Simon pulls out the script for The Butterfly Effect from his backpack and hands it to Jonathan Friedman.

Jonathan Friedman didn't open it, just glanced at the cover, pressed the script on the table and continued to look at him with a smile.

In this case, Simon sorted out his thoughts for a while and began to elaborate: "This is a suspense thriller with a soft sci-fi nature. From a very young age, people around Ivan often found that the child would do something very strange and even weird for no reason. However, Ivan always claimed afterwards that he had no memory of the situation at all. Doctors classified Ivan's condition as intermittent amnesia and recommended him to do adjunctive treatment by keeping a diary. ”

At this point, Simon noticed that Jonathan Friedman's expression was already showing a bit of curiosity, and continued.

The general plot idea of "The Butterfly Effect" is a story of a young man who has the ability to go back to the past by reading a diary, and in order to make up for his past regrets, he travels through time and space again and again to try to change his life.

It's just that every time the actor tries to change the past, when he returns to the point in time of his twenties, he finds that everything around him has not developed according to his vision, or even worse.

The biggest feature of "The Butterfly Effect" is its kind of rigorous plot that is so interlocking that it makes people shoot amazingly, and the whole story is like a well-conceived net, and all the details can find nodes that echo each other elsewhere.

Therefore, this film can be called a classic in the hearts of many suspense thriller lovers.

In the original time and space, the production company of "Butterfly Effect" was New Line Pictures, and Simon heard that the film had many endings during the editing process. However, he finally chose the darkest and most impactful one of them, and the male protagonist returned to his mother's womb in despair after repeated attempts and failed again and again, and strangled himself with the umbilical cord with his own hands.

Then the whole story came to an abrupt end.

After Simon's brief explanation, Jonathan Friedman, who had little expectations for him, fell silent.

The first part of Robert Zemeckis's Back to the Future was released just last year and won the 1985 box office of the year.

As a result, Simon's screenplay, which has a time-traveling element similar to Back to the Future, is far beyond Jonathan Friedman's expectations, and he even feels that the story is even better than Back to the Future in terms of pure conception.

For now, at least, the idea of a script that felt so original was enough to convince him to recommend Simon to the WMA's literary agency.

You must know that Hollywood is also full of a large number of follow-up phenomena, but it is only because of the generally long production cycle of Hollywood movies that people do not feel a sense of a lot of films of the same type being released in the second half of the year when a movie is hot in the first half of the year.

Therefore, in the case of "Back to the Future" winning last year's box office, Simon's idea, as long as it is paired with a relatively complete script, can definitely arouse the strong interest of Hollywood studios.

In addition, such a strangely conceived thriller also happens to be the genre project that Jonathan Friedman has been looking for lately.

Now the key is, what is the quality of this script in your hand?

After all, there's no shortage of ideas in Hollywood, all that's missing is a well-developed storyscript that can be turned into a great film based on relevant ideas.

Many Hollywood movies usually have to go through a long revision process of several years during the script creation stage, mainly because there are too many details that need to be polished between a workable script and the original story idea.

Thinking quickly in his mind, he glanced down at the cover of the script in his hand, and Jonathan Friedman subconsciously asked a similar question to Catherine yesterday: "Simon, can you explain the meaning of the 'butterfly effect' first?"

Simon nodded and explained the theory of Professor Edward Lorenz of MIT again.

Jonathan Friedman listened, but asked a question that surprised him a little: "So, you went to MIT?"

"No," Simon shook his head, but immediately added, "I entered Stanford last year and got a full scholarship, only to drop out early due to some changes. ”

When Simon said this, Jonathan Friedman's expression changed a little more.

Although Stanford University is not part of the Ivy League in the United States, in fact, the top university on the West Coast of the United States has surpassed most of the league members as a whole, and has its own significant place in the world university rankings.

Simon was able to get into Stanford University on a full scholarship, and even though he had dropped out by this time, this qualification would definitely have Jonathan Friedman think of him several notches.

Simon also knew in his heart that he was actually conducting an interview right now.

Westerners don't pay attention to modesty, and the better a person performs in the interview process, the more likely he can increase the success rate.

Therefore, Simon did not hesitate to take advantage of his qualifications at this time.

After Simon finished speaking, he saw Jonathan Friedman glancing at his watch, his expression was a little hesitant, and he said at the right time: "Mr. Friedman, the first ten pages of the script are the outline of the story I made, maybe you can read it first, it is more detailed than what I just said." ”

Jonathan Friedman nodded, no longer entangled, and briskly opened the script in front of him.

However, the content of the first page of the script stunned him again, but it was a copyright registration certificate from the Writers Guild of America.

Shaking his head slightly and laughing, Jonathan Friedman flipped over casually, but his heart completely changed his initial perception of Simon. The young man on the other side is obviously not one of those hot-headed people who thought they could soar when they crashed into Hollywood.

Later, seeing the beautiful and neat English handwriting although it was a photocopy, Jonathan Friedman was no longer too surprised. Of course, the evaluation of Simon in my heart inevitably improved a lot again.

Hollywood may have more copyright disputes every year than the movies it produces, and it is also Simon's helplessness to directly affix the WGA's copyright registration certificate on the title page. He wouldn't be naïve enough to think that an industry giant like WMA can't make a small move to steal someone else's script.

The current Simon can't withstand this kind of twists and turns, so he simply cut off some possible disputes from the source.

In fact, as Jonathan Friedman thought, although he inherited the memories of the other twelve people, Simon is definitely not the kind of stunned young man who thinks he can make a splash when he steps into Hollywood.

From the very beginning of the idea of rushing to Los Angeles, Simon has already begun to plan very carefully.

Although he has a decent skin, Simon has no intention of following the path of an actor. His first goal was to become a director, but without any qualifications and connections, this was obviously unlikely in the short term.

Then, it is a very good choice to start with a screenwriter with a slightly lower threshold.

According to some information in Simon's memory, the two major screenwriters' unions on the east and west coasts of Hollywood have more than 60,000 registered scripts every year, which seems like a very large number. But in Hollywood as a whole, the total number of low-budget solo films with all theatrical films, TV movies, and direct release videotapes added up to more than 600 each year.

The 1% success rate is already very high in Simon's opinion.

What's more, among the tens of thousands of scripts that appear every year, mediocrity still accounts for the majority after all. But as a traverser, the scripts that Simon can come up with are basically high-quality products after the big waves.

And, in the initial selection of the script, Simon also carefully weighed various factors.

As a newcomer to Hollywood, if you want to ensure that your script is favored by the film company as much as possible, you must first produce it at a low cost, and if Simon takes out the script of "Titanic" now, there is a 99% chance that someone will throw it directly into the trash. Second, the story must be novel enough to stand out. Finally, it's best to cover the hot elements of some of the box office blockbusters of recent years.

"Butterfly Effect" is exactly in line with the above three: low cost, new creativity, and crossing elements to follow last year's box office champion "Back to the Future".

Inside the office, there was a moment of silence as Jonathan Friedman reads.

When the knock on the door remembered, Jonathan Friedman found himself unconsciously reading the text of the script. The text of the script in the standard Hollywood format is also impeccable, and the beautiful handwritten English not only does not have any sense of disobedience, but makes it a more comfortable reading experience.

Immersed in reading, he was suddenly interrupted, and Jonathan Friedman looked up in displeasure to find his assistant Owen Wright standing by the door and gesturing to him.

Looking at his schedule, Jonathan Friedman said to his assistant, "If Courtney has nothing else to do, let her wait a while." The same goes for the next appointment, and I will leave work later today. ”

When Owen Wright heard this, he looked at Simon, who was sitting with his back to him, and nodded and was about to leave the office, when Jonathan Friedman called out to the other party and ordered, "Also, come in with two cups of coffee." ”

When the door closed again, Jonathan Friedman smiled at Simon, explaining nothing but turning his attention back to the script in front of him.

Simon didn't mind, and casually glanced at the electronic watch on his wrist.

The time is 4:13.

In other words, Jonathan Friedman should have reserved only 10 minutes for himself to meet, and if he did not perform as well as he should, he may have been sent away.

Simon doesn't have any guilt in his heart about this, and he probably would.

Politeness is a person's cultivation, but the work still has to be done according to the rules. He is still an obscure Hollywood rookie, naturally only worth 10 minutes.

Owen Wright quickly came in with two cups of coffee, and Simon took the cups, thanked him, and continued to wait patiently for Jonathan Friedman to read the script.