder than your Acting Department's. You wouldn't want me to fail, would you? How embarrassing."

The more famous you are, the more you can't afford to lose face. If you run into acquaintances during a make-up exam—well, they're all acquaintances—you'd really want to die.

The teachers wouldn't be able to save face either; everyone would say, "Look, even a big director fails exams. It's not our fault, it's your teacher's problem."

On the first day after the holiday, Lin Nan packed his luggage and left the hotel.

He wasn't there for the '03 art exams, and he wasn't there for the '04 art exams. Every year, not to mention national institutions, not many people could make it out of the three major academies.

A few days ago, Lin Nan contacted Tang Mu and sent over the latest script he had worked on, and incidentally confirmed a new business: acquiring novel copyrights, including older film and television adaptation rights. The latter required sending some bestselling novels every year, especially science fiction, fantasy, or award-winning literary works, to Lin Nan. After Lin Nan screened them, he would help Lin Nan purchase the copyrights.

Director Zhang selected a group of people to go to Athens, involving students from the Film Academy, the Drama Academy, and the Opera School. It was said that one junior from the '03 Acting Department was selected, and many people were very envious.

Lin Nan entered the school and heard people talking about this, hoping they could be selected as alternates.

"Lin Nan, back at school?"

A teacher from another year in the Acting Department saw Lin Nan and teased.

"Back at school. Teacher, you're busy." He said this and was about to run off.

"This kid. Little Zhou, I saw Lin Nan. That Zhu Yawen from your class is probably back too."

Lin Nan heard this from afar and ran even faster. Zhu Yawen had said he would play for two more days before returning to school.

Chapter 17: The Quick-Shooter