DUCKWEED乘風破浪

THE FIRST TIME I saw Duckweed was during Chinese New Year, when I was in my hometown, Qingdao. It’s a comedy about a professional rally driver who magically travels back in time and befriends the younger version of his father. I watched it with my family at a sold- out show and I can still recall how much the audience laughed.

I am friends with Han Han, the prominent novelist who directed the film. We’d often get together and chat about movies. When I saw Duckweed, I was amazed and surprised that a novelist could be so adept at film language and have such a good grasp of pacing. The film is hilarious and brilliantly conceived, with vivid characters that are well fleshed out. It’s an advanced piece of filmmaking. To be honest, it made me quite jealous.

Another reason I like it is that Han included music and clips from John Woo’s 1986 classic A Better Tomorrow, of which I’m a huge fan. When I told him I was remaking the film, he said one thing: ‘ There are only two people in this world who can make this film: one is me, and the other is you.’

That’s why I asked Han to do a cameo in A Better Tomorrow 2018. In that scene, Ray Ma, who plays a police officer, commandeers a car and pulls the driver out. The driver, played by Han, offers to take the wheel, but the officer says, ‘No way, because you have terrible driving skills.’ Everyone knows that Han is also a professional rally driver in real life, so I added that line as an inside joke.

我是在農曆新年期間於家鄉青島看《乘風破浪》的。這部喜劇講一個專業拉力賽車手無意中回到過去，與年輕時的父親成為朋友。我與家人一同看這部電影，那一場全院滿座，我還記得觀眾都看得哄堂大笑，氣氛熱鬧。

我跟這部電影的導演韓寒是好朋友， 我們經常一起聊一些關於電影的事。他是個很有才華的導演和小說家，我非常欣賞他。我看這部電影時，有種驚艷的感覺；我完全沒有想到，一個作家能夠如此嫻熟地掌握電影語言和節奏。整部電影有很多幽默惹笑的場面，情節設計精采，裡面的人物性格鮮明，有血有肉。我認為這是一部很高明很出色的電影，我很妒忌他。

我喜歡這部電影的另一個原因，是韓寒在片中加插了1986年由吳宇森執導的經典作《英雄本色》的配樂和片段，因為我很喜歡那部電影。當年我著手重拍《英雄本色》時，他跟我講過一句話：「世上只有兩個人能拍這部片，一個是我，另一個是你。」

因為這個緣故，我請韓寒在《英雄本色2018》客串一角。那一場戲講馬天宇飾演的警察將一輛車截停，將司機拉出車外。那個司機就是韓寒，他對警察說：「我可以幫你開車。」但是警察說：「不行，你的駕駛技術太差了。」人人都知道韓寒本人是專業拉力賽車手，所以我加了這句對白，幽他一默。