Chapter 61 Part Four: Regrets in the Film Industry: A Glimpse of the Unfinished Films of Famous Actors

In 1960, General Liu Yalou, Commander of the Air Force, visited North Korea with a military delegation of the Chinese People's Liberation Army composed of General Luo Ruiqing, Chief of Staff. During the visit, the DPRK entertained China's top diplomatic and military officials in a large hangar "ingeniously" according to local conditions, and performed a large-scale musical "Three Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains".The whole dance is composed of songs and dances from the Korean War era.All professional actors and more than 3,000 soldiers of the Korean People's Army were magnificent and majestic. Liu Yalou, who loves literature and art and enjoys the reputation of "commander good at singing and dancing" in the army, couldn't help feeling happy.

On his way back to China, Liu Yalou passed by Shenyang, and watched a cultural evening hosted by the Shenyang Military Region, and listened attentively to the four revolutionary historical songs sung at the evening.I don't know whether watching it triggered his nostalgia for the past of the Revolutionary War era, or made him feel connected with North Korea's big songs and dances. Liu Yalou couldn't help thinking, thinking about it, yes!The revolutionary armed struggle led by the Communist Party of China has lasted for more than 20 years. During this period, the people in the base areas and liberated areas have created a large number of revolutionary historical struggle songs loved by the army and the people during the long-term battle, and they are also very popular among the people.At that time, during the three-year period of natural disasters, the Party Central Committee and the General Political Department of the People's Liberation Army repeatedly issued calls to vigorously carry out revolutionary traditional education across the country and encourage the majority of literary and art workers to create more works full of national cohesion and pride. Spiritual works of literature and art, to inspire the fighting spirit of the people of the whole country and the commanders and fighters of the whole army, to strive for and change the fundamental improvement of the national economy.Liu Yalou thinks that the art form of singing and dancing is the best interpretation of promoting and implementing central policies.

In the second half of that year, when Liu Yalou held a meeting in Hangzhou, he deliberately took his long-awaited idea as a task assigned, and entrusted the special mission of singing revolutionary historical songs to the Art Troupe of the Political Department of the Air Force Deputy head Zhang Shuanghu.Head Zhang returned to the regiment, quickly convened a meeting, and mentioned singing revolutionary historical songs. Of course, the person in charge of the party committee of the regiment knew that there was such an episode behind the incident. Among the cultural performances, the first program at the opening ceremony was to have a chorus of hundreds of veteran generals from the entire army sing a chorus of revolutionary historical songs. For a while, it became a good story in the whole country and the entire army.However, at this military art show, the Air Force won the fewest award-winning works.Commander Liu Yalou therefore severely criticized the Party Committee of the Air Force Political Arts Troupe, and pointed out: "There is a problem with being handsome." , specifically designated Niu Changlai, the deputy head of the headquarter, to be in charge, and asked the art troupe to put down all other work and concentrate on singing revolutionary historical songs.The whole regiment worked hard and wanted to fight a beautiful turnaround.

First of all, the regiment made a plan, based on the clues, and found out what happened. They learned that the General Political Song and Dance Troupe accompanied Chief Luo and Commander Liu to North Korea, so they immediately sent people to the "General Political Bureau" to perform in North Korea. One look at the program list, it reads: a large-scale music and dance epic "Three Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains".In this way, the ins and outs were clear, and everyone unified their thinking and made up their minds to create a similar song and dance that mainly sang revolutionary historical songs.

Then, the leadership team was established, and the screenwriter team consisted of Niu Chang, Tong Chengjie, Zhu Zhengben, Zhang Shixie, Yao Xuecheng, Hu Dade, Gu Di, Meng Zhaoxiang and others.After the overall performance plan was determined, at the end of 1960, the troupe quickly dispatched a collection and creation group mainly composed of songwriters Zhang Shixie, Zhu Zhengben, Yao Xuecheng, Chen Jie, etc., to Jiangxi and other old revolutionary areas to systematically collect and organize revolutionary historical songs. Zhang Shixie and his entourage went deep into Jinggangshan, Ji'an, Yongxin, Anfu, Nanchang and other places successively, and collected many revolutionary historical songs with honest folk customs. In Ciping Nursing Home, old Red Army soldier Li Xinzhu couldn't help humming "Workers, Peasants and Soldiers Unite" , Lai Faxiu, a revolutionary old man in Jinggangshan, can also sing "Send Lang to the Red Army" very accurately. In February 1961, Zhang Shixie and others happened to watch the Jiangxi Provincial Folk Art Performance in Jiujiang City. A song sung by amateur actors in Ji’an area to bid farewell to the Red Army left a deep impression on Zhang Shixie and others. The tune is very colloquial, with a lot of slang and dialect in the libretto, which is full of local characteristics and regional customs.At the singing scene, Zhang Shixie, Zhu Zhengben and others expressed their feelings, and immediately copied down the general idea of ​​the lyrics and tunes, and sorted out the transcripts and tunes overnight like a treasure, and included them in the "Revolutionary History Song List Singing", It is called Gannan folk song - "Ten Sending the Red Army Away".

As meritorious ministers, Zhang Shixie and others, in addition to collecting and arranging revolutionary historical songs, they also used the dance "Sunflower Dance" created by the Air Force Art Troupe in the second military art performance in 1959, and the group dance "Flying Dance" created by the Chengdu Military Region based on oil paintings. Capture the Luding Bridge" (that is, "Heroes Overcome the Dadu River"), and the pas de deux "The Difficult Years" created by the Soldiers Song and Dance Troupe of the Guangzhou Military Region in 1961 based on famous military sculptures have all been organically processed and re-created.Later, there were as many as 13 of these songs and dances, which were revised, refined and processed, and finally put into the large-scale music and dance epic "Revolutionary History Song Table Singing" created in 1964.

Therefore, experts in the literary and art circles who knew the origin of the creation of "Revolutionary History Song Table Singing" agreed that the "Revolutionary History Song Table Singing" created in 1961 was the "previous chapter" of "Dongfanghong" performed on the 15th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1964. "Song of the Chinese Revolution", created in 1984 for the 35th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, can be described as the "continuation" of "Dongfanghong".In 1964, "Singing and Forging Under the Banner of Mao Zedong" created and performed by literary and art workers in Shanghai and several provinces in East China was actually a "transitional chapter" of "Dongfanghong". Dance Epic", since the "Song of the Chinese Revolution" that appeared after 20 years is the overlap and evolution of the overall content of "Dongfanghong", it is more appropriate to call it an "extension" of "Dongfanghong". "Revolutionary History Songs Singing" and "Singing Forward Under Mao Zedong's Banner", and "The East is Red", have been gradually approached and interrelated in four years, and together constitute a large-scale music and dance epic "The East is Red". "Red" is a "trilogy" with climaxes, passionate symphonies, and echoes from afar.

At the beginning, the Kongzheng Art Troupe of the performance unit raised doubts about the name of the big song and dance "Singing of Revolutionary History Songs", because they always felt that the name was too straightforward and lacked literary and artistic colors. Before that, the relevant main creators They racked their brains to give another name, called "Hurricane Song", in which the word "Hurricane" comes from the last two lines in Mao Zedong's 1930 poem "Butterfly Love Flower? From Tingzhou to Changsha": " An international elegy, Hurricane fell from the sky for me", but when the submission was made, it was immediately rejected by Liu Yalou as "too abstract".When the performance was approaching, the main creative staff still did not give up. In the attitude of being responsible for the art, they wanted to propose the name of the big song and dance "Glorious Course". "I asked you to sing revolutionary historical songs. When did I ask you to change it to a big song and dance?" Before that, Chief of Staff Luo Ruiqing had learned that the Air Force was rushing to arrange a big song and dance composed of 300 people, so he said bluntly. He said: "What kind of big song and dance? There are 3,000 people in a big song and dance in North Korea. How many of you have? What kind of limelight! Go back and tell you Commander Liu, tell him not to do it!" So Liu Yalou got angry: "Who told you to do it? , What glorious journey do you know?" Wang Jingmin, Director of the Political Department of the Air Force, Niu Chang and Dong Ju, Deputy Heads of the Headquarters, and Wang Yang, Head of the Song and Dance Troupe, who went together looked at each other in silence.After a long while, it was Niu Chang who broke the silence: "Director Wang, what do you think we should do? We are actually a table singing, also called Dahuo newspaper drama. I think it is better to change the name, and simply call it "Revolutionary History Song Table Singing." At that time At that time, the regiment sent people around to act separately upon hearing the news, and finally changed the posters in the newspaper and the program list of the scheduled performances to a unified name-"Revolutionary History Song List Singing".

On August 1, 1961, "Revolutionary History Songs Singing" had its grand premiere in Beijing Zhongshan Park Concert Hall, and then moved to the National Cultural Palace for performances. It was performed in Beijing for 8 days, with an audience of more than 22,000 people. It received rave reviews, and later entertained many performances field.The Central People's Broadcasting Station played it repeatedly, and the station also organized songs to teach singing.The play selected 46 revolutionary songs from the period of the Agrarian Revolution, the Second Civil Revolutionary War and the War of Resistance Against Japan, accompanied by dance performances. There is a panoramic picture from childhood to adulthood, through struggle, failure, and struggle, until the final victory.

"Songs of Revolutionary History" consists of 9 scenes and 16 scenes, which are divided into "prologue", "establishment of Jinggangshan revolutionary base", "long march of thousands of miles", "long march through Loushan Pass/passing through the Yi nationality area", "capture of Luding Bridge" /Climbing across the snow-capped mountains/The three main forces meet", "Crossing the grassland", "Victoriously arrived at Lazikou/Crossing the Yellow River and going north to resist the Japanese", "The Japanese invaded and occupied the three northeastern provinces/The Communist Party launched an anti-Japanese and national salvation", "Praise the revolutionary holy land of Yan'an", " Celebrating the victory of the Anti-Japanese War / The revolutionary ranks have matured and grown", from the founding of the Communist Party of China to the end of the celebration of the victory of the Anti-Japanese War.The whole station sang about 46 songs, many of which are widely sung classics, such as: "Internationale", "Send Lang as a Red Army", "(Xijiang Moon) Jinggangshan", "Osmanthus blossoms everywhere in August", " Ten Sending the Red Army", "(Recalling Qin'e) Loushan Pass", "Three Disciplines and Eight Points of Attention", "(Seven Laws) Long March" (that is, "The Red Army is not afraid of expeditions"), "On the Songhua River", "Anti-Japanese Military and Political University School Song", "March of the Volunteers", "Slash the Devil's Head with a Big Sword", "Go to the Enemy's Rear", "Song of the Guerrillas", "Military Song of the New Fourth Army", "On the Taihang Mountain", "Ode to Yan'an", "We Mao Zedong", "Nanniwan", "Dongfanghong" and so on.The main actors Qin Wantan, Meng Zhaoxiang, Luo Tangyin, Luo Diyin, Lu Yixian, Song Shizhen, Su Hailing, Xin Peiwen, Wang Jinshan, Liu Zhipu, Zhang Yi, Gao Guodong, Li Guang, Chen Xiaoman and other actors are all from the Air Force Art Troupe. Qin Wantan, Ma Yutao, and Pan Tianhui will sing solo, and Bai Jingcheng will be narrated.In terms of performance processing, it is not a simple chorus, but has poems, dances, characters, plots, dances, and singing; in the design of the stage, the latest stage technology at that time was adopted - the remake machine The production of stage slide projection technology was later widely used in the creation of large-scale music and dance epic "Dongfanghong" and "Model Opera" stages as well as many movies.

Zhou Enlai, Ye Jianying, Nie Rongzhen, Lin Biao, Luo Ronghuan, Luo Ruiqing, Liu Yalou, Peng Zhen and other party, state and military leaders watched the performance successively.Luo Ruiqing stepped onto the stage after watching the performance, and said uncharacteristically to the actors: "What a big song and dance, it's obviously an opera!" Before the results, Liu Yalou naturally felt that his face was radiant. He often smiled and said happily: "You guys did a good job, I asked you to sing, you learned from one example, you did the right thing!... We Air Force Standing Committee invited everyone to dinner, congratulations on the success of the performance!" A song "Revolutionary History Songs Singing", vividly reproduced the glorious course of the Chinese revolution, and warmly praised the great revolutionary fighting spirit of the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people.In order to popularize the traditional propaganda and ideological education for the general army and civilians, so that more people can see "Revolutionary History Songs Singing", on May 26, 1962, Lin Biao, then Minister of National Defense, personally instructed the Chinese People's Liberation Army to produce the Bayi Film The factory shoots it into a color stage art film.Lin Biao's instruction of "killing Cheng Yaojin on the way" caused difficulties for the director of Bayi Film Studio, Chen Bo, because at that time, according to the quota ratio, Bayi Film Factory only imported one movie every year. The supply of "Eastman" color film, and the color film from the August First Factory had long been allocated to director Li Jun's key film - the first feature film "Serf" in New China that reflected the liberation of the Tibetan people.Reluctantly, after Lin Biao's instructions came down, color film had to be temporarily used for the shooting of "Revolutionary History Song Table Singing", and "Serf" was replaced by black and white film. Hua Chun, who is good at filming military-themed feature films at Bayi Factory, directed this "Singing of Revolutionary History Songs". In addition to retaining the essence of singing and dancing in the whole play, he also used the visual effects of film art to integrate a large number of music and dance throughout the performance. , with very concise, bright, and compact shots and pictures, it handles the plot concisely, and uses the actor's vocal and emotional singing to guide the whole film. embellishment, so that the whole play is more vivid.What is even more gratifying and courageous to explore is that the shooting of the film jumped out of the limited stage, shuttled and extended with ease in the studio and the real scene, and also appropriately interspersed some wonderful scenes such as the vast sea, rolling waves, clouds and mountains and mists, and the rays of the sun. The empty shots of beautiful scenery are used as the background to show the grandeur and magnificent pictures of the film. In this way, the combination of fiction and reality vividly reproduces the glorious course of the Chinese revolution and praises the great achievements of the Communist Party of China and the Chinese people. Revolutionary fighting spirit.The filming was completed in December 1963, and it was officially released nationwide.