Gu Changwei’s film “Hedgehog” completed Ge You and Wang Junkai’s first collaboration to perform “weird people and strange diseases”
Today (19th), the film “Hedgehog” directed by Gu Changwei was completed, and the pilot trailer and concept poster were released. In the first cooperation between the two, Ge You played the role of the eccentric Wang Zhantuan, and tried the role of a mental patient for the first time; Wang Junkai subverted his image and played Zhou Zheng, a young man with inferiority complex and stuttering.
The film is adapted from Zheng Zhi’s novel “The Immortal Disease”. It tells the story of Wang Zhantuan and his nephew Zhou Zheng’s long-lost friendship. They are “others” in the world, but they are normal people in each other’s eyes. They have experienced a unique absurdity together. Northeast past.
Ge You and Wang Junkai’s “weird” cherish each other’s life and “treat together when they are sick”
Ge You and Wang Junkai collaborated for the first time in the film to interpret a pair of long-term friends who share the same illness. Ge You played the role of a mental patient for the first time. The Wang Zhantuan he played was a “mental illness” in the eyes of others, occasionally mad, but with a unique sobriety.
Wang Junkai plays Zhou Zheng, an autistic and silent teenager who suffers from stuttering and has silver needles all over his body for treatment. Such a sensitive and inferior character is very different from his sunny and cheerful image in the audience’s impression. Wang Zhantuan and Zhou Zheng are both “patients” in the eyes of others, and they seek medical treatment only to cure their “illness”. The announcement came to an abrupt end with Wang Zhantuan’s sentence “You, you are not sick”, which is thought-provoking. Is there any definition of “disease”? Where does the so-called “disease” come from and how can it be cured? The hilarious Northeastern Dialogue is paired with spicy human questions, showing a unique black humor. The content of the film is beginning to emerge, and one can’t help but wonder how director Gu Changwei will tell the story.
In the concept poster, the king battle group played by Ge You stands on the giant hedgehog, just like a maverick of the world. The hedgehog under his feet is covered in sharp thorns, like thorns that grow savagely. The Wang Zhantuan seemed to be standing among thorns, in an embarrassing situation, isolated and helpless. As a “minority” who is out of tune with his surroundings, why isn’t he a hedgehog? The distinctive sobriety is his thorns, which are easy to sting others and more easily hurt himself.
Once the trailer and poster were released, they quickly attracted the attention of netizens, and everyone commented and expressed their expectations: “The performances of Ge You and Wang Junkai subverted my impression, and I began to look forward to this drama.”
Ge You and Gu Changwei will cooperate with Zheng Zhi as the screenwriter following nearly 30 years to tell the story of “Northeast Family”
The film is adapted from the novel “The Immortal Disease”, which is Zheng Zhi’s representative work. Zheng Zhi served as the screenwriter of the film and worked with a group of gold medalists to create a high-quality drama.
There are two kinds of roles that Ge You is best at playing: one is a comedy character, and the other is a profound character who embodies the real pain. In the original setting, Wang Zhantuan is the “madman” in the eyes of most people, but he has a sober and pure heart, which is a good combination of the two characters that Ge You is good at. Ge You’s role in the Wang battle group can be described as unique and has ample room for development. After watching the trailer, many viewers felt the high degree of fit between Ge You and the character, saying that “the Wang Zhantuan imagined when reading the original book is what Ge You looks like”.
It is worth mentioning that the filming of “Hedgehog” is the second collaboration between Ge You and Gu Changwei following “Farewell My Concubine” in nearly 30 years. Gu Changwei’s works attach importance to humanistic care and look at the bottom groups of society. As an actor with a very personal style, Ge You’s comedy style can often add bright colors to heavy themes. When Gu Changwei’s humanistic spirit collides with Ge You’s comedic qualities, a wonderful chemical reaction is bound to break out. Comedy makes the insights behind human nature more vigorous, and humanistic care makes the expression of interesting characters more profound. The powerful combination of the two not only brought surprises to everyone, but also provided a strong guarantee for the quality of the film.
Yangzi Evening News/Ziniu News reporter Kong Xiaoping
