Because of her turbulent childhood, Qin Hailu's family environment has always been characterized by an inexplicable sense of wanderlust.
Later, in many of her classic roles, it was that sense of wanderlust, of not knowing where to go next, that she grasped most precisely.
After walking frankly for a while and a while, Qin Hailu was at war with the real world and moisturized her sensitive nerves.
In 1996, the Central Academy of Drama ushered in the "Six Golden Flowers", which included Zhang Ziyi, Mei Ting, Yuan Quan, Zeng Li, Hu Jing, and Qin Hailu.
The students of this session of the Central Academy of Drama, can be called a myth, after graduation nearly accounted for the entertainment circle half of the rivers and mountains. The girls in the class, one more than a stunning, face value and acting skills at the same time, in addition to Qin Hailu.
She has an ordinary appearance, standing in the crowd is very humble, she looks at who feel more beautiful than herself.
The first row of the left for Yuan Quan, the second from the left for Qin Hailu, the right for Hu Jing second row of the left for Zeng Li, the third from the left for Zhang Ziyi
In the days of the Chinese opera, Qin Hailu had a bitter life, she went into the theater group with Zhang Ziyi, Yuan Quan to pass the photo. After leaving, found that the backpack left behind, and went back to find their carefully selected photos, was torn into several pieces lying in the trash.
Qin Hailu froze, her self-esteem was hit, and she felt the sky was gray.
This northeastern girl did not believe in fate, many years later, she stood alone on top of the stage, so that acting has become their hometown, Qin Hailu is no longer a guest in another country.
In 2011, Qin Hailu appeared in the movie "Piano of Steel", playing a marginalized person again.
The movie tells the story of a father who, as an ordinary laid-off worker, makes a piano out of factory fertilizer in order to fulfill his daughter's dream of music.
Labeled a "literary film", Piano of Steel's fate was naturally not too smooth. Halfway through the filming, the money was at the bottom of the barrel, and Qin Hailu said she would not pay for the film, and helped director Zhang Mang to subsidize the final payment.
In the movie, Qin Hailu's character Shuxian had a line that was prophetic: "I might as well pay for it".
2011 movie "The Piano of Steel" Chen Guilin (played by Wang Qianyuan) and Shuxian (played by Qin Hailu) stills
After the film was released, it did not escape the fate of the literary film, the box office is very poor, the blood money is not returned, Qin Hailu did not feel sorry for it, she accepts the result that should have been expected.
Qin Hailu played Shuxian tough and tender, rich and three-dimensional. She sits in a dilapidated truck and sings "Heart Love" loudly, as if she is an ordinary citizen in that city.
The camera gradually pulls away, the long, bleak corridor grows smaller, and the piano looks a little sad on the surreal, romanticized soundtrack.
A collection of classic clips from the 2011 film Piano of Steel
The movie was filmed in Anshan, a heavily industrialized city in the northeast, and the bleakness is remarkably similar to Qin Hailu's hometown of Yingkou.
She grew up during the wave of layoffs in the Northeast, and watched as the clean-cut workers, overnight, faded from their glory, as they endured the great wounds of reform and were forced to accept their fate of being abandoned by the times.
Stills from the 2011 film "Piano of Steel"
For all the sorrows of China's working class, Qin Hailu grew up witnessing the whole process. Her parents went into business and sent her to the Yingkou Opera School to study Peking Opera.
Qin Hailu's childhood was discrete; her mother was in Yingkou, her father in Dalian, her sister in Shenyang, and she was only in the theater school, and only every year on New Year's Day could the family sit down for a meal together.
Before entering theater school, she and her sister were taken care of by their grandmother, and the food they ate most was buns, almost every day. To this day, buns are still the food Qin Hailu hates the most, even if she is so hungry that her stomach hurts.
In order for Qin Hailu to eat three normal meals a day, her parents sent their daughter to a year-round boarding theater school when she was nine years old.
Qin Hailu in her childhood
It was 1990 when Qin Hailu began to study Peking Opera at the opera school, majoring in the Qingyi of the Blade Horse Flower Dan.
There, she suffered a lot. Qin Hailu was not well received by her teachers and classmates, and was often shut out of the classroom. This isolation made her strong from childhood, and she worked harder and harder to be the best.
The teacher required everyone to leave the drill at 6:30 a.m., but Hailu didn't. She went to the playground at 4:30 a.m., and finished all the morning exercises alone, ahead of schedule.
In order to prove herself, Qin Hailu taught herself the Peking Opera "Heavenly Maiden Scattering Flowers", and at the age of 17, she visited many cities and performed more than 40 shows in a row with this piece of work condensed by sweat and tears.
She made a 14-meter-long silk and sang while dancing, setting a world record at the time, with a smile that had a bitter taste that didn't match her age.
A teenager
The heartache of living alone in a boarding school and studying theater is unimaginable for a teenager who should be enjoying love and care from her parents.
"The important period of life outlook to the establishment of values, in order to prove themselves, has been bearing, bearing the whole teenage years, even to the point of becoming a character that affects you for life."
After graduating from the Peking Opera School, Qin Hailu decided to go to university for a very simple reason: to find a boyfriend in the future, education is very important.
She gave her family an example: "There are two girls, a junior high school student and a college student, which one would you choose?" Her mother thought it made sense and agreed.
In 1996, Qin Hailu was admitted to the acting department of the Central Academy of Drama, where she was a classmate of Zhang Ziyi, Mei Ting, Yuan Quan and Zeng Li.
In the midst of a crowd of beautiful women, Qin Hailu appeared a bit bland.
The second row of the right one for Qin Hailu
In the Chinese opera, Qin Hailu study, although the appearance of mediocre, but her family conditions are not bad, dress in the class is the most elaborate. In her sophomore year, she put on a Burberry trench coat and walked around campus in an extremely windy manner.
However, this trench coat did not let her be noticed, in the beauty of the Chinese opera, Qin Hailu until graduation did not receive the play.
She spent the whole day, wearing a fat military coat wandering around the campus, such an unusual temperament attracted the director Chen Guo.
Chen Guo's friend said, "I know a girl in the Chinese opera, she often wears a military coat to sneak around the campus, the character is a bit strange, may be what you want."
Qin Hailu was not interested in the role of the dusty woman who came to her door, and chose to reject it. Chang Li, the homeroom teacher of the 96th acting class of the Chinese Theater in that year, called Qin Hailu: "The dusty woman is a role and a person."
Under the teacher's persuasion, Qin Hailu only used the time to eat a bowl of noodles to listen to director Chen Guo tell the story outline of the film, decided to take the role.
The millennium came and went as expected, and Qin Hailu made a name for herself in the movie industry with a movie called Durian Puffs.
A clip from the 2000 film Durian Puffs with Qin Yan (Qin Hailu)
She plays Qin Yan, a native of Mudanjiang in the Northeast, who travels to Hong Kong on a short-term travel visa to work as a prostitute in just three months.
After arriving in Hong Kong, Qin Yan didn't go out to play for a single day, and she spent all her time picking up clients to make money. The Hong Kong of the movie is not the familiar glittering red lights, but a hidden back alley in Mongkok.
Qin Yan wears different high heels and short skirts every day, traveling back and forth in this alley, waiting for different strangers.
Clip from the 2000 movie "Durian Puffs" by Qin Yan (Qin Hailu)
As a stranger in a foreign land, Qin Yan carefully begs for a living, calling out to everyone she meets as her boss. After earning enough money, she puts away her bags and returns home.
Ironically, after returning to her hometown of Mudanjiang with a five-figure passbook, she became the pride of her parents, with an absurd sense of tragedy.
After returning to her hometown, Qin Yan is at a loss for the life in the backward county, and the whole person looks a bit rushed. The insignificance of her future is revealed in Qin Hailu's eyes, and that sense of bitterness spreads across the northeastern land.
Stills from the 2000 movie "Durian Puffing" by Qin Yan (played by Qin Hailu)
After this experience in Hong Kong, Qin Yan has long ceased to be Qin Yan, and her life is so complicated that there is no way out.
In order to play this role well, Qin Hailu went to the bar to chat with all kinds of prostitutes and listen to their grievances; she went to a Hong Kong café to observe the prostitutes eating as soon as they had time, because time never belongs to them.
This was the first film in which Qin Hailu appeared.
Stills from the 2000 film Durian Puffs, Qin Yan (Qin Hailu)
The South is a damp, fluffy, money-ridden, faraway place with lots of romantic imagery for young people living in the Northeast.
At the end of the film, Qin Yan receives a parcel from the south and opens it to reveal a durian, the pungent smell of which immediately draws her into memories of her time in Hong Kong.
There are a hundred flavors that come to mind.
A clip of Qin Yan (Qin Hailu) from the 2000 movie Durian Puffing
This durian is like our lives, hard and cruel, and at some point, it gives us a head start.
The moral of the film's title, "Durian Floating," is self-explanatory, with the complex-smelling durian representing the South.
Peopeo, on the other hand, is the decaying Northeast China with its persistent cold and snow, as well as the hesitant young lives.
The way Qin Hailu stands under the roiling snow makes people move their eyes, and no one knows what she is thinking when she lifts her head to look at the gloomy sky.
Stills from the 2000 movie "Durian Drift" by Qin Yan (played by Qin Hailu)
With this debut movie, Qin Hailu beat Anita Mui, Maggie Cheung, and Shu Qi to take the Best Actress award that year.
Standing on the podium, she cried through her makeup: "My friends tell me crying doesn't look as good as laughing, but I'm really excited today."
After stepping down from the podium, Qin was ridiculed by the Hong Kong media as the "ugliest movie queen ever".
This is a response to the absurd comedy of the movie itself, which is often seen as superficial.
Qin Hailu, who was at the top of her game when she started out, still hasn't changed her mind about going back to her hometown to work as a white-collar worker and get married.
The director of the Central Experimental Drama Theater found Chang Li, the acting teacher of the 96 Chinese opera class, and named three people in their class, Zhang Ziyi, Qin Hailu, and Yuan Quan.
The second from the left is Qin Hailu, the third from the left is Zhang Ziyi, the first from the right is Yuan Quan, and the second from the right is Zeng Li
Qin Hailu still wants to go back to her hometown in Northeast China, and the class director Chang Li found her in the corridor of the auditorium on the 4th floor of the Chinese Opera class, and said in a long and sincere way:
"I don't want you to go back, and there are quite a lot of our class that can act but there are only a few of them.
"I don't want you to go back. There are many people in our class who can act, but there are only a few who can act.
The first time I saw this, I was in the middle of a long journey, and I was able to get to know the people who were there.
When friends around her expressed puzzlement, her reason was very simple: I did not see much of the world when I was a child, and I saw the TV wearing a white shirt female white-collar workers, and I thought it was very fashionable.
Qin Hailu bought a pair of high-heeled shoes with the prize money from the post-picture award, and told herself, "Wear new shoes, don't walk on the old road".
The life of a white-collar worker is not as easy as she thinks. Just because she knows how to act doesn't mean she knows how to operate all kinds of office software, and Qin Hailu screws up by not using a shredder and burning two coffee pots.
The company's boss couldn't stand to watch, and he told Qin Hailu, "I want a secretary who can do forms, not a movie queen."
Six months later, Qin Hailu was fired.
After that, Qin Hailu opened hot pot restaurants, hair salons, advertising agencies ...... without exception failed. After some tossing and turning, she woke up: "I'm still suitable for acting."
Just the clouds of change in the entertainment circle never for anyone to stop, in Zhang Ziyi has become the plotting girl, Qin Hailu before the resources are all deserted, she shot a number of film and television drama.
Back in front of the camera, no matter how small or insignificant the role received, Qin Hailu has studied the script with all her heart, and experienced the inner world of the characters.
During the filming of "Sister Peach", director Ann Hui felt that it would be awkward for Qin to play a supporting role in a movie with such a heavyweight actress, and she had to give her an extra role.
2012 movie "Sister Peach"
Stills of Miss Cai (played by Qin Hailu)
Qin Hailu was adamantly opposed to the idea, respecting the circumstances under which the characters of the original script existed, and this resolute attitude carries no aggression, and is a natural reaction when faced with acting.
In 2014, Qin Hailu collaborated with Zhou Xun on the TV series Red Sorghum, in which she played Shuxian, the sister-in-law of the Shan family, a widow who lived her life in chastity, and eventually broke through the feudal shackles to end up with her beloved.
2014 TV drama "Red Sorghum" Jiu Er (Zhou Xun) and Shuxian (Qin Hailu) stills
Being in the old society, she can only remove all the protective layers in the dead of night, leaning on the bed alone to smoke opium as a way to spend the long night, the eyes of the lost, every shot is unforgettable.
2014 TV drama "Red Sorghum" Shuxian (Qin Hailu) stills
In those years, Qin Hailu will be all kinds of small characters portrayed with flesh and blood, focusing on the life of women in the city, no mercenary gas, but there is a sense of human feelings, she has become the goddess of literature and art, but also become a veritable acting school.
With her excellent acting skills, she has been called "a rare genius who knows how to act" by people in the acting community.
Zhang Yimou's "Above the Cliff" has built up a cold and deadly atmosphere in the snowy countryside with just a few strokes.
After shooting this movie for a long time, Qin Hailu still thinks about the snow.
Stills from the 2021 film "Above the Cliff" featuring Wang Yu (Qin Hailu)
She plays Wang Yu, a highly trained agent in the Soviet Union, who is appointed to carry out the difficult covert operation "Utra".
Qin Hailu had a crying scene that was extremely shocking, she was wearing a hospital gown sitting on the cold floor of the restroom, clenching her teeth and sobbing silently, and could only keep breathing hard to relieve herself, she suppressed her mournful emotions, silent but painful.
"That's the space left for the audience to reverie. The hidden war is great. In tracing heroes, there are people who are famous and we know what they did. Some are nameless and can never be told."
Stills from the 2021 film "Above the Cliff" Wang Yu (Qin Hailu)
Zhang Yimou stood up and applauded Qin Hailu, whose performance was evoked over and over again, as if she were facing a cliff with echoes of the highs and lows, so that people couldn't help but want to look at it more.
Qin Hailu likes Maggie Cheung in "Fancy", she appreciates Maggie's temperament and is also very sober.
"I can say outright that I can't learn from it, because it was the expression of Maggie Cheung's life experience and cognition that was uniquely Maggie Cheung's when she incorporated it into her role. If it is me, it is the expression of Qin Hailu. I can't learn from Maggie, and you can't learn from Qin Hailu."
Such Qin Hailu, is confident and self-aware.
Stills from the 2021 film Above the Cliff, Wang Yu (played by Qin Hailu)
Qin Hailu is not approachable in the eyes of the media, and a cold face is the norm. In response, she said that in this industry, true, is the only capital she can show off.
In life, she also has a female warmth, whiney side, but this is an exclusive right; the media, she has always been mean:
"Maybe because too early when the queen of the movie, everyone held me, I was afraid that I lost the balance, I do not know what to do, the more wrapped up inside the tighter and tighter."
Qin Hailu said she is a rational first, emotional after the person, but never coexist.
Over the years, she has played countless classic roles, but none of them are called "Qin Hailu", and most of the women in the screen are valiant and cool independent image, but in real life, she is a little girl who needs to take care of.
When she was with her husband, Wang Xinjun, Qin Hailu's natural talent for pampering herself was on display, which came as a surprise.
The first time she met Wang Xinjun was when they worked together on Independent Column, and Qin Hailu was so serious that as soon as they met, she asked if the other had read the script all the way through.
Stills from the 2012 drama "Independent Column"
Meng Yunxiao (played by Wang Xinjun) and Li Shuwei (played by Qin Hailu)
After learning that the other party had not finished the script, he immediately harped on him, asking him to finish the script and then write down the problems in the script in words.
Wang Xinjun thought to himself: I've worked with big-time actresses, and it's the first time I've seen a girl as horizontal as you are.
Because of this work, the two men got closer and closer, and gradually rubbed out the sparks of love.
At the age of 36, Qin Hailu's youthful dream was finally realized, and she married. Because of the turbulent family environment during her childhood, deep in her heart, she has always longed for a home.
Wang Xinjun and Qin Hailu
In an interview with Jin Xing, she said:
"When I'm with Xinjun, I think he's a man. He can be relied on, you'll feel like you're leaning on a tree, he might have flaws because the bark isn't that shiny, but you can sleep against there and be at ease, that's it, there are not many men that can be called a man nowadays."
After marrying Wang Xinjun, Qin Hailu said she was gradually becoming less capable of living. Every day, she wakes up listening to an audiobook, and her husband takes the prepared meal upstairs so she can eat in bed.
The northeast girl with a big grin turned into a white rabbit in seconds.
Qin Hailu is very fond of home stalls, walking through the place is a mess, husband Wang Xinjun will follow the back to clean up, willingly, never complain.
Because of love and responsibility, they are getting closer.
Qin Hailu, who was spoiled to heaven, once described Wang Xinjun: "He is my playmate, my tree hole, and my life coach."
Qin Hailu, who is radiant in the movie, is Mrs. Wang, who is pampered and cute in front of her lover.
Married for seven years of the two, the so-called seven-year itch in their body as if it will not exist.
Qin Hailu remembers her mother saying, "Since I've been with Wang Xinjun, I feel that the second girl I used to be is back, so I agree to your marriage."
Qin Hailu already can not remember his previous appearance, laugh heartlessly when what kind of appearance, probably only because of the body in this mountain.
Nowadays, there is no thing or person is to let Qin Hailu fight to chase, she willingly fell deep into the long and gentle. This kind of tenderness is not a refusal to be strong, but after being strong, the courage to openly accept the softness.
On September 19, 2019, Zhang Ziyi showed a group photo of some of her classmates from the 96th class of the Central Academy of Drama, which for a time brought people's thoughts back to that long-ago era.
In the photo, there are many familiar faces, Zhang Ziyi, Qin Hailu, Zeng Li, Mei Ting and so on.
The second from the left is Qin Hailu, the fourth from the left is Zeng Li, the third from the right is Mei Ting, and the fourth from the right is Zhang Ziyi
Qin Hailu recalled that 23 years ago, when she was studying at the Chinese Academy of Arts and Crafts, her fellow classmates, Zhang Ziyi, Mei Ting, and Yuan Quan, were all famous in the theater, and she didn't even get a play, and she wore a military overcoat all day long as she wandered back and forth across the campus, with a sense of inexplicable wandering written on her face.
Later, in the face of many classic roles, she grasped the most accurate, is that kind of do not know where the next stop drifting feeling and strength.
After walking frankly and openly for a while, Qin Hailu has been fighting with the real world and moisturizing her sensitive nerves.
Stills from the 2011 film The Piano of Steel, Shuxian (played by Qin Hailu)
The film The Piano of Steel was shot in a steel factory in Anshan, Northeast China, a land that is extremely similar to the temperament of Qin Hailu's hometown, Yingkou.
Under the winter sun, the faded yellow straw reveals black soil, and the black houses speeding by are wrapped in heavy history, making the coarse texture of the northern city feel cold.
A month after the movie was made, the crew had only 47 dollars left. Director Zhang Mang took the actors to live in a hotel that cost a few dozen dollars, and when they went out, they saw dust and insignificance.
Stills from the 2011 film "Piano of Steel" showing Chen Guilin (played by Wang Qianyuan) and Shuxian (played by Qin Hailu)
Qin Hailu was so determined to finish the film that the cast and crew remembered her chivalry in "returning one-fifth of the advance payment and pouring in the money, as well as running around the film office looking for promotions and help". "
Ansan is the first person who has ever been to a movie in the United States.
The saddle mountain is the corner abandoned by the times, often touching Qin Hailu's sensitive heart, under the black humor of comedy, is the most soft and warm undertones of human nature.
After fighting one hard battle after another, 43-year-old Qin Hailu, the face of the sense of drift more and more light, and no longer want to prove themselves.