"Double Wong" Wong Kar Wai and Wong Jing's films THE GRANDMASTERS (YUT DOI JUNG SI) and YOUNG AND DANGEROUS: RELOADED (GOO WAT JAI: GONG WU SUN DIT JUI) yesterday opened on the same day in Hong Kong for a direct confrontation; Wong Kar Wai overwhelmingly defeated Wong Jing at the box office. THE GRANDMASTERS' advanced sales have been ideal, the predicted opening day box office was 2 million; the TVB new stars Law Chung Him and Oscar Leung Lit Wai starred YOUNG AND DANGEROUS was predicted to make 410,000. THE GRANDMASTERS has already opened in the Mainland nationwide on January 8, after 3 days it accumulated 100 million RMB; Wong Kar Wai took 3 years and left the cast exhausted and horrified, such a performance was quite the answer.
Wong Kar Wai, Wai Jai and Chang Chen recently promoted THE GRANDMASTERS nonstop. After completing the Mainland and Hong Kong promotions, yesterday they attended a Taiwan press conference. Wai Jai recalled breaking his arm twice during the shoot and was still shaken. "The first the fracture was only a hairline, the second time it was already cracked like shark teeth!" Because he did not want to hinder the progress, Wai Jai originally wanted surgery but the doctor did not suggest it. He could only tell Wong Kar Wai to wait 4 months for him; thus Wong Kar Wai could only head to the Northeast and shot the Zhang Ziyi train station duel first, but he ran into the coldest winter in history. Zhang Ziyi had to shoot in 30 degrees below zero.
Wong Kar Wai revealed that Wai Jai was reluctant. After recovering for about 3 week he headed to the Northeast to look for him and said that he could work on dramatic scenes. In the film Ip Man said that if life had four seasons, his before age 40 was all spring. Turning 50 this year Wai Jai said, "Now is still spring for me. Because I have been very lucky to run into very excellent film people to work with. Making this film has changed my view on life. In the future I will choose to be optimistic because the character of Ip Man is different from my characters in recent years. My recent characters are all depressed, but this time he is very positive and optimistic. Now I like to happy and joyous, I feel the world has hope. Thus after THE SILENT WAR (TING FUNG JEH) I wanted to make some happy and warm movies."
Wai Jai revealed the Grandmaster of THE GRANDMASTERS was recreated from the purification of Ip Man and Bruce Lee. Wai Jai said that Bruce Lee was his childhood idol. When he was 7 or 8 he was already a kung fu fan. Because his family was poor and felt that he would get into fights after learning kung fu, he was not permitted to learn. As for a lot of his scenes and dialogues being cut, Wai Jai did not mind because THE GRANDMASTERS was Wong Kar Wai's film. The director shot so much that cutting was necessary. Chang Chen agreed with Wai Jai and said that he did not mind.
Wai Jai in one scene washed his wife Song Hye-Kyo's feet. Wai Jai said, "I was forced to, Wong Kar Wai asked him to choose between bathing my wife or washing her feet. I could only choose washing her feet." Although the film received good response, Wai Jai never thought about winning Best Actor with this film again because that was not his goal for making the film.
Wong Kar Wai said that the film originally was 4 hours long, because the film companies asked he had to cut it down to 130 minutes. Wai Jai and Chang Chen's exciting duel in the wrap scene did not appear at all.
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