Chapter 330: Rushing to give Akira Kurosawa the award
"Steven, then it's settled that you will be one of the guests presenting the award to Mr. Kurosawa?"
"Of course, I will definitely attend when Akira Kurosawa receives an honorary Oscar."
As the producer of the Oscar Awards Show, Ronald's biggest job is to find as many stars and celebrities as possible to enhance the level of the show, attract more viewers, and at the same time, satisfy the Academy's gang.
Apart from nominations and awards duties, stars are actually not very willing to attend the Oscars live, they just do it as a last resort for some camera time.
Especially female celebrities, wearing very tight dresses and sitting at the party for several hours, it is difficult to even go to the bathroom. If there is no time to be on camera, it can be said to be a chore.
For a director of Spielberg's level, it is no longer necessary. In addition, his girlfriend Kate Capshaw, like Diane, is pregnant and about to give birth. Originally, Spielberg didn't want to come.
.
However, when Ronald mentioned Kurosawa's name, Spielberg agreed. He greatly appreciated Kurosawa's last film "Ran" and considered it his best film. He also praised Kurosawa.
Movies after the Ming Dynasty spent much effort on financing.
"George, I have a request, can you come and be the guest of honor for the Oscars?" Ronald continued to call George Lucas.
"Let me go to the Oscars ceremony, Ronald. Even though I heard that you are organizing the awards ceremony, I won't go, hahaha..." Lucas had some troubles with Oscar, and he quit the Directors Guild.
If the special effects department hadn't won the award last time, he wouldn't have attended.
"What, special honorary award, I won't go to anyone... Kurosawa Akira? Okay, okay, I'm definitely willing to go... Please save a seat for me, this guest must be me, no one can compete with me...
…”
"Hehehehe", Ronald knew that Lucas was a fan of Akira Kurosawa. In his "Star Wars - A New Hope", there was a lot of tribute to the content of "Spider Nest", whether it was the shots, the plot,
Still a role.
Moreover, he still has a fan-like belief in Kurosawa Akira. When Kurosawa Akira made his comeback in "Kagemusha", he was the financing guarantee for 20th Century Fox.
The news that two heavyweight directors were going to present Akira Kurosawa with an award had spread in some top director circles. In the past two days, Ronald had almost been annoyed to death by phone calls from friends from all walks of life.
Francis Coppola was a little better. He was currently filming "The Godfather Part III" and was very busy. However, he still strongly requested Ronald to arrange a meeting with Kurosawa when he came.
Ronald had no choice but to arrange a director's pilgrimage dinner after the Oscars party, and specially purchased red wine from Coppola Winery as the wine for the post-Oscar party, which satisfied him.
Martin Scorsese was very dissatisfied. He was very angry that he did not have the opportunity to go on stage to present the award to Akira Kurosawa. All the people on the phone accused Ronald of "forgetting this old friend of his...".
"Marty, it's really not my chance not to give you the award. You know, the academy's old-fashioned rules state that an award can only have two presenters at most, and there's nothing I can do about it."
"I am Akira Kurosawa's number one fan. You should let me be one of the two award presenters..." Scorsese pointed out sternly that even if there are two places, he should naturally occupy one, "I am with him.
The Hollywood director with whom I have the closest relationship, you say you like Mr. Kurosawa, but I took the initiative to go to the countryside around Tokyo to become an actor for his movie dream..."
"Marty...", Ronald was indeed speechless. Other people who pursue stars are to invest in their idols, make guarantees, or talk about how Akira Kurosawa affects them in the Hollywood media. Scorsese directly gives people
Gone to be an actor.
He is not the kind of director who excels in acting and directing. He has only appeared once in a Roberto Benigni movie because of his ex-wife Isabella Rossellini.
"This time it's a little different. Mr. Kurosawa's films did not do well at the box office in Japan, so they needed international funding. The money for his first few films came from George (Lucas) and Steven (Spiel).
Berg) found it.
And although he is about to turn 80, he still has a strong desire to create, so we have to commend the investors and make his wish come true."
"Well, okay, but I have to have a chance to chat with him, and you have to arrange it for me..." Scorsese thought about it for himself, and had no chance to compete with these two colleagues who were at the top of the box office charts.
I gave the award to Akira Kurosawa.
"I will make arrangements. A few days before the awards show, it happens to be Mr. Kurosawa's 80th birthday. We will all go there then..."
The two talked about the arrangements for a birthday party for Akira Kurosawa, and Ronald remembered another thing and asked Scorsese.
"The academy gave me a batch of copies of old movies and asked me to edit a few-minute clip as a way to review and reminisce about Hollywood in the past. Now I have a problem. The copies of many movies are in very bad condition. Is there any
How can we make some repairs?”
"Ha, you asked the right person." Scorsese happened to be a fan of old movies, and he kept many copies of old movies at his home in New York.
After the film copy is projected, some problems will inevitably occur, such as scratches, stains, and sometimes the film catches fire. The projectionist will cut off a part and splice the rest together. Or some films may become moldy due to improper storage.
Celluloid film will also cause the images stored on the film to slowly fade and the contrast to decrease due to the accumulation of chemical reactions over time.
After the rise of the videotape business, some people started the business of restoring old films, but it was often time-consuming and costly. Except for some classics in film history, it is difficult for other films to enjoy the restoration of modern technology.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! Scorsese told Ronald that the best way is to find the original studio and develop a new copy from the negative. But the negatives of many old movies are also
I can’t find it anymore, only some copies of the screenings still exist.
"By the way, how is your new movie going? When is it going to be released?" Finally, Ronald chatted with Scorsese about his new movie "Goodfellas." After the box office failure of "The Last Temptation of Christ" the year before,
Scorsese still returned to his favorite gangster movies that have the most box office prospects, and once again accumulated credibility for himself to make the movies he wanted to make (if you make a movie that fails at the box office, you need to make a few successful ones before someone will
I dare to invest in the kind of artistic films you make).
"It's really good. I'll show you my rough cut version then. I'm currently working on the final soundtrack... By the way, I now have a long scene where the male protagonist enjoys the convenience of picking up girls as a gangster for the first time.
The lens needs a suitable soundtrack. Can you lend me your Jimmy Lehner? I want to buy a music copyright that is difficult to buy..."
"What song do you want?" Ronald took out a pen and paper, "Well, Then He Kissed Me? Ah..."
Ronald remembers this piece of music. When Chris Columbus was filming "Adventures in Babysitting," it was used at the beginning when Elizabeth Shue was dancing in the room, waiting for her boyfriend to come to her door. It was completely a girl's fantasy about her boyfriend.
A portrait of the mood that comes with inviting yourself to dinner.
Scorsese is making a gangster movie, so why would he use such a cute song? The creativity of such a talented director is so unexpected.
Since the box office hit of "Babysitter", the copyright holder of this famous song by the Crystal Band has raised the price of the film soundtrack a lot. Ronald called Jimmy Lehner and asked him to give it to Scorsese.
After Si made the call, he became very curious and wanted to watch this movie.
…
The major studios were notified by the Academy and cooperated very well, giving Ronald copies of many classic works for use at the Oscars awards show. These films started from the silent film era and ran through black and white films, sound films, color films, and
Stereo, widescreen, various film and sound formats.
Ronald looked at a lot of films and scratched his head, so he had no choice but to find Walter Murch, gave him a contract, and asked him to serve as a consultant to re-edit these classics and calibrate and align all the sounds and films.
format so that the final result doesn’t feel weird.
If there is anyone in Hollywood who is best suited for this job, it might be Murch, a double Oscar nominee for film editing and sound design.
"If you look at these silent films, the expression methods are actually much richer than today. Without sound equipment, the production cost of the film is low, and there is no need to worry about the huge size of the live sound recording equipment, so the expression methods are very free, and many actors have very good acting skills.
A lot of it is missing from modern movies..."
Even Walter Murch saw some movies for the first time. He asked his assistant to play a few videos and sighed to Ronald.
Until very late in the sound movies, the on-site sound recording equipment was very large, and there were many requirements for stable shooting positions to avoid noise that could not be eliminated with the technology at the time.
In this way, the main shot, two over-the-shoulder shots during dialogue, and some fixed routines of reaction shots were created. In the previous silent film era, various random long shots, super frontal close-ups to express dialogue, etc. were all used
Disappeared.
"Any ideas?" Walter Murch asked Ronald. This kind of editing is actually very simple, but it is not easy to be impressive.
"It's better than this..." Ronald thought of Eisenstein, the Soviet Union director. The earliest masterpiece that used montage extensively was "Battleship Potemkin". Editing montage can modify the meaning of the original image and generate a completely different meaning of the movie.
fragment.
Ronald's idea was to re-edit the most famous shots from famous movies in history to achieve different effects. For example, the screams in horror movies turned into laughter in comedies, and the use of physical performance in the silent film era.
It becomes a dance that matches the rhythm of the music. The musical becomes a drama, and the plot of the commercial film becomes the expression of an art film...
A variety of movies from different eras have been cut together to create a special feeling. Both movie fans and ordinary viewers can be happy. Movie fans can recognize which paragraphs and which shots belong to which movie. And ordinary viewers can recognize which paragraphs and which shots belong to which movie.
I also like this kind of clips where obviously different movies are cut together and make people laugh.
In the end, this tribute to the classics fell on the common emotions of mankind and turned into a large collection of smiling and kissing shots.
"I think we need a powerful ending..." Ronald and Walter Murch discussed that it was not impossible to end with a kiss, but it lacked the sense of power of the beginning.
"Just use this..." Murch turned back and recalled the classic shot from David Lean's "Lawrence of Arabia". Lawrence struck a match, and then after the match faded out,
What appeared was the sunrise in the desert...
Here, Murch helped him edit, and on the other hand, Akira Kurosawa, the winner of this year's Oscar Honorary Award, also needed a short film to introduce his film achievements.
With the same logic, Ronald also cut together similar scenes from different movies, allowing Kurosawa fans and ordinary viewers to fully understand the outstanding directorial talents of this great director in a few minutes.
Ronald handed over this job to Ang Lee, who was also an East Asian and had just returned from home.
Ang Lee has returned to America. This time he is in a bad situation when he returns. Although he submitted two scripts, "Pushing Hand" and "Wedding Banquet", to the first script competition organized by the Information Bureau, he could not even compete with Chief Song.
Didn't even see him face to face.
This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading! Ang Lee’s father is just the principal of a school in the south and has no foundation in Taipei. Therefore, he did not receive any special help when he participated. The staff just let him
After filling out the entry certificate, including the name of the script and his contact information, the inspector began to check his script.
After confirming that there was no signature or secret mark on it, I sealed it in a large envelope and put it in a box dedicated to the competition.
Chief Song requested that the entire process be held in the name of anonymous elections, and publicly stated that he wanted to pursue fairness, eliminate nepotism, and establish new rules for doing things. Chief Song, after the death of the previous leader, his favorite thing was to appear in the news in all kinds of unconventional ways.
Increase your exposure in the media.
Anyway, he is the head of the Information Bureau, and the major media are happy to give him a face.
Chief Song also requested to increase the scale of the script competition and officially open it to overseas and mainland China. In order to give time to the playwrights who got the news, the selection of the entire competition was postponed to the second half of the year.
Ang Lee, who had nothing to do in his hometown, had no choice but to come back. He originally wanted to squat at home and write scripts again, but his wife became pregnant again, so he had to beg his old friend Ronald again, hoping to continue working.
Ronald didn't care about this. It was very understandable for a talented director to want to make movies. He gave Ang Lee a better treatment than the script doctor, letting him get more familiar with the editing work first, and then have the opportunity.
I will go on to intern on a film crew, and if I have the opportunity, I will invest in him to go back to his hometown to make his favorite Chinese-language movies.
"Kurosawa's films are a treasure trove, but I wanted to give viewers who were unfamiliar with him a theme..."
Ang Lee has watched Akira Kurosawa's films for many hours and extracted many representative shots. The expressiveness of these shots is very different from Hollywood's approach, and they reflect certain cultural characteristics of the Japanese nation.
However, Kurosawa's films are mainly in Japanese, and the audience is not familiar with the plot, so it cannot have the same resonance effect as a short film that pays homage to Hollywood classics, so Ang Lee has to find a way to make his genius familiar to American audiences.
"what idea?"
"This is something Akira Kurosawa himself particularly likes to have his protagonists say. In a crazy world, only crazy people are sane..."
Ronald looked at it and laughed. There were real shots of the protagonist being shot at close range with a bow and arrow in "Spider's Nest", a duel with real swords in "Seven Samurai", and a direct shot of the sun in "Yora Dog".
The shocking act of filming...
This sentence really sums up Akira Kurosawa's artistic characteristics very well.