Time is a little tight, but it actually doesn't matter to the "heroes", because except for Han Fei, others have little influence in North America, so there is no time for publicity. Almost all publicity is done online by local Chinese and international students.
spontaneous behavior.
Han Fei also got in touch with some international student volunteer teams and participated in some local promotion activities. The results can only be said to be average, better than nothing.
What really brought "heroes" into the eyes of American audiences was Han Fei's words "I came, I conquered." In the eyes of Americans, Chinese people are often very reserved and even a little cowardly.
If you praise them, they will even humbly say, "I'm not, I don't have it."
Han Fei is different. He should be the first Chinese to dare to say this in Hollywood.
Although Americans are unhappy with Han Fei's high-profile behavior, they are more curious. After all, "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" did very well at the box office in North America, and many people also recognized Han Fei through this film, but this
The guy from the East is not completely bragging, he still has two brushes.
So, in mid-March, "Hero" was released in North America. There was no so-called premiere, because it was unnecessary and the cast of all Chinese actors could not play a very good publicity role.
Chris is not completely bragging. On the first day of the North American screening of "Hero", it received screening specifications of 2,300 theaters, which is close to the treatment of a Hollywood A-level production.
"Hey, man, do you have a cigarette?" Chris was a little restless in the office and couldn't help but feel nervous. "The Wandering Earth" and "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" have been going smoothly for the past two years. However, that's all.
For Hollywood to gain a firm foothold, it can't just be the success of one or two films.
The former giant MGM has gone bankrupt, not to mention that they are a small company. The only thing recognized in Hollywood is performance. Again, either winning the Oscar or winning the box office.
As for Han Fei's statement that he wants everything from box office to Oscar, Chris does not admit it. He only cares about box office.
"Here, try our Chinese cigarettes." Wen Qi handed it to Chris.
I often stay up late on the set, so cigarettes and coffee are almost indispensable. Originally, Jiang Qinghou was also a long-time smoker, but once when he went home, his daughter disliked him and said he was ugly, so this guy actually quit. Alas,
Daughter slave!
A group of old smokers in the conference room started to smoke. Han Fei and Jiang Qinghou slipped out, brought a cup of coffee, and drank it quietly. In Han Fei's opinion, the only good thing about Los Angeles is that you can look up
See the stars.
"Should it have started over there?"
"Um."
At this time, more than half of the theaters in North America were filled with Chinese audiences. They showed their usual support for movies from China just because of their sense of identity.
Lao Ma still took his wife and children to watch this movie immediately. Since watching "The Wandering Earth", their family has become Han Fei's fans. They have also watched "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" and have also watched it.
I was shocked by the vivid CG animation special effects, but it was a bit unsatisfactory. After all, it was not the original taste of Chinese movies.
This time "Hero" was released in North America. As soon as he got the news, Lao Ma booked the tickets first. He prefers original Chinese movies.
Soon, the movie started, and two large red Chinese fonts immediately caught Lao Ma's attention.
Some American viewers were confused when they saw these two words, so they curiously asked the Chinese viewers around them what they meant.
"Hero!" explained a Chinese student.
"Oh, that's it." The foreigner spoke in Northeastern dialect.
"Can you speak Chinese?"
"Yes, I have been in China for five years, but I can speak but not write. You know, Chinese characters are the most difficult writing in the world, bar none."
After chatting for a while, the theater returned to calm, with only the sound of horse hooves coming from the speakers. This version of Hero has an English translation. Han Fei spent a lot of money to hire an American agency that specializes in English dubbing for foreign language films.
The cost is not cheap either, at US$2 million, this price would definitely not be paid by domestic film and television companies.
However, the money is definitely worth it. Many foreigners were worried that they would not understand the lines, but they found out that there was actually English dubbing, and the quality of the dubbing was much better than imagined.
The plot of "Hero" is not completely understandable to American audiences, but the use of colors is really addictive.
From the very beginning, there was black in front of the Qin Palace, and then the entire screen of Zhao Guo Library was occupied by red.
Afterwards, during the battle in the maple forest, golden leaves were flying all over the sky, which amazed all American audiences.
"Oh, my God, this picture is so exquisite."
"It's amazing. How did you achieve this scene of dancing leaves?"
There were exclamations in the theater, both in Chinese and English. Listening to the surprised expressions of these American audiences, Lao Ma couldn't help but feel a sense of pride. Look, this is our Chinese movie, no worse than your Hollywood movies.
Of course, compared to the scenes that American audiences pay more attention to, more Chinese audiences watch the connotation of this film. Everyone is familiar with the story of Jing Ke's assassination of Qin.
In this story, the King of Qin was embarrassed by Jing Ke and lost all face, which was completely inconsistent with his image of an emperor through the ages. And Jing Ke was also a parallel import. As you can see, he was so close to the King of Qin and could not kill the King of Qin.
But in the story of "Heroes", it's completely different. The abilities of Changkong, Canjian, and Feixue are amplified. It's like they came from the martial arts world to the real world and carried out a dimensionality reduction attack on King Qin. These three people
In fact, he looks more like a knight than an assassin.
In fact, the original version of "Hero" was originally adapted by Zhang Yimou from Jin Yong's work, but he was not authorized to do so. In the end, the story of Jing Ke's assassination of Qin was used. Perhaps this is also the reason why Zhang Yimou created the Broken Sword and the Unnamed Two in the play.
The characters can all be said to be great heroes who serve the country and the people. They gave up their hatred not because they did not hate it, but because they wanted the people of the world to no longer suffer from the war.
The moment Wuming stabbed King Qin with the hilt of his sword, his mental state had already broken away from the category of an assassin. It would not be an exaggeration to call him a hero.
Lao Ma was so excited to watch it. This is what he thought a martial arts movie should be like. Many Chinese-language movies before were either about vendettas or family feuds. It was really enjoyable when watching it, but what happens after you get over it? Nothing seems to make it better.
The picture that people remember, let alone the resonance in the spiritual world, after all, this is not the ancient times, it is illegal to kill people for grudges and grudges.
"marvelous!"
"It's unbelievable. I have to recommend it to my friends. This movie is really worth watching."
"Why, I feel like I haven't understood it yet? No, I have to read it again later."
After coming out of the theater, some American audiences were talking about the wonderful scenes, while many Chinese audiences were discussing the profound meaning of certain scenes.
"Have you noticed that the clothes told by Wuming and the story told by King Qin are different in the clothes worn by all the actors and the color of the entire set. Is there some meaning in this?"
"When you say it, it seems so. Why are the colors different?"
Gradually, many Chinese viewers were confused. What exactly did Han Fei's crew want to express later? It couldn't be just a coincidence, right? If there was no deep meaning, why go to all the trouble and change all the colors? It's very expensive
Okay.
"How about we see how the domestic website interprets it?"
“Great idea!”
So soon some international student viewers opened the domestic website.
There are actually many interpretations of color, but the most convincing one is the post by the famous film critic Fanghua.
"Actually, it's not just ordinary viewers, many friends in the industry also said they didn't understand it. Let me share my understanding here."
"First of all, at the beginning of the film, the entire picture is in black and white, which is actually the first layer of the film: colorless. At this level, Wuming tells the process of defeating Changkong. Wuming told King Qin that the reason why he was able to defeat Changkong
, because his sword is faster and more focused. In turn, the reason why King Qin was able to sweep Liuhe was because Qin’s army was of higher quality.”
"Second level: red, which is the story Wuming said about defeating Broken Sword and Feixue. In this story, everyone is wearing red. Red represents desire (possession, jealousy, murderous intent)
) In this story, Can Jian and Feixue are narrow-minded beasts devoured by desire, and in the end they were defeated by Wu Ming because they killed each other."
"The third level: blue, that is, King Qin said: You underestimated me. King Qin could see his mind through the word "Can Jian". Blue represents reason and is closer to the truth, but it is only close.
, does not mean that this is the truth. Many people are blinded by the word rationality. They only believe in the most likely outcome and never believe in any miracles. However, miracles really do happen in this world."
"The fourth level: white. In this story, Wuming told the real scene when he met Can Jian and Feixue in the library. White represents truth and calm. At this time, Wuming had begun to waver. At first
He was extremely murderous, and he met the King of Qin just for revenge. However, at this moment, Wuming remembered the story that Can Jian told him on the way here about his assassination of Qin."
"The fifth level: green, that is, Can Jian and King Qin, the whole palace of Qin is covered with green curtains. It is also here that Can Jian has an epiphany and gives up assassinating Qin for the sake of the world, because he believes that only King Qin can end the war.
Unify the world."
"In addition, I would like to apologize to the audience for my previous comment about Wuming stabbing King Qin with the hilt of his sword. Looking back now, I am actually too short-sighted. Wuming's sword stabbing King Qin was not
He had to stab, combined with the line: With this sword, I must stab. If I stab with this sword, many people will die, but the king will live. The dead people please remember the highest realm."
"Actually, the real meaning is to warn King Qin not to think that you can do whatever you want with the power. Once you implement tyranny, there will be thousands of unknown people in the world who will come to assassinate you again. Obviously this is a warning to King Qin, and although King Qin understands
When he reached the highest state of swordsmanship with no sword in his hand and no sword in his heart, he had no choice but to fulfill Wuming."
After reading the movie reviews, many Chinese viewers were dumbfounded. What the hell? Are we watching the same movie? Or is the gap in IQ between people already so big?
"Such a wonderful film review must be translated to the United States so that American audiences can also take a look at the connotation of this film."
As a result, some Chinese students began to repost Fanghua's film reviews on foreign movie websites, such as Rotten Tomatoes.
Not to mention, many American viewers actually watched it for a long time just to watch the fun. After reading the movie reviews, they found that they didn’t seem to understand it at all. Some American viewers even called "Hero" a brain-burning movie, and this statement is still
It has been recognized by many American audiences.
However, in comparison, Americans still prefer a more intuitive visual impact. Most of the comments left by American viewers on Rotten Tomatoes are.
"It's a very exciting kung fu scene, and the special effects shots are great."
Then, there is nothing more. For them, a more direct viewing experience is actually more important than the spiritual core. This will directly affect whether they will go to theaters to watch this film.
The rating on Rotten Tomatoes also increased with the number of comments, and finally settled at 7.8. What is interesting is that this rating is actually higher than the rating on the domestic Wandou.com.
Later, Chris finally got the box office statistics for the first day of release of "Heroes". His expectations for the box office of "Heroes" were not as high as those of "War for the Planet of the Apes". To be precise, in fact, if he had only half of them, he would
I'm very happy, after all, this is a Chinese movie.
However, he soon froze on the spot. Jiang Qinghou's English was not very good, but he knew where to look at the box office, so he grabbed it and started counting.
"One, ten, one hundred..."
The first-day box office of $15.6 million is still far behind the first-day box office of "War for the Planet of the Apes," but this gap is actually negligible.
Jiang Qinghou may not understand what this means, but Chris knows very well that this movie will explode.
"Hey, man, why are you going?" Han Fei rushed out when Chris didn't say anything, thinking something had happened to him.
However, Chris turned back and waved his arms at him, excitedly saying: "Money, banknotes, hey, man, I smell the banknotes, oh, you can always create miracles!"
Yes, in Chris's view, this is a miracle, because no one can explain how other than a miracle, an authentic Chinese movie can achieve such a high box office in the North American market!
Obviously, he is going to discuss with theaters to increase the number of theaters and screens showing "Hero". With the attendance rate exceeding 70%, Chris will soon increase the number of theaters showing "Hero" in North America.
The number has increased to 3,500, and the number of screens has increased by a quarter.