Low-budget films don't do fluff.
For the opening ceremony, other crews might burn incense, pray to Buddha, and offer a pig's head. This crew, however, found a villager and bought a proud, spirited rooster. They dabbed the red cloth covering the camera lens with a drop of blood from its comb, muttered a few words for good luck, and then handed the rooster over to the cook to be stewed as an extra dish for lunch.
They pulled off the red cloth, and with no further ado, filming began.
Lao Gua Village was located halfway up a mountain. The small road accessible by car only went as far as the foot of the mountain; from there, it was a half-hour hike up a mountain path to reach the village.
The village wasn't large, with only about fifty households in total, less than half of which were still occupied. The empty homes belonged to families who had either left to find work and never returned, or whose children and grandchildren had settled elsewhere, with the elders joining them to help with childcare. Some houses were left completely abandoned after the elders passed away and the younger generation never came back.
The scenes in the village would take at least half a month to shoot. With dozens of people in the cast and crew, plus all the equipment, going up and down the mountain every day was impractical, so they rented houses in the village to stay in.
The vehicles and any props and costumes not immediately needed were left at a base camp at the foot of the mountain, watched over by behind-the-scenes staff.
The day everyone hauled their things into the village, the desolate settlement welcomed a rare burst of activity.
Since they would be living in the village for so long, besides a change of clothes, there were many small necessities to bring. Ni Bingyan carried a backpack and lugged a large suitcase. Even with people occasionally lending a hand, she was panting from exhaustion by the time she reached the village.
After putting her luggage in her room, her hands trembled uncontrollably when she held them out. It had been a real ordeal.
Sweat soaked her T-shirt, and her hair stuck clammily to her face and neck. She was a complete mess.
Fortunately, the production coordinator this time was very reliable, truly deserving of the title "crew's general manager." When she came out after dropping off her luggage, she saw a large vat of water had already been drawn in the courtyard and was now pleasantly warm from the sun.
Ni Bingyan took out a towel, used a gourd ladle to scoop some water and wet it, and, without any fuss, began washing her face right there under the eaves.
After washing up, she went back inside to change her clothes, quickly rinsing her sweaty T-shirt and hanging it up to dry. She had just scooped out some moisturizer but hadn't even had a chance to apply it when a loudspeaker blared, announcing that the opening ceremony was about to begin.
Still applying moisturizer to her face, she arrived at the filming location. The crowd of watching elders and children parted to make way, revealing Director Deng grabbing the chicken to draw its blood.
The ceremony was just a formality. The red cloth was whipped off, and before anyone could collect their thoughts, they were ready to jump right into filming the first scene.
"We're on a tight schedule with a heavy workload, so let's have all departments be proactive! The sooner we finish, the sooner we eat! After that long mountain hike, I don't know about you, but I'm starving! Let's start with something simple for our first scene to get off to a good start, sound good?"
It was rare for Director Deng to be so talkative. He even announced the lunch menu.
Since it was the first day, the person handling logistics still had a conscience. Besides chicken and potato stew, there was also lamb and radish stew, shredded pork with green peppers, and hot and sour shredded potatoes.
While others hadn't noticed anything amiss yet, Ni Bingyan had already made a sharp observation—the potato content of this meal was a little excessive.
"Female lead, female lead! Hurry up and get to makeup!"
Hearing the assistant director's assistant calling for makeup, Ni Bingyan quickly called back in acknowledgment and ran over.
The makeup room was in an adobe house with a packed-earth floor. Water had been sprinkled to keep the dust down, but the day was so hot that it dried up in no time.
Every footstep kicked up a puff of dust. Ni Bingyan's freshly changed black cloth pants were instantly grimy.
And yet, the young woman from wardrobe, pushing up her square-framed glasses, was scrutinizing her up and down with a serious expression.
After a long moment, she squatted down, grabbed some dirt, and started smearing it on Ni Bingyan. "The first scene has you coming back from the fields carrying potatoes. You're too clean; it doesn't look right."
Ni Bingyan looked in the full-length mirror and nodded in agreement. "This is definitely much better."
A smile immediately appeared on the costume designer's face. She clapped her hands, signaling that Ni Bingyan could go.
The costume designer had been in the industry for several years and had worked with countless actresses. She often encountered the high-maintenance types who only cared about looking beautiful and paid no mind to the needs of the plot.
Not long ago, a certain starlet playing a beggar insisted on secretly pinning her tattered clothes to cinch her waist, making her walk like a willow swaying in the wind. The director blew up at her, and it's still a running joke in the industry.
'Thankfully, this one doesn't seem to be that type. Otherwise, this job would be a real pain.'
But just as she had that thought, she saw Ni Bingyan hesitating, not leaving.
"Is there something else?"
"No makeup?"
Ni Bingyan asked, pointing to her fair, clear face.
"The director wants a completely natural, fresh-faced look. You're perfect—no makeup, no hair dye, a simple ponytail. You also followed instructions and haven't touched your eyebrows recently. It looks very natural and pretty. There's no need to add anything."
The makeup artist thought she was afraid of looking bad on camera and wanted to wear 'no-makeup' makeup, so she refused her outright.
Oftentimes, the so-called "bare faces" of actresses on TV are actually achieved with 'no-makeup' makeup, but you can't get away with that on the big screen for a film like this.
'Later, when people watch it, they'll see a village girl from the mountains wearing such a high-end makeup look. What a joke, right?'
As a makeup artist, if she made such an amateur mistake, it would definitely damage her reputation, and no good film crew would hire her again.
Seeing her still lingering, the makeup artist grew a little annoyed.
Her relationship with Ni Bingyan wasn't close enough for her to go to great lengths to pull some strings for her. 'Besides, if you're that capable, you should have brought your own makeup artist to the set,' she thought. 'Why come and make things difficult for me?'
She was just following the crew's requirements; no one could fault her.
"No, that's not it. I just think, since Yingzi is supposed to have just come back from the fields, isn't it a bit inappropriate for her face to be this clean?"
On a day this hot, digging for potatoes in the fields, your face would be covered in sweat. One wipe and it would be smeared with dirt.
Only then did the makeup artist's expression soften. She took out some earth-toned powder and dusted it a few times across Ni Bingyan's face and hands.
"You're right. One must be meticulous."
Ni Bingyan smiled and turned to leave, but the costume designer grabbed her again. "Stop!"
The voice was so loud it made Ni Bingyan jump. "What's wrong?"
"Whoa! I almost missed that!"
There must have been a Conan hidden behind the costume designer's square-framed glasses! She spotted the problem in a single glance!
It was an inconspicuous black hair tie with a simple, large white bead on it, looking no different from the fifty-cent ones sold at street stalls. But when Ni Bingyan turned, the back of the bead revealed two back-to-back Cs!
Holy cow!
A single hair tie, almost five thousand yuan!
'Get it off, get it off now!'
Realizing what had happened, Ni Bingyan didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
'It seems I still wasn't careful enough.'
She had been poor before and had almost never bought luxury goods. Plus, the major brands in her two worlds weren't quite the same. The original owner of her body, on the other hand, had been raised in the lap of luxury and didn't care about material things, so there was no memory of these items.
She had a pragmatic personality and didn't feel weird about using the original owner's old things. To save money, she hadn't bought new ones.
It was fine with big-ticket items like clothes and jewelry. She had checked the price of each one and put away the more ostentatious pieces, planning to save them for important occasions.
After all, her status wasn't high enough. If she attended an event wearing haute couture or jewelry more expensive than a top-tier starlet's, the entertainment tabloids would definitely write that she was overly ambitious and trying to upstage so-and-so.
Having been in the entertainment industry for over a decade, she was no clueless newbie. She would never do something so likely to offend people.
'But I slipped up anyway. Who would have thought a hair tie could be so expensive?'
After retying her hair with a fifty-cent black hair tie, Ni Bingyan stood in the middle of the room and was inspected up and down several times before being allowed to leave the makeup room.
No one wanted to mess up the first scene and provoke the director's temper.
"She's here! Quick, come listen to the director explain the scene."
The assistant director's assistant, who dreamed of becoming an assistant director one day, was working very hard. Seeing her come out, they immediately led her over to report to the director.
The first scene was her solo scene. Ni Bingyan was confident she was well-prepared. But when the director saw her, he didn't say a word and just pointed to a basket overflowing with potatoes in front of him.
"Here, put on the basket."