Simon pushed the Hollywood Reporter in his hand towards Catherine and said with a smile: "Someone put Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep together to make a romantic comedy, and the guy who made this decision is really a 'genius'." ”

Catherine listened to Simon's mocking tone and imagined the scene of Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep falling in love, and inexplicably felt a little funny.

Intrigued, Catherine pulls the newspaper in front of her, and discovers that Simon has just read a news article about Paramount Pictures' upcoming release of the "Heartfire" movie tape.

"Heartfire" is a romantic comedy starring Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep, which will be released this summer. The film invested $20 million, but only recovered $25 million at the box office, and in order to recoup the funds as soon as possible, Paramount plans to release the tape at the end of November.

After a brief review of "Heartfire", this article in The Hollywood Reporter is mainly about the issue of the film window that the industry is concerned about.

After a brief glance, Catherine found that the notation Simon had just made was only a casual mention of a person's name in the article.

This is the screenwriter of "Heartfire" named Nora Epron.

Looking back up, Catherine was curious, "Simon, what's wrong with Nora Epron?"

Simon drank the rest of the milk, put down the cup, and said, "I watched the review of "Heartfire" a few months ago and was very interested in the plot of this movie. So, if you have the opportunity in the future, you may be able to cooperate with each other. ”

For Nora Epron, maybe not too many people know. But when it comes to "Sleepless in Seattle", it must be familiar.

Nora Efron is the director and writer of Sleepless in Seattle.

Of course, the film is not yet available. Moreover, among Nora Epron's works, Simon's favorite is not "Sleepless in Seattle", but another lesser-known film called "When Harry Meets Sally".

Simon has always felt that "When Harry Meets Sally" should be the pinnacle of Nora Epron's romance.

It just so happened that "When Harry Met Sally" was about to be released in the next few years, and Simon was just thinking about whether there would be a chance to cut the film down, so he put a mark on Nora Epron's name.

It's just that this kind of mind obviously can't be explained to Catherine, so she casually teases.

In any case, it is indeed too messy to let Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep make a romance movie.

Judging from the main creative lineup, this is obviously another CAA packaging project.

Catherine could sense Simon's reservation, but she didn't ask. In fact, she also agrees with Janet's point of view, the little boy in front of her definitely has a lot of secrets hidden in his head.

Thinking of Janet, the situation in the bedroom last night couldn't help but come to mind, glancing at Simon, who had finished breakfast, the woman's mood was suddenly a little scattered, and she quickly lowered her gaze, picked up a knife and fork and pretended to deal with a piece of fried egg.

Simon put away the dishes and said to the woman with her head down, "Catherine, you eat slowly, I'll go to Fox Studios first." ”

Catherine snorted, noticing Simon's movements, and said, "Simon, I'll clean it up later, anyway, well, and Jenny's." ”

Simon smiled and nodded, "Okay." ”

With that, Simon still sent his dishes to the kitchen sink before coming out.

Catherine saw Simon leave the dining room, thought for a moment, put down her knife and fork, and followed.

It's already November, and although it's Los Angeles with all seasons like spring, the weather at this time of year is also a little cold.

Simon picked up his coat from the hanger, took it naturally with Catherine, unfolded it to help Simon put it on, and reached out to straighten the rolled-up collar. Simon smiled and let the woman do it, and finally picked up his bag and put it on his shoulder, looked at Catherine in a burgundy turtleneck, and said, "Then, goodbye." ”

Catherine felt Simon's slightly tentative hopeful eyes, but Janet's sparkling eyes suddenly appeared in her mind, she took a step back, pretended to see if there was anything wrong with Simon's clothes, smiled casually, and said, "Goodbye." ”

Simon was not reluctant, nodded, and left the house.

In order to ensure as much post-production time as possible, Simon's basic work rhythm for the past month has been to shoot films on weekdays, rough cut dailies on weekends, straighten out various shooting plans in the evenings, and find time to write some soundtracks.

Two-thirds of the way through the filming of "Lola Run" has been completed, and the shots between the beginning of the film and Laura's first run have been filmed, and Simon's work over the past few weekends has focused on the rough cut of the first running scene.

The development of film editing is basically a small cycle of 'non-linear editing' to 'linear editing' and then to 'non-linear editing'.

In the earliest days of film editing, it was entirely directed to film.

Editors can arbitrarily culle, reduce, and replace films, so they are non-linear edits.

But this most primitive non-linear editing is not a large amount of work.

For a film, calculated according to 10 hours of footage, the cumulative length of all films is not how many meters, but 20 kilometers. You can imagine how complicated the whole process would be to edit a film from dozens of kilometers of film.

Then, the advent of linear editing finally freed the editor from the encirclement of dozens of kilometers of film.

Linear editing works by recording the contents of a film shot onto tape, and then transcribing the footage on tape to another cassette according to the editing plan.

This method of editing greatly reduces the workload of editors, and it is a WYSIWYG model that allows you to monitor the results of your editing at any time, so it quickly became popular.

However, the disadvantages of linear editing are also very obvious. Editors can only edit the footage on tape in a linear order, and with a little more flexibility, they can only insert and replace the tape for the same amount of time. However, if you want to delete, retract, or replace non-equal-length shots of the finished edit, it is not possible.

This mode is actually similar to a music tape, a five-minute song, if a person presses the record button and howls twice, he can replace his own voice, but the song is still five minutes, and if you want to make it four and a half minutes, you have to rearrange the song and then re-record it.

After linear editing, more advanced non-linear editing appeared in the late eighties.

By transcribing film footage into digital imagery, it is then possible to perform a non-linear operation on editing software similar to that of original hand editing.

I have to say that in the film era, whether it was the original hand-editing, the later linear editing, or even the digital non-linear editing, it was actually just an editing method. After a film completes the post-production process such as editing and soundtrack, it is ultimately necessary to manually edit the original negative of the film according to the finished results, so as to obtain a film copy that can be screened in theaters.

Now, in 1986, digital non-linear editing was just in its infancy, and the technology was far from mature, and Simon had to work on a linear editor for the post-production of "Lola Run".

Although he had never been exposed to linear editing in his previous life, he had these experiences in other memories, and Simon hired an assistant to help him get acquainted with the linear editing machines at Fox Studios on the first weekend, and he worked alone for the past few weeks.

No matter what the era, being an editor is a lonely profession that requires a lot of patience.

Fox Studios' linear editing equipment is billed by the hour, and Simon is not willing to waste time.

Rushed to Fox Studios, sat down in front of the editing desk, looked at the two vintage CRT monitors in front of me, listened to the clicking sound of the machines running, and before I knew it, it had been a morning.

It wasn't until the staff reminded him that Simon came back from his focused work and remembered that he had made an appointment with the reporter from the Los Angeles Times yesterday for a noon interview.

Hurrying to the gate of Fox Studios, Peter Butler had already waited for a while, saying hello apologetically, Simon did not take the other party into the studio, but picked a restaurant on the street outside the studio.

The two sat down in the dining room and ordered lunch, and Peter Butler turned on a tape recorder and put it on the table, with a natural familiarity in his tone, and said, "So, you're still working on the weekend?"

"yes," Simon nodded, "aren't you too?"

Peter Butler laughs, "It looks like we already have one thing in common, and that's good." ”

Simon smiled as well: "Speaking of which, Peter, why are you interested in me? I'm just an inconspicuous little person compared to the Los Angeles Times, right?"

Peter Butler shrugged his shoulders and said, "Actually, in the Los Angeles Times newspaper, I'm also a small person. Interviewing Spielberg must have nothing to do with me. ”

"I understand, that's another common denominator. ”

"It's a pity that there is no wine, or we would have had a drink," Peter Butler laughed, and continued, "but, Simon, in all fairness, I don't think you're a humble little man at all. ”

Simon just smiled.

Peter Butler also took it upon himself to say, "I have done some research on you beforehand. You're supposed to be in L.A. in June, and then, as a newcomer, you're surprisingly signed by Jonathan Friedman, the vice president of WMA, as the only writer client. Then, the WMA broke out into infighting, which is still related to you. Then there was the incident that happened in Santa Monica at the end of July, and although there was very little talk about it in the newspapers, as far as I know, we at the Los Angeles Times alone suppressed two reports that tried to explore the matter. Then, less than half a year into Hollywood, you're already directing your first film, well, "Lola Run." What's even more surprising is that several Hollywood bigwigs, Brian de Palma, David Giller and Robert Redford, have said that they will be named executive producers for the film, which is very rare in Hollywood. So, Simon, you can't be considered a small person by any point of view. Little people can't do these things. ”