Chapter 35 035 Hot Search

Chapter Thirty-Five

"I can't believe it, that's Lin Yuan?!"

"I previously criticized Lin Yuan for not being suitable for Gu Yilou because he and Gu Yilou had absolutely no resemblance in appearance or temperament. But now—I truly can't see a single thing about Gu Yilou that resembles Lin Yuan, because he's clearly Gu Yilou herself!!!"

"Can someone who's actually seen the movie tell me, is Gu Yilou really like the one in the trailer?"

"It's not just like in the trailer; Gu Yilou's acting is guaranteed to give you a huge shock!"

"!!!!"

The trailer released by the production team of "Thousand Mountains" quickly garnered millions of views.

Gu Yilou's image in the video is so captivating that it's hard not to be interested in him.

"I highly recommend this book. Last year I criticized Lin Yuan, but now I just want to slap myself in the face. No one is more suitable for Gu Yilou than Lin Yuan."

"+1+1".

Curious netizens then searched for reviews of "Thousand Mountains," specifically looking for reviews with low fan base and clearly written by genuine viewers.

After all, "The Immortal" had already taught them a lesson.

Xie Yu's fans praised that movie to the skies, and "The Immortal" had good pre-sale results and box office performance on its opening day. Who could have predicted that the movie's reputation would collapse to such an extent?

When the May Day holiday season started, absolutely no one thought that way; everyone assumed Xie Yu was about to ascend to heaven.

As a result, the first batch of scores for each film has been released today – "The Immortal" currently only has a score of 6.8.

This is still the rating on the ticketing software.

Generally, ticketing software ratings are quite lenient; low scores will only drive away customers. However, the current ratings for "The Immortal" clearly include a large portion of fan ratings.

Even so, while most movies can get around 9 points, "The Immortal" only got a pitiful 6.8 points, which is enough to prove how bad its quality is.

Even bad movies usually score around 8 points on ticketing apps. The reason why "The Immortal" scored so low is because Xie Yu's fans have completely offended the fans of the original novel.

Everyone knows that "The Immortal" is a heavily modified version, but there are different kinds of modifications. Some adaptations, even if they are heavily modified, still have a smooth plot. Although the adaptation deviates from the original work, they have won the audience's favor.

But "The Immortal" did not achieve this.

"Thousand Mountains" has a rating of 9.7.

Even on a film forum known for its strict standards, "Thousand Mountains" received a score of 9.4, making it the highest-rated new film released during the May Day holiday.

Compared to the comments on "The Immortal," which were clearly fan-made, the reviews on "Thousand Mountains" seemed much more objective and realistic.

"A short film where acting, visuals, and conflict outweigh the plot, with a somewhat thin storyline, but the adaptation of the original work is quite creative."

"It can be described as a feast of acting skills. The scenes between Li Mobei and Lin Yuan contributed the most classic moments of the entire May Day holiday. The subtle feelings between Li Mobei and Hua Lin are also one of the highlights of this movie."

"After reading the original novel of 'Thousand Mountains,' I thought Gu Yilou was a character who was inexplicable. Now that the movie has been released, my opinion has not changed. But even if he is an inexplicable madman, the actor in 'Thousand Mountains' still impressed me with his performance. You know, there are some abnormal people in this world. He doesn't need to be crazy for a reason. As long as he plays his role and has his own appeal in the story of 'Thousand Mountains,' that's enough."

"If Qin Zhong's existence is light, then Gu Yilou is complete darkness. He wanted to devour the light and drag it into the abyss, but he could never do it."

Whether it's the ratings "A Thousand Mountains" received or the real-time reviews from netizens, they are enough to entice book fans to buy a ticket and go to the cinema.

Book fans are generally willing to support film and television adaptations of their favorite works. However, for many adaptations, such as "The Immortal," book fans are unwilling to spend money even if they lower their standards.

"A Thousand Mountains" is the exact opposite.

Although the film cannot be 100% faithful to the original work in terms of details, that's because the original work itself lacks sufficient detail to support the length of a film.

...

Book fans were relieved and were naturally willing to buy tickets to support "A Thousand Mountains".

And these book fans who went to the cinema, if they write a review, will inevitably include one sentence—

"I was really scared by Gu Yilou!"

"The contrast between his two faces is simply amazing. Qin Chong is either incredibly lucky to have met such a close friend, or he's extremely unlucky."

"+1, I feel that his feelings for Qin Zhong are very complicated. There is a feeling that he does not want the other party to have a good time, but this feeling cannot be simply called hatred."

"If I had to summarize, my thoughts might not be right—I want to be you—that's Gu Yilou's mindset."

"It has that flavor."

"Because I am destined never to be you, I will destroy you."

"Ahhh, that's exactly right, the person upstairs really knows what they're doing."

"+1. Gu Yilou gives me the feeling that he doesn't care about anyone, not even powerful figures like the Third Prince. He only targets Qin Zhong."

"But logically speaking, why would someone who is indifferent to everything want to kill Qin Zhong? This is also a kind of emotional bias."

"That's a twisted mentality. A normal person would treat you well if you considered me a close friend, but Gu Yilou would treat you badly."

"...Why does this feel like they're trying to whitewash Gu Yilou?"

"No, no, to be honest, anyone who becomes Gu Yilou's friend is incredibly unlucky, but—the actors the production team found are just too good-looking."

"+1, the villain is good-looking and he also portrayed the feeling of being crazy and indifferent to the world, which gave the character a charm. This is not meant to say that Gu Yilou is a good person at all."

Gradually, the name "Gu Yilou" became a trending topic.

To be honest, "Thousand Mountains" is not a commercial blockbuster. It lacks box office appeal. The film's visual language is rich, and the visuals are different from those of typical commercial films.

In terms of box office, even though "Thousand Mountains" surpassed "The Immortal" in daily box office, it still couldn't beat "The Poison Gun".

However, there is one character in "Thousand Mountains" who has generated a great deal of discussion.

Since the casting process began, the choice of Gu Yilou has attracted much attention, with most online opinions predicting its failure. However, this has also become a selling point for "Thousand Mountains".

If Gu Yilou chooses the wrong actor, and the actor's performance is terrible, this outcome aligns with public opinion's expectations, and the discussion about Gu Yilou will subside.

But the choice of Gu Yilou's corner was brilliant.

There were too many people who were pessimistic and critical of Lin Yuan before, but after seeing Lin Yuan's performance in "Thousand Mountains", the audience will be more surprised.

This naturally became one of the sources of box office revenue for "Thousand Mountains".

The reputation of "The Immortal" among book fans has completely collapsed, and the original book fans are unwilling to support the movie. "A Thousand Mountains" is the opposite. The more the book fans who have seen the movie praise the acting of Gu Yilou, the more other book fans are willing to watch it.

Thus—since the production team released the promotional video for Gu Yilou, the box office of "Thousand Mountains" has been slowly rising.

Conversely, the better the box office performance of "Thousand Mountains", the wider the spread of Gu Yilou's image will be.

...

[On the Importance of Acting Skills in Enhancing a Character's Charm—A Comparison of Li Yunsheng and Gu Yilou.]

That evening, a blogger created a long video comparing and analyzing "The Immortal" and "Thousand Mountains," both adapted from novels, focusing on the characters Li Yunsheng and Gu Yilou.

The blogger titled this video "Comparison 3"—"Comparison 1" and "Comparison 2" were comparisons of Lin Yuan and Xie Yu's abilities in "Tomorrow's Star" and the musical, respectively.

Netizens: "..."

"I don't know what to say. His singing was completely outclassed, and his acting was even worse."

"At least Li Yunsheng is a positive character, but Xie Yu didn't bring out any charm in the role at all. I'm speechless. This guy is useless at everything. Who's promoting him?"

Netizens initially thought Xie Yu's singing was subpar, but after the blogger's comparison video was released, they were only relieved about one thing—thankfully, the "Thousand Mountains" production team didn't choose Xie Yu.

Xie Yu's past actions of trying to gain popularity by playing Gu Yilou, and then criticizing the production team after being abandoned by them, have also been brought up again.

In short, by this point, the box office of "The Immortal" had almost stopped.

During the popular May Day holiday, the increase in the number of screenings for "The Immortal" was so low that it was almost negligible, so theaters naturally had to reduce the number of screenings for "The Immortal".

The screening share of "The Immortal" was originally over 20%, but it dropped to 10% on the third day of its release.

Even so, the audience was still not satisfied, because the daily box office of "The Immortal" accounted for less than 10% of the total box office.

"Thousand Mountains" benefited from this, with its screenings increasing to 17%.

It's worth mentioning that "Thousand Mountains" has maintained a stable box office performance. It grossed over 40 million on the first day and over 50 million on the second and third days, but it did not experience a crazy surge or break 100 million in a single day.

But stability itself is not a bad thing.

In some ways, "Thousand Mountains" is the most stable film in the May Day holiday period.

Although it's not the kind of blockbuster that's easy to make money at the box office, it's of good quality, so there will be an audience willing to watch it.

Audiences have diverse tastes, and even niche works can attract a group of viewers who love them as long as they are of high quality.

"Gu Yilou is a real scoundrel."

"...But to be honest, I think Lin Yuan acted quite well, and I've started following him."

"Following Lin Yuan +1, this guy is so handsome, his acting is really... I heard he hadn't acted in any movies before playing Gu Yilou?"

"As a fan of the novel 'The Immortal,' I have something very troublesome to say. Seriously, I would rather Lin Yuan play Li Yunsheng."

"My condolences to the upstairs family."

"It's impossible. I know very well that the script adaptation is so bad that even the best acting can't save it. But Xie Yu's acting is just too bad. Li Yunsheng has been ruined and can't be saved."

However, the fans of the novel "The Immortal" still struggled a little - they edited Gu Yilou's hidden side into Li Yunsheng's mortal version, and then added the soundtrack of "Hot".

Lin Yuan's handsome face and his voice were a perfect match, and the number of views for this video of Lin Yuan as Li Yunsheng even exceeded the number of views for the promotional trailer of "The Immortal".

Then—unsurprisingly, it was reported and shut down once again by the production team of "The Immortal" orDA Entertainment.

The blogger himself: "..."

Netizen: "..."

Can you please stop being so petty?

You portrayed Li Yunsheng as such a monstrous character, yet the fans of the original novel wanted to stab you in the back but didn't, right?

"How stingy!"

"This person has always been like this. Wasn't it the same on the debut night of 'Tomorrow's Star'? All those posts questioning Lin Yuan on forums, Weibo, and Tieba were eventually deleted, leaving netizens unable to find any evidence to speak up for him."

"May 'The Immortal' flop to the death!!"

There's a side story to the video deletion incident—fans of the novel "The Immortal" used the song "Hot" in a video they edited.

As we all know, "Hot" is the theme song of "Prosperous World", with lyrics written by director Jiao Le and specially invited by Lin Yuan to sing. Both the movie and the song are quite popular.

Shortly after fans of the novel "The Immortal" edited this video, director Jiao Le reposted it to his Weibo page, proudly boasting: "[The Lin Yuan I found, isn't he amazing!]"

The director didn't think there was anything wrong with using "Hot" in video editing; he just thought the song was of high quality and fit well in different videos.

Before the director could even finish showing off for an hour, the video was taken down.

Director Jiao Le: "?"

Generally speaking, most young directors have tempers, especially young and talented directors like Jiao Le, whose tempers are even more unrestrained.

Upon discovering the video had been deleted, director Jiao Le immediately protested: "The song belongs to our production team, and the video is from 'A Thousand Mountains.' I've already asked director Qin Panyun, and she said there's no problem using it. Why was it deleted?"

Director Jiao Le directly tagged the platform where the video was uploaded.

Who deleted it?

Netizens: "..."

Everyone knows who deleted them. After all, in the past few days, most of the videos mocking "The Immortal" have been deleted. Although the "The Immortal" production team pretends to be all calm and peaceful, the answer to who might be upset by this is obvious.

The problem is that the production team of "The Immortal" can indeed request the platform to remove all content related to "The Immortal," as the video copyright belongs to the production team.

But what do the videos made by book fans have to do with "The Immortal"?

At most, the title will contain the three characters "Li Yunsheng".

However, "Li Yunsheng" is not an original character created by the production team of "The Immortal", but a character from the original work "The Peerless Female Warrior".

The copyright of the novel still belongs to the author.

"That's right. The song copyright belongs to 'Prosperous World,' and the video copyright belongs to 'Thousand Mountains.' What right does the 'Immortal' production team have to ask them to delete it? Isn't this overstepping their bounds?"

"+1+1".

Jiao Le took the lead, and netizens sent letters of protest one after another. As a result, the video was released again by the platform more than an hour later.

Because of the production team's questionable actions, the video's views skyrocketed, bringing Lin Yuan, who has both released songs and created a new image, even more attention.

Lin Yuan's Weibo followers continue to rise.

As viewers of the video know, the character he portrayed is named Gu Yilou, and the movie he starred in, "Thousand Mountains," is still showing in theaters.

As a result, the box office of "Thousand Mountains" rose again.

On the third day of the May Day holiday, "Thousand Mountains" officially broke 100 million yuan at the box office, reaching a total box office of 150 million yuan. On the fourth and fifth days, the daily box office of "Thousand Mountains" remained above 60 million yuan, achieving a counter-trend increase.

One reason is that the number of screenings for the film has increased.

Secondly, "Thousand Mountains" attracted a group of viewers who called themselves "refugees of "The Immortal".

These viewers all know that Lin Yuan and Xie Yu are extremely at odds, and it wouldn't be an exaggeration to call them mortal enemies.

Because of the novel "The Immortal", they really, really dislike Xie Yu.

In any case, "Thousand Mountains" absolutely cannot lose to "The Immortal".

...

In fact, although "The Immortal" grossed 300 million yuan at the box office, the film did not recoup its costs. To be precise, it is still a long way from breaking even.

Objectively speaking, the cast of this movie isn't particularly large, but the special effects for this fantasy film still cost a lot of money—the film's investment cost was more than 300 million.

In any case, there is no possibility of "The Immortal" recouping its costs.

The May Day holiday was not even over yet, and the daily box office of "The Immortal" was only a few million. Even though the film still maintained a screening share of about 10%, it did not bring any positive growth.

On the contrary, because the theaters gave it a lot of screen time, the production team's costs actually increased.

This time, the crew of "The Immortal" was unusually quiet.

However, some netizens on a certain forum have already started a thread to discuss: "So, how does Xie Yu plan to shift the blame this time?"

[Normally, Xie Yu would shift the blame to her female co-star—we've already seen this kind of blame-shifting between male and female leads during the filming of "A Tear," but this time, Wei Wushuang, the main female character in the original work, has had almost no screen time. Even if this film flops, the blame can't be placed on the female lead.]

[Next is the screenwriter, but the screenwriter of "The Immortal" gave him all the screen time. Unless he's an idiot, he wouldn't complain about the screenwriter giving him too much screen time. This was clearly at his behest.]

Finally, there's the director. Personally, I feel it's more likely the blame will be shifted to the director this time, as the director wields considerable power on a film set.

[As a last resort, we could also consider the option of Lin Yuan casting a curse. Regardless of whether others believe it or not, fans might.]

[Hilarious! The poster knows Xie Yu way too well!]

[What else? This is how they've always operated. I vote for the director.]

[Director +1.]

[This time it's definitely the director, but Lin Yuan might also get hit by the typhoon's tail end. Anyway, Xie Yu's fans are unhappy, so they'll just go and criticize Lin Yuan. The more they criticize Lin Yuan, the more popular he becomes. I'm dying of laughter.]

In a sense, the forum's prediction post was quite prescient; shortly after it was published, a certain term appeared on the trending searches—

#The director of "The Immortal" has not read the original novel#

The entry is filled with Xie Yu's fans' exclamations of surprise: "Oh my god, the director hasn't read the original work!" / "Isn't this dragging my brother down?" / "Xie Yu is so innocent!" / "The production team just wants to exploit my brother's fame to make money!" / "Xie Yu wanted to act in a good movie, and you let him down!" / "It's clearly the director's fault!" / "Director, how many people have you ruined?" / "People who don't respect the original work don't deserve to be directors!" / "How can my brother's talent not deserve a good production team..."

Netizens: "…………"

Xie Yu didn't come out to pour oil for the director this time, but—

#Xie Yu apologizes to fans of "Ordinary Girl"#

My brother is responsible, a good person, the best Xie Yu, genuine, and has a strong sense of responsibility...

At that moment, Lin Yuan added the hashtag #kindness# to his Weibo account.

Netizens: "..."

Lin Yuan stated that he meant nothing by it; he was simply expressing his hope that Gu Yilou would be a kind person and not so unkind.

However, shortly after Xie Yu apologized to the fans of the original novel "Ordinary Women and Peerless Guards", Chen Zhuo, the female lead of "A Tear in a Cup", also posted a Weibo post.

[Recent events reminded me of myself last year. As actresses, we often encounter similar predicaments [laughs].]

"Sister Xiaozhu took the initiative to speak out for the actress who was hurt. Waaaaah, girls always help each other."

"Hasn't this been the same person since 'A Tear in the Eyes'? What else can he do besides shifting blame to his co-stars? Oh, this time he didn't shift blame, he stole all the scenes from the actress."

"Hilarious! How could someone dare to act in his film if the director hasn't even read the original work? Besides, wouldn't this be even more beneficial for that person? If the director had actually read the original work, the female lead would have had more screen time."

"Hilarious! What 'Immortal'? Why not call it 'The Legend of Li Yunsheng'?"

"Honestly, 'Peerless Female Warrior' is a female-oriented novel. If it were adapted into a male-oriented novel like 'The Legend of Li Yunsheng,' zero readers would want to read it, okay?"

"Anyway, I can see it. He joined Wink without any surprise by taking Lin Yuan's spot. Then he blames Lin Yuan for being a flop. He acted in 'Yesterday's Stars' and turned it into a disaster, blaming the music director for his poor performance. He acted in 'A Tear,' and the actresses, screenwriters, and directors were all guilty. Now it's 'The Immortal's' turn, and it's all the director's fault."

Even in the entertainment industry where fans don't seem to learn their lesson, the same tactic shouldn't be used too many times. Xie Yu's attempt to shift the blame for the failure of "The Immortal" onto the director has naturally made netizens realize something is amiss.

It's obvious to anyone with eyes that compared to the number of people who spoke up for Xie Yu back then in "A Tear in a Cup," the number of people speaking up for him in "The Immortal" is much smaller.

"The Immortal" is clearly a work tailor-made for Xie Yu.

The script prioritized him, and the publicity prioritized him—the female lead barely appeared in the trailer, so it's fair to say that the production team gave him all their favoritism.

In the past, it was understandable for Xie Yu to shift the blame, since the production team didn't have any particular preference. But this time, he couldn't get away with it no matter what, because the movie was called "The Immortal"!

Moreover, the production team initially cast him as the lead actor precisely because of his strong fan base.

Regardless, as the lead actor, Xie Yu has to carry the box office.

By shifting the blame to the director, fans can extricate him from the public eye. However, "The Immortal" has incurred huge losses, and the industry will not ignore Xie Yu's leading role.

He lost money.

When "The Immortal" was first released, Xie Yu's fans repeatedly emphasized that he was the leading male character, and many netizens still remember this. Now, Xie Yu wants to extricate himself from the role of the leading male character, but it's not something he can do as he pleases.

Besides, the director himself is no pushover.

That day, the trending topics were incredibly lively—

#Director says Xie Yu has five screenwriters#

#The crew of "A Tear in a Cup" says the box office performance of "The Immortal" is not surprising#

#Director sheds tears at roadshow#

#Female Leads of "A Tear" and "The Immortal" Dinner Party#

#Ye Liuchuan praises the long post by the director of "The Immortal"#

#Ji Xiaming Likes the Long Article by the Director of "The Immortal"#

#Zhang Xiaoyue praises the long article by the director of "The Immortal"#

#Lin Yuan found a dead worm in a peach#

Netizens: "..."

What is the necessity of having this last tag?

#KindnessOfInsects#

"?"

"?"

#Because I saw a whole worm, not half of it#

#They're tearing each other apart, can you be serious for once?#

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Author's Note: [Starry eyes][Starry eyes][Starry eyes] Updated! Two chapters combined into one, I still owe one chapter.