sovbooks Chapter 20: Ambiguity
Chapter 20: Ambiguity
In filming, the male and female leads fall in love while filming.
Liu Yu was filming a movie when he and the female lead developed a romantic relationship.
It's not his fault, Yan Danchen is indeed beautiful, not the kind that's stunning at first glance, but the kind that grows on you the more you look at her.
Her features weren't particularly delicate, but together they created a kind of indescribable comfort, like a perfectly simmered soup—neither too salty nor too bland, but once you took a sip, you wanted a second.
In addition, the two are from the same hometown in Hunan, one from Changsha and the other from Xiangtan. They speak similar dialects and have similar tastes, so when they chat, there is a tacit understanding that no one else can get into.
During the more than 30 days of filming in Tianjin, after the crew finished work, while others went out to eat, drink, and play cards, Liu Yu and Yan Danchen often sat in the conference room chatting in Hunan dialect for one or two hours at a time.
We talk about everything: which rice noodle shop in Changsha is the best, betel nuts in Xiangtan and bandit duck in western Hunan, the time I was beaten the hardest by my parents when I was a child, and the times I missed home the most during my years in Beijing.
Yan Danchen said that when she was studying at Beijing Film Academy, every year when she returned to Xiangtan for the Spring Festival, her mother would cook a table full of dishes, and she would always eat until she was so full that she could not walk.
Liu Yu said that when he was serving in the army in XJ, what he wanted to eat most was stinky tofu from Changsha. He couldn't sleep because he thought about it so much. Once, he dreamed that he was eating stinky tofu on Pozi Street, and when he woke up, he found his pillow covered in saliva.
Yan Danchen laughed so hard she almost fell over, saying, "How can you be so unserious?"
Liu Yu said that this was called being genuine, not pretending. Yan Danchen glanced at him, and there was something in that glance that was hard to describe.
Liu Yu is no fool.
He has lived two lives, with a combined life experience of over forty years. What kind of situation hasn't he seen?
He can tell what a woman means by the way she looks at you.
When Yan Danchen looked at him, there was no shyness of a young girl in love, nor any utilitarian scrutiny in her eyes, but rather a very comfortable feeling.
Having been given a second chance at life, Liu Yu's attitude towards relationships has changed.
He got divorced three times in his past life, not because he was a womanizer, but because he was too busy.
Busy doing business, busy making money, busy dealing with customers, busy handling all sorts of messy things.
Therefore, his attitude towards Yan Danchen was very relaxed from the beginning.
He neither deliberately gets close nor deliberately distances himself; he chats when he should chat and works when he should work; if she takes the initiative to talk to him, he talks to her; if she doesn't reach out to him, he doesn't bother her.
This humble yet confident, calm and composed attitude actually made Yan Danchen feel comfortable.
It's rare to find a man in his early twenties who can be so genuine, unpretentious, and not greasy.
.....
On April 10, Liu Yu finished his fourteen-day quarantine in the Beijing Film Academy dormitory and entered the school's post-production studio.
It's called a post-production studio, but it's actually just a large classroom on the first floor of the teaching building that has been converted into a simple editing room.
Several computers were lined up in a row, the walls were covered with soundproofing foam, the windows were covered with black cloth, and the lights were on all day long, making it impossible to distinguish between day and night.
The senior editor's surname is Ma, his full name is Ma Jianming. He graduated from the Beijing Film Academy's Cinematography Department in 98. After graduation, he stayed at the school to work as a post-production technical support. He has excellent skills, a reserved personality, and doesn't talk much, but when he does, it's always something substantial.
"Have you copied all the materials in?" Ma Jianming asked.
"Copy it, 420 shots, about 300 minutes of footage."
"More than 300 minutes, cut down to 90 minutes, do you even realize that?"
"Yes." Liu Yu opened the storyboard. "The core paragraphs cannot be changed, the transition paragraphs can be compressed, and not a single emotional paragraph can be omitted."
Ma Jianming glanced at him, said nothing more, turned on his computer, and started importing materials.
Editing is a tedious and long process. Every morning at eight o'clock, Liu Yu would appear in the editing room on time and not leave until eleven or twelve o'clock at night.
Besides editing, Liu Yu is also doing something else: writing songs.
While he was filming in Tianjin, the melodies of these songs kept playing in his head.
I've heard them all in my past life, and I know every single one of them by heart.
So after finishing his work in the editing room every day, he would go back to his dormitory and hug his guitar; Zhang Yan bought it when she was young to learn guitar, and Liu Yu also learned to play it when he was young.
"Actually, There's Nothing," theme song.
"I once had dreams, but nothing came of it. Now, I can only express my feelings through a song."
The lyrics and music of this song are one and the same. When he was writing it, his mind was full of movie scenes: the female protagonist sitting in a convenience store, holding a cup of cold coffee, staring blankly out the window.
She doesn't remember who she's waiting for, but she is waiting.
"Always Quiet," an interlude. "My love for you has always been quiet, in exchange for the occasional care you give me."
When Liu Yu wrote these lyrics, he thought of his first marriage in his previous life.
He was like that back then, thinking that every effort would be rewarded, only to later realize that the least valuable thing in a relationship is "what I thought".
"Without You", an interlude.
"If it weren't for you, if it weren't for the past, I wouldn't be heartbroken. But if there were a choice, I would still love you."
"Don't Think of Me," an interlude.
"You clearly love me too, there's no reason why our love shouldn't have a happy ending. As long as you dare to be strong, why should we miss out?"
He used this song in the scene where the female lead couldn't remember the male lead's name for the first time after she lost her memory.
The male protagonist is standing in the kitchen with his back to the camera, chopping vegetables, but the chopping speed gets slower and slower until he finally stops.
He didn't turn around, didn't cry, didn't do anything, he just stood there.
His retreating figure seemed to say: You don't remember me anymore, but I remember everything you did.
"A Little Happiness" - "It turns out you are the luck I most want to keep, it turns out we were once so close to love."
Mercury, ending theme song.
How much further must I go before I can enter your heart? How much longer until I can get close to you?
Liu Yu wrote the lyrics and music for all six songs in a week.
.......
In late May, Yan Danchen visited Liu Yu at the Beijing Film Academy several times.
The first time was on a Saturday afternoon.
"I've arrived at school, where are you?"
He received a text message, paused the argument, wiped the sweat from his face, and walked out of the editing room.
Yan Danchen stood at the entrance of the teaching building, wearing a blue dress, her hair down, and holding a cup of milk tea in her hand.
Seeing Liu Yu come out, she smiled and handed him the milk tea: "I brought this for you, less ice and half sugar, just like you said last time."
Liu Yu took the milk tea, inserted the straw, and took a sip; the temperature was just right.
"Why are you here?"
"Can't I come to see you if there's nothing wrong?" Yan Danchen tilted her head and looked at him. "I was bored at home, so I wanted to see how your haircut was going."
"The editing is almost done, but there's still how to handle the emotional moments of the last scene. My senior colleague and I argued about it for ages."
"Why are you arguing?"
"He thought that scene should make the audience cry, but I don't think it should. A good movie doesn't make the audience cry; it makes the audience want to cry."
Yan Danchen looked at him with a puzzled look in her eyes. "Come on, take me to see."
Liu Yu led her into the editing room. Ma Jianming was staring blankly at the screen. When he saw Yan Danchen come in, he paused for a moment, then stood up, looking somewhat unnatural.
Yan Danchen was very generous and smiled at Ma Jianming, saying, "Hello, Senior Brother Ma, thank you for your hard work."
The second meeting was a week later.
Yan Danchen came to Beijing Film Academy again, this time not alone, she brought a bag of fruit.
"I passed by a fruit shop and saw that the watermelon looked pretty fresh, so I bought one. But I couldn't finish it all by myself, so I brought it here to share with you guys."
Liu Yu took the watermelon and looked at the neatly arranged box of red-fleshed watermelons. Something inside him was gently touched.
It's not about being moved; it's like someone has placed something in your world that doesn't belong to you, but you feel that the thing is just right there.
"How did you know I love watermelon?" Liu Yu asked with a smile.
"When we were filming in Tianjin last time, one day after work, you went to a roadside stall and bought a watermelon. You squatted down and ate it. I saw that you were eating it with great relish, so I knew you loved it."
Yan Danchen spoke in a very calm tone, as if she were talking about a trivial matter. Liu Yu listened and his mind raced.
The third meeting was the day before the editing was completed.
Yan Danchen called Liu Yu and said she wanted to come and see the finished film.
Liu Yu said the editing wasn't completely finished yet; there was just a little finishing touch, and it wouldn't be done until tomorrow. She said she'd come tomorrow then, and wouldn't bother him today.
After hanging up the phone, Liu Yu stared at his phone screen for a long time.
He thought of the women from his past life: some liked his money, some liked him as a person, some truly loved him, and some he truly loved.
No one is as calm and composed as Yan Danchen, like a cup of tea at just the right temperature—it's there when you're not drinking it, and it's just the right temperature to not burn your mouth when you want to drink it.
She's three years older, but so what?
......
In mid-June, post-production on "A Moment to Remember" was completed.
That day, Liu Yu sat alone in the editing room for a long time, watching the entire finished film from beginning to end.
Ninety minutes, no fast forward, no pause, I watched it from beginning to end.
After watching it, he leaned back in his chair and let out a long sigh. It was like finishing a marathon; you don't care about the ranking or the results, you just want to lie down and have a drink of water.
Xi, a senior student from the Sound Academy, had already transcribed the demos for him, writing them neatly on staff paper, with chord markings and arrangement suggestions for each song.
For the theme song "Actually, Nothing Happened," Liu Yu already had someone in mind: Li Jian.
Li Jian, a former member of Shui Mu Nian Hua, went solo in 2002 and released his first solo album, "Like Flowing Water," in 2003.
His voice is clear, clean, and restrained; it is not sentimental, but it can touch people's hearts.
The song "Actually Nothing" has a restrained sadness in its tone. It's not that I'm very sad, but that I once had hopes, but they didn't come to fruition.
This way of expressing himself is a perfect match for Li Jian's personality.
Liu Yu used his connections at the school to get Li Jian's contact information and arranged to meet him at a coffee shop on the East Third Ring Road.
Li Jian was thinner than Liu Yu had imagined, and he was wearing a dark blue sweater. Liu Yu handed him the demo and lyrics of "Actually, Nothing Happened," and he listened to it once with his headphones on, without saying a word, then listened to it again.
"Did you write this song?" Li Jian took off his headphones and looked at Liu Yu.
"Yes, both the lyrics and the music."
Li Jian was silent for a few seconds, read through the lyrics from beginning to end, and then said something that put Liu Yu's mind at ease: "I want to sing this song. Name your price."
Liu Yu was stunned for a moment. He had prepared a set of arguments to persuade Li Jian, but Li Jian agreed without asking any questions.
"Mr. Li Jian, I don't want money. You can use this song; just include it in your next album."
Li Jian looked up at him, his eyes showing surprise and wariness.
"No money? Then what do you want?"
"Your singing is excellent, which highlights the song's value. What I need now isn't money, but influence. The fact that Li Jian sang my song is the best form of publicity."
Li Jian stared at him for a few seconds, then smiled relaxedly—not the kind of social smile, but a genuine one.
"At your age, having this kind of vision is not easy. Okay, I'll take this song. On the next album, I'll give you credit; lyrics and music: Liu Yu."