Riding the Hype

Box office earnings in this era were impossible to track accurately; everything was a rough estimate. Take *The Shaolin Temple*, which had long been rumored to have grossed over a hundred million yuan. Even though that figure had been issued officially, there were still no hard data behind it. The truest indicator was always print count. Sell a hundred prints, and you broke even; two hundred made a modest hit; three hundred was a blockbuster; four hundred etched your name in the annals of cinema. Two weeks after *Romance on Mount Lu* hit theaters, the fervor only continued to climb. Reel prints were struck around the clock and shipped across the country. Audiences were just there for the show, but as the film's influence swelled, voices across cinema, literature, and criticism began to erupt. Praise was lavish to the extreme, while criticism was outright lethal. "It merges grand love and personal love wonderfully, seamlessly uniting deep patriotic devotion with the sweet romance of the protagonists. It sounds the strongest chord of emotional yearning and our era—it deserves our highest praise!" "Though *Romance on Mount Lu* features only two people, it carries the vibrant air of a carnival. This is a revelry born of the times; having just emerged from darkness, the people find the world bright and beautiful. Every scene bursting with blossoms, every carefully composed frame, and every sprint the characters make conveys an overwhelming joy." "A solitary man and woman roaming scenic peaks and waters, whispering sweet nothings, and preaching hedonism—this is an out-and-out bourgeois lifestyle!" "So many in our country still lack enough to eat, yet you're idling away in sweet romance. This flies completely in the face of China's reality!" "Capitalism is corrupting us!" As the screenwriter, Chen Qi naturally drew an enormous amount of attention. Packed screenings provoked dark mutterings from the grandees of the literary and artistic establishment: "Young screenwriters don't understand life. They're divorced from reality, completely naive about practical life, relying purely on imagination to write. This will never do." That was on the polite side. The less polite lashed out directly: "Artistic garbage catering to the low tastes of petty townfolk! We must follow the mass line, but we must reject vulgar aesthetics, not become a tail wagged by the masses!" "Seeing the ending made me realize with sudden clarity: so the struggle between the two parties was just a historical misunderstanding, and the four bloody years of the Liberation War were also a misunderstanding! What a colossal misunderstanding!" Chen Qi had written several stories for *Story Session*, none of which had ever caught mainstream attention. Now, having penned just one screenplay, he was instantly thrust onto a towering pedestal. Cinema, after all, was the mainstream of mainstreams, the absolute focal point of the nation. The dividends of fame yielded by *Romance on Mount Lu* went primarily to two people: Gong Xue and Chen Qi. Figures like Wang Haowei, Tang Guoqiang, and Zhang Jinling were already household names. As the screenwriter, Chen Qi appeared in the newspapers once more, with coverage multiplying several times over what he had received during the *China Youth Daily* incident. …… Ji County sat north of the Yellow River, along the eastern foothills of the Taihang Mountains, endowed with quite a few scenic spots of mountains and rivers. The *Tai Chi* production crew had moved from Xinxiang to Ji County. It wasn't a wealthy area—though in truth, hardly anywhere was prosperous in those days. Everyone stayed in a rundown guesthouse, heading out to Xiaodianhe Village to shoot by day and returning at night. Both food and lodging were meager, but everyone was accustomed to such a life anyway, so there was nothing to complain about. Today was overcast. With the lighting falling short of requirements, Li Wenhua gave the entire crew the day off. Gong Xue stayed in her room, using a brick to steady one leg of the desk, hunched over reading letters and occasionally letting out a silly giggle. The heatwave of *Romance on Mount Lu* was raging outside, but they remained largely insulated from it here. When Gong Xue went out, no one recognized her, since the film had yet to reach county-level theaters. Still, she knew she had become a star. Beijing Film Studio had forwarded several viewer letters to her, every single one written by a young man. Each letter was brimful of passion, profoundly heartfelt, pouring out ocean-deep adoration. "Ugh! Sister Xue, this one is so mushy it's gross! Let me read it to you!" Huang Qiuyan gleefully helped go through the letters. "'I am intoxicated, I have gone mad, I have drunk a cup of wine called Zhou Yun... Never have I seen a woman as wondrous as you. I am like a man possessed, going to see *Romance on Mount Lu* every day after work. Your every frown and smile is engraved deep in my heart!'" "Stop reading! That's so embarrassing!" Gong Xue rubbed her arms, goosebumps rising all over. Huang Qiuyan bobbed her head side to side. "Hold on, here comes the best part! Listen to this: 'I am so fortunate to share the same city as you. Forgive my presumption, but my emotions can no longer be contained. I have decided that next Sunday, I will wait at the gate of Beijing Film Studio. If you take pity on me and deign to step outside to grant me a single glance, I will die with no regrets!'" "……" Huang Qiuyan finished reading and exchanged a look with Gong Xue. *Is this guy out of his mind?* "I'm not even in Beijing, so why would he wait at the studio gates? Good heavens!" Gong Xue cradled her head, bewildered. Just then, a rhythmic knocking sounded from the door. Her head snapped up. "Don't open it!" "Why not?" "What if someone sees? It'll look bad!" "Oh please, he came to see me, not you. It's just that you happen to be here, so it turns into a visit for you!" Huang Qiuyan opened the door like reciting a tongue twister. Sure enough, Chen Qi stood outside. "Brother Chen, here to chat with me again?" "Yep. You free?" "If you brought good food, I'm free!" Chen Qi shook the tin lunchbox in his hand with a grin. "I just saw a street stall downstairs selling steamed vegetable buns, so I bought a few. Come try one." "Hehe, don't mind if I do!" Huang Qiuyan snatched it over and conscientiously squatted down in the corner, taking a huge bite. Fortunately, she was a martial artist who burned a mountain of energy shooting scenes every day; otherwise, Chen Qi would have fattened her into a little butterball by now. "Go on and talk! Don't mind me, I can't hear a thing!" "……" Gong Xue rolled her eyes at her, then whispered, "You shouldn't keep coming over. What if people see? It'll look bad." "We're not doing anything wrong, so what's wrong with a chat? Huh, what're these?" "Letters forwarded from Beijing Film Studio." "For *Romance on Mount Lu*?" Chen Qi picked up an envelope, skimmed through it, and chuckled. "The masses adore you, don't they? Treating you like their guiding beacon, their emotional muse, the goddess of their dreams, their life's aspiration... Wait a second?" He paused. *Doesn't that make me Mark Chao?* "Here's another one. I think it crosses the line a bit..." Remembering Chen Qi's advice not to bottle things up and to tell him if anything came up, Gong Xue handed over that specific letter. Chen Qi took one look. *Whoa, sasaeng fans even in the eighties?* Every line practically screamed mental instability. "You really do need to watch out. You never know what someone like that might do. Still, we're not in Beijing, so worrying won't help." Normally, the duration of their chats depended on how fast Huang Qiuyan finished eating. Today, the steamed vegetable buns probably weren't all that tasty, because she scarfed down two and promptly shooed Chen Qi out. As soon as he stepped outside, he ran into Li Wenhua, who grabbed him by the arm. "Chen, perfect timing! Hurry and round everyone up, the county magistrate is here!" "What's the county magistrate here for?" "We're famous now! Well, basking in the glow of your *Romance on Mount Lu*. Word got out that you and Gong Xue are both here, and he rushed right over!" "Oh. I'll go call everyone, then." He quickly gathered the cast and crew on the first floor of the guesthouse. An older, amiable-looking man had been waiting there for some time and hastily said, "Director Li, if you'd be so kind as to introduce everyone!" "This here is the screenwriter of *Romance on Mount Lu*, Comrade Chen Qi!" "A great talent! I just came back from the provincial capital, where I heard the film has become an absolute sensation. When I asked around, I found out the mastermind was right here in Ji County! Forgive my intrusion!" "And this is the leading lady of *Romance on Mount Lu*, Comrade Gong Xue!" "A true pleasure, a true pleasure!" Having recently emerged from the tumultuous decade, officials in these days carried little bureaucratic haughtiness and were generally quite down-to-earth. Whenever a film crew arrived locally, local authorities would enthusiastically cooperate. The county magistrate had known *Tai Chi* was filming here, but he hadn't realized two towering deities of the current cultural scene were in their midst. With *Romance on Mount Lu* burning this bright, of course he had to come and bask in the hype.