Chapter 148 Cool and fun

"I want to die." In the elegant and spacious living room, Joshua lay weakly on the fabric sofa, looking sad, and said, "Jesus! I got married like this, and then divorced like this, less than a day!" He sighed long and covered his face and said, "Why does this happen to me? I have an 'ex-wife' in my resume? I have never touched her!"

"Hahaha..." Wang Yang sat on the sofa next to him with his feet crossed, laughing quietly. He looked at Jessica who was walking with an ice pack and smiled, "Scarlett Jackson!" Jessica smiled unhappily and handed them the two ice packs to them. While Wang Yang applied the ice pack to his forehead, he smiled, "Joshua, Scarlett is actually quite spicy, maybe you should just be together, right? Don't get divorced."

Joshua gritted his teeth and said, "If that was Johnson!" He covered his ice bag with his eyes and said resentfully: "I don't want to live anymore, I really don't want to live anymore."

"I don't know what to say about you two guys!" Jessica smiled and patted Wang Yang's arm, sat down beside him, and said, "Fortunately no one was injured." She looked at the tattoo on Joshua's arm and couldn't help but be amused, and smiled with teeth: "Why am I not a boy? In that case, I can do these crazy things too."

Joshua laughed and finally could laugh at others, saying, "You are a boy, Yang must be a gram!" Wang Yang smiled and said without saying anything; Jessica smiled with a handsome eyebrows, "So I'd better be a girl, do crazy things that belong to girls." She smiled and asked curiously, "What did you do last night, how could it be like this?"

After a night of crazy life, the four of them were sober and compensated the Caesar Palace Hotel. Joshua contacted his newlywed wife with his mobile phone, confessed to the mistake and agreement, and divorced a few days later, and the four of them returned to Los Angeles. They were all dizzy and exhausted. Naturally, they did not drive back, but took an hour of dizziness. Wang Yang and Joshua were then taken back to Beverly Hills by the driver. Until now, they were still in pain at around 4 pm.

Although he had a headache, Wang Yang's head was very clear, but many of the memories of last night were fragmented, buried in the long river of memories waiting to be excavated or completely forgotten. He frowned and said, "Well, I can only remember a part of it... We couldn't reveal the farewell to the bachelor's party to the girls, but Jessica, now you should treat you as our brother."

"Thank you!" Jessica hugged her fists with a bold heart, kissed him on the cheek, and smiled sweetly, "Brother!" Joshua immediately shouted, "Don't irritate me, I can't see anything about love now! Otherwise I'll go crazy." Jessica spread her right hand and smiled, "Please."

Wang Yang smiled and turned his eyes, covered the cold ice pack on his forehead, and said while thinking, "Do you still listen? We arrived in Las Vegas and started drinking in the hotel room. I don't know how many bottles I drank... I think when we walked out of the room, all four of us were drunk, Joshua, right?"

"I don't know, I must be drunk..." Joshua also recalled, and vague memories came like a tide and said, "Then we went to the casino, and they exchanged 10,000 chips. I remember this number, because only I exchanged 500 pieces, shit..." Wang Yang nodded and said, "You said at the time, 'I want to make a sports car!'"

Jessica Ha laughed, and Joshua sighed without refuting: "Yang said slot machines are lies, don't play; roulettes are lies, don't play... In the end, we all went to play blackjack, but Tom and Zachary were not very lucky, and the money was lost soon. But Yang, this guy, I have to admit it!" He gave a thumbs up and smiled: "He is very good at gambling, has good luck, and has won a lot of money. Another time, Black Jack! Young said he is that... who?"

"What?" Wang Yang thought for a while, and some memories suddenly flashed through his head, and he smiled and said, "Jeff-Ma!" Joshua nodded repeatedly and said, "Yes, yes, that's Jeff-Ma! Then we left the hotel and prepared to go to other places to play. For some reason, we went to the tattoo shop, in the tattoo shop..."

He suddenly stopped when he said this, as if he had remembered something. Wang Yang also glared at him. The two of them looked at each other and could not say to their brothers anymore. Wang Yang took the speech and said, "Joshua had tattooed the portrait of Jesus, and then I couldn't figure it out... My head hurts very much." He closed his eyes in discomfort, and Joshua also said in pain: "Me too! But my heart hurts even more, I don't want to live anymore!"

Jessica nodded without caring, thinking about their words just now, and suddenly asked, "Who is Jeff Horse?" Joshua said in certainty: "A novelist? A book that teaches people to gambling?" Wang Yang couldn't help but smile and said, "No, it was his true story adapted into a novel by Ben Mozridge. At that time, Jeff Horse was a student of MIT and was preparing to attend Harvard Medical School. One day, he was pulled into a secret organization by two classmates, MIT 21 points group."

The members of this group (mit-blackjack-team) are all geniuses who are very good at numerical measurement. They study card counting skills at 21 o'clock, learn from each other, and use calm and high IQ numbers to manipulate the gambling table. They go to the casino every weekend and weekend, and sometimes win more than 900,000 US dollars in one night, becoming a nightmare for casinos in Las Vegas.

The casinos will naturally not remain indifferent. The technology in the mid-1990s was not that advanced, with only ordinary monitors; and these top students were not ordinary gamblers. They always disguised themselves as various people, athletes, businessmen... They played around with the private detectives they hired. After a long period of time of cats and mice, Jeff Ma and others won for nearly 10 million US dollars, and the private detectives gradually pieced together a little clue and locked their identities with the monitor.

After his luggage was exposed, Jeff Ma and others were blacklisted by Las Vegas and nearly 100 casinos across the United States and refused to let them enter the casino. Although it was not illegal to count cards, the court also supported this judgment. Jeff Ma and others captured Las Vegas and were also expelled by the city. However, they are all living well now and continue to be elites in other industries. The legendary stories of that year were also revised and published.

"That's it. All the casinos are afraid of them, and no one dares to let them in and gamble." Wang Yang sighed and laughed: "It's so majestic!"

Joshua was quite excited and said excitedly: "So that's the case, unbelievable! This is the real story? Cool! I really want to see the expressions of those casino owners at that time, it must be very exciting!" Jessica frowned in confusion and asked with a smile: "Well, this is cool! But no one in those casinos beat them? I don't know, but there will always be something in the movie."

"Yes, there are also in the book." Wang Yang shrugged, of course to increase the storyline, and said: "But there is no in reality. Jeff Ma said that they have never been treated rudely, but were just kicked out by casino employees." He smiled and said: "Think about it, those people are geniuses of mit, and it is not illegal to count cards. They will not let themselves suffer that kind of loss. In fact, there is a lot of content in that book that is different from reality. There is a professor in the book..."

In the book "The Capture of Las Vegas", the protagonist Kevin Lewis (Jeff Horse) cannot afford the $300,000 he went to Harvard Medical School, fictional; then he was tempted by a professor at MIT to pull into the group, the professor made it; they were beaten and fictional...

"Yeah." Jessica nodded as she heard this. Joshua suddenly remembered something, held up, and said happily: "Yang, I seem to remember you said you wanted to make it into a movie? Man, this is definitely a good story!" Jessica was stunned and said: "Yang, really? But you just finished filming "The Ninth District."

"I have a lot of time, right? This is a good story! I can shoot it, not necessarily now, but I will." Wang Yang smiled and felt very excited. This idea came out yesterday. It was now pierced there, and it was pierced very strongly! He turned to look at Jessica and smiled, "Sweetheart, can you go to the study to help me get that book? "Conquer Las Vegas" is on the desk, thank you!"

Jessica said ok, then stood up and left. Wang Yang thought for a while, and suddenly asked, "Joshua, how do you feel when you hear the story of Jeff-Ma and the others?"

"Does it need to be said?" Joshua was surprised and spread his hands, then shouted loudly, saying, "That's incredible! Cool! I know now that they were not beaten, they were doing well, and it was even cooler! You know that this is very incredible, but it is really happening. Several people made all the casinos in Las Vegas, but everyone can't do anything to them, they can still be free and easy..." He said with emotion: "What kind of people are that?"

"It's very good, very good!" Wang Yang smiled and clenched his fists, but he was still a little weak, and said with a smile: "I think this is the first impression it gives to the audience, the expectations it gives to the audience! This is a core."

At this time, Jessica walked back with a book and handed it to him. Wang Yang opened it and asked, "Hey, if you were asked to shoot this story, what would you do? What would you do?" He turned the page and looked at it casually, saying, "This story has a lot of room to play. It's OK to shoot it into a biopic of Jeff-Ma; it's OK to shoot it into a drama film of several people, serious, serious, funny, and even a campus film..."

Joshua took off the ice pack, frowned and said, "I don't know, maybe it's made into a funny movie? No, no! I feel wrong. I want to make a cool, exciting movie. How did Jeff Ma and the others sweep the casino, and the bosses look furious!"

"Me?" Jessica tilted her head, thought for a while, and said, "If I want to film, I will probably win the worst movie award for Golden Solid Mai. But I will be unserious, not for the sake of funny dramas." She smiled and said, "What I am very interested in is how they did it? Those skills of calculating cards, as well as the makeup, code language gestures you mentioned, etc., I just think this is very interesting."

"I understand, as you wish!" Wang Yang nodded seriously, then turned his eyes to the book, and smiled, "I want to think carefully for a while." Joshua lay down on the sofa after hearing this, and said, "Then I'm going to sleep." Jessica nodded, stood up and said, "Then I'll go out to the supermarket to buy something. There is no food in the refrigerator. You can take care of yourself." After she said that, she picked up the handbag on the coffee table and walked out.

Looking at the book in his hand and thinking about the true story of Jeff Horse, Wang Yang slowly fell into deep thought.

This legendary story can be made into many types, and when he returned home today, he watched a future movie called "Black Decision Blackjack" in his mind, which was modified from this book and this story. The movie became a drama film, but it was completely screwed up. He had to say that the movie was mediocre, boring, and lost patience to watch, and was called a bad movie, which completely wasted this subject. (The positive review rate of Rotten Tomatoes was 35%, and the metacritic score was 48, with a full score of 100).

"Decisive Blackjack" failed to grasp the focus and core of the story, and lost its supposedly characteristic, the characteristics of those first reactions to the story.

First of all, there are some "high IQ details", the operation of the entire group, card counting skills, code words, gestures, and how they tease the casino and play cat and mouse games with private detectives... "How did they do it?" But in the movie, these are all avoided and light, and the stories on the gambling table are actually swept through with fast shots, without professionalism, without high IQ, and the genius team has not played a role... The characteristics of this story originally belonged to this story have become some gimmicks that look very stiff.

It also did not understand the positioning of the enemy. There should be only one enemy in the group, that is, the casino, and private detectives who fight with them. Instead of insidious and money-loving professors, or those boring and clichéd internal contradictions.

The positioning of the enemy determines the focus and direction of the story, and also determines what the story wants to say. In "Decisive Blackjack", perhaps what it wants to say is that it is wrong to get rich overnight without any effort. These are ultimately unretainable. So in the end, the professor, the protagonist and the group both lost the money and became "nothing" people, returning to their original life.

This is the most unbearable! The gambling idea that gets nothing for nothing is wrong, but it does not apply to this story. Those people are not gambling, not breaking the law, but counting cards. What they want to show wisdom, not preaching. In fact, it does not need to be so complicated at all. There is no need to add those heavy things to this story. The more they add it, the more mediocre it becomes, and the more they lose its true legend.

The protagonist and others were fooled by the professor, caught and beaten by the casino security boss. In the end, the protagonist wanted to work with the security boss to calculate the professor, and then be plotted by the security boss and had nothing... This is not only a cool problem, but also a problem that completely violates the audience's expectations for it, which is simply angering.

The amazingness of the Jeff Horse and mit-21 points group is that the story is attractive. It is a magic that really happens. It is they fooling the casinos, they captured Las Vegas, and they swept away ten million! It forces the casinos to blacklist them helplessly. The big winners from beginning to end are all these MIT students.

The core of this story is "a group of high IQ geniuses conquered Las Vegas, and they laughed to the end." Those professionalism and high IQ are all things that are naturally cool; sweeping casinos and playing with private detectives are its natural climax. This should be a movie that makes people excited to watch.

"I can't do this..." Wang Yang murmured to himself, and then flipped through a few pages of the book. He had some ideas in his mind. He wanted to write a cool, professional script to grasp the core of the story. Obviously, this is not a work that can be completed in one or two days. He thought he needed to contact Jeff Ma, Ben Mozridge, and some experts and professors who could provide professional help, private detectives and others.

But who will play Jeff Ma? Thinking of this question, Wang Yang frowned. In the future "Black Winning Blackjack", the protagonist became a white Ben Campbell, and in the end he was naturally a white actor, which is another big bad point. In some related reports, this change has aroused great dissatisfaction and protests from the Asian community.

Because in reality, Jeff Ma, nicknamed "Intel Chip", is the most important member of the group who ushered in the peak changes; and most of the members of the group are Asians. As a result, in "Decision Blackjack", Jeff Ma is white; the five-person team has two Asians, one with no image, and the other is a boy who is greedy for small gains and likes to steal things. One of the typical Asian screen images, a wretched thief.

Jeff Ma's approach to change this has caused Asian netizens to denounce him as a "racial traitor" and declare that he would not watch this trash movie; while Jeff Ma said: "I value the talent of the actor more. If the film company just finds an Asian actor, such as a Japanese or a Korean, to play me, it would be a greater insult."

This situation will not happen in his movies. Jeff Ma is a Chinese, and the protagonist on the screen must be a Chinese. If it is considered an honor to conquer Las Vegas with wisdom, then this honor is also a Chinese! Why are Chinese always villains, despicable and mean? Even the real story will be snatched by white people to act? If one day a long time later, someone suddenly goes crazy and wants to film "Miqi Yang", would he also find a white person to act?

Unreasonable! Jeff Jockey Club is a new screen image of Chinese people. The positive role is no longer limited to Kung Fu. Chinese people do not only Kung Fu, but also a handsome, high IQ, and charming MIT genius. This is also one of the reasons why he strongly wants to shoot this story.

In reality, Jeff Ma is very honest and not handsome; but in the movie, he must be handsome. Where can I find such a "Jeff Ma"? A tall and handsome actor with high IQ and genius temperament, good acting skills, and can play a 21-year-old young man? Moreover, his English is also very good. Although Wang Yang himself can speak Chinese, the male protagonist must interact with other actors and communicate with some people in the crew. To do this, you must have enough English level.

The best thing is that he is a Chinese American who grew up in the United States. There are several reasons. The first is the accent. The actor with an American accent is more Jeff Ma, and he is more accepted by the market. Similarly, his identity is the same, which can alleviate the market's arrogance and prejudice to a certain extent; but the more important reason is that a Chinese who is familiar with American culture obviously has a profound understanding of the script and the character shaping, and has that style.

But where to find it? Wang Yang understands that he is absolutely impossible to find in Hollywood. There are no Chinese child stars here, and there is a lack of opportunities and space for Chinese actors to grow and survive. Therefore, his eyes can only look to Greater China, where there is the soil for Chinese people, which also attracts Chinese people to return to develop.

Although he is almost 22 years old and has not been to Greater China once, Wang Yang is no stranger to Hong Kong, because he grew up watching Hollywood movies on the one hand and Hong Kong movies on the other hand. Hong Kong movies have its great characteristics and charm. Quentin Tarantino is one of the hardcore fans, and his film style is also deeply influenced by Hong Kong movies.

When I was a child, many Hong Kong films were shocked by him. Those unique lens techniques, such as many eye contact without lines, and silent collisions, made him exclaim, "It turns out that movies can be shot like this!" In terms of gambling movies, it can be said that Hollywood and Hong Kong films are completely two types. Hong Kong films can always play a special profession very coolly, with a very textured texture, and exudes a "authentic" flavor, which is worth learning.

Of course, due to the market, cost and shooting cycle, Hong Kong films have a characteristic that a good film follows a bunch of bad films until the subject is shot to death. Wang Yang hasn't watched Hong Kong films for a long time, and he couldn't figure out whether there are any actors who are suitable for playing Jeff Ma. He shook his head, temporarily put this problem down in his heart, and said softly: "Okay, think about the heroine first."

In his initial idea, the movie was called "mit-21-team". The leader of this group is no longer a professor, and there will be no role as a professor. This not only conforms to reality, but also seems cooler: "We are geniuses, not a group of children led by teachers; this is our own idea, and no professor is needed."

The captain of this team, the leader, fell on the head of the heroine. She is the kind of very, very cool big sister, with a super IQ, close mind, calm, and extraordinary leadership... She is also the one who brings the hero into the gang.

In the team, she and the male protagonist are both big players, while the other three are card counters. The so-called "card counters" are their job to sit at a certain gambling table, calculate the cards of this table with the lowest bet in each game, accurately determine when that gambling table will be unfavorable to the dealer, and then send a signal to let the "big player" enter the game. The big players have higher card counting ability, are so calm that they are not affected by emotions, and are very lucky. Their task is to win money, so naturally the more they win, the better.

Card counters and big players are both mobile. When the card at the gambling table is "cold", it is when they change tables.

This big player who is both calm and crazy, a girl with a very cult charm... who is suitable? When this question arises in Wang Yang's heart, he has an answer the next moment. Looking at a smiley face that appears in front of him, he murmured: "Natali Portman...Natali!?" He thought about it seriously for a while, and suddenly laughed: "Oh my God, who else is more suitable than her?"

In terms of the movie itself, Natalie's acting skills are undoubtedly, and this role is very suitable for her, almost tailor-made; she is a Harvard college student and Queen Amidala, and has the screen persuasion and appearance of a high IQ sister.

From the perspective of market considerations, her extremely high popularity of "national idol" and her extraordinary status in the hearts of popular movie fans are of great help to "mit-21-team". After all, the Chinese male protagonist is a big element of "box office poison", which is not a kung fu movie. It is a delusion to suddenly digest and accept the market in an all-round way; on the other hand, the more it sells, the more confidence it can give to the market, at least it proves that Chinese are not only kung fu once.

So this movie requires a heroine with strong market appeal to support the team. So who is more suitable than Natalie Portman?

Thinking of this, Wang Yang immediately closed the book and picked up the phone on the coffee table with great enthusiasm. Regardless of the time now, he dialed directly into Natali's number, beeped a few times and then connected. He smiled and said, "Hey, Natali!"

"Wow!" Natalie over there shouted in surprise, and then said, "Brother, you call me on your own initiative? This is the time! What kind of festival is today? Happy Natalie's holiday?"

Wang Yang smiled and leaned on the sofa, pressed his painful forehead, and said excitedly: "Don't worry about those shit, man, you have to leave some time for me!" He thought about the plan for this movie and a series of other things to do, and said: "I don't know the exact time now. It should be after October this year. I need you to join me in a movie, the heroine."

"Um..." Natalie responded without objection, her mouth facing the phone was already curled up, and she asked in a drag voice: "What kind of movie is that?"

"Please!" Wang Yang laughed impatiently, picked up the water cup and took a sip of water, and said with a decision: "You have to agree no matter what movie!" Natalie couldn't help but laugh, making a quick "um, uh" sound, and then said: "Okay, I agree! It's definitely not a porn anyway." Wang Yang pretended to be relaxed and said: "I've taken the bait! What are you sure of? This time I'm going to shoot that one."

Natalie seemed to be surprised and said, "Really? Cool! Who is my partner?" Wang Yang smiled, ignored her question, and said seriously: "Actually, this is a movie about high IQ gambling. The name is now called "mit-21-team". Do you play blackjack? Do you know if you want to count cards? Jeff-Ma?"

"What do you think?" Natalie's voice was full of anger and said, "You don't know that many people think that Natalie is an old antique playing chess?" She laughed and said, "I played it at blackjack, but I don't know much about card counting and Jeff-Ma."

Wang Yang nodded, then told her some preliminary ideas and role settings, and finally said, "Anyway, that's all now. If you have time, you should read the book "Conquer Las Vegas" first, and learn about card counting. You know you are the captain, so cultivate that boss temperament!" Natalie on the other side smiled and said, "Okay, I will! Shenqi Yang, can I still get that damn Oscar nomination this time?"

"Oh, I don't know!" Wang Yang laughed, Oscar? He shrugged, "Maybe. This character doesn't have so many award-winning elements, but you can do it well, maybe you have a chance." Natalie's tone became indifferent again, and she said, "Whatever! But man, I know I'm going to have another bucket of popcorn prize in my bedroom."

After talking to her for a few more words, he ended the call to confirm the candidate for the heroine of "mit-21-team", happily threw away his phone, steadily caught it, and smiled: "Do it!"

At this time, with a cough, Joshua, who was lying on the main sofa, sat up, looked at Wang Yang without blinking, and pointed his eyes at both fingers and crossed over, saying harshly: "Yang, I'm staring at you!" Wang Yang looked at him and smiled and said, "Scarlett Jackson." Joshua immediately bounced back and took a deep breath; Wang Yang repeated the sentence "Scarlett Jackson", and Joshua neighed and gritted his teeth, "Scarlett Jackson", and he screamed: "Say it again, I'll commit suicide immediately!"

"Hahaha--" Wang Yang let out a burst of unscrupulous laughter and silently recited "Jackson" to him. Joshua hurriedly closed his eyes and changed the subject and said, "You really want to shoot that Jeff-Ma movie?"

Wang Yang smiled and nodded, "Of course, give me a reason not to shoot?" He picked up the water cup and drank a sip of water, moistening his dry throat, and said, "But that movie should be taken slowly, and the script and storyboards must be considered carefully; and before that, I will make another movie, "Hangover".

Joshua suddenly opened his eyes and said in surprise: "There is another one? Wow, it's really like the newspaper's written, the high-speed magical Yang is coming back?" He waved his fist excitedly and smiled: "man, you are cooler than Jeff Horse! So what story does this movie make? Drunk?"

"What happened to us yesterday." Wang Yang smiled, and Joshua was stunned for a moment and said, "What does it mean?" Wang Yang spread his hands with a smile on his face, and said, "It's what happened yesterday. A man was going to get married and then bid farewell to the bachelor party. Four men ran to Las Vegas to get drunk and crazy. Imagine that after we woke up this morning, Tom disappeared, but the wedding will be held one day later! What should we do? We have to find Tom!"

He picked up the ice bag next to him and smashed it at Joshua, and continued to laugh, "But you see, the three of us were drunk and didn't remember exactly what happened last night, so we had to rely on clues to restore the truth about the crazy night. A lot of crazy things continued to happen in the middle. Finally, we found Tom and the wedding was completed smoothly. That's it."

"You mean..." Joshua frowned in confusion and said, "Are you saying that my marriage will be brought to the big screen?" Wang Yang laughed a few times before nodding, "Yes, of course! This is one of the contents, it's so interesting! Also, there will be card counting in it, let's mention Jeff Ma and the others. I think this is to promote "mit-21-team" first. When it comes to promoting it in the future, you don't have to spend so much effort to explain what card counting is."

But Joshua was not interested in publicity. He only knew that this would promote his marriage! He took a few breaths of anger and said, "No, Yang! You can't do that, what movie will do that!? Unbelievable!"

"Brother, just a funny comedy movie." Wang Yang smiled and lay down on the sofa, looking at the snow-white ceiling, and said to himself: "Joshua, do you know? I'm going to have a good time this time!"

For most of last year, he was entangled with some sad things; in order to better grasp the story, he was a little too deeply involved in the entire filming of "The Ninth District", lonely, depressed and sad, and his mood was always bad, bad... And last night's indulgence gave him a real chance to vent. He had already remembered it, pushed the sofa down, smashed the TV, and messed up the entire presidential suite... It was all his credit.

This also gave him a strong desire to continue playing like this and make a funny movie! No matter so many shit, it's just for fun and funny!

"Can I get rid of my marriage?" Joshua asked unwillingly. Seeing Wang Yang shook his head, he immediately wailed and gritted his teeth, "I'll commit suicide now, I'll commit suicide now!" At this time, Jessica, carrying bags and two bags of things, walked in. When she heard her brother's words, she asked with a puzzled smile: "What's wrong with you?" Joshua wiped his eyes without tears and said sadly: "It's time to ask your boyfriend what's wrong! He's going to make another funny movie, why!"
Chapter completed!