Chapter 127 Tragic Change and First Meeting

It was only January and the flu had just started to spread, so control was not very strict at this time.

After some communication and inspection, the crew left one after another.

Liu Dehua returned to Hong Kong, Zhao Wenzhuo and Sun Honglei returned to Beijing, and Liu Zhou suddenly found himself not knowing where to go back to.

Beijing and Guangzhou are both severely affected by the flu, and his girlfriend and family are all in these two cities.

Finally, after discussing with his family, Zeng Li was the only one in the capital, so Liu Zhou decided to return to the capital first.

The Chinese New Year is not far away, so Liu Zhou will not go home for the New Year this year.

After returning to the capital and conducting some inspections, Liu Zhou finally returned to his home in the villa.

In order to give Zeng Li a surprise, Liu Zhou did not tell her in advance that he would be coming back.

So Zeng Li, who was reading a book out of boredom, suddenly saw Liu Zhou appear in front of her. She was stunned at first, and then rushed towards Liu Zhou with a look of surprise.

Liu Zhou caught Zeng Li who was rushing towards him, turned around twice on the spot, and then the two of them couldn't help but hugged and kissed each other and walked towards the bedroom.

The two hadn't seen each other for more than two months, so it was inevitable that they confided in each other.

Afterwards, Zeng Li lay quietly in Liu Zhou's arms, telling him about what had happened to her over the past two months.

For example, she and Zhang Ziyi have completely severed their relationship.

Although Zeng Li is not competitive, she competes with her in everything, whether it is filming or subsequent publicity, and even issues press releases to criticize her.

All the methods that Zhang Ziyi used on Zhang Manyu in her previous life are now being used on Zeng Li.

Although the two did not fall out in public, they no longer had any contact with each other in private, and the little friendship they had as classmates was completely exhausted.

Then they talked about Zhang Yimou, saying that Director Zhang is very energetic and he was already preparing for a new movie before "Hero" was finished.

However, the heroine this time was directly chosen to be Zhang Ziyi. Although Zeng Li felt a little regretful about this, she did not have too many emotions.

"Lizi, don't worry. Behind Zhang Ziyi there is New Picture and Zhang Yimou, but behind you there is me. I said I would make you the most famous actress in China!"

Hearing her lover's words that gave her a sense of security, Zeng Li was suddenly moved.

Feeling Zeng Li's unruly hand, Liu Zhou said with a bitter face:
"Again?"

"You're going to surrender after only three times?"

Looking at Zeng Li's provocative expression, how could Liu Zhou tolerate it?
Immediately put out the cigarette butt, Liu Zhou must fight for his man's dignity!

……

The next day, Liu Zhou slept until noon.

Yesterday Liu Zhou traveled a lot and worked hard in the fields, and he was really exhausted.

Even after waking up, Liu Zhou still felt some soreness in his muscles.

Zeng Li also knew that he might have been too tired last night, so she didn't tease him for the next few days and continued to make delicious food for him.

Liu Zhou is now a little envious of the iron kidneys of other reborn people. He feels that he should also start drinking tiger bone wine, but he doesn't know if he can get it now.

After resting at home for a few days, New Year's Eve 2002 is just around the corner.

The capital city had not yet been completely under martial law at this time, and it was still very lively outside during the Spring Festival.

However, for safety reasons, Liu Zhou rarely went out after buying some New Year's goods.

On New Year's Eve, Liu Zhou and Zeng Li sat in front of the TV watching the Spring Festival Gala.

The Spring Festival Gala looks even better now, and with the filter of Zeng Li's appearance on the Spring Festival Gala, Liu Zhou is now also looking forward to the Spring Festival Gala programs.

"No injections, no medicine, just sit down and talk with you, treat you through conversation, it's called talk therapy."

"The first topic is postpartum care for sows..."

"No matter how good a house is, it is only a temporary residence. This little box is your permanent home."

"Oh my god, there's an unexpected bonus!"

"My surname is Hao, and I married a village chief named Zhao Da... My wife, my wife!"

"..."

The Spring Festival Gala skit "Heart Disease" performed by Zhao Benshan and his triangle was playing on TV, and the two of them were laughing so hard that they couldn't stop.

Zhao Benshan's sketches never disappoint.

In fact, compared to the "Selling Crutch" trilogy, Liu Zhou personally prefers "Heart Disease".

The rhythm of Zhao Benshan's lines and his performance are so good that you can never get tired of watching it. You can hear the second half of a sentence after hearing the first half.

There are many highlights in this year's Spring Festival Gala. In addition to the much-anticipated Zhao Benshan sketch, many Hong Kong singers also appeared.

Hong Kong's top star Zhang Baizhi made her first appearance on the Spring Festival Gala and attracted much attention.

In addition, two big names also came to the Hong Kong music scene, Queen Lin Yilian and King Guo, one of the Four Heavenly Kings.

The former was attending the Spring Festival Gala for the first time and sang his representative work "At Least I Have You".

This is the latter's second time on the Spring Festival Gala. The last time was in 1993, exactly 10 years ago. His work was "Get Moving", which is also considered his representative work.

This song was the Pepsi advertising song in 2000 and the theme song of the Chinese A-League in 2001.

The mainland singer leading the show is Liu Huan, and there are also two folk song queens, Tian Zhen and Tan Jing. Poet Chen’s wife and Cai Guoqing are also one of the highlights.

Except for Liu Huan, the popularity of the others is inferior to that of several Hong Kong singers.

The next day, as expected, the newspaper media was dominated by news about the Spring Festival Gala.

The Four Heavenly Kings are really popular in mainland China, and the one that is reported the most is Aaron Kwok.

His song "Get Moving" is really nice to listen to, and Lin Yilian's "At Least I Still Have You" is also very good.

However, Liu Zhou didn't care much about this. He took Zeng Li on a New Year's greeting trip from the second day of the Lunar New Year.

The first place I went to was the home of my class teacher, Mr. Huang. Since we were quite close, I had lunch at his house.

Then we went to visit Zeng Li's homeroom teacher, Ms. Chang Li, and we could see that she was very happy.

Teacher Chang Li is now very famous, and the Class 96 he taught has become a well-known star class.

This class is the one she has devoted the most effort to. She has personally taken care of everything from enrollment to teaching. Now that this class has borne fruit, compared to the praise from the outside world, the joy of the harvest is what makes her happiest.

Afterwards, Liu Zhou visited Han Shanping and some other relatives and friends. Finally, Liu Zhou went to the home of the retired dean Xu Xiaozhong to pay New Year's greetings.

Although Liu Zhou did not have much contact with the old dean, the dean still gave Liu Zhou a lot of help in the early stage, and he is even now enjoying the aftereffects of his protection.

It was not until the seventh day of the Lunar New Year that Liu Zhou finally had some free time.

Liu Zhou rested for two days and then returned to work again.

While the flu is not very serious now, Liu Zhou also hopes to seize the time to do the post-production of "Xiu Chun Dao".

"The Blade of Embroidery" is not as simple as Liu Zhou's previous films, and there is more material involved.

Moreover, the investment this time was so huge that Liu Zhou also hoped to achieve perfection, so the editing was not completed until early March.

However, the influenza situation in Beijing was becoming more and more serious at this time, which also had some impact on the post-production of the film.

At this point, "Hero," having exhausted its box office potential, was finally released.

With a box office of 2.48 million, it raised the box office record of domestic films by a large margin. It's just a pity that it didn't break the box office record of more than million set by "Titanic".

As long as this record remains, it will be a shame for mainland filmmakers.

In Japan and South Korea, their domestic movie box office records are all held by domestic films.

But in the mainland, this record will remain for seven years. When everyone saw a glimmer of hope, James Cameron set a new record with "Avatar".

Fortunately, the mainland film market had begun to prosper at that time, and within two years, the record was broken by a comedy.

Although "Hero" has been taken off the screen, discussions about it are still very heated.

Many media people are still criticizing this movie, as if they want to completely crush Zhang Yimou.

But no matter how much it is criticized, the movie "Hero" still left a significant mark in the history of mainland cinema.

And the impact at this time is huge and far-reaching.

The overseas copyright of "Hero" has sold for more than 30 million US dollars, which has fully recovered the cost.

The box office in mainland China is almost pure profit.

Not only that, the video tape copyright of this movie was also sold at a sky-high price of more than 13 million, and many companies were competing for it at the time, and it was sold through auction.

At that time, the copyright of videotapes generally cost hundreds of thousands. Movies like those by Liu Zhou and Feng Kuzi might be more expensive, but not much higher, only about one million.

Now you sell it for 13 million in one go, making all those production studios and film and television companies jealous.

So everyone started to take action.

Han Shanping of China Film Group began discussing with Chen Shishi about shooting a similar blockbuster.

In his opinion, poet Chen is a great director as famous as Zhang Yimou. If Zhang Yimou can succeed, there is no reason for poet Chen to fail.

The pace in Beijing is even faster. Huayi and Columbia Pictures invested 10 million US dollars to shoot a blockbuster "Heroes of Heaven and Earth".

The film has been approved and will be directed by He Ping, a famous Beijing director, and co-starred by Jiang Wen and Boss Zhao.

Boss Zhao is not affected by the military flag dress incident at all and has great resources.

At this moment, Wang Zhongjun couldn't help but feel a little regretful.

Why did Liu Zhou back off from investing in "Xiu Chun Dao"?

Now with the success of "Hero", the box office of "Blade of the Immortal" with a big cast will definitely be good, and Emperor Entertainment Group will get a great deal for free.

But these have nothing to do with Liu Zhou. He is still working on the post-production of the film in an orderly manner.

In mid-March, Liu Zhou was sitting on the sofa in his villa watching the news.

Liu Zhou was feeling emotional when Zeng Li came in carrying a bag.

"Didn't I tell you to wear a mask? The situation in Beijing is already quite serious, this is no joke."

"I have it with me. I just picked it."

Zeng Li took out a mask from her pocket and then undressed from all her protective gear. Liu Zhou took the bag and naturally went to the faucet to wash the vegetables.

"Let's try to go out less in the future and stock up on more things in the next two days."

"Well, there are already quite a few people outside buying food and daily necessities."

On March 3, just as the influenza situation in the mainland was becoming increasingly serious, the Iraq War broke out.

The whole world was in uproar, and the United States was in an uproar. Major celebrities in the entertainment industry also came out to oppose the war.

The Oscars ceremony held on the 26th even cancelled the red carpet as a sign of opposition, of course some also said it was to prevent the flu.

When April 1st came, Liu Zhou felt a little restless.

Zeng Li also noticed Liu Zhou's abnormality and thought something bad had happened.

Faced with Zeng Li's concern, Liu Zhou didn't know how to tell her and could only refuse with a few words.

As someone who spent every day with Liu Zhou, Zeng Li knew that he was not telling the truth, but she did not ask any more questions and just accompanied him silently.

As time went on into the evening, Liu Zhou became even more nervous.

At this moment, the cell phone suddenly rang and Liu Zhou answered it immediately.

"Ah Zhou, how do you know that something important is going to happen to my brother today?"

"Brother Hua, what happened to my brother?"

Liu Dehua on the other end of the phone may have also sensed Liu Zhou's urgency, and said directly without beating around the bush:

"Just now, my brother held a press conference at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, announcing that he would temporarily retire from the entertainment industry and that he would move to the mainland to settle down. Now this news is going viral in Hong Kong!"

Hearing Liu Dehua's words, Liu Zhou breathed a sigh of relief.

Finally changed!
That sad thing didn't happen.

Zhang Guorong began to suffer from depression in 2001. At that time, Liu Zhou was worried that his life trajectory would continue like his previous life.

So I always advised him to go out and see more and not stay in Hong Kong all the time.

Fortunately, Zhang Guorong's condition was not very serious at the time and he listened to what Liu Zhou said.

Mr. Tang also quit his job and accompanied Zhang Guorong on travels at home and abroad.

When communicating with Zhang Guorong on weekdays, Liu Zhou felt that he was in good condition, but on April 1 this year, he couldn't help but feel very nervous.

So a few days in advance, Liu Zhou asked Andy Lau to inform him as soon as possible if there was any big news in Hong Kong on April Fool's Day.

"My brother is suffering from depression. Now he is taking a break from acting to recuperate." Liu Zhou's voice became much lighter.

After chatting with Liu Dehua for a while, Liu Zhou hung up the phone.

Seeing Liu Zhou returning to normal with a smile on his face, Zeng Li asked:
"Is it over?"

Liu Zhouyi held Zeng Li in his arms and said:

"It's over. Sorry for making you worry."

"Then you have to tell me what happens in the future. I want to share it with you."

"Ok!"

Liu Zhou couldn't help but tighten his grip around Zeng Li's hand.

In early April, the situation became increasingly serious. Soon after, the specialized ward of Xiaotangshan Hospital was built in just seven days, and the capital city began to become solemn.

Liu Zhou completely stopped the post-production of "The Blade of Embroidery" and stayed at home, while frequently calling home to inquire about the situation there.

Such tense days did not last too long.

By June 24, the influenza crisis in the capital was resolved and the work of preventing and controlling influenza achieved a phased success.

Although the threat of influenza has not been completely eliminated, normal social life can be resumed.

Simply put, the ban has been lifted!
The lifting of the ban and the overwhelming work pressure almost drove Liu Zhou, who had been resting at home for two months and was used to being a lazy guy, into autism.

Liu Zhou came to the studio in the 798 factory area and held the first management meeting.

(End of this chapter)