Chapter five hundred and ninety fifth unconfident and self-confidence
On September 17, "The Sun Also Rises", which failed to return from Venice, premiered. Perhaps stimulated by being left out in Venice, Jiang Wen tried to make a comeback in the domestic market.
There was a lot of material promotion and non-stop road shows in various places. Unfortunately, once it premiered, the general response from the audience was three words - they couldn't understand!
Although Jiang Wen claimed during the promotion in Guangzhou: "In fact, there are many things in life that you cannot understand. Likewise, if the movie can arouse people's thinking, that is what I hope. The audience can have their own views on this film.
It's very good. It's very interesting to discuss whether you understand or don't understand. A movie that can be debated and discussed by people after watching it is the greatest success. In my opinion, it has impressed people.
in my heart."
At the same time, he also declared domineeringly: He has a lot of humorous ideas, and he can make ten comedies a year like New Year's Eve. However, he personally does not want to make purely funny films to entertain the public, but wants to pursue his own artistic quality.
.
Okay, let's talk tough like a dead duck.
In the three days of the first weekend, although the media publicly reported that the box office of "The Sun" reached 6.8 million, only Yu Dong knew best that the actual box office was less than 4 million. For example, in Shanghai, known as the country's largest box office, United Cinemas' first
The weekend box office was less than RMB 500,000, which did not exceed the overseas imported film "The Lion's Mouth" which was released for two weeks.
At the same time, "The Sun" also caused great controversy among the audience and critics, and there was almost a debate about whether they understood it or not.
Don't look at Yu Dong who kept saying in an interview: The current controversy outside, we think this will be of great help to the box office of "The Sun", because the film has gradually transformed from a simple movie release into a fashion.
topic, more and more people will pay attention to it.
In fact, he knew it very well, especially when he discovered that pirated copies had been leaked out. A total of more than 600 copies of "The Sun" had been released this time, and tens of millions of publicity funds had been invested. Loss was a foregone conclusion.
There is no way around this. In an era when piracy is rampant, the box office in the first week of a movie's release is particularly important. In a sense, it is competing with piracy for time. This is very important to the film's producers and distributors.
These are all very helpless and irreversible things, given the national conditions.
For example, "The Stone" in the original time and space only had a box office of more than 20 million, and Ning Hao was praised as a "genius director" by the circle, and Sanye supported it. The reason is that "The Stone" relies on word-of-mouth. When the audience knows about this movie,
By that time, pirated copies were all over the streets. But even so, "The Stone" was still able to win more than 20 million yuan at the box office, which was extremely difficult.
And in this time and space, because of He Xin's halo as the protagonist and the heavy investment in early publicity, the audio-visual effects of the movie were not even a bit better than the original version, which made "Stone" win more than 90 million yuan in box office in one fell swoop.
"Brother Dong, why do you look so bad?"
He Xin was startled when he saw Yu Dong. Compared with the energetic Mr. Yu who was in Venice ten days ago, his big fat face was obviously thinner now, and his hair was messy.
, his eyes were deeply sunken and covered with bloodshot eyes, as if he had lacked sleep.
Yu Dong waved his hand and said expectantly: "A Xin, this time my brother is completely dependent on you. I hope that your "Two Donkeys" will be an instant hit."
"Brother Dong, look what you said, "A Tale of Two Donkeys" is our company's movie, of course I hope it will be a hit at the box office!" He Xin said with a smile.
Yu Dong glanced at Xiao Douding and Brother Song who were sitting next to him, and said: "So, we decided to fine-tune the previous publicity plan."
With that said, he took out two pieces of A4 paper and handed them over.
He Xin took it and took a look. First of all, Bona added an additional two million in promotional funds. This was a good thing for "Tale of Two Donkeys", but He Xin was not calm when he saw the upcoming publicity roadshow arrangements.
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He immediately shook his head like a rattle and said repeatedly: "Traveling to twelve cities in half a month? No, no, no, I'm filming here, how can I have so much time? Besides, "Two Donkeys" is fundamentally about
It is just a literary film, not a commercial film, and it is impossible for a miracle like "The Stone" to happen!"
There is nothing wrong with what He Xin said. There is a natural gap between literary and commercial films at the box office. Just like the poor box office performance of Jiang Wen's "The Sun Also Rises" two days ago, a vice president of Shanghai United Cinemas was accepting reporters
During the interview, he said: With similar ticket prices, the result is obvious whether the audience chooses to watch the profound and difficult-to-understand "The Sun" or the simple, thrilling, purely sensory-stimulating overseas film.
Although "A Tale of Two Donkeys" won the Grand Jury Prize in Venice, but so what? Last year, Chief Jia also won the Golden Lion Award. His "The Legend of Three Gorges" was removed from the shelves within three days of its release in China.
The box office is almost negligible.
Of course, "Three Gorges" has no luxurious scenes, no big-name stars, no gorgeous epigraphs, only ruins, ordinary lives and dull dialogues, and no publicity. This result seems to be expected.
Even though "A Tale of Two Donkeys" is very popular nowadays, Bona still has to invest a steady stream of promotional resources, and the storyline in the film looks more interesting than the average boring literary film.
But literary films are literary films after all, and they cannot change the reality of a relatively small minority. This is the case all over the world. Let’s not talk about it far, let’s just talk about Lou Ye’s “Purple Butterfly” a few years ago. Even if it also includes the popular Zhang Ziyi, Feng Yuanzheng and
He personally supported it, but the final box office was only 3 million.
Therefore, He Xin does not have high expectations for the domestic box office of "A Tale of Two Donkeys". It would be a blessing to have a box office of more than 10 million, recover the cost, and make a net profit from overseas profits.
And now this plan is obviously to promote this literary and artistic film as a commercial film. Compared with the box office of "Two Donkeys", he is more worried about his own schedule. Previously, because of Cheng Hao's accidental injury, he had already been delayed.
week, and now he has to fit in an extra week due to publicity, completely disrupting his schedule.
"We don't hope that "A Tale of Two Donkeys" can replicate the miracle of "The Stone," but at least the box office numbers should be better, which is very important to our company." Yu Dong spread his hands.
He Xin somewhat understands what Yu Dong means. Since Bona completed its first round of financing, with a big boss like Poly, even if "The Sun" loses money, it won't hurt much. But what Yu Dong values more is performance.
It is eye-catching, because this is related to whether Polybona can successfully land on the NASDAQ in the United States in the future.
It’s no secret that Bona is bent on pursuing an overseas listing.
"And we have done market research. It is precisely because of the poor reviews of "The Sun" that the audience has high expectations for "A Tale of Two Donkeys". Our box office forecast for "A Tale of Two Donkeys" is still optimistic. It is necessary to strengthen
Propaganda offensive. So, brother, I only have to work hard for you."
When Yu Dong talked about the poor evaluation of "The Sun" by the outside world, he couldn't help but look depressed. As a former literary and artistic young man, he liked Jiang Wen's new work from the beginning, although the previous failure in Venice gave him an ominous feeling.
I have a premonition, but I still hope to make a turnaround in China. After all, Jiang Wen has had successful examples before. But with the current dismal box office, he even thinks that the aesthetic taste of domestic audiences has seriously declined.
Including before, he had the courage to say that debate is a good thing and can increase attention. But now it seems that the so-called good reviews come from the critics' self-pleasure, and the audience is completely incomprehensible and does not look good.
"Mr. Yu is right, "A Tale of Two Donkeys" still has great potential in the domestic market. Even for literary films, "If Love" and "Riding Alone" both received 30 million yuan the year before last.
At the box office, I think "A Tale of Two Donkeys" is better than these two movies." Xiao Douding also chimed in.
"That's what you think. What I want is what the audience thinks."
He Xin said angrily to her, and at the same time glanced at Yu Dong. After all, Yu Dong also felt that Jiang Wen's "The Sun" was much better than "A Tale of Two Donkeys" at the time.
He had always felt puzzled before that someone was willing to invest in a highly experimental literary and artistic film like "The Sun" that cost as much as 60 million. Even if the director was Jiang Wen, the risk was too great.
Later, after listening to Yu Dong's revelation, I learned the cause and effect. It turned out that the initial investment in "The Sun" was only 30 million, but after the investor Taihe invested 18 million, he found that not even one-third of the film was shot. In this case, Taihe
Of course I quit, and I didn’t invest the remaining 12 million. For this reason, the filming of "The Sun" was stopped for a while.
Does it sound familiar? This has been the case from "Sunny Days" to "The Japanese Are Coming". This is Jiang Wen's consistent behavior as a director. Just like the later "Let the Bullets Fly", he stood on the money.
After making money, he responded with the classic rhetorical question when asked by reporters: "What is a budget?"
Of course, the reason why Jiang Wen is awesome is that even though the first two works exceeded the budget, he still made money in the end.
But this time it was different. This time the gap was so big that even Taihe didn't dare to gamble. So in the end it was Mr. Han who came forward to help attract Yinghuang, who wanted to come to the mainland for development.
Ying Huang was very aggressive and invested a generous 22 million yuan. He also added the Dragon Prince Fang Zuming, who is currently being favored by Ying Huang, into the film. But even so, the money was still not enough. In the end, Jiang Wen and Zhou Yun spent 11 million on their own.
In addition, all the 10 million equivalent of the two people's salary was paid in, and the film was completed.
This does not include the more than 10 million in promotional expenses and 600 copies invested by Polybona. If the investment was to be recouped solely through the domestic box office, it would require at least nearly 200 million in box office.
Now let alone 200 million, even 20 million is hanging by a thread.
At this time, facing Dong He Xiaodou Ding's eager eyes, He Xin could only nod and said: "Okay, I agree with this publicity plan, but I'm going to say something ugly first. If "Tale of Two Donkeys" does not do well at the box office in the first week, we
There is no need to continue, just follow the original path."
"You kid, the movie hasn't been released yet, so you're so unsure!" Yu Dong finally breathed a sigh of relief, patted him hard, and said with a smile.
To be honest, the domestic film market is too fickle. He was full of confidence in "The Stone" before, because "The Stone" was a success in the original time and space.
He had never even heard of "A Tale of Two Donkeys" in his previous life, and he invested in filming it simply because he liked the story. Although he has won the Grand Jury Prize in Venice, he really doesn't have much confidence in the domestic box office.
Just like "Wolf Warrior 2" and "Operation Red Sea" in later generations, the main theme blockbusters can easily earn 3 billion or 5 billion at the box office. It's the turn of Da Hei Niu's "Sky Hunter", which has both Fan Xiaopang and Wu Xiubo.
With the support of Wang Qianyuan, who is an actor, and the aerial combat theme, it attracts the audience's attention even more. I originally thought that no matter how bad it was, a dozen or two billion might not be a problem.
The result...
Therefore, there were too many uncertainties. He Xin really did not dare to have high expectations for his unknown situation.
And don't look at the fact that he has filmed "A Thousand Arrows Pierce the Heart" and "Love Is After Life" one after another. The former is simply to praise his girlfriend; as for the latter, apart from the fact that he does not reject the subject matter and the role, he may be attracted to a certain extent.
Bewitched by her sister's beauty.
After all, everyone has a love for beauty. From ancient times to the present, beauties in the beacon drama are indispensable. From then on, there is such a legend that kings will not go to court early.
In fact, what he is most concerned about right now is "The Wind", for which Uncle Gao Qun is currently tinkering with the script. This is the real blockbuster in his mind.
So, after talking about business, he followed Yu Dong: "By the way, Brother Dong, I have an appointment with Lao Gao tonight. The first draft of his script has been released, let's get together!"
"Well, I really can't spare time tonight. But don't worry about one thing. Your brother Dong's words are guaranteed to count! Hey, can you roughly estimate what the future investment for this film will be?"
"How do I know this now? I can't estimate it until the script is finalized. But I estimate it will definitely not be smaller than the investment in "The Ballad of Clouds and Waters"."
He Xin's memory in his previous life only knew that the final box office of "The Wind" reached more than 200 million, but he had no memory of the specific investment. He could only use his memories of the original scenes, including the cast, and combine it with what he has learned so far.
Based on my understanding of the movie, I have a preliminary judgment.
You must know that "Yun Shui Yao" actually cost nearly 35 million yuan in investment.
"Hey, you kid is so big this time?"
Sure enough, Yu Dong couldn't help being surprised when he heard this, and at the same time he subconsciously said: "Is it reliable for you to hand over such a big project to Lao Gao?"
Regardless of the fact that Lao Gao won the Huabiao Award for Outstanding Director, "Tokyo Trial"'s box office of nearly 30 million seems good. But in the eyes of insiders, Lao Gao has actually lost the label of "the one who makes documentaries"
, but he is still just a TV drama director. Yu Dong is somewhat worried.
"It's okay, Lao Gao."
He Xin now has no doubts about "A Tale of Two Donkeys" and is extremely confident, just like when he supported Lao Gao's "Conquest" and Ning Hao's "Stone".