Chapter 350 Small production is worse than publishing it yourself
Although he didn't have high hopes, Ronald went to meet two old friends who were running a small studio.
One is Roger Corman. After selling New World, he established his own film company. He is still making new films using the same economical production method.
Roger Coleman is still the same. He drives to the office very early in the morning and personally controls the progress of each project. In his company, there is no concept of management. He is the only one who uses experience and intuition.
Make various decisions.
The other subordinates who are named production managers are more like Coleman's secretaries than producers. They don't have much decision-making power. They just upload and issue orders and go to the set to help Coleman keep an eye on the crew and not overspend.
and timeout, otherwise Corman will be notified to come over and tear up the script scenes that cannot be shot.
"Ronald, welcome to my office. I remember you came twice." Coleman asked his secretary to make Ronald a cup of cheap coffee, and the two got down to business.
"I have a very controversial film project that none of the seven major Hollywood studios have the guts to try. I met Gail that day and she said to me, why don't you go to Roger? He dared to do it in the 1962s.
When it comes to filming the black apartheid issue in the South, he dared to film motorcycle gangs in 1966... There are no left-wing progressive themes in Hollywood, so he didn't dare to film them."
Ronald took two sips of coffee. His ability to distinguish coffee was not as good as black tea. He drank cheap coffee very happily.
First, give Roger Corman a challenge, throw out a bait, and attract Corman's attention. This is Ronald's pre-planned negotiation strategy, so that he will not be intimidated by the controversial plot of designing a Jewish girl.
.
Roger Corman has two characteristics. The first is that he likes left-wing progressive themes. He will be naturally interested in movies that challenge the conservative and decadent concepts of society. Second, he likes to save money and does not like to make mistakes at every turn.
A big production worth 30 million yuan, I feel that Hollywood movies are a lot of waste.
"Of course, this is a small production. I calculated that the production cost is about 4.5 million. If you can give me a distribution contract, I can find people willing to invest. I personally feel that this movie must be
It will be a big seller.”
Roger Corman put on his glasses, took the script of "Dirty Dancing" and read it carefully.
"Isn't this very controversial?" Coleman spent twenty minutes, quickly flipped through the script, and asked Ronald.
Coleman did not think that Jewish girls could not fall in love with handsome dancing guys like other ethnic groups.
"The story happened in the 1960s when JFK was the commander-in-chief. A girl from a middle-class Jewish family fell in love with a poor Irish boy who was a backup dancer at a resort. This was considered deviant at the time, right?"
Ronald was overjoyed, but he still deliberately reminded the words "Jewish girl" carefully, and then concentrated on watching Coleman's answer.
"This is not controversial at all. I have never been afraid of this when making movies." Coleman waved his hand, as if to dispel Ronald's concerns.
Coleman then took off his glasses, sighed softly, and said to Ronald, "If you had come up with this script three years ago, I would have definitely gotten the distribution rights.
But now. You have to wait, it will probably be next year before I can completely restore the power to distribute movies in America."
"What, you can't release movies in America now?"
Roger Corman explained the troubles he encountered. He sold New World Pictures for $16 million a few years ago. He left some discounts in the sales contract with New World's new owners.
Terms.
New World will help distribute films produced by Corman on the condition of a 15% preferential share.
But then New World did not really fulfill this condition, and none of the films produced by Corman's new company were distributed. So Roger Corman sued the other party, seeking compensation for losses, and asked the other party to transfer New World Pictures to
Give it back to him.
On the other hand, Coleman had no choice but to reorganize the distribution department and start distributing movies by himself.
New World Pictures, however, seized on Corman's loophole and countersued Roger Corman, saying that he violated the contract and that the film was not distributed by New World as per the contract, but instead became its own distributor.
He came to compete with New World in the distribution business and demanded that Coleman compensate New World Pictures for its losses.
Since last year, the two cases have been scheduled for trial. Now Coleman's new company, Concord Pictures, has suspended its production and distribution operations to prevent the other party from seizing the opportunity.
"I am very optimistic about the outcome of the case. They said that at the end of 1984 or the beginning of 1985, I secretly bypassed New World and distributed the movie myself. But I sold New World to them at that time and left a preferential distribution
The only purpose of the clause is that I no longer want to engage in the high-cost and energy-consuming distribution business. I want to regain the feeling of being a director and producer and focus on making movies.
After discussing with me, my lawyer came to the conclusion that they could either compensate me for my losses and return the property to New World, or they could reach an out-of-court settlement with me and pay me a sum of money, and everyone would go about their own business."
Ronald had only one word of admiration for Colman in his heart. He had a chance to get huge compensation even if he didn't make a movie.
"Then your production and distribution business has been greatly hindered?" Ronald asked one more question. He knew that with Corman's wealth accumulated over decades of making movies, he could have quit movies long ago.
I am enjoying life with my wife Julie and four children.
Now that he has to resume his distribution business, the only reason why he has conflicts with New World is that he likes to make movies.
"Hey, who says it isn't?" This was the most distressing thing for Coleman.
"I could have produced 15-25 movies a year and screened them in drive-in theaters and small theaters. Occasionally, one or two movies would win the favor of mainstream theaters and enter large-scale screening channels. Now everything has been stopped.
Let me tell you, I originally had an agreement with Marvel, the comic company, to adapt "Spider-Man". Because of this case, the production rights also expired, so I had to give it back for free.
How could I deliberately pick up the distribution business and compete with New World? I wish I could get rid of all this baggage and concentrate on making movies."
Coleman had an accident here, and Ronald had to go see Cannon's Minahan.
Minahan Golan has been very busy since he received US$300 million in financing. Finally, he was caught in the office through his agent Richard, and Ronald quickly took the script to discuss with him.
"Quack, Ronald. Did you bring me any good news? We haven't seen each other for a long time. Let me show you the new movie we are going to make."
Minahan was still very enthusiastic. He put his arms around Ronald and took him to the newly rented office on the first floor, an extra-large office he shared with his cousin Yoram.
When Ronald saw that he was still very enthusiastic about him, he was half relieved. At least he would not have anything to do with him because of the improvement of his financial situation.
"Look, this is our series, the second and third parts of 'America Ninja'." Minahan pointed to two large posters on the wall. A white young man was wearing a ninja headband and wearing a ninja hat.
clothes, and was holding a ninja sword and posing.
“This is the third and fourth part of ‘The Last Man’ with Chuck Norris. This is the third and fourth part of ‘The Wild One’ with Chuck Bronson.”
There are already several successful movies in the Cannon series, and Ronald knows that as long as the quality of such movies can be guaranteed, it is easy to make money.
"I've upgraded now. I wouldn't have considered a movie with a budget of less than 10 million two years ago."
"Ten million?" Ronald turned his head and looked at Minahan. Is the cannon so powerful now? Dozens of movies with an investment of more than 10 million are made every year and then distributed by themselves?
"Ten million is still a small amount. Let's look at these two series, big productions produced by us and distributed by Warner Bros."
"This is the second major production that Stallone has collaborated with us on, 'Over the Top', and we are prepared to invest a production budget of US$30 million."
"What place are we going to save this time? What bad guys are we going to fight?" Ronald felt a little uncomfortable. Stallone was in Cannon. It was indeed a big-budget movie.
"Gaga, you guessed it wrong. Stallone will not kill bad guys again this time. I had a deep talk with him and we plan to transform. This is a family film. He plays a divorced father who has not seen his son for a long time.
She took her son with her, drove a truck, and went to participate in the National Arm Wrestling Competition... In the end, she not only won the championship, but also improved her relationship with her son."
"Arm wrestling?" Ronald touched the beard on his chin. Is this a plot that the idiot came up with? The audience spent three or four dollars to buy tickets and come in to see you, Stallone, arm wrestling?"
"How's it going? It's a good idea, I came up with it. I will personally direct this movie, quack quack..."
"So it was you who came up with it..." Ronald held back his laughter. Minahan's old habit of always using foreign eyes to evaluate the American audience's thoughts has returned.
This kind of arm-wrestling is indeed popular among truck drivers. But why would the public be interested in this kind of plot?
How to shoot the final battle? Is it that Stallone was about to lose when you pulled him over at first, but then he saw the beauty and his son, gained strength again, turned defeat into victory and defeated the opponent again? It was so boring...
"Maybe we can make a sequel." Ronald held it in for a long time before he said something he thought was humorous.
"Yes, yes, we can also make a sequel, so we have a third star." Minahan looked proud.
"Sequel? The sequel is about upgrading the difficulty of the game. How to upgrade the arm wrestling? Could it be...is it a two-hand wrestling?" Ronald held it in very hard.
"Gah ga ga, it seems you think it's good too." Minahan looked at the way Ronald wanted to laugh but didn't, thinking that he and Stallone still had a grudge and didn't want to see him become a bigger star.
"That's another blockbuster we're preparing. It's awesome... I bought the production rights to the 'Superman' series of movies, the first Superman movie produced by Cannon, and will also get Christopher Reeve to star. We're going to
Invest $40 million."
"Which bad guy will Superman fight this time?"
"This time it's not a specific villain. We plan to have Superman find all the nuclear weapons in the world and then send them to space for destruction."
"Um……"
Ronald felt the change in Minahan's mentality after he received 300 million US dollars. His original Corman-like spirit of making small productions was gone, and he was now obsessed with big productions, blockbusters, and sequels to blockbusters.
He might not be interested at all in the small production of "Dirty Dancing" that he wanted to cast for less than RMB 5 million.
"Why don't you distribute these two movies yourself, instead of asking Warner Brothers?"
"Hey, this is also because America's theater market makes it difficult to schedule blockbusters. Warner Bros. currently does not have the ability to produce blockbusters, so it can only rely on distribution channels to provide large blockbusters to others. Their studio in Burbank has been assigned
Ramone and Universal took a big part of it, leaving them with small productions and filming abroad."
"We were in a hurry to get financing and didn't have time to book the schedule a year and a half in advance. When we recover the cost of these movies next year, we can distribute them ourselves."
"Who is Warner Bros. talking to now? Is it still Robert Daley?" Ronald didn't have much dealings with Warners, so he took the opportunity to inquire.
"He no longer cares about specific affairs. Daley has found a capable Jew, Terry Semel. Now he is mainly responsible for Warner's affairs. What, do you have anything to do with him?"
"I'm just asking." When Ronald heard that it was a Jew, he had no idea of continuing to explore.
"Ronald, you should come and cooperate with me. Now that you have the conditions, I can give your project the green light and make a movie with a production budget of 15 million, no problem.
What do you want to make? Let’s bring in Tom Cruise and you guys can make another air combat movie together?”
"I have no other plans for the time being. The project at hand is a feature film. I have signed a contract with MGM. As for Tom, you still have to find his agent."
Ronald declined Minahan's invitation. He felt that Minahan now was very different from what he remembered. He was super confident and even a little crazy.
While the two were chatting, staff members kept asking him to sign and ask for work instructions. There was no such thing as Minahan's super focus on one project when the two collaborated on "Break Dance".
Besides, even if Cannon releases this kind of small production, it won't be able to squeeze into a good schedule in mainstream theaters. Even Minahan's Cannon now has to rely on Warner Bros. to get a real blockbuster.
If possible, it would be better to let Daydream Pictures establish a simple distribution department, just like Roger Corman did, and try to distribute a movie at a low cost.
"I just don't know how much it would cost to produce and distribute a movie by myself?"
"Are you really not coming? I have a new good project here. It's the Spider-Man production rights I bought from Marvel. Are you interested?" Mina rarely saw Ronald being thoughtful and silent, and started again.
Promote your own projects.
"Spider-Man?" Ronald thought, didn't Marvel just take back Coleman?
"Yes, I bought the production rights within five years. If you are willing to be the director, we can start looking for someone to write the script. In this way, Superman, Spider-Man, and America's two most popular heroes will all belong to Cannon
.”
"If there is no script, I'd better forget it. I don't have the energy to write a new script now. I'll wait until I finish the project at hand."
Ronald did not disturb Minahan's precious time, nor did he embarrass himself by showing off a small production script worth less than five million, and shook hands with him goodbye.