Chapter 269: A Chinese Film with a Big Shot

On September 15, Liu Zhou, Zeng Li and two or three people from the distribution department arranged by Jiahe boarded a flight to Milan together.

After arriving in Milan, they took another flight to Venice.

Now Liu Zhou doesn't have to be as frugal as he was when he attended the European Big Three a few years ago. This time, he no longer has to worry about things like booking rooms, film promotion, and possible copyright negotiations.

So this time when they came to Venice, Liu Zhou and Zeng Li not only came to attend the film festival, but also took the opportunity to travel and relax for a few days.

Venice is known as the Water City and is considered to be the most famous Italian city in the mainland. After all, Venice is the only city that is specifically included in primary school textbooks.

But in addition to being a textbook example, Venice is also a very famous tourist city. In particular, the various love legends make this city a check-in destination for couples from all over the world.

This is Liu Zhou’s first time in Venice, and to be honest, he is quite looking forward to this water city.

But when I got there, I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed.

Although there are dense networks of water here, there are not many boats on the water, and the water is a bit turbid, not as clear and blue as described in the pictures or words.

The water also seemed a bit shallow, and the supporting columns below many houses could be seen.

It seems that you shouldn't be too superstitious about Western cities, like the romantic city of Paris. But when you actually go to Paris and walk on the street, you can smell the smell of urine after every few steps.

The Seine River was not as beautiful as I had imagined, it was also very turbid.

Seeing this situation, Liu Zhou and Zeng Li had no interest in going out for fun.

The two of them just took a quick stroll and then got down to work at the film festival.

This year's Venice Film Festival opens on the 16th, with a week of screenings, and closes on the 23rd with the final awards ceremony.

The opening film of this Venice Film Festival is the Italian film "Bitter and Sweet".

Entering the new century, Italian films began to decline. There were only three local films entering the main competition unit, and the quality of the films was mediocre.

This is not what Liu Zhou thinks, but what the local Italian media said.

Natalia Aspasi, a commentator for the Italian newspaper Communist H, said:

"Today our films look more like TV series, they have no soul."

Prior to this, the Italian-American director Quentin Tarantino once said:

“The new generation of Italian cinema is frustrating, the ones I’ve seen lately are all the same.

They talk about boys growing up, or girls growing up, or couples having a crisis, or a holiday for the mentally damaged."

Compared with the decline of Italian films at this Venice Film Festival, Chinese-language films are very popular.

In addition to the works of the three major directors Liu Zhou, Li An and Jiang Wen, there are also "The Detective" by Hong Kong director Du Qifeng and "Help Me, Eros" by Taiwanese director Lee Kangsheng.

A total of twenty-three films were nominated for the main competition unit, five of which were Chinese-language films, stealing the show.

Because this year's Venice Film Festival has a strong Chinese element, many media outlets from both sides of the Taiwan Strait and Hong Kong and Macau sent reporters to Venice to stake out the event.

In addition to the strong Chinese elements, this year's Venice Film Festival also has a strong political color.

"Revised Extracts" by director De Palma of the United States and "In the Valley of Elah" by director Paul Haggis of the United States both involve the Iraq War.

Both films are filled with anger, albeit in different ways.

Liu Zhou and Zeng Li both took time out to watch these two movies, but to be honest, they are indeed quite daring films.

Especially the former, which directly shows the atrocities of the U.S. army, the innocent deaths caused by the war, and the helplessness of the Iraqis in the face of war from the perspective of a young U.S. soldier.

To be honest, Liu Zhou felt a little heavy after watching these two movies.

It’s not that he is sentimental, but he thinks of the suffering that China has been experiencing for nearly a hundred years. Only by truly experiencing the cruelty of war can one appreciate the preciousness of the current peaceful days.

After watching these two movies, Liu Zhou’s “Room” will also be screened soon.

"Room" was scheduled to be screened on the third day after the opening. Compared with "Lust, Caution" on the first day and "The Sun Also Rises" on the last day, it was obvious that it was not given much attention.

Reality does.

Although Liu Zhou has some fame overseas, he is definitely not as famous in the European film industry as directors like Li An and Jiang Wen who have won the three major awards in Europe.

So compared to their two works, Liu Zhou's "Room" is not that popular.

However, Liu Zhou doesn't really care about this, as there are many cases of popular movies becoming flopped.

Didn’t the original film "The Sun Also Rises" fail to win any awards at this Venice Film Festival?

For this screening, Golden Harvest still spent some money on publicity, otherwise the audience would have been sparse during the screening, which would have been embarrassing for the big boss.

What surprised the Chinese journalists was that neither of the two great directors, Li An nor Jiang Wen, attended the screening of "Room".

Considering that neither Liu Zhou nor Jiang Wen went to the screening of Lust, Caution, could it be that these three great directors were having a falling out because of competition?

The thought of this made all the reporters excited. This was big news, and it would definitely go viral if it was reported.

And even if this is not true, the three of them had no intersection in Venice, so their relationship must not be very good.

Liu Zhou didn't know what the reporters were thinking, and even if he knew, he wouldn't care.

The relationship between the three was always average, or even bad.

Not to mention Liu Zhou and Jiang Wen, he also doesn't like Li An. He feels a little disgusted by the movie "Lust, Caution".

As for Jiang Wen and Li An, they are similar to him. They are also disgusted with "Lust, Caution", so they are also disgusted with the director of this movie.

Jiang Zhiqiang, the investor of "Lust, Caution", also tried hard to invite Liu Zhou to participate in the screening of "Lust, Caution", but he still refused.

Perhaps Li An was aware of Liu Zhou's attitude towards him. As an Oscar-winning director, he was naturally proud and would definitely not come and curry favor with Liu Zhou.

This also resulted in the three of them each having their own film screenings, without each other attending.

The movie "Room" is still very much in line with Western tastes, especially the version that Liu Zhou exhibited, in which he retained the final theme of exploring freedom, which is exactly what they want.

So after the 90-minute movie ended, there was quite warm applause in the exhibition hall.

Zeng Li saw this and whispered to Liu Zhou:
"Zhou Zhou, it seems that the movie is quite popular. Does that mean our chances of winning the award are even greater?"

"There is no correlation between the two. The audience's preferences do not represent the judges' tastes."

"Well, it seems that winning awards really depends on luck."

“I don’t know about other awards, but your chances of winning Best Actress should be pretty good. I’ve also taken a look at the films nominated for the main competition unit.

There aren’t many good female roles, and your only real competition is probably Cate Blanchett, who does a pretty good job as folk singer Bob Dylan.”

The work brought by Cate Blanchett this time is called "I'm Not There", a biographical film about the life of Bob Dylan.

Although biographical films are more likely to win awards if they are well-acted, "I'm Not There" seems like a patchwork film.

Six actors play Bob Dylan, each performing Bob's life story and musical experiences in different eras.

Cate Blanchett, on the other hand, played the role of a woman playing a male role.

Although Cate Blanchett performed very well in her few scenes, Zeng Li was not inferior at all, and even gave wonderful acting skills throughout the entire movie.

If Liu Zhou were a judge, he would definitely choose Zeng Li, after all, Cate Blanchett doesn't have too many scenes.

But before the awards are announced, anything can happen. Maybe the judges like Cate Blanchett's performance?

The winner of this year's Venice Film Festival was Cate Blanchett.

After the screening, Liu Zhou finally put his worries to rest and all he had to do was wait for the final awards ceremony.

In the next few days, because there were too many Chinese reporters in Venice, Liu Zhou and Zeng Li did not go out and stayed in the hotel.

Zeng Li has been running around for a while and feels a little tired. She can take a good rest these days.

In the blink of an eye, a few days passed and it was September 23rd, the day of the award ceremony.

This day is also the busiest day of the entire Venice Film Festival, and many media and celebrities have made careful preparations for today.

The red carpet is still a battlefield for female stars, each of them vying for beauty.

Zeng Li also attended the event in a gorgeous dress. Although she was not yet showing her pregnancy, she was now over three months pregnant and had a slight bump, so she wore slightly loose clothes.

Even though this was the red carpet in Venice, Zeng Li didn't really care about it, as long as she dressed appropriately.

Only Liu Zhou and Zeng Li from the "Room" crew walked the red carpet. In their gorgeous attire, they looked like a perfect pair of golden boy and jade girl.

They originally wanted to walk the red carpet as quickly as possible, but faced with so many domestic and foreign media reporters taking pictures, the two had to walk slower and stop from time to time to take pictures.

After walking the red carpet and entering the venue, the two found their seats and sat down.

Unexpectedly, not long after sitting down, Jiang Zhiqiang actually came over with Tang Wei.

I haven't seen Tang Wei Liu Zhou for a long time. Today she was wearing a white evening gown with hollowed-out details, which looked quite stunning at first glance.

Later, Liu Zhou also understood the reason why Jiang Zhiqiang came over. He was worried that she still had some grudges against Tang Wei, so he came over to ask her to apologize formally.

After all, it was Liu Zhou who made Tang Wei famous, but when she left Jiahe, she only notified Jiahe unilaterally, and then it was Jiang Zhiqiang who negotiated with Jiahe.

But to be honest, Liu Zhou didn't care about this matter at all and never thought of making things difficult for others.

Liu Zhou also didn't care about Tang Wei at all. She was just a former employee of the company. There was nothing worth his concern about her.

After understanding Liu Zhou's attitude, Tang Wei felt relieved, but he couldn't help feeling a little disappointed.

I thought I had some status in Liu Zhou's heart, but now it seems that I was overthinking.

(End of this chapter)