Chapter 671: The Wandering Earth

Luo Mo currently possesses such terrifying popularity.

A trailer that revealed nothing, along with the title "The Wandering Earth," directly ignited the entire internet and air-dropped to the number one spot on the Hot Search.

Tian Ou's "Car King 3" was already leaking some details and had also spent a lot of money on promotion.

But the eye-catching degree was completely incomparable to Luo Mo's side!

"Damn it, the timing he chose is simply too good!"

"A production budget of 700 million is, in itself, a huge gimmick!"

"Plus, in that interview video, some of the words were extremely bewitching and inflammatory!" Tian Ou felt so frustrated his teeth itched.

You have to know, this movie had only just started filming not long ago, so the current filming progress is likely still in the early stages.

You say you come out to do promotion at a time like this; isn't this just disgusting those of us who have new films being released?

He took a look at the heated discussions online; everyone was exploring what kind of story "The Wandering Earth" would actually tell.

This trailer only informed people of one thing, and that was that all of humanity was facing a common crisis.

Other than that—nothing!

But in reality, how the Blue Star version of "The Wandering Earth" should be filmed was something Luo Mo had also pondered for a long time.

This movie was released in February of 2019.

At the premiere, the media's box office forecast for the film was 2.8 billion to 3.18 billion.

And the final cumulative box office was 4.688 billion!

Many people claimed that this movie opened a new era for Huaxia Science Fiction films and pushed open the door to Huaxia Science Fiction in one fell swoop.

It is just a pity that later, another "blockbuster" called "Shanghai Fortress" appeared, which was called by netizens: the one that closed the door of Huaxia Science Fiction again.

From the box office results and many other aspects, "The Wandering Earth" is a very successful Science Fiction film.

But in reality, what most people saw in theaters was the cut version.

Director Guo Fan once stated externally that due to concerns regarding scheduling, the runtime was shortened.

Within this, other reasons might also be involved.

Due to the shortening of the runtime, some parts of the Drama appeared somewhat abrupt, and many characters were consequently not fleshed out enough.

Therefore, in 2020, this movie was released again as "The Wandering Earth: Leap 2020 Special Edition."

It seems the box office from the re-release would all be used for charity.

This version had a runtime 12 minutes longer than the original.

In Luo Mo's personal opinion, he felt this version was better.

These 12 minutes are actually quite important.

He intends to extend the runtime a bit more without affecting the overall rhythm of the Drama.

To fill in some details a bit more.

At the same time, some scenes did not appear in the extended version either, whether due to funding issues or because they could not pass the Review Department.

Luo Mo felt he could also give it a try.

He has money.

Besides, we are filming "The Wandering Earth" on Blue Star, not "Wandering Blue Star," so there is no big problem with passing the review.

Hmm, it is definitely not because we have people in the Review Department, absolutely not, it's all rumors!

"In fact, if based on the original work, there is still a lot that can be filmed for 'The Wandering Earth'," Luo Mo thought to himself.

But these are not things he should consider for the time being.

Film the first one well first, then consider the rest; that is more practical.

And for this movie, he intends to personally play the role of Liu Qi.

"Time passes too quickly; in the blink of an eye, a few years have passed," Luo Mo sighed with emotion.

When he first transmigrated to Blue Star and the two souls merged, he was only 24 years old.

But in a few more years, even if he still looks young, some roles will appear slightly inappropriate.

The role of Liu Qi still requires a sense of youthfulness.

As for the role of Han Duoduo, naturally, he is going to let his good apprentice Ding Xiaoyu play it.

It's just that this role was one of the points of criticism when it was released on Earth in 2019, and it was roasted by many viewers.

This also has a certain relationship with the cutting of the Drama.

Of course, the acting skills of the actress who played Han Duoduo, Zhao Jinmai, were also not as good back then as they are at the current stage.

Ding Xiaoyu has not worked with her master for a long time.

Therefore, her mood has been very good recently, and her mental state is also particularly great.

Although she is already a university student, Luo Mo feels that the spiritual aura about her is still there, and her sense of being a young girl is still very strong.

"Cherish it while filming," Luo Mo thought to himself.

………

………

Time passed very quickly; in the blink of an eye, a month and a half had passed.

During this period, another movie within the Hundred Billion Box Office Plan was released.

As of now, the goal of 100 billion is only a little bit away.

All of this gave the Review Department a very magical feeling, as if 100 billion was very easy.

But thinking about it carefully, this year was still thanks to Luo Mo.

At this moment, Luo Mo and Xu Chujing were on a plane, heading together to the set of "Charlotte Troubles."

The crew of "The Wandering Earth" was on a three-day break because the weather these past few days was simply too bad, and there was a Typhoon at the filming location, so they were afraid of accidents.

You must know, there is a classic line in this movie: "There are thousands of roads, but safety is the first one."

If it were exposed that the crew had some major accident, wouldn't that be a huge slap in the face?

For Luo Mo, although the filming tasks for The Wandering Earth were heavy, he indeed needed to set aside time to visit Liu Shixiong and Wang Rong.

He was originally going to make a cameo in this movie, so he had to go there sooner or later.

As for Chen Luo, he had long prepared himself mentally to head to the set, thinking he could use this opportunity to meet Luo Mo in person.

As it turned out, Luo Mo told him that he didn't need to come to the set.

Because he didn't need to appear on camera.

This left Chen Luo completely dumbfounded.

But what he found most absurd was that when he asked Luo Mo what role he would be playing, Luo Mo told him: "Luozai, just play yourself."

"What does that mean? Did you tailor a role for me that has a personality similar to my own?" Chen Luo was overjoyed.

It was common knowledge that his acting skills were terrible.

Precisely because of this, many Singers crossed over to act, but in all the years since his debut, the number of film and television works he had participated in was pitifully small.

Every time he filmed, he was laughed at, and everyone told him he should just stick to Singing in the future.

Therefore, if he played himself, his pressure would be much less.

Chen Luo considered himself to owe Luo Mo a favor, and he was terrified that if he went to make a cameo, he would cause the movie to be roasted by netizens.

But who could have guessed that Luo Mo would say: "You didn't understand what I meant; you are literally playing Chen Luo in the movie."

Chen Luo: "???"

He thought it was playing himself, but he didn't expect it to be this literal...

Luo Mo heard the astonishment in Chen Luo's voice over the phone and explained with a smile: "It's nothing, in this movie, I am also playing myself."

Chen Luo: "..."

He said with a wry smile: "Hearing you say that, I'm even more curious about what kind of movie this actually is."

Upon hearing this, Luo Mo thought to himself:

"What kind of movie?"

"A movie where I openly film a part of my secrets for you all to see."

………

………

It was past two in the afternoon when Luo Mo and Xu Chujing finally arrived at the filming location of Charlotte Troubles.

When the two of them arrived, the crew was still in the middle of filming.

But they weren't filming Liu Shixiong's scenes, but rather Xu Wai's.

"Brother Rong, Liu Shixiong," Luo Mo greeted them.

Xu Chujing looked at them and said with a smile: "Have you both lost a bit of weight?"

Luo Mo looked the two of them over and said: "It's true! It seems the filming work is quite exhausting."

After a bit of small talk, Luo Mo sat down naturally beside the director, Wang Rong, and began to watch Xu Wai act from the Perspective of a director.

The character Yuan Hua, who comes with his own BGM, was played by Xu Wai.

The Actor he was currently acting opposite was named Zhuo Ying, an artist under the New Yu banner.

The role she was playing was, naturally, Qiu Ya.

There was a hard requirement when casting this role.

Her acting skills definitely had to meet the standard, and the other thing was that she had to... have a particularly good figure.

After all, many viewers would likely have a deep impression of the scene in the movie where Qiu Ya wears a swimsuit.

At this moment, the content being filmed was still the scenes on campus.

Therefore, Qiu Ya was still wearing a school uniform, wrapping herself up tightly.

One could see Qiu Ya standing by the campus greenery, secretly wiping away tears by herself.

Yuan Hua, wearing a yellow shirt on his upper body and school trousers on his lower body, walked out from behind a large tree with his hands in his pockets.

The moment he walked out, the music for "A Spray of Plum Blossoms" began to play within the crew.

This was originally supposed to be added during post-production.

But after thinking about it, Wang Rong felt it could be played directly during filming, as this would help the Actors find the right feel, and he himself could better distinguish the Comedy effect.

Yuan Hua raised his hand, wanting to pat her, and said: "Qiu Ya."

Qiu Ya turned her head, and when he saw her red-rimmed eyes, he immediately... gave a "hey" sound and punched the large tree.

"Ah! Don't do that!" Qiu Ya said immediately, looking with heartache at the fist Yuan Hua had slammed into the tree.

"I'm so annoyed!" Yuan Hua said: "I suddenly became a fool who cries easily."

"I don't look like a Three Good Student or an outstanding youth league cadre at all."

The campus scenes actually tested the Actors' command of their lines; the lines had to be delivered with that specific flavor for the Comedy to be sufficient.

Luo Mo watched Xu Wai and Zhuo Ying's performance, a smile on his face, and nodded slightly.

"Not bad, right, Director Luo?" Wang Rong said.

"You've trained them well, Director Wang," Luo Mo replied.

Qiu Ya looked at Yuan Hua and said: "I didn't expect that Xia Luo would..."

Before she could even finish her sentence, she saw Yuan Hua punch the tree again, saying with heart-wrenching pain: "Don't mention him—!"

The prelude to "A Spray of Plum Blossoms" ended there, and the Singing voice came through at this exact moment.

"【True love is like the vast grasslands...】"

Among the crew, many of the onlookers already had the feeling of "I'm going to die laughing."

For audiences of this era, content with this slight touch of Qiong Yao-esque melodrama does indeed feel quite comical.

It's just that for some reason, when I was a child, I didn't find it funny at all; instead, I could watch it with great relish.

"Ah, your hand is bleeding!" Qiu Ya immediately grabbed Yuan Hua's fist with both hands.

Yuan Hua looked at her delicate hands wrapping around his own; he first looked down, then couldn't help but tilt his neck forward, making a gesture to kiss her.

Qiu Ya immediately pulled her hands back, clasped them tightly together, and placed them in front of her chest.

She turned around, with her back to Yuan Hua.

Yuan Hua immediately opened his mouth wide.

Every word he said here, he opened his mouth very wide, speaking in a very exaggerated manner.

"I only touched your hand, and you..."

He said again in a sad, hoarse voice: "But he touched your mouth!"

Yuan Hua looked up at the heavens and shouted three times at the top of his lungs:

"No! No! No!"

A middle-aged female teacher passed by and poked her head in to ask: "Isn't this student Yuan Hua? What's wrong?"

Yuan Hua continued to look up at the sky, saying with a slight sob: "I can't do this problem, I can't do it—!"

He knelt on both knees, looking at the sky, his heart shattered: "It's too hard!!!"

The crew members around them were already laughing like crazy.

Wang Rong glanced at Luo Mo and said: "Do you want to call cut?"

"Sure." Luo Mo didn't decline, and said loudly: "Cut—! This take is good!"

Xu Wai, who played Yuan Hua, had actually seen Luo Mo arrive long ago, which was why he acted even more vigorously, striving to show his best side to his boss, yet he said: "Boss, why are you here!"

Luo Mo smiled and said: "Just here for a cameo, that was a good performance just now."

After praising Xu Wai, he looked at Zhuo Ying and said: "The Qiu Ya you played is also very good."

Both of them instantly beamed with smiles.

Wang Rong joked: "Tsk, look at that, one word of praise from you is more effective than ten from me."

After everyone joked around for a bit, they got back to work to film the cameo scenes.

Xu Chujing was actually replacing the role of Na Jie from the original movie.

I heard that they had originally invited Na Jie to act in it on Earth too, but she didn't come in the end.

But that's normal; after all, back then, Happy Twist was still nothing in the film industry.

From a director's perspective, Luo Mo watched the performances of Liu Shixiong and Xu Chujing, and only felt that Liu Shixiong had something special when it came to humor.

No, he had a lot of things in him.

His sense of humor gives people the feeling of being funny without trying too hard.

This point is the most commendable.

Luo Mo looked at Wang Rong and asked: "How is the film's shooting progress? Where are you at?"

"Halfway there," Wang Rong replied.

"Charlotte Troubles" doesn't have many big scenes, so the filming efficiency is actually quite high.

And this film won't take too long for post-production either.

"How about on your end?" Wang Rong asked.

"The Wandering Earth?" Luo Mo pondered for a moment and said: "That film is slow; the shooting cycle is fine, but it's mainly the post-production."

Wang Rong nodded and said: "That's true, it is Science Fiction after all; the special effects alone are very time-consuming."

"It'll be good if it can be released during next year's Shuji Dang," Luo Mo smiled.

"Then what about 'Charlotte Troubles'? Which release window do you think is best?" Wang Rong asked.

"Ideally, it would definitely be the Shuji Dang," Luo Mo said.

"Hmm? But isn't 'Manslaughter' being released in July?" Wang Rong said: "I don't want to have my left hand fighting my right hand."

He is the lead actor in "Manslaughter," which counts as another transformation work for him.

"That's true, so isn't August empty?" Luo Mo laughed.

Although "Manslaughter" will definitely have its 【key】 extended for a month, stretching the release duration to 2 months, the second month is actually just coasting, and it's good enough to make a few million a day.

The screen allocations in August are basically still reserved for new films.

If "Charlotte Troubles" can make it in time, a release in August would also be good.

It just so happens that Wang Rong is the lead in "Manslaughter," and "Charlotte Troubles" is directed by him, so it could bring in a bit more traffic.

Who knows, it might even feed back into "Manslaughter."

Looking at it this way, there really are no downsides.

Wang Rong thought about it; among the films currently scheduled for August, the most eye-catching one seems to be "Car King 3"?

Wang Rong has great confidence in the quality of "Charlotte Troubles."

So, he looked at Luo Mo and said: "You young man has a wicked Heart Eye; you're trying to dominate the entire Shuji Dang!"

(PS: Last day of the month, asking for monthly votes.)

(End of this chapter)