This summer, Relativity Entertainment is undoubtedly one of the winners, and many of its films have achieved good results.

Although "The Incredible Hulk" in May has little hope of recovering its total investment at the box office, the offline results ensure that the film can be profitable and take the entire Avengers project a big step forward.

In June, "Cars" did well at the online box office, and it was super popular offline, and the sales revenue of peripheral derivatives caught up with the "Harry Potter" series.

"Teddy Bear" is small and big, ruining countless people's childhood, while bringing Relativity Entertainment nearly $200 million in North America and more than $400 million in the global box office.

And the film was also released in North America and overseas, and the global box office exceeded $500 million.

Needless to say, July's "Transformers" was a hot mess from online to offline, and the love and killing of Optimus Prime and Megatron affected the world, and the global box office is now close to $700 million.

"Kung Fu Panda" is the latest to be released, but the North American box office is also steadily advancing, and it will exceed $200 million in the next few days.

This film takes an international route, and the overseas response is even stronger, and the overseas box office has now surpassed the North American box office.

While these five films have not yet been rolled off the globe, they have generated more than $2 billion at the box office worldwide.

Relativity Entertainment is like a gold sucker, with huge amounts of money constantly coming in, and on the basis of ensuring that the capital chain is healthy enough, most of it becomes the company's reserve fund to deal with the upcoming big plans and all kinds of troubles.

"At present, the company's liquidity is operating normally, and the cash reserves are abundant. ”

In the finance department's office, Mary told Ronan: "As of the end of July, we have a total of $14.5 billion in reserves, in addition to liquidity, and that number is expected to increase to $20 billion by the end of the year." ”

Ronan nodded slightly and asked, "What about the credit?"

Mary immediately replied: "Bank of America has the last loan left, and if we want to mobilize money, Bank of America can provide us with $5 billion in a short period of time, and we can double the mortgage loan that has been mobilized for a long time." ”

Today's Relativity Entertainment is no longer the small company it used to be.

Ronan said, "Mary, start preparing early. I ask that in the second half of 2008 or 2009, when the group company needs it, it can mobilize at least 35 billion US dollars in the shortest possible time without affecting normal operations, and you need to plan and plan well. ”

Mary knew about Ronan and Robert Iger's plans and said, "I understand, I'll give you a satisfactory answer." ”

Ronan is not worried about the problem of funds, because there is one last guarantee, Relativity Entertainment is still the absolute controlling party of Netflix Network, and the stock price of Netflix Network, under the strong performance guarantee, has maintained a relatively stable and rapid upward trend, and the overall market value will exceed 100 billion this year.

Although it is almost 2008, Ronan has also done a lot of work in advance, and the economic crisis will have some impact, but it will not affect the Netflix network too much.

And in my impression, the impact of this economic crisis on the Internet industry is not very large.

In contrast, industries such as real estate, finance and insurance are the hardest hit areas.

Ronan has largely not invested much in these industries.

Along with the economic crisis, there is also a shortage of money in Hollywood, the financial industry has been impacted, and many big productions now need to be financed to shoot Hollywood, which will inevitably have problems raising funds.

Even, the liquidity itself will be difficult.

The other is the famous strike in Hollywood.

In the Hollywood industry, the industry agreements and sharing agreements between the producers' alliance and major trade unions are basically a 20-year cycle.

In the last cycle, in 1988, the famous general strike broke out in Hollywood, and the major unions, including the directors' union, the actors' union and the screenwriters' union, prepared to go on strike and demand a share of the producers' dividends on TV broadcasts and video rentals and sales.

The Producers' Union was able to get the directors' union and the actors' union as quickly as possible, and the two unions withdrew from the ranks of the strikers and participants before they could start the strike on the ground.

Then, the Producers' Union rejected the Writers' Union's conditions, leading to a general strike of the Writers' Union.

Frankly speaking, the importance of the script as the foundation of a film is self-evident, but Hollywood's neglect of the script and screenwriters is also an objective fact, and in the inherent concept of the producers' alliance composed of Hollywood's large and medium-sized companies, the screenwriters are a group of worthless goods.

Want to get the same treatment as the directors' union and the actors' union? That's a pipe dream!

Now that 2008 is approaching and the agreement between the Producers Union and Hollywood's major unions is about to expire, contact negotiations are now underway.

The Producers' Union wants to get rid of Hollywood's major unions as quickly as possible at the least cost and in the best way in their own interests.

Frankly speaking, from Ronan's standpoint, when I see the director's union, the actors' union, and the screenwriters' union, I can't help but feel a little tired.

From time to time, jumping up and down is okay, and I especially ask for an increase in employee salaries and dividends, which is really unbearable for uncles, uncles, and grandfathers!

Ronan's thinking is actually the thinking of the members of the Producers' Alliance.

Therefore, even if the producers' alliance has begun to contact the major trade unions, the effect is very unsatisfactory, and even the results achieved are zero.

Times are changing, Hollywood is changing, the film market is changing, and the demands of both labor and management are also changing.

Today, the emerging DVD and Internet streaming channels, led by Netflix, have become the main source of film and television peripheral revenue, but according to the agreement signed in 1988, these are generally irrelevant to the crew members such as directors, actors and screenwriters.

Those that have signed a late sharing agreement are exceptional cases and are not universal.

This piece of profit is really eye-catching, and it has naturally become a point of conflict between the interests of labor and management.

Labor demands universal access to the dividends of new businesses such as DVD and the Internet, so how can the employer easily let go of its own interests?

The first few contacts between the two sides were basically a one-shot affair.

The Producers' Alliance, which is dominated by six major Hollywood companies plus Relativity Entertainment and DreamWorks, has assembled a negotiating team.

In this regard, the interests of the major companies are completely aligned.

Over the next six months, the negotiating team will need to get a handle on Hollywood's many unions.

In fact, the focus is on the directors' union, actors' union, and screenwriters' union, and the interests of other organizations are not high, and they are more likely to follow the crowd.

Hollywood's large and medium-sized companies also have a certain tacit understanding, and the directors' union and the actors' union say that although they will not agree to the conditions they put forward, it is not difficult to reach an agreement after the two sides make concessions.

However, what about the Writers Guild......

In the general opinion of the Union of Producers, the Writers' Guild thinks too much.

Ronan is a very important member of the Producers' Alliance, so it is clear that there is a high probability that the old drama of 1988 will be staged between the Directors Guild and the Actors' Guild and the Producers Alliance, and the so-called strike will eventually be stillborn.

And with the general disdain of screenwriters and scripts in Hollywood companies, a screenwriters' strike is inevitable.

As a member of the management side, Ronan will not stupidly jump out and take the initiative to act as a bad person, and the requirements put forward by the screenwriters guild also damage the interests of Relativity Entertainment.

It is in the interest of Relativity Entertainment to keep the conditions of the major unions down as much as possible.

This inevitable strike involves major differences of interest, and it is not something that can be adjusted casually.

So, Ronan did a lot of preparation in advance.

After leaving the finance department of the group company, he went directly to Shahai Entertainment, talked with George Clint for a while, and went to the screenwriting department to urge several screenwriting teams to complete the script work at hand as planned before October this year.

At present, the screenwriting department has completed a number of scripts, and nearly ten scripts are busy creating, even if the upcoming strike lasts for a few months, it will not have much impact on Shahai Entertainment's filming and production plan in 2008.

For many projects such as "Joker", "The Hunger Games", "Beauty and the Beast" and many other projects, the script has already been finalized, and even if there is no screenwriter, the crew can prepare for filming normally.

However, some unexpected circumstances will still affect the filming and production plan of Shahai Entertainment.

For example, in the "Resident Evil" series, after "Resident Evil 3", the husband and wife Paul Anderson and Milla Jovovich took a break for a while to prepare for the filming of the fourth part, and then suddenly found out that the heroine Milla Jovovich was pregnant, so she had to postpone the fourth part.

The filming and production of "Resident Evil 4" can only be carried out after Milla Jovovich gives birth and recovers her figure next year.

This can also be regarded as an irresistible factor of manpower.

Another zombie movie series, the script of "Dawn of the Living Dead 3" was also pushed into the fast lane by Ronan, because "Dawn of the Living Dead 2" achieved a slightly higher North American opening box office than the first part, with a score of $38.65 million, grabbing a North American box office top for Relativity Entertainment in August.

This film, whose main story and background are focused on a small island, is actually an old routine inherent in zombie movies, but it is talked about by many fans of this genre.

In particular, several videos were widely disseminated through social media such as the Netflix network.

The heroine of "Dawn of the Living Dead 2" is called Alexandra D'Addario, and she is chased by zombies several times in the film and desperately escapes.

From the beginning of the promotional period, Alexandra Daddario, wearing a white skinny short T-shirt, fully showed fans what the Everest earthquake is!

On the Netflix network, some fans said that the footage of Alexandra D'Addario escaping from the zombies alone brought millions of male viewers to the film.

It is not difficult for those who have followed Hollywood movies to find that there are some very cliché plots, but they are repeatedly used in Hollywood movies and continue to succeed.