Bullfight [DVD] - Comedy - Hollywood Cinema [www.hlwyy.com]

The story of "Bullfight" is set in the period of the War of Resistance, in 1941, China, war raged, and the earth mourned. The Japanese devils came, and all the villagers were killed, only Niu Er was left. The Communist International sent a Dutch cow to China's anti-Japanese base area to provide nutrition for the wounded soldiers. But because the devils were going to enter the village, so the comrades of the base had to transfer, and entrusted the cow to Niu Er (Huang Bo) to take care of. Niu Er initially did not want to accept this cow, but the village chief induced him to take on this task by marrying Jier (Yan Ni) to him. Who would have thought that this cow forced Huang Bo to outwit the Japanese devils, bandits, and wandering quacks.

In the movie, Huang Bo plays the farmer Niu Er, who is responsible for taking care of the dairy cow that supplies the Eighth Route Army with milk for the wounded soldiers. He has no choice but to escape again and again... Niu Er weaves through the gunfire of the killers, mutually dependent with the cow, risking death many times. The Japanese devils, bandits, and refugees all had designs on the cow, and Niu Er had to deal with the devils and bandits until the day of liberation.

Behind-the-scenes story:

Since Huang Bo and Yan Ni, these two top comedians, are in the movie, everyone thought it was a comedy story. But in fact, although the film has many laugh points, it is still a very cruel story. The ugliness of human nature and the kindness of animals are vividly portrayed. Especially in the ending part, it is full of surprises and melancholy.

For this movie, Guan Hu said that he derived it from a legend while chatting with villagers. For those who say the style of the movie is close to Jiang Wen's "Devils at the Doorstep", Guan Hu said: "We want to say different things. Although 'Bullfight' is cruel, it is still a hopeful movie, and has little to do with national sentiment. The theme of the film is actually 'love'. Don't look at those farmers as selfish, but they also have a spirit of great love."

For Yan Ni, the audience always can't get rid of the impression of Tong Zishan from "My Own Swordsman". But in "Bullfight", Yan Ni willingly sacrifices her image, smearing her face dirty, making her teeth yellow, wearing a bulky cotton jacket, becoming very fiery, even daring to fight with a group of men, and daring to challenge the authority of the old people in the village. Unfortunately, just when she got love, she was brutally killed by the devils. Although her screen time is not much, her always wearing bright red clothes makes her the only splash of brightness in the dark tones of the movie.

If Yan Ni's brilliance didn't satisfy everyone due to her limited screen time, then Huang Bo's brilliance is absolutely from beginning to end, making people feel that he is no longer the actor from the "Crazy" series movies. A reporter said that in this movie, Huang Bo's appearance no longer makes people laugh, but instead makes them feel his tragedy, and the events happening to him are also cruel.

The most impressive part is when the cow he took good care of was milked dry and was about to be slaughtered by a bunch of villains, Huang Bo stood far away on the wall head unable to do anything, jumping around anxiously and crying uncontrollably. Another scene is when he was stabbed by the Japanese devils, his expression of pain... These are all expressions that Huang Bo's previous roles couldn't show.

As the discoverer of Huang Bo, Guan Hu is particularly qualified to evaluate Huang Bo's transformation over the years: "I chose Huang Bo because I felt he had a bit of 'oiliness'. At first, I was worried that he acted too hard and lost his original simplicity. But later I found that he added experience that he didn't have before. And in order to shoot this movie, he was injured more than a hundred times, fractured many times, but later recovered. Through this, I found that he is no longer the little boy he used to be, but a man who can endure."

However, the most surprising "big name" in this movie is still that Dutch cow. In previous movies, the most common animal stars were either dogs or monkeys, and cows were rarely seen. But it turns out that cows also have rich emotions, seeing someone being wronged, she will shed tears; seeing someone unhappy, she will rub against them to comfort; seeing someone without food, she would rather let them milk her dry; seeing someone trying to harm her, she would run away without hesitation. The most touching thing is the cow's eyes in the movie, looking so kind and gentle.

But talking about using a cow as the lead actor, the director looks very frustrated: "We selected seven cows from several dairy farms, and finally eliminated four because of their bad temperaments. What you see in the movie is actually played by three cows. But even these three cows have 'cow tempers', so I almost despaired at the beginning."

Later, thanks to Huang Bo using all the patience he had when dating, feeding the cows grass and water every day to build up feelings, the "cows" were finally pleased. There is a scene on the cliff where the cow voluntarily stretches her head to Huang Bo and rubs against him coquettishly, Guan Hu said that scene was purely the cow's spontaneous affection for Huang Bo, no means were used.