The Promise
Press Release of "The Promise" soundtrack CD
KLAUS BADELT PROMISES ANOTHER GREAT SCORE!
GOLDEN GLOBET - NOMINATED FILM THE PROMISE AND ITS SOUNDTRACK TO BE RELEASED
IN MAY
(May 2, 2006- New York, NY) - Known as the most expensive Chinese movie
made to-date THE PROMISE will
be released in theaters on May 5, 2006. Written and directed by Chen Kaige (FAREWELL MY CONCUBINE),
THE PROMISE features score by Klaus Badelt (PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN, POSEIDON).
Superb Records
will release THE PROMISE - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack on May 2,
2006.
A Goddess offers a slave girl a deal - she will lead a pampered life as
a celebrated beauty, adored and kept by the most powerful men in return
for a small sacrifice: every man she loves, she will lose. The girl accepts.
A new epic fantasy set in China's mythical past, THE PROMISE is a visually
stunning tale of passion that unfolds against a backdrop of war as a beautiful
and mysterious princess becomes the object of affection for three very
different men - a powerful Duke, a brave general and a lowly slave. As
passions spark and egos clash, lives will be ruined and lovers spurned
and no one will ever be the same.
Directed by Chen Kaige, winner of the Golden GlobeT for Best Foreign Film
for FAREWELL MY CONCUBINE, THE PROMISE was also nominated for a Golden
GlobeT for Best Foreign Language Film. Cinematography and production design
are by Academy AwardT winners for CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON, Peter
Pau and Tom Yip, respectively.
PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN and over 25 other major Hollywood films have established
Klaus Badelt as one of the most sought-after composers in Hollywood. Badelt
approaches each film with the intention of generating a purely original
score with authentic production value. His style is to constantlyreinvent
himself and create a musical undercarriage that supports and enhances each
cinematic experience. He has developed a devoted team who share his personal
drive to explore new ideas and push the creative envelop. Badelt's credits
include CONSTANTINE, THE RECRUIT, THE TIME MACHINE, K-19: THE WIDOWMAKER,
NED KELLY, BASIC, CATWOMAN, Werner Herzog's INVINCIBLE, Richard Donner's
16 BLOCKS, ULTRAVIOLET and the upcoming Wolfgang Petersen's POSEIDON.
Based in Los Angeles, Superb Records was launched in 2000 by music industry
veteran, Shiro Gutzie. Gutzie's vision for the label is to explore unique
opportunities in branding, artistry, film soundtracks and compilations.
Superb Records has released the motion picture scores to such major Hollywood
films as the Academy AwardT winning CRASH, XMEN-2, SOLARIS, THE MATADOR
and others. The label has an exclusive licensing agreement with book publisher
Wiley Publishing, Inc. for the rights to release audio compilations marketed
with the Music For DummiesŪ trademark including "Disco For Dummies,"
"80's Pop For Dummies," and "Pop and Rock Divas For Dummies".
The label is distributed by KOCH Entertainment. For additional information
on the label visit their official website at: www.superbrecords.com
Label-founder Gutzie said, "We are thrilled to be working with Klaus,
his score for this film is epic. Our goal is to release quality product
and continue working on groundbreaking material. We are committed to becoming
one of the leading soundtrack labels in the US and support independent
films with substance".
Warner Independent Pictures presents THE PROMISE, opening in limited release
on May 5, 2006. THE PROMISE-Original Motion Picture Soundtrack will be
in stores on May 2, 2006.
For more information please contact cinemediapromo@yahoo.com
Articles from sina.com
<As always, Feline kidnly translated these Chinese articles into English
and posted it on Aurora's "Poet and Warrior" board, and permit
us to put it here as well. Thank you very much, Feline!>
http://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/f/wuji/index.html
11 May 2005
On the night of the
12th, <Wuji> will hold a huge party in the castle. All of the main casts
have all arrived except Jong Dong Kun (arrive tomorrow). So on tomorrow's night,
the castle will be surrounded by huge Wuji posters, and more than a hundred
french people wil be hired where they'll wear the same soldiers costumes as in
the film. This party is one of the most dazzling events of this festival!
10 May 2005
Although the "War with wild ox" will only be 90 seconds long
in the film, the shooting took 14 days to finish. "The crew arrived
Yuan Mu, Yunnan on 1 May 2004, and all of them are shocked by how high
the temperature was -- it was 60C in ground temperature and eggs can nearly
be cooked there! After a week of shooting, all of the crew had a tan to
an unbelievable stage, just like Yuan Mu people!" On the returning
to Yuan Mu after some work in Beijing, Chen Hung said, "We'd to find
local people to be the barbaric soldiers so we wanted them to wear feathers
on their head, with a bare upper body, carrying special made bones around
their body. In such high temperature, not only a few of them caught skin
infections! And OF COURSE the most touching is the main cast of this shooting
- SANADA-san! Chen Hung said, "Sanada-san started practicing swords
from the age of 3. Therefore, the strength and the control while performing
comes from deep within to the outside. For the weapons we designed for
the great general Guang Ming, the "meteor hammer", when swinging
around, is very heavy. Plus with the around 100catty (~60kg) costumes he's
wearing, to finish this mission under such a high temperature is nearly
impossible!"
19 April 2005
*****Spoiler warning!!! Do not read this part if you don't want to know
the crucial part*****
Yesterday afternoon, <Wuji online>, based
on the theme of the movie <Wuji>, was announced and released in the press
conference in Beijing. Among the information distributed to the reporters, they
unintentionally gave out the "top secret classfied" story synopsis!
According to the information -- "the whole story doesn't have clear
indication on which era it is in. A person from 3000 years ago talked about the
future. After some serious logical thinking and great consideration, the story
felt very real. Each person has a similar experience."
But yesterday,
the reporter found out the whole story synopsis from a "2004 film catalogue". In
there, it's written:------
A small girl, being especially cared for by
the Destiny goddess, become the world's most beautiful Queen, receiving /
carrying thousands of love, enjoying all kinds of luxury; but is condemned by
destiny, that eternally she can't find the true love, unless time goes back,
where one dies and relives. However, there is a low class Slave who truly loves
her, and uses his own life as the price. He uses his super, near-light-speed
type of running, finally breaks the destiny chain on her, and lets her to go
back to the starting point of life, to gain back the right for her to choose.
*****End of spoiler warning*****
31 March 2005
So they finally found the right person to do
the voice-over for Cecilia. She's a reporter from Beijing traffic channel. In
short, out of the 2300 people, she (Chun Xiao) possessed the most advantages and
went through successfully.
The Voice of Chun Xiao can fall in love with
Sanada san
Up to now, Chun Xiao passed the two test (test on pronounciation and voice
testing). The reason why she's chosen because the crew said her voice could
fall in love with Sanada san. "It's a very exciting thing to go to
the Wuji voice test", CX said. "I was really shocked by the voice-dubbing
of Sanada san. First is his accuracy on pronounciation that shocked me.
Second is the wild manly sensuous essence of Sanada san. I think I've started
to like him (Feline note- what, only like???). I seldom get to like a man's
voice, but the natural untamed wildness of Sanada san is very attractive!".
"During the hour in the recording studio, I had a very strong feeling!
and I'll come back."
Chun Xiao said she doesn't really like to take up jobs on voice dubbing since
she likes the originality in works. But this time, she went because of the big
name of the director - Chen Kaige.
She further said she felt the problem
and pressure in doing the voice for the Queen. The crew told her to prepare
intensive "hell style" training with the director on the artisitc requirements,
like for one sentence could take her 10+ hours. Then before the actual voice
dubbing, she would be given further training on the dialogues and the emotion
guidance.
4 Mar 2005
Jang Dong-kun and Nicholas Tse has already left Beijing, but Sanada-san
is scheduled to work on voice-over for the coming 2 days.
Hiro's General rides on a horse a lot. To make his voice realistically
sound like he is short of breath, Sanada-san hops and jumps around, and
he sweats a lot in a cold winter day!!
This year in Cannes, Chen Kaige prepared to show up with all of the cast
members, and to play the 10-miniute trailer. At present, a version is already
produced where there's no dialogue. It's said that this version already
made a lot of people cry!
28 Feb - 1 Mar 2005
It is now decided that all cast members will do the voice-over using their own voice, except Cecilia Cheung (Queen), for her coarse voice isn't suitable for her character in the film (which is portrayed as elegant, sexy, gentle and beautiful).
Initially the film crew has run through the whole of China in finding suitable professionals to do the voice-overs, but at the end the director Chen Kaige decided that the cast would do the voice-over by themselves. He believed that for the year in involving in this movie, the actors understand the best about their characters portrayed and know the best the emotions and feelings inside the film so that only them could know how to express the emotions through the voice in the most natural way.
Talking about Sanada-san, Chen Hung (the producer) said he has the particular seriousness that Japanese people possess. He has started learning Chinese 6 months before the real shooting of the film. From the start of shooting till the end, there's a coach by his side teaching him the lines in chinese. Ever since Sanada-san arrived China, he "melted" into the Chinese world, demanding to achieve perfection even for a single word.
Chen Hung told the reporters on some interesting funny side stories. Sanada-san is very serious after he arrived Beijing for the voice-over. He not only repeated practicing the every line, every syllable; because of the requirement of his character, he even practiced screaming / shouting every day! Nicholas Tse teased him saying perhaps he's too serious. But after some time of thinking, he's suddenly enlightened and told Chen Hung, "I know why he's practising screaming / shouting! It's cos he believed that the Chinese style of screaming / shouting and the Japanese one is different!" So that's why Sanada-san has to practice using the Chinese style of screaming / shouting.
01 March 2005
Because of the two "foreigner" actors in the film, the director has conducted a "dark house" blind test to see if there's anything "abnormal" in the dialogues.
The crew has recruited nearly 100 people from all ages, all occupations. The youngest is 8, and oldest is 67. They are given RMB$30 an hour as a reward, and are told to listen to some sets of dialogue to see if there's anything "abnormal". And only one 47-year-old lady said there's one person with a Xinjiang (northwest of china) accent. And the person she's referring to is Jong Dong Kun (the Slave). Chen Kaige broke down laughing after hearing this news.
It is said that their speed of learning Chinese is so fast for both Sanada-san and Jong Dong Kun, that they can use Chinese to greet the crew and even to make jokes with them!
So needless to say, the two actors have passed this "100-people-dark-house-test"!
Initially Jong Dong Kun planned to stay for a week for the voice-over. But 10
days passed and he still hasn't finished, making Chen Hung a bit worried.
According to the crew, because of the perfection both actors (Sanada-san &
JDL) demanded, sometimes only one sentence can be recorded in a single day!
When they were
together, they not only liked to compare who's Chinese was better, but they
liked to compare who'll be more outstanding in the voice-over. So therefore they
pushed their perfection to the limit, and sometimes a single sentence can be
recorded for 10+ hours.
A crew told the reporter, "Once, JDK used 15
hours to record a single sentence, from 9am to 12midnight... the most horrible
thing is that the two actors often compare with each other. If one spoke better,
the another has to have a retake. But luckily such will only happen in the
critical lines, such as those expressing love or complex emotions." But
nonetheless, all the staff expressed much admiration on the actors.
13 June 2004
A scene with the double of the "Queen" (Cecilia Cheung)
A slim girl (Cecilia's double), wearing a red coat, was riding a horse running on the wide green plain. A pair of clear eyes covered by the black veil, she was facing Hiroyuki who was coming on her way. She beautifully hopped off the horse, embracing Hiroyuki. Then came the close up of those big watery eyes with tears rolling (Cecilia's). Her slim shadow stood in the wide plain with such loneliness.
The double is a Tibetian girl. There's another scene where she had to ride on a horse where Hiroyuki was also riding a horse, chasing after her. The horses are all shipped from Hong Kong as those in HK are taller, and faster.
She felt special on the scene where she had to embrace Hiro. She thought since Hiro was the 1st class star and it's the first time she acted, she felt the movement when embracing Hiro was very mechanical. And after she stopped crying over this, Hiro especially told his translator to ask her that "Are you a bit embarrassed?" and told her "It's just acting, it's ok". She felt Hiro was very good person!
14 June 2004
Cracks seen in the RMB$2,000,000 Scene, the Crew left Shangri-La
Because the scene that they are building in Shangri-La has found to have some cracks, due to safety reasons, the director and Chen Hung have decided to leave Shangri-La and headed back to Beijing. Therefore, the shootings will be rearranged.
Hiroyuki is now in Yuan Mou for some fighting scenes.
9 July 2004
The film has finished 2/3 of shootings. During these times, Chen Hong (wife of Chen Kaige) paid particular attention to the main casts. She gave Cecilia a bigger, more comfortable room; specially order Japanese cuisine for Hiroyuki; other casts are also touched.
Chen Kaige used this film to enter the market in Japan and Korea. Hiroyuki and Jong Don Gun used this film to enter the market in China. Hiro has been staying in China since March and been missing home, missing sashimi dearly! He suggested to go back home after leaving Yunnan, and Chen Hong kindly agreed . But then perhaps its because Hiro thought he hasn't finished his "homework" eg. learning kung fu, Mandarin, so he suddenly changed his mind and continued to stay in China.
Because Chen Kaige want to make the film as real as possible, he minimised the use of "doubles" apart from all CG technology. Hiro has to wear 17 wires around his body, swinging in the air! Sometimes there are 40 NGs for one single shot!
14 July 2004
The crew went to inner Mongolia for the unfinished shootings instead of going to Shangri-La.
15 July 2004
It's said that the contracts of the main casts will soon end as the original plan was to finished all the shootings by September. But this news hasn't been confirmed yet.
Unexpected things like the collapse of the big scene set in Shangri-La has delayed shootings for over half a month and the director Chen Kaige has to think of a solution to that: to increase the part played by an actor from China -- Liu Ye. Liu Ye has once said that he played the smallest part in the film, but now his parts is coming close to the parts played by Jong Dong Gun (the korean actor)! But because the director is still altering the script while filming, so the film crew can't tell the proportion of the casts in the film.
26 July 2004
First exposure of the characters in <Wuji>
The reporter interviewd Miss Yen from the marketing/advertising department.
The General "Guang Ming" (equivalent to Bright) A lot of crew have the impression/feeling on Hiroyuki as "On screen better than off screen" (Feline note: Why did they say that?). Reporter note: Put it this way, may be Hiro isn't that eyecatching when you see him, but since he's acting as the "always-win" General, when the shooting starts, his essence of "bravura", splendidness, boldness will all come out! And Hiro would always express -- that for all this years of acting, he has never come across a director who would give an actor so much time to think over and create a character for a movie.
29 July 2004
The reporter is interviewing Miss Yi (who belongs to the marketing department) and her tone became more relaxing when started talking about Sanada-san.
"He's the most active / lively one in the crew. Although he became an actor for a long time, in real life he's still like a child. When the director praised his good acting, he would make faces; when others praise how trendy his clothes are, he would initiate to take pictures with them, and casually making different poses, what a natural born actor he is!"
4 Aug 2004
Yesterday night Cecilia Cheung (the Queen) had her first shooting totally naked in the silver screen.
Location: the Golden Hypericum Cottage.
Her opposite: Sanada-san!!!!!!
Cecilia had a bath scene on the Moon Lake bank, then she and Sanada-san
would have a "love scene" in the Cottage! Because it'll be quite
a "passionate" scene, the director had asked if Cecilia would
need a double but she declined because she wanted it to look "real
and natural". She also had another "kissing" scene with
Jong Dong Gun (the Slave). She acted very calmly and very "into"
it on both of the scenes. On the contrary the male actors felt shy!
Back to the "love" scene: Because of the possibilities of not
passing the "examination" (eg. PG, 15, 18 thing), they have shooted
2 versions. The 1st version was to shoot the actors both naked! And the
2nd version was to shoot them wearing a special made clothing. It is said
that you won't have naughty thoughts after looking at that clothing , but
just a sense of art and infatuation.
The scene in Wuji is said to be very beautiful - with the bright moonlight, the "sexy" moon, and the quiet moonlake. And the Golden Hypericum Cottage is the love nest for the Queen & the General!
7 September 2004
Final story version according to Sina.com:
The story will mainly surround the most beautiful Queen (Qingcheng - Cecilia Cheung). The Slave, The General , the Ghost and "No happiness" Wuhuan will have entanglements both emotionally and on their destiny with the Queen.
Someone will destroy a whole castle for a woman; someone will sacrifice himself because of a promise; someone will change his whole life because of a memory. They all have their own unique skills and each have their own weakness(es). They keep on fighting killing and searching because of love, because of freedom. But finally they can't escape from the strange circle of fate.
===============================================
Wuji has a special way of saying goodbye to each of the main actor/actress. They were given a big cake, a bottle of red wine and a big bouquet of fresh flowers. Seeing every one of them leaving one by one, some of the crew couldn't hold their tears any longer, cos afterall, they've been working / fighting together day and night for a few months.
Each of them had difficulty saying goodbye when the shooting's over. For Nicholas Tse (Wuhuan), he said it's the most important movie in his life. For Cecilia Cheung (Qingcheng), she said she'd not take in as many movies so she'll only leave an image as the Queen to the audience. Jong Dun Gun had tears in his eyes, and for Hiro-chan ... on the night to celebrate the birthday of Chen Kaige the director, Hiro-chan was partially drunk and used the chance to hug the director and expressed his deepest respect to him!
Sep. 10, 2004
<This is provided by Esther. Thanks!>
-- Characters in The Promise --
Qingcheng: Cecilia Cheung plays an imperial concubine Qingcheng in the
fictitious Kingdom of Qing (not related to Manchuria). She's being greatly
admired by the Wuhuan, Guangming and Guilang.
Wuhuan: Nicholas Tse plays Northen Baron Wuhuan ("Without Happiness"),
who is handsome, well-learned, and competent in martial arts, but seldom
shows any smiles.
Kunlun: Jang Dong Gun plays a slave named Kunlun, who's constantly trying
to hide his rude and uncivilised manners. He brings about the development
of the main plotlines. The main themes, love and freedom, are fixated on
him.
Guangming: Hiroyuki Sanada plays General Guangming ("Bright and Clear"),
a tough and overbearing person, a representation of authority and law.
Guilang: Liu Ye acts as Guilang ("Ghost"), an anti-hero who is
naive yet carries a certain sinister air, is dark yet tender, and unpredictable.
Bigstar
