Exploiting Hollywood 1980.

Chapter 1436 What did Forrest Gump say?
"start!"

Below the obelisk of the Washington Monument is a very large but shallow pool called the Reflecting Pool.

The pool is two thousand feet long, one hundred and seventy feet wide, but only about twenty inches deep. Its only effect is to reflect the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial, creating a spectacular scene and enhancing the solemn visual impact of the monument.

The famous "I Have a Dream" speech by Martin Luther King, former leader of the civil rights movement, was delivered here.

In the script of Forrest Gump, the speech that Forrest Gump gives here in front of the people marching against the war has a special meaning.

Forrest Gump is a very peculiar character, and many of the historical events in America over the past twenty years seem to have been experienced by him. This is of course impossible in reality, but the narrative of the film is to bring this sense of reality to the audience.

Of all the historical events he experienced, only the anti-war speech at the Washington Monument was fictional. And this was the only event that Forrest Gump took the initiative to do, not just being a witness to history.

Moreover, this is the first time he and Jenny have met since they separated in the Vietnam War, which is a significant point in the movie. From the perspective of the film's structure, this reunion between Forrest Gump and Jenny is exactly at the middle point of the film's length.

After this incident, Forrest Gump became more proactive than before because of his increased life experience and emotional setbacks. From then on, Forrest Gump made more decisions about his own life instead of just passively accepting orders from others.

"One, two, three, up the stairs, the camera rises, pans, turns, and then takes a panoramic view of the two hundred extras below. Finally, Tom Hanks makes his declaration here, just like Dr. Martin Luther King..."

Ronald was rehearsing here. The 200 extras were directed by Ken Ralston, who was in charge of all the different actions and anti-war slogans, who would raise the banner first, who would raise the banner later, where the camera would scan, and how the actions were performed.

Ronald was on stage, and was more responsible for the overall camera movement and lens scheduling, when and what scenes would appear, how they would move, and what characters and scenes would appear in the frame.

There are also some performances by Tom Hanks that Ronald needs to watch and nod his approval.

"Okay, let's do it again!"

The rehearsal lasted for a whole morning, and finally everyone was able to perform a series of actions such as holding up signs smoothly. Ronald signaled to do it all again.

"Fuck it..." A man wearing a shirt with a star-spangled flag pattern was the host of the rally. He was full of swear words and couldn't finish a complete sentence without saying the word "fuck". But in that turbulent era, the audience liked such directness.

Forrest Gump was pushed onto the podium, and the camera passed over his head and filmed the crowd below. An actress who looked a bit like Helen Slater's mother was holding a big sign that read "Long Island Residents Against the Vietnam War."

At that time, the camera will give her a shot of less than one second, which can be regarded as Ronald's gesture of goodwill to Helen's mother, allowing her to relive her years as an anti-war activist on the screen.

Tom Hanks came up and was welcomed by thunderous applause as soon as he faced the crowd. This was because he was wearing an active military uniform and had many medals. There were more veterans who had already retired and some hippies pretending to be veterans who just came to meet some female hippies and say a few anti-war slogans.

Such an authentic soldier was welcomed by the people at the scene, and an old soldier even went up to encourage him, saying that he was very brave.

But Forrest Gump was not good at speaking in public, and was a little frightened by the applause, so he froze on the stage. The host wearing the Star-Spangled T-shirt came over, hugged Forrest Gump, and said softly, "Tell us about this war..."

"The war in Vietnam?" Tom Hanks still looked silly. Forrest Gump's question was not ironic, but a normal question. But it aroused the audience's emotions again.

Seeing Forrest Gump being so savvy, the host blurted out, "That fucking war in Vietnam!"

There was another round of cheering from below, followed by loud shouting while holding up various anti-war banners.

Forrest Gump was obviously nervous. He hesitated for a long time. Under everyone's urging, he finally remembered the experience of Bubba dying in his arms and Lieutenant Dan unfortunately losing his legs and becoming disabled.

Although Tom Hanks only put in 30% of his effort in rehearsal, the expression of Forrest Gump being scared and finally thinking of his friend and mustering the courage to speak his mind in a trembling voice was very accurate. After he opened his mouth, he broke through the tension and said:

"Sometimes, when people go to Vietnam, they come home without legs. Sometimes they don't come home at all. It's a very bad thing, that's all I want to say."

"yeah……"

The two hundred people began to cheer again.

This speech actually did not contain any sensational parts, it simply stated Forrest Gump's own experience. But in the ears of those anti-war listeners, it was tantamount to an accusation against the government and the army!

"Tsk..."

Ronald suddenly felt that this part was not powerful enough. It seemed that the reactions of the extras to what Forrest Gump said were not sincere enough.

Sometimes, such sincere speech can only have such extraordinary power when it comes from a person of status and who is already familiar to the audience. But at the time of the film, Forrest Gump was just a retired soldier, and his life legend had not yet begun.

And such remarks also somewhat diluted the emotional intensity of the scene where Jenny recognized him and jumped into the reflecting pool to hug him.

"Something is not right..."

Ronald brought Tom Hanks and screenwriter Eric Roth together to discuss a solution.

"It is indeed a bit problematic. Such a speech can easily be compared to Dr. Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream". Some black audiences will be dissatisfied, and some audiences who support the Vietnam War will also be dissatisfied..."

Eric Ross was very sensitive. Black audiences were particularly concerned about the status of great men from their own race. If Forrest Gump said something in the same place and they thought it was trying to steal the limelight from black leaders, there would be potential risks.

Black people do often discuss these issues. For example, they believe that jazz was invented by black people, and then white people took it away. Rock and roll was also invented by black people, and Elvis copied it. Now they want to discredit Michael Jackson's pop music and then take it away.

Those in the South, especially the evangelical whites, also disagreed with the hippie anti-war movement in the big cities on the East and West Coasts. In particular, those who used the Star-Spangled Banner to protest the war were considered unforgivable in their eyes.

Forrest Gump did not talk about the benefits of the Vietnam War in maintaining the free world alliance, but only talked about the misfortune of several comrades, which perhaps in their eyes was also a betrayal.

Ronald also thought it made sense. The main theme of Forrest Gump's story is to bridge the conflict of values. No matter what ethnicity you are or what position you hold, everyone's common memory is a series of historical events during the Vietnam War. As for how to evaluate it, it's best not to say in the movie, and let different audiences draw their own conclusions.

"Or maybe you just don't say it. The microphone is broken, or Forrest Gump is too nervous to say it..." Ronald said.

"How about this? I'll arrange for a military representative to observe this rally to see if there are any anti-America behaviors. When he sees a soldier like Forrest Gump wearing an active military uniform and wearing the Congressional Medal of Honor speaking, he thinks it will cause controversy on TV, so he ripped out the audio cable..."

Eric Roth had an idea. This character actually took away all the controversial aspects of Forrest Gump in this scene. All the controversy was on this character, while Forrest Gump was speaking and no one heard anything. In this way, everyone maintained a good impression of him, and the black people did not have any resentment because he did not speak.

"Let's rehearse it again..."

Sure enough, after adding a character, Forrest Gump's plot became much smoother.

"Action!"

The camera showed the military representative on duty being beaten up by two girls from the anti-war organization after he tore off the audio cable, and then he frantically reconnected the cable. After a series of screams, Tom Hanks said his last words on the stage, "That's all I want to say."

"That's right, you said it very well. What's your name, buddy?" The host wearing the American flag shirt came over and grabbed Forrest Gump's shoulders. It was a pity. Now it was impossible to ask him to say it again, so he had to ask his name as usual and then end it.

"Cut!"

Ronald, wearing a headset, stopped the filming.

It was the morning after rehearsal, and Ronald had finished filming the crucial speech, then paused.

Twenty minutes later, the rearranged cameras were in place, and Robin Wright, dressed in hippie clothes, leather boots, and a wreath on her head, walked to a spot to the left of the reflecting pool and signaled to Ronald that she was ready.

"Action!"

Tom Hanks continued from the previous shot and said his name, "Forrest, my name is Forrest Gump..."

"Forrest! Forrest!" Robin Wright shouted Forrest's name loudly, and then walked into the reflecting pool from that location.

The shallow water just covered the tops of her shoes. Jenny took one step at a time, struggling to break free from the water's resistance, and walked towards the podium on the side of the Lincoln Memorial.

"Jenny!"

Forrest Gump, played by Tom Hanks, also shouted, jumped down from the podium in two steps, landed clumsily in the water, and walked towards Jenny.

The extras next to them automatically separated to the sides. Forrest Gump and Jenny approached each other, one step, two steps, and finally they were together.

Both actors had bright smiles on their faces and hugged each other inside the reflecting pool.

"Wow, wow, wow..." There was a roar. The audience was so excited by this unexpected reunion that they all let out a loud shout and raised their hands high to cheer for the reunion of the two young lovers (as they thought).

"Cut!"

After Ronald confirmed that this was acceptable, he immediately had the extras moved to the spot where Jenny had just entered the water. He then had them line up in several rows there. He also directed the camera crew to go to the right side of the reflecting pool to take the shot.

We shot this scene again, and this time the background was filled with the extras' pants and shoes, and it seemed like the place where Jenny went into the water was also full of people.

After shooting from several different angles, Ronald handed the baton to Ken Ralston, the on-site director of the special effects team, and said, "It's up to you to shoot the rest..."

Because it was impossible to find thousands of extras to fill the surroundings of the reflecting pool, and it was impossible to direct them. This scene was superimposed using post-production computer special effects. Two hundred extras were filmed one by one after the areas were drawn by Ken Ralston.

After filling up an area, we filmed them cheering there. After each area was filmed, we went to the Los Angeles studio and superimposed the films of these dozen areas into one picture through the computer.

If there are inconsistencies, such as the water in the pool, the lighting conditions will be different at different times today and tomorrow, and you may not be able to capture the Washington Monument reflected in the pool.

But this can all be done by taking a good shot and then pasting it to the same position of the lens. If this technology becomes popular in the future and the cost drops significantly, if there is something wrong with the framing, such as a modern airplane appearing in the sky in a costume historical movie, it can be erased with an eraser.

"Everyone listen to me, first in the first box from the left, everyone stand here."

Ken Ralston was full of confidence. Ronald had already filmed the difficult scenes. Now all he needed were some extras to fill in the space. They could still be filmed even if they didn't know how to act.

Ronald took several protagonists, as well as a part of the photography and sound crews, to the White House and Capitol Hill to shoot scenes.

This is the plot before the speech. Forrest Gump has just received the Medal of Honor awarded by President Johnson. His mother feels tired and is resting in the hotel. He is alone with a point-and-shoot camera, touring the famous classics of DC. He is inexplicably squeezed into the team of veterans and then taken to the Washington Monument to give a speech.

Two days later, at the speech site, they discovered that the anti-war girl, who was a military representative, had destroyed the sound system and was directing order in front of a bus.

"Rodham, are all the veterans here? Where do you want them to go?" said an anti-war girl wearing a helmet with an anti-war symbol painted on it to another girl named Hillary.

The girl named Rodham wore a southern women's hat, a corduroy coat, and jeans. She didn't look like a hippie, but more like a good southern wife and mother. She was pretty..."

"Cut!"

After this shot, Ronald finished shooting for the day. He looked around and it seemed that no one noticed.

Only his cousin-in-law, Doug, who was visiting the scene, came over and whispered in his ear, "Did you do this on purpose? Will our first lady be unhappy?"

"She will definitely be happy. The actress I chose is prettier than her..."