Kapitel 267: Low Labor Costs
After Levi finished shooting the Panama Canal part, he came to China in December, hoping to shoot the last part of his movie, which is the extremely spectacular part of the cyborg sequence.
In fact, Chinese films have not been completely self-isolated since the 1990s. Some movies can already be filmed in China. For example, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was filmed in China.
If the movie Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was treated differently because it was a Chinese-language movie, it would not make sense because just when Levi arrived in China, there was another American movie being filmed in China: the movie Kill Bill, most of which were also shot in Beijing.
In Levi's memory, future movies such as The Mummy 3 and Mission: Impossible 3 will also be shot in China.
This kind of cooperation is not the first time for the country.
The reason why these movies are shot in China, where there is no tax rebate, is, of course, not simple: the costs are low, and labor is cheap. This is the biggest reason.
Quentin is shooting a B-level movie, and he doesn't like to play with special effects and explosions. This style of martial arts movies in the 1970s was naturally cheaper to shoot in China.
Similar to him, the cyborg part of Levi's movie can be filmed in China - from a demographic perspective, Bollywood can do it, but Levi figured being truthful to the original novel is better.
Therefore, coming to China to shoot part of the film was almost the only choice.
Certainly, if you want to shoot a movie in China, there is another important issue, that is, the content you shoot needs to be reviewed. If they don't agree, then filming in the country is not allowed.
Such rejections happened a lot in the past, such as when they wanted to film a story about a certain monk, they could not get permission from China. They can only shoot such a movie in India.
However, even though his movie The Lives of Others was also banned in China, Levi is now quite famous. After all, that's not directly talking about China; there's a layer between them.
If it were five years ago, Levi might have been restricted from coming to China. However, now, Levi has become more famous and developed some relationships in China for him to make movies. The State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television is turning a blind eye.
However, no matter how much preferential treatment he received, Levi knew that his movie could not pass the mark. Fortunately, there were not many parts that Levi wanted to shoot in China, and these parts did not violate domestic requirements.
Because the story of the script has been moved to the United States, the historical memory that is most likely to cause problems has nothing to do with China, and naturally, there is no problem.
And this part of the filming in China went very smoothly. This part is the part where cyborgs line up.
In this part, the only Chinese character with lines is Qin Shi Huang. After considering the candidates, Levi chose to find actor Chen Baoguo to play the role.
This character is actually just a minor player, but Levi also put some thought into it. There is no need to find a particularly famous star for this role, but to play this role, the actor must also have some acting skills. After all, he is playing a role like Qin Shi Huang. If he plays a bland character, he will lose a lot in the Chinese market.
Originally, Levi wanted to invite Tang Guoqiang, but in comparison, he thought Chen Baoguo was more suitable. Headstrong and self-willed, this is the temperament Levi intends to express, and he has no problem playing this.
And except for him, basically, everyone is a sidekick, and they only need to perform actions from below. Although it is very difficult for thousands of people to complete the correct steps at one time, it requires a long time of training, and it also requires many shots to achieve complete success.
However, for Levi, this is not a big deal.
Because here in China, the wages of actors are really cheap.
At this time in 2002, prices were really low.
In Beijing, for a role without lines, an actor costs about 30 yuan, about 3.6 dollars a day. And if you go to other cities, some entertainment companies can even quote 10 yuan, about 1.2 dollars, per actor per day - of course, according to the rules, the crew has to take care of their working meals every day.
If the filming is in the outer suburbs, they have to prepare vehicles to transport them back and forth. However, Considering the labor costs, these don't cost much.
An actor earns 30 yuan a day, and if he hires 10,000 people, he only spends 300,000 yuan a day. According to the exchange rate of 1:8.27 at this time, this is 40,000 US dollars in one day.
Even if the shooting process of the cyborgs requires training, the time is considered to be the most generous. Calculated on a monthly basis, using the prices of these actors, it's not as expensive as buying a big brand of clothes.
What's more, Levi's movies don't use 10,000 actors. Of course, his requirement is not that big. One or two thousand people is enough for him. The rest can be done with computer technology.
And Levi's idea makes this part of the budget surprisingly cheap.
"We should film more movies in China in the future. These actors are really cheap."
Looking at this labor cost and thinking about the minimum company regulations stipulated by the union in the United States, Alexander's eyes lit up when he came with Levi.
The one-day salary of actors in China is about the same as the one-hour salary in the United States, and they don't have excessive requirements for weekends. This is simply the best thing, in Alexander's opinion.
"You have to consider the Asian background and how many Americans like to watch it." Levi didn't say anything about this. The consumption levels on both sides are different. "And you have to pay attention. The salary is already so low, don't cause any more trouble."
In fact, although it seems that the extras' salary was very low, for many movies, there were still disputes between the crew and the extras, such as salary arrears during filming, not to mention some issues of differential treatment and poor food. These are commonplace.
Levi knew these things very well, and he wanted to avoid running into these problems.
"Don't worry, I won't cause trouble. Usually, those issues are because some big names or Hong Kong people work less and get more money. We don't have such issues."
Compared with them, Levi's film company is still full of integrity in this regard. After all, they have to be careful about being kicked out of China if they make a mistake, so they still dare not do it in arrears of wages.
And Alexander met the director Zhang when he was in the United States, and he knew the seriousness of the problem. In his opinion, it was not worth it to go on strike just because of a meal.
Why save such a small amount of money when investing in such a big movie? As for differential treatment, in Alexander's opinion, it seems even more unnecessary: in his eyes, they are all Asians, so what's the point of treating them differently?
"Just feel free to shoot boldly; don't worry about other issues. After shooting here, our early stage shooting of characters is basically over. Labor here is cheap, and we don't have any big burden, so just shoot it. This part will definitely shock people!"
*****
Thanks and kudos for my patreons
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