Dancing with lions

When it comes to Chinese animated films, which titles first come to mind? Big Fish & Begonia, Ne Zha or Legend of Deification?
说到国产动漫电影，你最先想到哪个片名？《大鱼海棠》《哪吒之魔童降世》还是《姜子牙》？

They are based on Chinese mythology. But I Am What I Am sets its eyes on reality. The film, released on Dec 17, shows three stay-at-home children from a poor village in Guangdong. The story follows a boy named A’juan and two of his close friends as they overcome difficulties in pursuing their dream – becoming the best lion dance performers. As of Dec 22, it has earned a score of 8.3 out of 10 on Douban.
这些电影创作均源于中国神话，影片《雄狮少年》却着眼于现实。《雄狮少年》于12月17日上映，刻画了来自广东贫困山村的三个留守儿童。故事将视角对准一个名叫阿娟的男孩和他的两个好朋友，他们克服困难，追求梦想——努力成为最好的舞狮表演者。截至12月22日，《雄狮少年》在豆瓣上获得8.3分(满分10分)。

What makes it distinctive is the film highlighting a centuries-old Chinese folk art – lion dance. This is attributed to the director Sun Haipeng’s personal life experience. Sun lived in Guangdong for over 10 years and has been fascinated by lion dancing there. Previously, he was also impressed by a lion dance performance when he was on vacation abroad.
这部电影的与众不同之处在于突出了一项拥有悠久历史的中国民间艺术——舞狮，这要归功于导演孙海鹏的个人生活经历。孙海鹏在广东生活了10多年，一直对广东的舞狮文化着迷。此前，孙海鹏在国外度假时，也曾对一场舞狮表演印象深刻。

“The performance is exciting and powerful. At the moment, I felt a sudden surge of pride in our national culture,” Sun told Beijing News. As an animated filmmaker, Sun decided to bring this to the big screen.
孙海鹏在接受《新京报》采访时表示：“那次表演令人激动，充满力量。那一刻，我忽然感觉涌起一股对民族文化的自豪感。”作为一名动画制作人，孙海鹏决定将舞狮搬上大银幕。

But it was not easy. Technically speaking, the biggest problem lay in how to vividly present the moves of the head of the lion through special effects, Sun told The Paper.
但制作舞狮电影并不容易。孙海鹏在接受《澎湃新闻》采访时表示，从技术上讲，最大的问题是如何通过特效生动地呈现狮头的动作。

Different lion heads are made out of different materials. This greatly affects how the hair on the lion’s head moves. So the production team bought many lion heads to observe, photographing the movements of the hair. They then spent several months designing each individual hair on the lion’s head to make it look as realistic as possible.
不同的狮头由不同的材料制成，这极大地影响了狮头上绒毛如何颤动。所以制作团队购买了很多狮头来观察，拍摄绒毛的变化，然后花费几个月的时间，设计狮子头上的每一根绒毛，令其看起来尽可能真实。

The music of the film is in the Guangdong style and uses Cantonese. Bands from Guangdong, like Wu Tiao Ren and Jiu Lian Zhen Ren, made music for the film.
《雄狮少年》的配乐富有广东风格，并以广东话演唱。五条人和九连真人等来自广东的乐队为这部电影制作了音乐。

With its Chinese-style visual and audio effects, the audience can see the story of the characters trying to realize their dreams while feeling the charm of the traditional culture, Foshan News noted.
《佛山新闻》指出，影片的视听效果具有中国风，令观众可以在看主人公努力实现梦想的同时，感受传统文化的魅力。

以上文章内容选自《21世纪学生英文报高中版》，详情请见《21世纪学生英文报高中版》高三767期