It took Xin Zhilei two years to become Li Li.
Jin Yucheng, the original author of "Flowers", wrote about Li Li in the book: "His beauty is in the bones, and he has a heart to silence the beauty of the general." ”
Beauty and style can be glimpsed.
Wong Kar-wai originally chose Xin Zhilei to play his own work, because he was optimistic about her previous performance of the heroine Ding Baiying in "Embroidered Spring Knife 2", and her eyes were full of sharpness and stubbornness.
Strong emotions and chivalrous spirit not to be outdone are Xin Zhilei's true colors.
In Flowers, Li Li, a northern faction, comes to Shanghai and breaks into the bustling Yellow River Road, and her story has a deep background and an unbearable past. Under the guidance of Wong Kar-wai, Xin Zhilei's chivalrous spirit began to be endowed with charm.
Xin Zhilei used a "de-personal" way to complete Li Li's personalization.
The show has already begun, and after Wong Kar-wai, the "haute couture designer", tailors Xin Zhilei, the audience is fortunate to see her rarely revealed sense of brokenness.
What will be left after the influx of praise.
At this moment, Xin Zhilei is in the depths of flowers.
01 Xin Zhilei met Wong Kar-wai for the first time in Hong Kong.
The two didn't talk for a long time, basically Xin Zhilei was telling about her past experiences, her understanding of the roles she had played, and her own personality, and she also traced her childhood.
Wong Kar-wai, who was sitting opposite, smiled silently, and after speaking, Xin Zhilei took the initiative to say goodbye to the director and leave.
Perhaps it is this neat, neither humble nor arrogant way of doing things that makes Wong Kar-wai very much recognized Xin Zhilei, which is very similar to Li Li in "Flowers".
When leaving, Xin Zhilei walked through the corridor of Wong Kar-wai's studio and looked up to see posters of Wong Kar-wai's film works hanging on the white wall, such as "The True Story of A Fei" and "* In the Mood for Love" ......
She thought to herself that if one day she could cooperate with Wong Kar-wai to make a film, how proud she would be to hang the poster in this corridor, after all, the word "Wong Kar-wai" means texture.
Stills from the TV series "Flowers" Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei) However, she has no bottom in her heart.
Before meeting, Xin Zhilei had finished reading the original book of "Flowers", and she felt that Li Li was a melancholy, beautiful, and love-minded person, which was very different from herself.
Half a year later, she got her wish.
Xin Zhilei received a message from Wong Kar-wai asking her to try makeup in Shanghai and play the role of "Li Li", she was very surprised.
Clip of the TV series "Flowers" Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei).
Li Li in "Flowers" is definitely not a simple character.
She came to Shanghai from Shenzhen alone, took over the luxury restaurant Golden Phoenix on the most prosperous Yellow River Road, and renamed it Zhizhenyuan. She has a sharp eye and a hard wrist.
Xin Zhilei under the lens of Wong Kar-wai is graceful, standing in light and shadow in a backless dress, giving her a different atmosphere, and her temperament and acting skills interpret the various emotional changes of the character in place.
Stills from the TV series "Flowers" Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei) She doesn't talk much, most of the time she is silent, and expresses her inner thoughts with her eyes. Li Li's eyes have a story, like a deep lake, which makes people want to explore it.
Li Li and Mr. Bao met for the first time, not face to face, but as soon as she raised her head, she met his eyes with him standing on the second floor opposite, needless to say.
Xin Zhilei believes, "Li Li is a woman with a lot of goals and means, very good at business, but also has her own principles, and I also appreciate her. She and Po have a lot of similarities, the two are people who can share the same soul, but like the sky and the sea, they seem to be connected, but in fact they are separated." 
On the first day of filming of the stills of the TV series "Flowers" Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei) and A Bao (played by Hu Ge), Xin Zhilei and Hu Ge walked on the Yellow River Road for a whole night.
The two of them didn't know why they were walking, and they didn't know where the end was.
This scene was only used a little bit later, but that process was very important, and the director wanted to see how it felt like two people walking together. ”
Stills from the TV series "Flowers" Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei) and A Bao (played by Hu Ge).
Wong Kar-wai likes to take pictures of walking, likes to shoot the back of walking, Maggie Cheung who wears a cheongsam and walks late at night in "In the Mood for Love", and Lin Qingxia, who walks in a windbreaker in "Chongqing Forest", ......
In order to learn to walk, Xin Zhilei spent two years, and she walked to her feet to grind blood, but she still couldn't achieve the expected effect in Wong Kar-wai's heart, and it was always a little worse.
Wong Kar-wai arranged for her to learn various dances to make her soft.
During the filming, Xin Zhilei ate hot mutton hot pot, stood by the window, and walked, Wong Kar-wai had strict requirements, he would personally come forward to demonstrate, and he must be completely photographed until he is satisfied.
She said: "The director is more enchanting than me. ”
Stills from the TV series "Flowers" Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei) and A Bao (played by Hu Ge).
02 Walking, standing, looking, and eating are ......Inside and outside, Xin Zhilei gradually approached and became Li Li under the guidance of Wong Kar-wai.
She has black curly hair and red lips, and she is dressed in gorgeous clothes, silently, and her gestures are the charm of Hong Kong-style beauties in the 90s.
All this will take a long time.
In this regard, Xin Zhilei said that the actors who joined the group had already been mentally prepared to cooperate with Director Wong Kar-wai, and fully agreed to shoot beyond the deadline for free, after all, everyone had already heard of Director Wang's slow work and meticulous work.
During the filming process, it was very painful to be repeatedly NG by Wong Kar Wai, and when Xin Zhilei felt difficult, she would watch the interview clip of Wong Kar Wai Victim Alliance to seek comfort.
When she saw the talented actor Tony Leung, she would be scolded and cried by Wong Kar-wai, and she felt much better.
Of course, there are moments that come over and over again.
Xin Zhilei's "broken feeling" life and death parting scene of being canonized has a sense of fate and reincarnation.
With tears in the corners of her eyes, she watched her lover commit suicide in the sea, crying hoarsely, and also had her own life shot.
It wasn't a storm, it was the long dampness of this life.
Clip of the TV series "Flowers" Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei).
Xin Zhilei filmed this scene once, and she was surprised and surprised: "What's going on, director?."Why did it pass?”
Wong Kar-wai said: "Look, I can shoot very fast. ”
Of course, such a thing as "shooting fast" is unavoidable for Wong Kar-wai and his actors.
Xin Zhilei finished and killed four times.
When she finished the film for the first time, the crew thoughtfully prepared flowers and cakes to celebrate Xin Zhilei. Who knew that a few days later, she received a ** from the director: You come back again, there are a few places to reshoot. ”
Later, the actors, including Xin Zhilei, didn't believe that they were finished, and always felt that they would have to spend their lives with this drama.
On the day when the actors of the TV series "Flowers" took a group photo, Xin Zhilei felt a huge loss.
She didn't want to end this dreamlike shoot, "I see myself getting better and better, and I feel like I can be better".
This collision with Wong Kar-wai, "Flowers", and Li Li brought great energy to Xin Zhilei.
Before this, the stills of Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei) in the TV series "Flowers" were nothing more than women who never showed weakness and made people feel unapproachable, and even a little fierce.
Some temperaments are given to her by the role, most of them are the original heart in her bones, and the city of Hegang in Northeast China, in a sense, is the origin of her temperament.
Hegang, Heilongjiang Province, is where Xin Zhilei comes from.
She was born there, and what she saw all year round was the black dirt exposed under the faded yellow straw, the black houses that flew by were wrapped in a thick history, and the rough northern city texture made people feel cold.
During her childhood in Hegang in the 80s, she lived with her grandmother and grandfather in an extremely remote mountain village, and there was no electricity at home, so she needed to light candles for lighting.
Parents need to go out to work and earn a meager salary to support the family.
Xin Zhilei remembers that when she was a child, the snow in the Northeast was so heavy that she could barely go out, and the snow was so thick that it could not reach her knees.
Winter in childhood is the season forgotten by the outside world. The village is remote, almost no one comes, and the people in the village do not go out, only Daxue, Grandma, Grandpa and her, life passes slowly, not rich but happy.
The snowy days in Hegang did not last long, and my father, who went out to work, suddenly suffered a stroke and returned to Hegang, unfortunately paralyzed in bed.
The mother went to the town to do odd jobs during the day and came home at night to take care of her husband, which was very hard and had to raise the family's three children.
As her father's illness became more and more serious, she couldn't leave anyone around her, and her mother couldn't go out to work anymore, and the burden of the family fell on Xin Zhilei.
It costs a lot of money to take injections and medicines for her father's illness, and her younger siblings are still young, Xin Zhilei's burden is very heavy, and she began her career of working while going to school, and she has experienced the bitter taste of life very early.
When the father was paralyzed in bed, he couldn't go, he was very lonely and depressed, and he asked his daughter if she could buy herself a computer, so that she could use QQ to chat with her friends.
At that time, Xin Zhilei had no money, so she rejected her father, and she felt sad when she saw her father smile and say that it was okay.
Xin Zhilei 03 when she was young In Xin Zhilei's memory, her growing years have been entangled in money, and she wants to make money to support her family.
Soon, the opportunity came.
In 2011, Xin Zhilei was still studying fashion design in Harbin, and she worked part-time at Harbin TV Station when she was not in class.
Donnie Yen said to the agent standing beside him: "Don't you want to sign a new actor?I think this girl has a lot of potential. ”
Be an actor?Xin Zhilei went without thinking about it, she could get a salary of 2,000 yuan a month, and she could earn a lot of money as an actor, and she could treat her father's illness.
Xin Zhilei when she was young.
At that time, in Hegang, almost no one had heard of any children going to be actors, which was undoubtedly a fantasy in their eyes.
After Xin Zhilei told her parents, she went back to the dormitory to pack her luggage, she only brought a few simple clothes and put them in her backpack, and threw everything else in Harbin, as if saying goodbye to her past.
She carried a simple bag and followed Donnie Yen's team to Guangzhou to start her new life.
For the first time, Xin Zhilei was lucky.
In 2011, Xin Zhilei starred in the costume drama "Painted Skin" starring Xue Kaiqi and Ling Xiaosu and officially debuted.
Later, he cooperated with Tony Leung to shoot an advertisement, playing a couple who walked in the rain, full of youthful and romantic atmosphere.
Xin Zhilei and Tony Leung co-shot the advertisement In order to receive systematic performance learning, Xin Zhilei entered the ** Drama Academy for further study, and she is looking forward to shining in the future.
What Xin Zhilei didn't expect was that the beginning was a highlight and an end.
For a long time after that, she walked downhill.
No one asked Xin Zhilei to film, even if she did, she was a passerby without a name, and she would not appear on the staff list on the homepage.
Stills from the TV series "Painted Skin" Xin Zhilei.
She has starred in works such as "Women's Gang", "Moon Embracing the Stars", "Happy Chocolate" and other works without making any splash.
At that time, Xin Zhilei was particularly afraid of the completion of a play, because it meant that she finally entered a group, and she was about to face the dilemma of having no job, she didn't know that the next play was in **, and she was very anxious.
From not making money from filming to having no scenes to film, she was so hungry that she couldn't remember when she had her last meal.
This bleak situation lasted for five or six years.
Hunger and pain hovered in Xin Zhilei's young life, and no one cared about it.
Xin Zhilei when she was young.
In 2013, my grandfather was diagnosed with cancer and came to a hospital in Beijing for treatment, which was the person who took care of Xin Zhilei since childhood.
She took her grandfather, who had never been far away, to the streets of Beijing, to the Great Wall and Tiananmen Square, and to eat roast duck.
That meal made her unforgettable for the rest of her life.
Xin Zhilei ordered half a roast duck and added a few dishes, grandpa looked at the ** on the menu, and said to her that he was not hungry, and the old man knew that it was not easy for children to work hard in Beijing alone.
After the food was served, no one was willing to eat it, pushing and shoving, and finally the dishes were scattered on the table.
At that moment, Xin Zhilei felt sad in her heart, and she was determined to become famous and make money.
I wish I had money, and I admit that I have a lust for money, because I hope that I will never regret and blame myself for a meal, because of a computer. ”
04 There are highs and lows in life, and the opportunity to belong to Xin Zhilei has finally arrived.
It was 2015, and 29-year-old Xin Zhilei was invited to play the heroine of the literary movie "Yangtze River", and her partner was Qin Hao.
In this film, Xin Zhilei plays a female practitioner An Lu, who has been walking on the banks of the Yangtze River to trace her past, and has a love story intertwined with magic and reality with Gao Chun, who met on the way.
Stills from the movie "Yangtze River" Gao Chun (played by Qin Hao) and An Lu (played by Xin Zhilei).
Shot on film, the cinematographer Li Pingbin, who once shot for Hou Hsiao-hsien, manipulated the footage of "probably the last film film in China."
When the actor was first determined for the role, director Yang Chao asked Xin Zhilei if she could swim, and she lied and said that she was a master swimmer.
In fact, she couldn't swim, and after taking over the role, Xin Zhilei began to learn to swim like crazy.
Stills from the movie "Yangtze River" An Lu (played by Xin Zhilei).
When filming really started, she knew that she was going to swim in the Yangtze River, and she said that she would jump into the river, and every time Xin Zhilei looked dead and walked to the bottom of the Yangtze River.
In the extremely cold weather of sub-zero in deep winter, Xin Zhilei often had a fever because the river water was too cold, and she continued to shoot after getting up the next day.
Xin Zhilei has never been a bitter snack and is not a flower carefully cultivated in a greenhouse, which in a way, nourishes her strong character.
Stills from the movie "Yangtze River" An Lu (played by Xin Zhilei).
There is a scene where Xin Zhilei is about to jump into the water from the stern, the boat is moving forward, the propeller at the stern is rotating at high speed, and after she jumps, someone will come to rescue her after ten minutes.
She couldn't manage so much, so she could only bite the bullet and perform heart-rending in the cold and biting river water.
Xin Zhilei when filming "Yangtze River Map".
Later, Xin Zhilei recalled it and realized that it was a particularly dangerous thing, but at that time, she suddenly understood that life and death are not something that anyone can control, just maintain a sense of crisis at all times and do what she wants to do.
It seems that no one has delivered anything to me since I was a child, and if I want something, I have to take the initiative to fight for it. ”
"Yangtze River" finally won the 66th Berlin International Film Festival "Silver Bear Award for Outstanding Artistic Contribution", Xin Zhilei and the crew went to the Berlin Film Festival to walk the red carpet, and she hugged her idol Meryl Sterry.
Xin Zhilei and Meryl Sterry hug.
Unfortunately, when Xin Zhilei was filming "Picture of the Yangtze River", her father and grandfather passed away one after another.
She was so sad that she lost two close relatives one after another, failed to buy the computer for her father, and did not let her grandfather eat a good meal of Peking duck, which became Xin Zhilei's regret.
Stills from the movie "Yangtze River" An Lu (played by Xin Zhilei).
05 After leaving "Yangtze River Map" for nearly a year, Xin Zhilei did not make any more huge waves, and the future is an unsolvable script.
Until 2017, Xin Zhilei filmed the movie "Embroidered Spring Knife 2", and her partners were Zhang Zhen, Yang Mi, Zhang Yi and Lei Jiayin.
Ding Baiying, played by Xin Zhilei, is a young woman with excellent martial arts, with countless subordinates and cold eyes. She closed her eyes and stroked the knife, and when she opened her eyes, the knife came out of the sheath, revealing a sense of arrogance from her bones.
Stills from the movie "Embroidered Spring Knife 2" Ding Baiying (played by Xin Zhilei) She herself has a face that looks very difficult to mess with, sharp eyes, full lips with the corners of the mouth downward, and sharp edges.
The scene of the broken knife in the bamboo forest, between the light and shadow of the sword, she was dressed in plain clothes and acted neatly, cutting off the opponent's knife in an instant, and her face was calm.
This knife is extremely shocking, and it has the momentum of not letting women shave their eyebrows.
This year, Xin Zhilei was 31 years old.
Stills from the movie "Embroidered Spring Knife 2" Ding Baiying (played by Xin Zhilei).
With the role of Ding Baiying's heroine, she went from the heroine of literary films to the public.
In the same year, Xin Zhilei appeared in "The Birth of an Actor", and played on the same stage with Shu Chang, restoring the TVB classic "Golden Branches".
Shu Chang and Xin Zhilei staged a thrilling rivalry, their words and demeanors were full of intrigues, they presented the epitome of Gong Dou on the stage, and Shu Chang won a game.
Backstage, Xin Zhilei said unabashedly: "To be honest, I didn't expect that I would lose, I don't think Shu Changyou is particularly good." ”
After the final results of Shu Chang and Xin Zhilei came out, she lost to Shu Chang again.
Xin Zhilei was still unconvinced: "Why are you convinced?."Don't talk nonsense, no one wants to lose. ”
This speech directly sent her to the first place in the hot search.
Senior Song Dandan was a mentor at the time, and apologized to Xin Zhilei on Weibo that night: "The scene is too far away, the details are not clear, it is easy to be taken away by the plot, go home and watch it on TV, Xin Zhilei acted really well." I'm sorry!”
This incident caused an uproar on the Internet, some netizens said that Xin Zhilei "lost the game and lost the demeanor, you are not worthy", and there are many unbearable words**, in this regard, Xin Zhilei replied directly: "It's over, isn't it?"You try to scold again. ”
The people around her advised her to calm down and remain silent, but she was unwilling.
Immediately afterwards, Xin Zhilei encountered the costume palace fighting drama "The Legend of Ruyi".
In it, she plays the bewitching-looking Jin Yuyan with a deep heart, she has no one in her eyes, and she is flying in the palace.
Clip of the TV series "The Legend of Ruyi" Jin Yuyan (played by Xin Zhilei).
Xin Zhilei has always wanted to play the role of "bad enough", which makes her feel enjoyable.
Her ambition and desire have always been clearly written on her face: "I really want to be red." I don't think there's ...... shame on desireI'm proud to have a face full of desire. ”
06 If you want to be popular, you must have hard acting skills, a good actor is the creator, this is the core of acting skills, and the core of the story, Xin Zhilei knows this very well, so she began to set foot in more challenging new areas of stage plays.
The drama "Preliminary Evidence" is a drama about women's bravery, telling the story of Tessa, a female lawyer who has defended countless ** victims, one day she encountered **, she became a victim, and how to make her voice out and defend herself ......
Not only a lawyer, I am also a victim and a woman. ”
Drama "Preliminary Evidence" Xin Zhilei Stills This is a one-man show, 130 minutes, 20 roles, 18 scenes, on the stage**, Xin Zhilei kept changing out of one set of costumes after another, and her mood and performance methods had to be changed quickly, and she completed all the performances by herself.
The difficulty of the performance is obvious, this is Xin Zhilei's debut, and before that, she had no stage experience at all. More importantly, this is a one-man show, which tests the actors' acting skills.
She has the desire to create, and she is willing to give everything for the role, and Tessa is the only one on the stage, but behind her is an army of thousands of horses.
Drama "Preliminary Evidence" Xin Zhilei The most touching thing about Xin Zhilei in the stills was that line:
There has always been such a person in my heart, a girl who struggles hard for success. This girl is brave and fearless, and if I cower and do nothing, I think I'll lose her. ”
That girl is Tessa herself played by Xin Zhilei.
Drama "Preliminary Evidence" Xin Zhilei Stills director Zhou Ke saw Xin Zhilei's unyielding energy, "Her courage makes me feel that we can complete this play together and put it on the stage in China."
In the performance of Beijing Station, Xin Zhilei's mother came, and the mother in the play gave Tessa a lot of love and warmth.
When Xin Zhilei stood on the stage and saw her real-life mother sitting under the stage, she also felt warm and sure in her heart.
When filming "Flowers", Wong Kar-wai heard that Xin Zhilei was going to film the stage play "Preliminary Evidence", he said: "I heard that you are going to play that one-man show?."”
Xin Zhilei nodded, Wong Kar-wai was silent for a long time, and then gave her two words: "You are ruthless." ”
At that moment, Xin Zhilei felt that she was truly recognized, and she felt happiness that she had never felt before.
07 Today's Xin Zhilei has become famous for filming Wong Kar-wai's "Flowers" and has become a frequent visitor to hot searches. She found her own unique charm and became a reasonable thing to be remembered by the public.
In the same year, Xin Zhilei also participated in the variety show "Flowers and Youth", and people said that she changed from "Shanghai Rich Flower" to "Northeast Big Flower".
Her true temperament infected her peers and made the audience feel the cuteness behind her cold appearance.
The picture above shows Xin Zhilei in the variety show "Flowers and Youth".
The picture below shows the TV series "Flowers" Li Li (played by Xin Zhilei) After the stills became popular, Xin Zhilei often thought of her deceased father and grandfather, she would burn a computer made of paper for her father every year, and every time she ate Peking duck after that, she would feel sad.
That kind of regret in the bottom of my heart may never be able to let go.
But people always have to move forward, and they can't often look back and reminisce about the past.
When she was young, Xin Zhilei always felt that my life was up to me.
Now she feels that fate dictates that everything is the best arrangement, and she only needs to act the script that fate gave her.
This script has nothing to do with acting.