Fala Chen’s Mysterious Look in “Sound of the Desert”
Starring in blockbuster Mainland drama Sound of the Desert <風中奇緣>, Fala Chen (陳法拉) had to constantly wear a facial veil due to the mysterious background of her character, Qin Xiang, who later becomes an empress.
As the veil covers the bottom half of Fala’s face, Fala is only left with the top half of her face to convey expressions and emotions. Furthermore, to avoid soiling the pristine and expensive veil, makeup was only applied to the top half of Fala’s face. This made the entire experience very challenging for Fala, but she may be heartened by many netizens’ praise that she looks mesmerizing and classically beautiful as Qin Xiang.
Qin Xiang is a character shrouded in mystery. Rising from unknown origins, she manages to enter the imperial palace and become the empress. To emphasize the enigma surrounding Qin Xiang, the production team of Sound of the Desert deliberately designed her costume to feature a facial veil. In an interview, Fala enthuses that she has thoroughly enjoyed the novelty of only using her eyes to act, and working with the rest of the team in Mainland China.
After her TVB management contract expired in May, Fala chose to not renew with the station in order to have greater freedom over her work projects. She received various acting offers, but is slowly reviewing the scripts to sift out the interesting roles. Fala is selective in her work projects and it is important that the story is well-written and the role appeals to her.
Source: ihktv.com
This article is written by Jingles for JayneStars.com.
not looking good there needs hair down
Anybody else watching the drama? I can’t seem to find a place for discussion, lol
I’m watching it, but it’s the last thing on my list… I.e. when I’m out of things to watch :/ I mainly watch for Eddie. And the storyline is slow ATM, the character development is non-existent. Bam, she’s smart and know how to run business -.- (i havent read the book, but general there should be something indicating shes capable, telling me she made a play and the business go well = capable is a bit hard and fast to shallow) and they try to milk the hu ge – Cecilia scenes so much, that I don’t feel much spark between them :/ I don’t feel much spark between Eddie and Cecilia ATM either, even though Eddie is beaming with charisma (what his character meant to be, so it makes sense). It’s rather a boring series ATM, but I’ll take boring series over ridiculous sword of legend, I’ll watch that one (finish it off) when I’m totally out of things to watch lol.
She’s smart and political savvy in the book. Besides that she’s also highly skill in the martial art. She learn all these from her adopted father in the dessert and also from the wolves (the fighting).
Haha! I have nothing to watch at the moment, so I gave China productions a chance. It’s very slow thus far. A tad bit boring, so hopefully the plot will pick up.
I get that part, kid. But as how they presented it in the drama, it’s disjointed. And you had to assume she picked that up with her adopted dad because otherwise there is nothing to hold on to lol (because the other idea of the wolf pack taught her that just seem very unreasonable :p). My point was you just have to take her as what they feed you, but not actually seeing it, last I checked a drama is about seeing, not hearing lol.
To Hannah, I know, not many good series ATM, luckily, the western drama just restart for a new season, plus the way we were and tomorrow is another day, and new game expansion, so I’m occupied :p but it’s good to talk about something you watch.
Hi Hannah, you can join the discussion here http://www.spcnet.tv/forums/showthread.php/36326-Sound-of-the-Desert-%E3%80%8A%E9%A3%8E%E4%B8%AD%E5%A5%87%E7%BC%98%E3%80%8B-Hu-Ge-Liu-Shi-Shi-Eddie-Peng
Thanks for sharing, sehseh!
Are you also following the drama?
Yes I am! Watching the live stream every Wed-Thur. LOL I need some sleep.
I think it doesnt meet the expectation. After the success of BBJX, ppl looked forward to an incredible products, but the editions and chances make Feng a boring series. Tong Ren makes it too similar to BBJX so it doesnt fresh at all. Im now watching it for Eddie, the person I like the least among the cast.
I think its not-so-high rating is reasonable.
old…. can’t look good with or without makeup on.
Ok… I’m probably going to get a lot of * for saying this… but… I’m going to anyway….
The above pictures of Fala Chen greatly reminds me of Cecilia Liu.
Anyone else see the similarity?
Yes, a bit. I mentioned it earlier in another article, but people did seem to agree.
The one where she got her face covered – I agree. The one where her face is not covered, disagree lol. I never a fan of fala, but she’s like 100 times more prettier than Cecilia in this series… And that’s sad… Very disappointing on Cecilia’s makeup, hairdo, and outfit in this series. It likes the girl doesn’t look any good -.- even though she could potentially be so pretty -.-
Fala’s outfit or how she wears those are stunning, when the two girls together, you would pick fala. I knows in a sense it’s intended, but uhm, Cecilia don’t even stand half a chance is what sad :/ I would be fine if one girl is stunningly beautiful, while the other is cute and pretty, the makeup and hairdo make Cecilia look like she’s 30+ :/
Fala already look old and not that pretty in the pic, you make me wonder how bad LSS looks since you said she’s uglier than Fala.
Quite bad, which is sad. It’s just they done a really terrible job on her face. Pink eye shadow just make she look old. And the hairstyle is that of the old woman :/ I don’t get why they couldn’t pick a better hairstyle on her?
For fala, the pic isn’t great, but in the drama, she’s quite good. I always think if you are beautiful in motion, it’s a lot better than still pic. Because still pic is only that 1 second.
The outfits are not bad, but the makeup is not as good as usual in Chinese series. I only think LSS looks odd in the wolf outfit because the outfit doesnt match her character.
Yes, LSS is like a very plain version of Fala. Fala’s features are much more striking. However, honestly neither look that great. I think the period’s style just isn’t very flattering to our modern eye.
The period style done well is very pretty. But not in this case, like in the stills, they look nice. But in motion, I can’t get over the old woman’s hairstyle of LSS. Someone did not do their homework/work hard to actually find a style that look nice on the main actress
oooo gold digger is back!
Oh wow!!! Fala looks weird and very mysterious In that pic!!!!!
she doesn’t look good in the pics above. perhaps aged look?
I insist on calling her Li Yan.
Same here
Fala isn’t exactly considered a classic beauty to play this role but so far she’s portraying the cold side of Li Yan / Qin Xiang well.
However, I do admit that the makeup & hair makes her (and Cecilia) aged 10 years ahead.
The makeup and the hair are not right but I think she acts quite well. More than what I expected from her. Surprisingly, Eddie Pang did the best among the cast.
Eddie playfulness and charisma fits HQB/WWJ very well. He really surpassed my expectation.
They cut out a lot of good scenes from the novel though.
I like Eddie, too. And indeed, he’s the best among the cast. His character helps, but seriously, he looks so young, and vibrant, whereas the rest looks old, dull and gloomy -.-
I always like Hu Ge but he is kinda lost in this one. His character helps. Liu Shi Shi is consistently good at dramatic roles, however she fails to convince as a a wild girl (wolf girl). Hence Eddie takes all the credits for acting in my opinion.
Kristen is good at acting but she doesnt suit ancient. Anytime I see her, I think she travelled through time.
You think so? Maybe it’s the language barrier, but I felt Fala’s acting was a bit too OTT. I feel like the show made her character more devious than in the book. Like in the book she was ambitious but not that cold – at least not yet.
Eddie is the perfect casting. I’m on the fence with Hu Ge. I feel like he portray’s the tragedy of Jiu Ye well enough – yet I don’t feel that much for the character. I think LSS is the most miscast of the leads. She’s just portraying the wild wolf girl very childishly which I find at odds with how smart and savvy she is.
It should not be a language barrier. Mandarin is Fala Chen’s native tongue. Perhaps the script of her character required her to act like that in order to make her character more vivid and entertaining. It happens very often.
advo, LSS character is sort of childish and wild. It depends on the people around her, she is more quiet/obedient because she holds herself back to match Jiu Ye.
SPOILER
After she falls in love with HQB/WWJ, she showed more of her wild/prank style. Not sure if this will be shown in the drama, she was upset with WWJ not spending time with her, she went around the city pretending to be wolf howling and end up injuring an important minister. WWJ cleaned up the mess for her but didn’t reprimand her.
@ Sandcherry,
I wasn’t referring to Fala’s language barrier but to my own. I’ve mostly watched unsubbed.
@ Sehseh
I do remember that JY is a “wild” character but like you said, she tones it down depending on her surroundings. And I feel like she’s still ~too much around Jiu Ye, when she’s supposed to tone it back around him. I feel a lot of it is also in LSS’s exaggerated acting. It feels very forced so there’s a compounded effect? All in all, I feel an actress with a more rambunctious nature would have portrayed it better. To me, it’s when XJ is with JY that she holds back so the quiet side of the character should feel forced, not the wild side. But for LSS’s XJ it’s the opposite, because LSS is a low-key personality herself.
Edit:
Sorry for messing around with the JY and XJ lol. TR’s name changed have made it all a giant mess in my head! Sometimes I meant JY for Jin Yu (supposed to be Yu Jin) and XJ is supposed to be Xiao/Jin Yu. Other times I meant Jiu Ye.
Fala looks aged in the picture. She looks older than usual.
It’s a bit sad that a mainland production will prioritize their own actresses and a TVB lead actress like Fala is only able to get a supporting role in mainland.
That is life unfortunately. Even Charmaine did not get first role in “Legend of Yuan”, Kevin Cheng not in “BBJX” and Ada Choi not in “後宮甄嬛傳 / Empresses in the Palace”.
Kevin’s role is pretty heavy imo although not the first lead.
I remember a friend was disappointed that Charmaine is like a flower vase in there.
Charmaine is the first leading actress in Legend of Yuan. But the drama is male oriented.. shrugs. So far Charmaine is the leading actress in all her Mainland Drama, the least is sharing lead in The Female Constables.
Though Charmaine Sheh’s role was considered as one of the main leads for actresses, her screen time was not very heavy, compared to the two other Mainland Chinese actresses (one old and one young, both of them were empresses).
What?! Kevin was definitely male lead together with Nicky.
Kevin Cheng’s screen time was a lot less than Nicky Wu’s in “BBJX”.
I didn’t count the screentime, but I thought up to the first half up where RX break up with 8th (around ep. 15), the show featured Kevin more. Then by half it shift to focus more on 4th. Yes, 4th does still have screentime in the first half, but so does 8th in the second half.
She’s 2nd lead to LSS, which isn’t too shabby.
Charmaine and myolie and bobby and bosco get to star.Raymond and Michelle too. And hawick. But Ada, and Sonija not quite, although their projects are good.
Forgot to mention roger. He stars in his mainland dramas. Damian gets pretty awesome roles, but I wouldn’t call him tvb.
Sonija leaded in one or two Chinese series.
Normally, the TVB actresses do not have leading roles in their first Chinese series. In this particular case, Fala has second lead role which is much better than some other TVB actresses in China.
It’s like that LOL. Even for Taiwanese Gui Gui and George Hu only get 2nd female/ male role in their respective roles in mainland dramas.
i really doubt her acting skills is enough to get her any lead roles. i was quite surprised that she got any in tvb.
I don’t think there is anything to do with acting skills. Chinese entertainment industries just placed their artistes first to attract local audience as they have such a huge market to please.
oohmygod i wanna see it!
Like most ppl here. I was surprised at how good eddie is for this role. He is witty, has a captivating royal aura, funny, and screen stealer. Im waiting it now for him
She looks weird – old and not attractive like she used to be
Does any one know why china dubs there drama series? I really want to know
i believe i once read b/c the actor/actresses are from different parts of china. they have different accents so to standardize the mandarin language, they dub everybody’s voices. china in particular, dislikes the taiwanese accent. it’s basically china’a control freak.
http://www.wuxiaedge.com/why-are-ancient-chinese-series-always-dubbed/ this will explain why. :D.
They were trying to make the hairstyle fit the dynasty, everyone has that hairstyle in the series. Just unfortunate it is not the most pretty compared to the other dynasty. I think Fala is doing her job in the series, of course Eddie is stealing the show at the moment! I love all of WWJ and Xy scene so far!!
I know they must do it to fit the dynasty. However, her character is wild, she could have pick a different hairstyle. 2nd, if they know they can’t follow the history and change the main character name to comply with the rule, they could just go to hell with this, and explore a more creative approach in hair, costumes, makeup. All in all, they either didn’t check with the governing body, and make timely changes, or the governing body is too hard to reach, and do not giving out timely notification of regulation changes, and so we ended up suffering this bad old grandma’s style
@little fishy, at that time I think they thought everything was good to go, someone in the TR department really screwed up lol. TR is trying to stay close the the novel as possible and by doing that they had to use the dynasty setting and clothing. She looks really pretty in her Lou Lan dress and very youthful when she first appeared in Jian An. I actually really think their costume and setting is very beautiful and they paint the scenery very well. I think TR is doing heck of a good job with this series!
The blue dress was indeed quite good. But she was in it for 30mins only lol. And she was a bit skinny on them. Then the rest of the series, she doesn’t look good lol.like I said I understand they try to stay true with the dynasty, but the hairstyle… Seriously bad… I could not stand that bob on her head lol… Felt like she’s a grandma or a 40yrs old try to act cute >_< strange though because like I said in stills, she doesn't look too bad, but in the drama, the camara angle always top down on her face, so it's hard not to recognize her bad hair (possibly the worst angle for that hairstyle) and makeup lol (you know it's bad makeup when she looks like clown and you can tell how much pink powder they used on her cheeks and eyes =_=). I give them good costume on Eddie, fala, the rest of the girls in the brothel (or playhouse whatever you want to call them), but LSS (except that blue dress). Setting is quite good. Sorry if it seem I'm so focus on that hair and that makeup, but it really annoys me lol
Yes her hair does look like a helmet sometimes, and that pink shadow does have to go lol.
@m0m0 @ping0 thank you! 🙂
Any link for me to watch “Sound of the Desert”?
Live streaming link every Wed & Thurs, 10pm (China time)
http://tv.idol001.com/liushishi.html
For previous episodes you can search 風中奇緣 in youtube
There’s english sub in yt also but I forgot the channel XD
Thanks! I will search it on YouTube.
The subbed version is the Hunan version right? I hate how much of HQB’s scenes have been cut!
This is a good yt channel for uncut versio. FZQU未刪減版
http://www.youtube.com/user/eggtiger/videos
Yeah they cut out some scenes in the HunanTV version so its a bit of disjointed. Technically 1 episode of HunanTV = 2 episode of uncut version.
Yes, thank you. That’s also the channel I’ve been watching but I would like subs since my Mandarin is rudimentary at best 😉
Fala looks beautiful. I am sure the cistume will ve top notch and great in hd. The hair is sort of han-ish and itlooks good. Seen worse in tvb.