Chapter 49: Who Doesn’t Have a Little Scheme of Their Own?

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The wrap party was far larger than the previous gathering, and people kept coming over to toast Cao Yang.

Under normal circumstances, it was rare for nearly everyone to come over and raise a glass like this.

In China’s drinking culture, toasting was not something just anyone could do.

The various crew members whose titles ended in “master”—the cinematographer, lighting technician, stylist, art director, and so on—would certainly come over to have a drink with the director at the wrap party.

But as for the assistants and other lower-ranking crew members, unless the director particularly valued them, coming over to offer a toast could seem rather abrupt and might well end in embarrassment.

Cao Yang’s crew was different from a traditional film crew. Almost all the assistants were students from the Beijing Film Academy, most of them juniors or seniors. With that identity behind them, coming over for a drink did not seem out of place.

Besides, Cao Yang not only controlled their internship evaluations; more importantly, who wouldn’t want to become part of a famous director’s team and take a shortcut to success?

The actors needed no explanation. Having entered this profession, who didn’t want to become famous? How many people could truly claim to be above worldly ambitions?

Even though Cao Yang merely took a symbolic sip each time, he still ended up drinking quite a lot.

This couldn’t go on. Cao Yang decided that the next time he held a wrap party, he would establish a rule: after everyone downed one drink together, he would find an excuse to make it clear that he would not drink anyone else’s toast.

Seeing that quite a few people were still eager to approach him, Cao Yang hurriedly slipped away to the restroom.

When Che Xiao saw Cao Yang leave, her eyes flickered. Without showing anything on her face, she took a sip of tea, mainly to rinse her mouth, wiped her lips with a tissue, and chewed a piece of gum before standing up.

“Xiaoxiao, where are you going?” Dong Xuan asked beside her.

“I’m going to the restroom,” Che Xiao said quietly.

She finished speaking and headed outside.

Wen Zhengrong’s hand paused as she secretly reached for a piece of gum. She looked up, then silently offered a most impolite greeting in her heart.

Little bitch!

“Xiaoxiao, wait for me. I’ll come with you.”

Wen Zhengrong stood as well, beaming as she hooked her arm firmly through Che Xiao’s and refused to let go.

Hmph. Who didn’t know what you were thinking? At your age, you were already dreaming of getting lucky.

Che Xiao’s smile stiffened, and Wen Zhengrong practically dragged her toward the restroom.

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They happened to run into Cao Yang as he came out of the restroom. Wen Zhengrong greeted him warmly.

“What a coincidence, junior. Are you all right?”

Che Xiao’s carefully prepared plan had been completely disrupted, and her mind was still in a whirl. She awkwardly followed up, “What a coincidence, junior... No, senior. Senior, you came to the restroom personally?”

Cao Yang smiled and nodded. “I’m fine. You girls shouldn’t drink too much. Be careful.”

As she watched Cao Yang walk away, Che Xiao was furious. She was just about to wrench her arm free from Wen Zhengrong’s grasp when Wen Zhengrong let go first and walked into the restroom without even turning her head.

Che Xiao stamped her foot angrily and gnashed her teeth for a while before leaving in frustration. She didn’t even bother going to the restroom anymore.

Cao Yang decided to cut through the Gordian knot. When he returned, he picked up his glass and waited until most people were looking his way before speaking.

“Everyone, I’m very happy that so many of you could make it today. Especially Teacher Wu and Teacher Liao, who came all the way from Hong Kong—thank you. And once again, thank you all for your hard work over the past few days.

“I’ll be starting postproduction tomorrow, so I’m going to call it a night. Eat and drink to your hearts’ content. Anyone who wants to go sing karaoke later can have Teacher Cheng put it on the bill.”

Not long after Cao Yang left, Yu Feihong also made an excuse to leave.

After walking along the street for a while, Cao Yang found somewhere to sit. He took out his phone and stared blankly for some time at the number “1206” in the text message. At last, he sighed.

Teacher Situ, I really didn’t mean to disobey you. It’s just that...

After thinking for a while, he still couldn’t come up with a reasonable excuse. He simply muttered, “The main thing is that I’m young. It’s perfectly normal for young people to be impulsive. What young man could resist this kind of temptation? Teacher Situ will understand, right?”

At that moment, Cao Yang felt he somewhat understood Old Tian, the State Preceptor, and Brother Kai. If it were someone like Brother Kai’s Sister-in-law Hong, and he himself...

Pah! He was an upright gentleman. What sister-in-law? He couldn’t think about this. Absolutely not.

He had drunk too much. That was all. Next time, he would definitely quit drinking.

In Room 1206, Yu Feihong had transformed into a female knight, valiant and dashing. Looking down at Cao Yang from horseback, she lifted her chin and said impatiently, “Quickly, tell me. How was my acting?”

Damn!

Did everyone have their own little quirks?

“Very good. Extremely good. Compared with Li Xiaoran...”

The female knight let out a cry, trembled for a long while, and collapsed over her horse.

The next day, Cao Yang went straight to Green Shadow Film Studio and threw himself into postproduction.

This time, there were not nearly as many long takes. The footage was much more fragmented than in his previous film, making the editing far more time-consuming and labor-intensive.

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The school assigned three senior students majoring in film editing to serve as assistants. Green Shadow Film Studio also sent over an editor.

The editor’s surname was Yang. His name was Yang Qian, and he was in his forties.

“Teacher Yang, thank you for coming to help. I already have a rough version of the finished film in my head. If you have any suggestions during the process, please feel free to offer them. I’ll adopt the good ones.

“You may not know me very well. I can be rather stubborn sometimes, so if I don’t take one of your suggestions, please don’t take it personally.”

It was best to give him a warning in advance. Once an editor was hired, his job was to “stick” different shots together and create a coherent narrative.

When ordinary editors were working, the thing they hated most was having the director stand beside them and talk nonsense—clapping his hands every other moment to say that this part was wrong or that part lacked impact.

What did an editor need?

The director had to explain his ideas openly: what theme the film was trying to express, what kind of narrative structure it required. He couldn’t just vaguely say that one part wasn’t forceful enough or that another lacked the right feeling.

No one was a mind reader. How was anyone supposed to know what “forceful enough” or “the right feeling” meant? The director had to be specific.

For instance, he could say: cut six frames from here and move them to the third shot of the fifth scene.

Only then could they communicate effectively, avoid arguments caused by differences of opinion, and improve their efficiency.

What Cao Yang meant was that he wanted to tell the editor: I know how this should be cut, but the workload is heavy, and you’re here to help. Just edit according to my instructions. That way, we can avoid disagreements and arguments later.

Yang Qian nodded. Hou Keming had already told him that Cao Yang’s opinion was to take priority and that he only needed to provide support.

Since everything had been made clear, they got to work.

Yang Qian finally witnessed what made Cao Yang different. It was as if Cao Yang truly had the finished film in his head. Many shots that looked excellent would have made Yang Qian hesitate and try several different arrangements.

But Cao Yang was different. After comparing the shots before and after, he immediately knew which one to choose. He never hesitated. Anything that needed to be discarded was abandoned without the slightest reluctance.

If another director had encountered the same situation, Yang Qian dared bet the rest of his apprentice’s life that the director’s first thought would have been to keep everything: this shot couldn’t be discarded, and that one couldn’t be thrown away either.

After finally getting into a huge argument with the editor, the director might even say, “Then cut both versions and keep them for now. We can decide which one is better later.”

In the end, neither version might be usable, and all that would have happened was a pointless waste of time.

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