In the afternoon, at The Peninsula Hotel in Kowloon, more than 20 tables were placed in the center of the hall, and the customers who came early to drink tea chatted quietly with their friends.

Huo Yaowen glanced at Uncle Shao Liu, who was still pondering opposite, smiled slightly at the corner of his mouth, and turned his gaze to the small lobby of the Peninsula Hotel. With high ceilings, retro decoration, and a lobby that presents the overall atmosphere of the twenties and thirties and the unique style of Europe, Huo Yaowen has not come here for tea once or twice, but he has rarely had the opportunity to seriously appreciate the Peninsula Hotel, which is known as the "Far Eastern Lady".

Uncle Shao frowned, pondered for a long time, and then slowly said in a tone of uncertainty and suspicion: "Yaowen, are you sure you are not teasing me?

Huo Yaowen smiled bitterly: "Sixth uncle, I will definitely not let you cheaply." Didn't we make it very clear? This time I went to Hollywood to open a film company, which was jointly funded by you and me, and there is no one who is cheap and who is not cheap. ”

Uncle Shao Liu thought about this truth, his mind became active, and he hurriedly asked: "Then tell me in detail what this B-grade film is, I remember that Hollywood doesn't seem to have a B-grade film system, right?

"Uncle Six is right, B-grade films are indeed not a type of Hollywood film classification system. To put it simply, it refers to a film made with a low budget, which has been in the prototype of Hollywood in the 30s, and in recent years, the production of B-grade films in the United States has been very popular with Hollywood film companies, because of the small investment cost, high rate of return and fast, it has become a major production project of many Hollywood film companies. ”

Young people living in the 21st century basically know the level of American films, which are mainly divided into two levels: A and B, A-grade films are blockbusters, and B-grade films are small-budget films.

Compared with A-level blockbusters, B-level low-budget films often use pornography, gore, and horror as gimmicks in order to earn box office, such as horror films such as "Saw Horror" and "Black Friday". Of course, there are some classic B-grade films, such as "Vulgar", which was positioned as a B-grade film when it was first made.

Strictly speaking, there is not much difference between grade A and grade B, it is nothing more than a question of how much investment cost.

Nowadays, B-grade films have not formed a trend in the United States, there are many small-scale films, but most of them are biased towards literary films, and what major companies really care about is the production of A-grade blockbusters, and this situation will not be until the mid-to-late 80s, when several Hollywood film companies go bankrupt due to excessive investment, and Hollywood will gradually move towards the production of B-grade films.

After listening to Huo Yaowen's serious explanation, Uncle Shao Liushu muttered: "In other words, a B-grade film is a small-budget investment movie, and it is not an R-rated film?"

That's what it means, but because the investment cost is too small, if you want to make money, you have to shoot on a large scale, so often B-grade movies are not suitable for minors. Huo Yaowen didn't hide the disadvantages of B-grade films, and there was nothing to hide, anyway, Uncle Shao Liu would definitely investigate it when he went back.

"I know that. Uncle Shao nodded understandingly.

Although the most shot by Shaw Brothers in the past few decades is martial arts films, with the return of Li Hanxiang, many Fengyue films have been filmed in the past ten years, and the investment cost of this kind of film is small, but the return rate after release is very high, in fact, it is no different from B-grade films.

In the future, when Hong Kong introduces a film classification system, such films will also be planned as third-class films.

"Sixth uncle, you don't have to rush to reply to me, wait until you go back and think about it slowly, but it's best to give me an answer as soon as possible. ”

Huo Yaowen looked at Uncle Shao Liu, who was still hesitating, and said with a smile: "Uncle Six, you are a generation of movie tycoons, I have liked to watch films produced by Shaw Brothers since I was a child, but to be offensive, you yourself know very well how Shaw Brothers films have been in recent years. ”

The rest of the words don't need Huo Yaowen to say, Uncle Shao can also make up for it, it is nothing more than the Shaw Brothers is declining, there is Jiahe in the front, there is Huanyu in the back, plus some small film companies that have been established scattered recently, the mountain of Shaw Brothers is slowly being hollowed out.

Huo Yaowen saw that Uncle Liu's brows furrowed, and continued to add fuel and vinegar: "And the local market in Hong Kong alone has become more and more unable to meet the existing film companies, Huanyu Film counted the annual local box office last year, which was roughly about 70 million Hong Kong dollars, which is only 12 million US dollars, and no matter how much it expands in the future, it will not exceed 30 million US dollars."

And how big the U.S. market is, Uncle Six may not know very well, last year, the U.S. branch of Huanyu Film, led the film, the annual profit was about 15 million US dollars, this is because the investment is in low-cost films. As for the movies invested, I don't need to say much about this, Uncle Sixth should also know that it is a lot of money. ”

"Do you think I don't want to make dollars?" Uncle Shao looked at Huo Yaowen unhappily, although his family knew about his own family, but Huo Yaowen opened his mouth directly to say it, and he was inevitably a little uncomfortable, not to mention that he was still a junior who said it.

The sixth uncle couldn't help pouting and said: "I don't have the ability to give birth to Yaowen, I also went to Hollywood a few years ago, but the ghosts watch movies and our preferences are different." A few years ago, I invested 10 million US dollars to shoot the "Galaxy War", and you know that the box office was dismal, if it wasn't for the investment in "Raiders of the Lost Ark" with you, I am afraid that Shaw Brothers would have collapsed long ago. ”

"That's why I said to make a B-grade movie. Huo Yaowen said seriously: "Huanyu Film's branch in the United States has never produced movies with large investments, just because the investment is too large, and the market risk will increase dramatically. Except for what I wrote myself, I basically don't invest in films that exceed two million dollars. ”

"This ...... Let me think about it. "Uncle Shao really wants to cooperate with Huo Yaowen, but he is almost eighty years old now, and although his body is healthy, it is a foregone conclusion that he will be old, and he will not be able to accept his old age. At this time, he cooperated with Huo Yaowen to set up an American film company, which is okay, but if it fails, it can be described as a late festival.

"Okay, then wait for your news, Uncle Six. Huo Yaowen looked at the hesitant Sixth Uncle Shao, naturally knowing the scruples in his heart, but he didn't urge the other party to agree now.

This time, Huo Yaowen found Uncle Shao Liu and asked him to open a film company in the United States together, of course, the purpose was not to give the other party a chance to make a fortune, mainly because Huo Yaowen wanted to unify the Hong Kong TV field as soon as possible. I thought of using the gimmick of opening a film company in the United States to attract Uncle Shao to turn his attention from the TV station back to his old professional movies.

Since investing in the filming of "Raiders of the Lost Ark" two years ago, Uncle Shao Liushu has earned millions of dollars with a low-investment "Orangutan King", which has made the movie tycoon enthusiastic about the film industry again.

not only increased investment in Shaw Brothers films, but also spent a lot of money to renovate the Shaw Brothers cinema line, which has not changed for decades, which is enough to see that although "Lian Po" is old, he is still ambitious.

Huo Yaowen took a fancy to this point, so he thought of pulling Shao Liushu to open a new film company in the United States, hoping to rely on movies to drag Shao Liushu's attention to the TV station, so as to speed up Huo Yaowen's plan to acquire wireless stations.

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