This is a brilliant and politically correct film, but there is one problem: the image of Chiang Kai-shek in the movie is different from the image depicted in past movies.

Preface

On October 1, 1989, marking the 40th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. To celebrate the 40th anniversary, the well-known film director Li Qiankuan is preparing to present the completed masterpiece " Founding Ceremony " as a gift.

This is a brilliant and politically correct film, but there is one problem. The image of Chiang Kai-shek in the movie is different from the image depicted in past movies. For a time, it caused great controversy.

1989 On August 8, 1989, Jiang Zemin, other members of the Politburo Standing Committee and five military leaders met with director Li Qiankuan. After watching the movie and discussing it for a long time, Jiang Zemin's words set the tone for the film.

Jiang Zemin met with director Li Qiankuan

After the filming of the "Founding Ceremony", due to the controversy in Chiang Kai-shek's image, it is very likely that the film will not be moved to the big screen. As director, Li Qiankuan and his wife (also the deputy director) Xiao Guiyun were in a state during those days, and they could be said to be in a slump.

Later, Li Qiankuan recalled: "We stayed in the studio of Beijing Film Studio , and we couldn't eat or sleep. We were so depressed. It was summer, and the sultry and humid weather made our feelings worse."

Soon after, Li Ruihuan, a member of the Politburo Standing Committee in charge of media and culture, heard about the film, and he decided to intervene. After Li Ruihuan learned about the whole story from Li Qiankuan, he suggested that he directly report his opinions to Comrade Jiang Zemin.

is matched by Li Ruihuan. On the afternoon of August 8, the video "Creation Ceremony" will be played on Zhongnanhai for leaders such as Jiang Zemin. Li Qiankuan believes that the life and death of the film he worked hard to film depends on the situation after the screening that day. Before going to Zhongnanhai, Li Qiankuan also received a request for him to give an introduction for 15 minutes.

wife Xiao Guiyun is quite worried about this. She understands that as a big director, her husband Lee Qiankuan is the boss on the set. He not only always speaks in an authoritative tone, but also often has a stern face.

For this reason, Xiao Guiyun said to Li Qiankuan many times: "You should speak humbly and have a smile on your face. The person we want to meet is the real national leader, not the person who seems to be noble through makeup."

After Li Qiankuan and his wife Xiao Guiyun arrived at the screening room, a staff member told them that the leader would arrive soon. After a while, Li Ruihuan, who presided over the meeting, was the first to arrive. Afterwards, Jiang Zemin, Qiao Shi and Yao Yilin, General Liu Huaqing and General Yang Baibing were present one after another. After a simple greeting, Li Ruihuan announced the beginning of the meeting. He said loudly: "Director Li, please explain to General Secretary Jiang and other leaders how you filmed this video? What is the current situation? Tell us."

Li Qiankuan said affectionately: "In this video, I am faithful to objective facts and art. About 8 years ago, when my wife and I directed another film describing the Liberation War, Old General Tan Zhenlin came to the scene and said to the crew: 'We have fought bloody battles to establish our country, and millions of soldiers are for the new. China has given its life and blood. Therefore, you artists should not be afraid of the challenges encountered during the shooting process. '"

Li Qiankuan said that he was moved by the enthusiasm of the veteran general. He firmly told the veteran that he could reproduce those historical moments, especially the moment when the five-star red flag rose in Tiananmen Square ...

Speaking of this, Jiang Zemin interrupted him with applause and said, "Very good! Very good!"

When Li Qiankuan explained his thoughts in 15 minutes, Jiang Zemin applauded again and invited Li Qiankuan to sit next to him.

At this time, Li Qiankuan remembered his wife's advice to him, and smiled and said, "General Secretary, I am just a director, I should sit next to you."

Jiang Zemin stood up, pointed to the empty seat beside him, and invited Li Qiankuan to sit again. Jiang Zemin said: "If your job requires you to sit here, you just sit here." It turned out that Jiang Zemin thought that he could ask director Li Qiankuan more conveniently during the screening of "The Founding Ceremony".

Jiang Zemin filmed Li Qiankuan's hands twice

Jiang Zemin has always been very supportive of our country's film culture. Although he had never met Li Qiankuan before, through other people's introduction, he learned that Director Li is an excellent filmmaker who is extremely serious about his works and regards him as a parent-child.

At that time, Li Qiankuan was admitted to three colleges, including Lu Xun Academy of Fine Arts, Beijing Film Academy’s Department of Fine Arts and Changchun Flying Academy. When choosing, although the teachers in the school strongly opposed him coming to Beijing Film Academy , Li Qiankuan liked movies very much, and Beijing was too charming because there was Tiananmen here and Chairman Mao.

1959, 18-year-old Li Qiankuan came to Beijing alone. As soon as he registered at the school, he was arranged to go to the Meridian Gate to practice a performance celebrating the 410th anniversary of the founding of New China. Li Qiankuan remembered that on the day of the celebration, he stood in the first row to play cymbals, the closest to Chairman Mao. When he saw Chairman Mao, Premier Zhou and political leaders from various countries, he was so excited. This also laid the foundation for Li Qiankuan's later enthusiastic filming of the "Creation Ceremony".

10 years later, 28-year-old Li Qiankuan got married with the famous director Xiao Guiyun. With the release of excellent works, the couple also became famous in the capital.

In 1989, Li Qiankuan and his wife spent a lot of effort to film the "Create of the People's Republic of China", hoping to present it as a gift on the occasion of the 40th anniversary. In this way, as a filmmaker, Li Qiankuan felt no regrets. However, the film was controversial because of Chiang Kai-shek's character. Whether it could be broadcast successfully can only be decided until Jiang Zemin and several leaders watched the movie.

At the beginning of the movie, Jiang Zemin asked in Li Qiankuan's ear: "Who is the actor who plays Chiang Kai-shek?"

Li Qiankuan replied: "It's Sun Feihu ."

Jiang Zemin said: "He does look like Jiang, right?"

Li Qiankuan explained: "In fact, his appearance does not look like Jiang, but he has a good grasp of Jiang's temperament and temperament."

Jiang Zemin heard it and nodded and said: "Yes, yes."

Speaking of Sun Feihu playing Chiang Kai-shek, it can be said that he is familiar with him. After graduating from high school, Sun Feihu applied for the performance major of Shanghai Theatre Academy . During his time at school, Sun Feihu portrayed the role of Chiang Kai-shek on the drama stage. Later, when director Li Qiankuan filmed " Xi'an Incident ", he chose Sun Feihu to play Chiang Kai-shek with keen eyes.

So far, Sun Feihu played Chiang Kai-shek since 1980 and continued until the founding ceremony. He said that playing other roles is indeed more difficult than playing Chiang Kai-shek.

He once said: "The role of Chiang Kai-shek is familiar with the way, and the tone is more accurate, and the role is more relaxed. Other characters must overcome some of the inherent things that play Chiang Kai-shek, and then enter some specific personalities and postures of other characters, so it feels more difficult, not as easy as playing Chiang Kai-shek."

When a black and white film appears in the film, Jiang Zemin asked, "Did you shoot it yourself?"

Li Qiankuan replied: "No, this is the information I used. I incorporated it into this scene. "

Jiang Zemin nodded. When the film was put into the next exciting clip, Jiang Zemin asked, "Where did you get this expansion?"

Li Qiankuan explained, "This part is not an expansion. I took this video myself and used special skills to make it look like an expansion." During the movie watching, Jiang Zemin kept asking questions, and Li Qiankuan explained in detail one by one. At the end of the movie, Chairman Mao waved his hat on the Tiananmen Gate Tower and shouted: "Long live the people!" At this moment, Jiang Zemin patted the director's hand. During the entire screening of

, Jiang Zemin filmed the director's hands twice, which added great confidence to the successful release of this film. Later, Li Qiankuan recalled: "After he patted my hands twice, I knew he liked this video."

Li Qiankuan breathed a sigh of relief. My movie saved

After the video was played, Jiang Zemin stood up.He praised Lee Qiankuan's filming level and explained some innovative technologies. Of course, these new technologies were introduced to Jiang Zemin during the film screening.

Li Qiankuan heard Jiang Zemin's recognition of this video, and he was deeply moved. Looking back on the shooting process of this film, it can be said that it is difficult and difficult.

"The Founding Ceremony" was launched in real scene in Guniantang, Zhongnanhai on November 11, 1988, shooting a major scene of Chairman Mao and Mao Anying. Later, on the Tiananmen Gate Tower, the climax of the film "The Founding Ceremony" in front of Tiananmen Gate.

This film moved to 12 provinces and cities across the country, traveled all over the country, mobilized 150,000 extras, invited more than 130 actors to participate in the crew work. After more than 6 months of continuous struggle, the machine was finally shut down on May 11, 1989.

During this period, although everyone encountered various difficulties, everyone had a wish to make the "Create of the People's Republic of China" well and present a gift to the 40th anniversary of the Republic's National Day!

Jiang Zemin's evaluation of this video is very interesting. He told other leaders: "I also learned some knowledge of filmmaking. Director Lee used historical expansions and shot special shots to cleverly integrate them with expansions, combining real and fake - I was deceived."

Jiang Zemin thought that Li Qiankuan was a very talented director. When talking about the views of this video, Jiang Zemin should first listen to the views of other leaders.

Jiang Zemin modestly said to the generals in military uniforms: "I have never fought a war and have no military experience. But today I wisely invited these veteran generals who have experienced many battles to watch the film with us. I suggest that our respected military leaders talk about their ideas before we, civilians, commented on their opinions."

Then, the participants gave a lot of opinions, but none of them were about Chiang Kai-shek's personality traits.

Speaking of Chiang Kai-shek's personality characteristics, the actor Sun Feihu once said that in the past, he often only paid attention to the momentum of the military leader of Chiang's appearance, and did not reveal enough about his inner world activities, so he could not say that he had any emotions.

But in the "Creation of the People's Republic of China", the situation is different. It uses the mentality of describing the leaders of both sides of the enemy and us as a breakthrough innovation. Therefore, according to the requirements of the film's director, Sun Feihu decided that Chiang Kai-shek must be portrayed as a living person with emotion.

In the performance, Sun Feihu remembered that there was a scene that was the one that impressed him the most. On October 1, 1949, the day when the founding ceremony was held in Tiananmen Square in Beijing was a difficult time for Chiang Kai-shek to endure in Yangmingzhuang, Taiwan. In this scene, Sun Feihu tried hard to portray Chiang Kai-shek's sad mood.

Chiang Kai-shek was pacing and thinking, and suddenly heard his grandson's crying. Chiang Kai-shek hurriedly asked why he cried? Jiang Ching-kuo reply: Today is the "day of national humiliation". The elders and young people of the Jiang family should stop fireworks for a day, he is so hungry. After hearing this, Chiang Kai-shek took out a tube of biscuits for his grandson to eat.

grandson said, "Grandpa is so good!" Chiang Kai-shek suddenly burst into tears: "Grandpa is not good, if grandpa is good, how could he bring you here?" Everyone present cried. The film uses these life details and descriptions of characters' dialogues to perfectly express the human nature of Chiang Kai-shek's defeat and backwardness.

The leaders who have watched this "Founder of the Country" all expressed their opinions. Jiang Zemin also expressed his opinion. Then, Jiang Zemin turned around and said to Li Qiankuan, "I am moved by your video." After hearing this, Li Qiankuan was very excited and thought to himself, "My movie is saved."

Jiang Zemin emphasized in his speech: "What is the theme of this video? My suggestion is: 'The establishment of our country is hard-won'." In this way, Jiang Zemin's words set the tone for the film.

After watching the video, Premier Li Peng praised Sun Feihu's performance. The film not only saved it, but also won the Golden Rooster Award , and is considered to be one of the most important films in the history of Chinese production.The English translation of this film is " The Birth of New China ", and it is a movie in which my country participated in the 62nd Oscar "Best Foreign Language Film" selection in the United States in 1990. As soon as the "Founder Ceremony" was screened, it immediately aroused strong response from domestic and foreign audiences. Director Li Qiankuan was extremely grateful to the leaders. He later said: "It was unprecedented that they spent 3 and a half hours watching and discussing the film and supporting Chiang Kai-shek whom I created in a non-traditional form." The success of the

movie also made the starring actors popular. Especially Chiang Kai-shek, played by Sun Feihu, was well received. Even Premier Li Peng has watched the video and said this: "Chang Kai-shek performed very well, performing his insidiousness and cunning." After watching the video, some worker commentators commented on the scene "Chang Kai-shek played mahjong" and said: "Chang Kai-shek performed well, and his image suddenly became clear in front of us."

Sun Feihu also talked about his performance mentality in "The Founding Ceremony". He said: "It's different from "The Founding Ceremony". He was defeated and decayed. His spirit is on the verge of collapse, and he shows an old attitude everywhere. But this is the decline of a politician, and a dictator will not be willing to decline." The reason why the movie

was successfully screened is inseparable from the care of Jiang Zemin and other leaders! Comrade Jiang Zemin is a filmmaker and deserves our eternal miss!