Amid the media praise for "Lola Run", the weekend passed quickly.

However, since February 16 is the third Monday in February, President's Day in the United States, one of the federal statutory holidays. According to tradition, the weekend box office of the new week is calculated from February 13 to February 16 for four days, which is actually an important reason why Orion chose to set the schedule on February 13.

Tuesday, February 17th.

Due to the recent period of very busy, the president of Orion Pictures, Mike Meadow, has not had much rest in the past three days of vacation. However, he still arrived at the company early today.

Sitting in the office, thinking back to the bumpy experience of Orion Pictures in the past year, Mike Medowal even had a feeling of the rest of his life in his heart.

In 1985, Orion produced and released 12 films, but the best one, "Looking for Susan," earned only $27 million at the North American box office, nine of which were losing money.

Due to a series of box office failures, Orion, which was in serious financial crisis at the beginning of 1986, faced the fate of being taken over by the well-known Warburg Pincus investment group on Wall Street, and once it happened, the original management of the company would be dismissed.

At the critical moment, the company's CEO Arthur Kerim persuaded his friend media tycoon John Kruger to buy 6.5% of Orion's shares, bringing the company the most needed working capital, which saved everyone's jobs.

Then, everything seemed to start to go smoothly.

Orion's summer release of "Back to School" completely got the company out of financial crisis with a North American box office of more than $90 million. At the end of last year, the company's key release of "Field Platoon" had a cumulative box office of more than $40 million as of last week. According to the current box office curve, the film's North American box office could easily sprint to the $100 million mark.

In addition, in terms of awards, Orion has also gained a lot this year. With the excellent reputation of the three films "Field Platoon", "Hannah Sisters" and "Court Ambition", Orion has received a total of 18 nominations at the upcoming 59th Oscars, more than any of the seven.

Now, in the blink of an eye, it's 1987, and Orion seems to have completely inherited last year's good fortune.

At the beginning of the new year, the company picked up a small box office 'dark horse' from the seven hands.

"Lola Run".

Although the box office figures for the opening weekend have not yet been seen, based on the feedback from various sources in the past few days, Mike Medois has no doubt that the film will bring Orion in 1987 a good start.

While he was casually flipping through a document and thinking about these things, the secretary knocked on the door: "Mr. Medowa, Miss Johnston is here." ”

"Let her in," Mike Meadow replied, thought for a moment, stood up again, and asked, "By the way, did last weekend's box office data arrive?"

The secretary shook his head: "Do you need me to push it?"

"No, just send me to my office later, and make two cups of coffee," he ordered, as Michael Medowell turned his desk and stretched out his hand to Janet, who had already walked through the door, "Miss Johnston, it's still so early today." ”

Janet smiled and shook Mike Meadow's hand, "Aren't you too?"

"It's my job, and of course I'll have to work harder," said Macké Medowa, motioning for Janet to sit down in the reception area at will, and to sit across from the coffee table, "and it usually arrives at half-past nine, and the time is about the same." ”

Janet also heard the conversation that Mike Meadow had just had with the secretary, and only nodded slightly.

The two sat down, and Mike Medois was about to ask a few words about Simon's recent situation, but the office door was pushed open again, and the secretary raised a fax in his hand and said, "Mr. Medova, the box office has been delivered." ”

Mike Meadow felt that the secretary's tone was a little stumbling, his face was puzzled, and he even had some bad premonitions in his heart, so he simply took the initiative to get up and stepped forward to take the box office report.

Just a glance, Mike Medowa's expression also became strange, and he turned his head and asked the secretary, "Are you sure?"

The secretary didn't seem to be able to ease up, and said, "I, Mr. Medowa, why don't I call and ask?"

Although he felt that there was little chance of a problem with the data in his hand, Mike Meadow nodded.

Janet also got up at this time and walked over, stretched out her hand and said, "Mr. Medowa, can I take a look?"

"Oh, of course," said Mike Medover, handing Janet the box office report, "the numbers should be fine, but it's incredible, much higher than I thought." ”

Janet didn't answer, but her eyes fell on the box office report in her hand, and she saw the name of "Lola Run" and the box office figures at a glance.

$5.51 million.

That's pretty good.

That was the first thought on Janet's mind. Then the psychology began to calculate, 5.51 million US dollars, according to the 15% fixed box office share negotiated between Simon and Orion, just the box office of the past four days, he can get back more than 800,000 US dollars, even if he counts the copy fees that will be paid in the future, this is already a return to the capital.

Mike Meadow noticed that Janet only raised her eyebrows slightly, and a satisfied smile appeared on the corner of her mouth, although she understood that this was her new contact with the industry and it was difficult to understand what the box office data of "Lola Run" meadow meant, but he still wanted to wake up the woman in front of him loudly: "That's how you reacted?"

At the same time, at Fox Studios, which is also Century City in Beverly Hills, less than a kilometer away from Orion Pictures' headquarters, Ronald Goldberg waved the box office report in his hand and shouted at his assistant: "$5.51 million! How is this possible, is there a mistake on the part of the theater?"

The assistant held the folder in his hand, but was not as flustered as Secretary Mike Medowa, and replied in the affirmative: "Mr. Goldberg, I have already called to confirm, yes." ”

Listening to the assistant's calm tone, Ronald Goldberg exhaled deeply and waved his hand at her.

The assistant left, and Ronald Goldberger, who sat down again, opened the drawer at his desk, glanced at the humidor, but closed it casually, picked up the box office report again, and scanned it line by line.

North American box office data for the 7th weekend of 1987.

First place: "Field Platoon", $12.87 million, Orion.

Second place, "Cruel Fate," $6.31 million, Bo Wei.

Third place, "Spirits Alive", $5.99 million, Fox.

Fourth place, "Lola Run", $5.51 million, Orion.

No. 5, "Leap to the Top", $5.15 million, Warner.

In the top five lists, except for the first place and the current hit "Field Platoon", the box office of the other four movies does not seem to make much difference. However, if you continue to compare the number of screens screened by several films, you will see how far the gap is.

Among the five films, in addition to "Lola Run", even Fox's "Spirit" has reached 932 screens. The other three movies all have more than 1,000 screens, and the opening screen scale of Stallone's new work "Leap to the Peak" has reached 1,758 this time.

In comparison, the number of screens screened in "Lola Run" is only 207, which is not even a quarter of "Spirit" and one-eighth of "Leap to the Peak".

However, with such an insignificant 207 screens, "Lola Run" frantically collected $5.51 million at the box office and squeezed into the top five of the North American weekend box office list.

How can this not be surprising.

Moreover, it got such an excellent box office at the beginning, so what next?

You know, Orion is currently only distributed in a few West Coast states, including California, even if the second-tier solo film company can't reach overseas markets. However, in Canada, in the central, eastern and even northern parts of the Federation, "Lola Run" has not yet been released.

Well, continue with this box office momentum.

Ronald Goldberg shuddered slightly, barely daring to think about it anymore. He couldn't help but think of a lot of things in the past few months.

When Simon Westeros finished "Lola Run", the first contact was Fox Films. After the film was well received at the Sundance Film Festival, Westeros still preferred to hand over the distribution rights to Fox, and until the film finally won the award at the Sundance Film Festival, Fox still had a chance to win the film.

It's just that.

All of these opportunities were missed.

Right now.

My God.

What did you miss?

Leaning back in his chair and thinking for a moment, Ronald Goldberg pressed the landline call button on his desk, and his assistant soon came in again.

"You say hi to David Giller, I'm going to see a rough sample of The Butterfly Effect in the afternoon. Also, another Simon Westeros play, well, what's it called?"

The assistant skillfully reminded: "Death is coming." ”

"That's right, it's "The Grim Reaper", you contact the WMA, send the script over, and besides, Simon Westeros ......"

Ronald Goldberg pondered for a moment, and before he could make a decision, the assistant had already taken the initiative to say: "Mr. Goldberg, Simon Westeros is currently in Arizona, participating in the filming of a movie invested by De Laurentiis Entertainment, called "Night of the Bloody Corpse". ”

Ronald Goldberg was a little puzzled: "Is there anything special about this movie?"

"No," the assistant shook his head and said, "However, the director of the film is Kathryn Bigelow, during the filming of "Lola Run", Kathryn Bigelow served as Simon Westeros's assistant director, and he should be returning the favor." ”

Hearing the assistant's words, Ronald Goldberg's mind flashed with the doubt of who Catherine Bigelow was, but he didn't ask again, just waved his hand and said: "In this case, forget it for the time being, you go and do what you just did first." ”

No matter how surprised, gaffe, and remorseful Hollywood executives who had the opportunity to get the distribution rights of "Lola Run" were shocked, gaffe, and secretly regretted, the astonishing box office figures of "Lola Run" in its first weekend still spread quickly and made many important pages in the evening newspaper that afternoon.