The Development of Chinese Fantasy Films Based on the Evolution of Digital Technology: A Study on the Stylistic Transformation of Director Urshan’s Works
Published Online: Feb 05, 2025
Received: Sep 14, 2024
Accepted: Jan 09, 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/amns-2025-0077
Keywords
© 2025 Simeng Wang, published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
The modernity of the fantasy movie not only has its historical origin but also meets the expectations of the human heart since ancient times. “The East and the West have the same psychology, the South and the North have the same art, and the Tao has not yet been split.” For all mankind, all kinds of fantasy art forms are attractive and easy to produce aesthetic identity. Especially fantasy movies, which are rich in the spectacle of sound and picture effects, but also fantasy literature is incomparable to the expression of the text. In line with this, the study of fantasy films has gradually become a hot spot in film theory [1-3].
In the past one hundred years of Chinese movie history, fantasy movies started earlier and had experienced a period of development with ups and downs. Due to the limitations of technology budget and other conditions, its quantity and quality have been affected to a certain extent, resulting in many fantasy movies failing to reach the international level in terms of production. Since the new century, the reform of film industrialization has been in full swing, the market has been fully activated, and commercial genre films have begun to flourish [4-6].
Along with the extensive use of virtual image technology, the god and monster films, fairy films, ghost films, etc., which have been absent for many years, have been able to reappear, and the treasure hunting films, crossing films, and magical films, which are borrowed from the West, have entered the market to test the water. This batch of genre films, which structure transcendent time and space, portray supernatural characters, and provide surreal stories, are now named by the universal concept of “fantasy film”, and some scholars even call the new millennium the first year of “fantasy film” [7-8]. On the one hand, the reform of the film industry after the new millennium has led to continuous breakthroughs in media technology, audience demand, film investment, distribution and projection. Against this background, Chinese fantasy movies have gradually recovered and especially achieved great success at the box office and word-of-mouth. On the other hand, the vigorous development and barbaric growth of fantasy movies once created a complex and varied chaotic situation due to the proliferation of themes and crude imitations.
Nevertheless, people’s desire to explore the mysterious and fantastical world not only never faded but also showed a stronger impulse, which largely promoted the innovation and development of fantasy movies [9-10]. Chinese fantasy movies strive to create more realistic and shocking visual effects, creating a more immersive viewing experience. Obviously, only under the premise of technological development as well as cultural fusion and by tapping into the advanced experience of the world’s fantasy movie development can we open up a diversified and multi-dimensional space for innovative fantasy movies [11-12].
As one of the new directors in China, Ulshan is a representative of the creation of magic martial arts movies. His movie works have often become box office dark horses in the domestic movie situation in recent years, and his movies have consecutively set new movie box office records as of 2016 and have become the second domestic Chinese movie box office ranking. Although there are only three films listed by Urshan, they have concentrated on the development trend of today’s movies and have a certain research value for the development of movies [13-14]. The gradual formation of magical martial arts films, both associated with traditional martial arts and borrowing new film technology, is not only a localized development path in the formation process of Chinese contemporary genre films but also a bold attempt and innovation in the creation of traditional Chinese martial arts films in terms of genre. The booming development of virtual reality technology and film and television digital special effects technology makes the film industry enter a golden period in the context of the gradual improvement of the film and television industry. Just like the magic movie popularity in Hollywood, the magic martial arts movies directed by Ulshan became the domestic box office favorite is the industrial properties of the film and the commercial properties of the film [15-16].
The concepts and types of fantasy films have always been subject to different opinions, but the spatial consciousness and illusory realm in their images are worth exploring, and the development of spatial consciousness and continuous artistic creation always accompany the fantasy images they display. Although Hollywood fantasy blockbusters have greatly influenced Chinese fantasy films since the new century, they have begun to form spatial constructions with unique Chinese characteristics that are different from the Western model in their continuous exploration, evolution and practice. Yang, X elaborated on the kernel and essence of fantasy films and pointed out that Chinese fantasy films need to be based on national and local cultural characteristics, pay attention to humanistic expression, and give more value connotations to fantasy films in the process of going to the international arena [17]. Using focus group research methodology, Su, W revealed that Hollywood movies stimulate the imagination of young Chinese people to look dialectically at the ideological core of their own culture and society and to think about the ideal society and value system for which they strive [18]. Wang, C. Y examines and analyzes contemporary children’s fantasy works in China based on a feminist perspective, arguing that these fantasy works promote the formation of new subject relations and that these new subject relations are transformed by replacing the rejection and domination between men and women with understanding and tolerance between them [19]. Yang, J et al. analyzed The Great Wall, a Chinese fantasy film. Compared with the Western monster genre of fantasy films, the Chinese monsters symbolize the greed of human nature, while the West focuses more on the thinking about science and technology triggered through the monsters, which demonstrates the complex dynamics of the relationship between China’s local and the global in a cross-cultural context [20]. Thompson, K describes the development and transformation of fantasy cinema with The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings film series, noting that in recent years, fantasy cinema has focused more and more on the development and use of special effects in film [21].
Since the twenty-first century, with the continuous development of digital technology and its deepening application in film art, digital technology has strongly promoted the innovation of film visual art and prompted the film industry to enter a period of change. Wang, J et al. talked about the practice of digital technology in the field of film media, such as human-computer interaction technology, wearable clothing, etc., and argued that it is necessary to combine the film media in order to understand the concept of fashion and to think of a path to convey the design concepts of digital technology-based based wearable device design concepts to be communicated to the user’s path [22]. Burghardt M et al. examined issues related to digital humanities and filmmaking, proposing the use of computer-assisted analysis techniques for complementarity as a basis for a deeper understanding and orientation towards the idea of DH [23]. Bešlagić, L introduces the desktop documentary, a prose film variant with computer technology as the core logic, emphasizes the digital technological advantages of this film form, and concludes with an in-depth discussion in the context of analyses and evaluations by film experts [24]. Zhang, W et al. explored the performance of virtual reality technology as well as film and television post-production special effects technology in film and television animation production and concluded that these digital technologies had improved the production efficiency and cost-effectiveness of film and television works to a certain extent, and finally, the future development trend of these film and television digital technologies and the potential application scenarios were comprehensively analyzed [25]. Haleem, A et al. analyzed the practice and characteristics of digital media technology in film and television animation design, and on this basis, deeply analyzed the characteristics of the digital media animation system and the functions of each module and concluded that the application of digital technology in film and television animation media improves the quality and level of film and television animation creation, and there is a need to further promote the digital construction of film and television animation production [26].
The new generation of Chinese filmmakers represented by Ulshan is gradually opening a new chapter of Chinese fantasy films with the fullest industry enthusiasm and the most rational industrial production thinking. In this paper, we take director Wuerxian’s fantasy works as the object of style transmutation analysis, construct the observation matrix of the main narrative elements of director Wuerxian’s works, and calculate the correlation coefficient matrix after the standardisation of the original data. The eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the matrix are analysed by the Jacobi method, and then the key narrative elements in the film are extracted according to the principal component analysis method, reflecting the stylistic characteristics of the film. In this study, after analyzing the basic situation of word-of-mouth and box office for six works directed by Urshan, we quantitatively analyze the data of the shots and audio-visual language used in the films. Using principal component analysis to analyse the main narrative elements of the work, such as dialogue and confrontational fights, and at the same time exploring the variations of digital special effects in different films, we reflect the stylistic transmutation of director Urshan’s work from two aspects.
The field of fantasy cinema is a relatively new genre concept in the spectrum of Chinese-language film themes, and the definition of fantasy cinema, its main content, and its artistic style are still under discussion in Chinese film academia. Among them, Cheng Bo’s viewpoint is universal: “In fantasy films, there are empty worlds that embody independent worldviews, or worlds that are superimposed on or intersect with the real world. The supernatural things in them cannot be explained by science, but exist as an established ‘reality’, and the subject matter of its stories generally combines supernatural, human unpredictable or imaginary things.” It is on the basis of such an initial market foundation for the fantasy genre that Chinese-language filmmakers have gone forward to open up the frontier of fantasy-themed films that belong to China’s local characteristics.
It is not difficult to find that, in addition to a series of explorations in the channels of release, promotion strategy and production process, in the selection of narrative content, the 5,000 years of Chinese civilisation have provided inexhaustible story materials for Chinese fantasy film themes, in which there are story materials such as adaptations of Journey to the West, Liaozhai Zhiqi, and Fengshen Yanyi, Shan Haijing, which have been passed down over the years by their literary achievements and even produced social influence across the borders, which is also an important resource for text adaptation of domestic fantasy films. Among them, story materials such as the adaptation of Journey to the West, Liaozhai Zhiyi, Fengshen Yanyi, and Shanhaijing, which have been passed down through the years by virtue of their literary achievements, and have even generated social influence across national borders have emerged, which is also an important resource for the adaptation of domestic fantasy film texts. Through this, these well-known classic stories and the fantasy characters who interpreted them formed the original ancient textual genealogy of Chinese fantasy films. The repeated interpretation of classic mythological novels causes the audience to become tired of the screen full of gods and goddesses and the narrative theme that is detached from the real world. Especially under the current global film industrialisation system, the level of visual effects of Chinese fantasy films is not as satisfactory as it should be, and coupled with the impact of Hollywood’s A-grade magical blockbusters, people have begun to resist this kind of domestic film. Therefore, Chinese filmmakers began to accelerate the pace of catching up with Hollywood fantasy films, and with the times, gradually achieved the innovative retrospect of classic texts and the construction of a new genealogy of the classical Chinese myths as a real-world mapping, which led the domestic audience into a magical space that is very different from the Western films, and better fulfilled the task of shaping the IP to meet the audience’s needs. At the same time, due to the fantasy theme of visual language level of large-scale production and large investment, forcing China’s visual effects production level of rapid growth, the film “Painted Skin 2” started the whole process of film industrialisation system also beginning to see the beginning.
In 2023, the fantasy epic film “Feudal Gods Part 1” directed by Urshan, went all the way against the box office [27], opening low and going high, in which a grand and mysterious world of the Feudal Gods was presented, and the film, supported by the more advanced visual effect technology, made the ancient legend come to life. At the same time, modern thinking is used to re-light the traditional story, as the epic structure of the classic Chinese mythological novel “Feng Shen Yan Yi” is woven into a magnificent scroll. This is not the first time that Ulshan has tried to make a modern interpretation of an ancient legend, as his previous fantasy films “Painted Skin 2” and “Dragon Quest” have shown a realist interpretation with a modern perspective in their different emotional categories.
In addition, Urshan is also particularly good at using capital to fulfill his personal authorial feelings, which is mainly reflected in his overall control and planning of the industrialization of production in fantasy films. Starting from small and medium budgets and gradually transitioning to blockbuster and even super-blockbuster productions through positive feedback from the market and word-of-mouth, Urshan should be said to be rational and in line with the film industry’s selection and requirements for commercial directors. Urshan stressed that his creation respects the technology and standardised process of the film industry, We didn’t do it by luck, by chance, or by “miracles”. Every step was thought out clearly, and the organization of all the commercial elements of the film, including the choice of the entire theme, was done rationally. It can be seen that the new generation of Chinese filmmakers represented by Ulsan is gradually opening a new chapter of Chinese genre films with the fullest industry enthusiasm and the most rational industrial production thinking. Personality, standard, fantasy, and reality have always been the most worthwhile theoretical significance in Urshan’s style of work. By analyzing Urshan’s representative fantasy films as stylistic texts, it can provide more detailed and novel creative ideas and theoretical research references for the creators of subsequent Chinese fantasy genre films.
In this paper, the concept of “function” is borrowed so that it can be studied and analysed according to the “function” of Urshan’s film and television works. The narrative structure of Urshan’s film and television works is divided into narrative elements [28], and each narrative element can be regarded as a unit of “function” in the film and television works, and the unchanging factors in the narrative elements can be observed through the details. No matter how the details (variables) change in the plot, as long as their basic role or function is the same, they can be summarized as the same “function”. Narrative elements are the ‘functional’ units of a film or television work. That is, the same kind of film structure content in the overall film and television story assumes the same function; the film plays a consistent role and effect. By categorizing film and television works according to narrative elements, different data about narrative elements can be obtained, which can be visualized and studied.
There are a variety of statistical methods in data mining. Principal component analysis [29] is aimed at replacing the correlated metrics by combining them into a new set of mutually uncorrelated composite metrics. The usual mathematical treatment is to linearly combine the original indicators to create a new composite indicator.
The observation matrix of the data set of narrative elements in Urshan film and television works is:
Where
In the second step, the sample correlation coefficient matrix is calculated:
For convenience, the correlation coefficients of the standardised data are assumed to be the same after standardisation of the original data:
In the third step, the eigenvalues
In the fourth step, select the significant principal components.
The principal component analysis can get
In the visual analysis of the key narrative elements of Urshan’s film works, the narrative elements are based on the method of Principal Component Analysis (PCA), which creates the first, second, third, fourth, fifth (or sixth) principal components, and defines these principal components as the key narrative elements. These key narrative elements, constructed based on fundamental components, play a central role in the composition of the entire film and television work and occupy a significant position. The characteristic of key narrative element data is that each type of key narrative element data plays the same “function” and role in the overall story and, at the same time, is the core structural part of the whole film. These key narrative elements can be regarded as the key “functions” of the film. By visualizing the position, duration, and sequence of several key narrative elements in each film, the narrative characteristics of each film can be clearly seen, which in turn reflect the stylistic characteristics of the film.
In order to better achieve the visualisation effect of key narrative elements and the independence of the data set, object-oriented technology can be used to establish two different objects for the visualisation graphics and data set. The data object is responsible for obtaining data from the data source, forming the visualization object through visual data mining, and then processing the visualization object to intuitively visualize the results. According to this mechanism, the film and television visualisation process model can be established, and the specific model design is shown in Figure 1. The first step is to carry out film and television data cleaning and filtering from the database of films directed by Urshan, to select the required film works with fantasy themes, and to form a film and television data warehouse. The second step involves artificial selection and analysis of changes in a large amount of data from these works to extract key narrative element data, so that the data objects constitute a basic data set. Finally, through visual data mining, using methods such as principal component analysis (statistical methods) and classification statistical methods, the obtained data objects are converted into visual objects, visualised and processed to form intuitive visual diagrams.
Visual process of film and television narrative elements
From 2004 to 2024, Ulsham directed a total of six films and TV productions, namely Soap Opera, Knife See Smile, Painted Skin II, Ghost Blowers’ Dragon Quest, Feudal Gods Part I and Under the Inhuman. The results of the public data collated on the box office, and word-of-mouth ratings of Ulsham’s directorial works from 2004 to 2023 are shown in Table 1. In terms of film ratings, a total of three works entered the 7-point sequence, namely Painted Skin II (7.4 points), Ghost Blows the Light and Seeks the Dragon (7.2 points), and Feudal Gods Part I (7.8 points). Painted Skin II raised the level of visual effects in Chinese cinema to a new level, while Ghost Blows the Light to Find the Dragon is considered a superior film in terms of both production standards and narrative ability, much higher than the more popular Heroes, which scored 6.5, Ambush on Ten Faces, which scored 5.7, and Peace Wheel, which scored 5.4, as well as Journey to the West to Vampire, which was just released in 2017, which scored 6.0. This shows that the Urshan-directed spectacle film has not only broken through in terms of production standards but has also steadily improved in terms of audience reputation. The rating of “Beneath the Inhuman” is the lowest among these 6 films, not even reaching the passing score of 6 (5.2). The Inhumans Underneath was filmed in a way that the entire film was shot in special IMAX, perfectly recreating the wide-open scenes from the stop-motion comics. The reason for the lower word-of-mouth rating may be due to the fact that the film is adapted from a manga created by manga artist Mi Er and released on online platforms (originally titled “One Man Below”), which has been serialised since 2013 and has been a huge hit with young people in China due to its unique worldview, the image of a hot-blooded teenager and the oriental culture that runs through the whole story, making the film version unacceptable to the majority of manga enthusiasts. Judging from the box office figures, “Feudal God Part I” successfully topped the box office list of director Urshan’s film and television productions with more than 2.634 billion yuan, which is a world of difference compared to Hero’s 429 million yuan. If the inflation rate is taken into account, the box office amount of “Fengshen Part 1” has to be doubled at least ten times, and its box office record is beyond the reach of domestic filmmakers in a short period of time. As the prelude to the “Feudal Trilogy”, the film “Feudal Part 1”, under the saturated market of film and television works on the subject of the Feudal God, is a brand-new adaptation of the literature of the Feudal God with the self-positioning of a “mythological epic”. While finding the fulcrum of traditional culture, the film also presents popular characteristics in terms of content setting, value orientation, aesthetic art, etc., conveying the spirit of traditional culture to the audience to the greatest extent possible, and exploring a brand-new contemporary universe of the Feudal Deities.
The box office and word of mouth of the director Wuershan
| Year | Title | Douban score | Box office (10,000yuan) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2004 | “A soap opera” | 6.4 | 1564.26 |
| 2011.3.17 | “The knife laughs” | 5.9 | 2233.31 |
| 2012.6.28 | “Painted skin Ⅱ” | 7.4 | 70210.58 |
| 2015.12.18 | “Legend of the Dragon Seeker” | 7.2 | 168274.19 |
| 2023.7.20 | “Feng shen trilogy” | 7.8 | 263400.99 |
| 2024.7.26 | “Under person of extraordinary talents” | 5.2 | 6012.34 |
Before analyzing the style of director Urshan’s works, the six films are quantitatively analyzed first. The data of each film are averaged out, and based on these data, we will explain the style of the films of director Urshan, and explore the differences in style between the different films of director Urshan.
The results of the quantitative analysis of the audiovisual language of the films are shown in Table 2, and the results of the analysis of the camera movement style and the scene are shown in Table 3. A-F in the table represents the results of the analyses of Soap Opera, Knife Seeing Smile, Painted Skin II, Ghost Blowing Lamp of the Dragon Quest, Seal of the Gods Part I, and Beneath the Inhuman, respectively. From a quantitative point of view, Beneath the Inhuman shows the most prominent data characteristics in terms of audiovisual language, occupying six of the most, namely the lowest average shot length ASL (6.1), the lowest middle shot length MSL (4.1), the lowest share of aerials (0.2%), the lowest share of close-ups (6.3%), the lowest density of lines (0.62) and the highest density of music (0.36). In this film, confrontational fight scenes occupy the largest space, thus resulting in a faster-paced film. Generally speaking, films with more empty scenes also tend to have a relatively slower pace. Therefore, a fast-paced film corresponds to the lowest percentage of empty scenes and correspondingly more fixed shots. The next film with significant data features is Soap Opera, which has the lowest percentage of stunt switching, the highest percentage of close-ups, and the lowest music density. As a realistic film, Soap Opera uses the least amount of stunt switching (2.05%) to eliminate editing traces as much as possible, so that the audience can be immersed in the film’s story. The lowest music density (0.25%) also highlights the film’s restoration of the film’s realism, and the Soap Opera’s storyline is already moving enough so that it doesn’t need to use too much music to set the mood. The highest percentage of close-ups (15.0%) also shows the film’s focus on portraying the characters’ emotions, thus revealing the complexity of the characters’ journeys. Painted Skin II has the highest ASL (8.4) and MSL (5.8). The slow pace of the film, coupled with the low density of lines and the high level of stunt switching, creates a slow and subdued effect.
Film measurement analysis results (Audio-visual language)
| Film number | ASL | MSL | Shear amplitude | Line density | Music density | Switching mode (%) | Lens Angle (%) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Direct | Special effects | Flat | Pitch | Stooping | ||||||
| A | 7.5 | 5.7 | 75.0 | 0.74 | 0.25 | 97.95 | 2.05 | 60.45 | 10.83 | 28.72 |
| B | 6.2 | 4.6 | 60.5 | 0.66 | 0.28 | 95.35 | 4.65 | 71.4 | 10.58 | 18.02 |
| C | 8.4 | 5.8 | 87.1 | 0.64 | 0.29 | 87.82 | 12.18 | 67.42 | 11.96 | 20.62 |
| D | 6.6 | 5.4 | 57.2 | 0.72 | 0.30 | 85.72 | 14.28 | 72.52 | 12.13 | 15.35 |
| E | 6.6 | 5.1 | 64.4 | 0.76 | 0.32 | 92.31 | 7.69 | 64.7 | 16.19 | 19.11 |
| F | 6.1 | 4.1 | 81.5 | 0.62 | 0.36 | 89.73 | 10.27 | 65.9 | 15.62 | 18.48 |
Film measurement analysis results (Lens motion and picture)
| Film number | Lens motion mode (%) | Image failure (%) | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fixup | Motion | Synthesize | Far | Completeness | Medium | Near | Special | Empty mirror | |
| A | 69.2 | 19.2 | 11.6 | 2.9 | 13.1 | 30.6 | 36.4 | 15.0 | 2.0 |
| B | 57.3 | 34.8 | 7.9 | 3.5 | 8.5 | 32.1 | 33.2 | 7.7 | 15 |
| C | 67.7 | 22.9 | 9.4 | 4.3 | 11.8 | 35.9 | 31.6 | 12.8 | 3.6 |
| D | 61.3 | 28.5 | 10.2 | 5.8 | 11.1 | 31.5 | 34.7 | 9.5 | 7.4 |
| E | 66.1 | 21.7 | 12.2 | 2.4 | 8.0 | 40.9 | 36.8 | 10.3 | 1.6 |
| F | 65.3 | 24.3 | 10.4 | 6.8 | 15.4 | 31.9 | 39.4 | 6.3 | 0.2 |
This paper analyzes the stylistic transformation of Urshan’s directorial work in terms of narrative elements and digital effects.
The main narrative elements of the film were extracted and analysed using the principal component analysis method proposed above, and the results of the analysis of the main narrative elements obtained are shown in Figure 2. A-F in the figure represents the analysis results of Soap Opera, Knife Seeing Smile, Painted Skin II, Ghost Blows the Light and Seeks the Dragon, Seal of the Gods Part I, and Beneath the Inhuman, respectively. As early as the beginning of the 21st century, Chinese cinema was characterised by a focus on the creation of “scenes” and an emphasis on visual style. In terms of dialogue and narrative elements, the highest percentage of Urshan’s works is 39% in “Ghost Blows the Wind and Seeks the Dragon”, which is a typical adventure film, and in addition to the plot style of the adventure genre, every twist and turn in the film is strictly designed in accordance with the Hollywood commercial genre. The two films, The Blade Seeing Smile and Painted Skin II have vast and exquisite landscape shots, with landscape elements accounting for 33% and 23%, respectively, but to a certain extent, they ignore the participation of other film elements. The spatial, spectacle-inducing display of the plot is less involved in the process of narrative representation, the temporal logic of the narrative is often fragmented by the “landscape”, and depth and meaning are replaced by a sense of representational formality. In the process of adapting The Inhumans, directed by Urshan in 2024, the first difficulty was how to condense the original’s complex story and numerous characters into the narrative framework of the film while preserving its cultural essence and character development. The film also needed to shorten and refine the plot to fit the narrative pace and time constraints. Director Urshan attempted to explore how to re-express the language of cinema in his film, which has a high proportion of three narrative elements, namely confrontational fights (24%), memories (27%) and landscapes (23%), and chose to weaken the other elements to highlight the hero’s path of heroic growth as a means of constructing a more universal and easy-to-understand narrative framework.
Key narrative elements analysis results
In terms of digitally-inspired visual effects, director Urshan has consistently raised the production standards of spectacle films to new heights. In this paper, we analyse the number of total shots and special effects shots to show the changes in digital style in director Urshan’s works, and the results of digital style analysis are shown in Figure 3. A-F in the figure represents the analysis results of Soap Opera, Knife Seeing Smile, Painted Skin II, Ghost Blows Out the Light and Seeks the Dragon, Seal of the Gods Part I and Beneath the Inhuman, respectively. While Ghost in the Shell: The Quest for the Dragon has been criticised by the audience for its narrative shortcomings, the film’s visual effects have been unanimously recognised by the audience. The film found a point of relevance with virtual special effects technology, showing the catacombs in a near-traceable way through special effects technology, making the film look dazzling and very real. The total number of shots and digital special effects shots in the whole film is about 1525 and 1211, which means that 79.42% of the shots in the film are special effects shots, which is unprecedented in the percentage of digital special effects shots in domestic films in that year.2023’s “Feng Shen Part 1” faces the process of standardisation and optimisation of production in the huge volume of production and massive data assets to ensure that every shot is of Mall quality and precise technology. Without compromising on the complexity of the footage or relying on tricks and claptrap, the production team of “Feudal Gods Part I” embodied a high degree of sincerity and professional responsibility, with the film’s total footage and special effects footage amounting to 1,774 and 1,466, respectively, and the proportion of special effects footage reaching 82.65%. In the Hollywood commercial film system, post-production is regarded as an important symbol of the fantasy digital film industry and is widely used as a mature standard in the field of special effects production. Hao Yi, the visual director of Beneath the Inhuman, asked the post-production company Tian Gong Yi Cai to participate in exploring the presentation of the film’s visual effects at the very beginning of the film’s production, providing technical support and verification for director Urshan’s ideas. Meanwhile, in order to ensure the magical presentation of the Inhuman world, this part of the film was shot with stereoscopic film cameras, and the production of IMAX stereoscopic film means that the special effects team has more precise control over the stereoscopic photography, more stringent requirements for 3D conversion, and more detailed image production The film’s optimised processing of 3D double data streams, the quality assurance of IMAX image sound, the unprecedented number of live-action builds, and the efficient completion of 85.42% of the digital special effects shots (1,399). It is safe to say that Urshan’s directorial effort, Beneath the Inhumans, takes both the special effects technology and narrative level of spectacle cinema to a new level.
Digital effects lens and total lens analysis
The field of fantasy cinema is a relatively new genre concept in the spectrum of Chinese-language film themes, and the definition of a fantasy film, its main content, and its artistic style are still under discussion in the Chinese film academy. This study examines the stylistic transformations of films by Urshan, a new generation of Chinese filmmakers, by scrutinizing their quantitative indicators, narrative elements, and digital special effects. Among the six films directed by Ulshan, Fengshen Part 1 successfully topped the box office list of Ulshan’s film and television works, earning more than 2.634 billion yuan. This film successfully conveyed the spirit of traditional culture to the audience to the fullest extent possible and explored a brand-new contemporary universe of Fengshen. From a quantitative perspective, Beneath the Inhuman exhibits the most prominent data characteristics in terms of audiovisual language, including the lowest ASL (6.1), the lowest MSL (4.1), the lowest line density (0.25), and the highest music density (0.36). The highest percentage of dialogue narrative elements in Ghostbusters’ Dragon Quest is 39%, and every twist and turn in that film is strictly designed to follow the Hollywood commercial genre. In addition, with the optimized processing of 3D double data streaming and the efficient completion of 85.42% of the digital special effects shots (1399), it can be said that The Inhuman Underground of Urshan’s directorial work has raised both the special effects technology and narrative level of spectacle films to a new level. This paper’s analysis of the stylistic transformation in director Urshan’s work can serve as a valuable reference for the development of Chinese fantasy film themes, ensuring that these themes combine the beauty of digital special effects with the charm of commercial fantasy films.