Although Eric is not in Los Angeles, "Toy Story" began a small-scale screening after a long period of publicity when the internal test film of "Cut Throat Island" was made. The novel form of 3D animation, the heartwarming and interesting plot, and the allegorical storyline quickly became a huge sensation in the media.

“…… Unlike the fairy tales of Disney's princes and princesses, this film tells a story of friendship, trust, and search from a toy perspective. ”

“…… This is an allegory for adults, with heroic and anti-hero elements being the main pillars of content. The collective family feels lively and lively, and there will always be a lot of warm scenes. Buzz and Woody's big heroic feelings and unpretentious sincerity can find our shadow. A little black humor doesn't detract from the beauty of what is worth believing in. ”

“…… A new form of animated film, Pixar's 3D animation technology will undoubtedly bring about a revolution over hand-drawn animation. ”

“……”

After a one-week screening, the Firefly publicity department was so confident that Michael Lynn, after consulting with Eric on the phone, added $10 million to the Toy Story budget, and the total cost of production and distribution of the film reached the $70 million blockbuster level.

However, Eric knew that as long as he could establish 3D animation in Hollywood with "Toy Story", the total cost of $70 million would definitely be worth it. What's more, according to the number of memories of the game, Firefly is confident enough to recoup the entire cost of Toy Story with its local release in North America alone. The subsequent distribution of various channels will bring a lot of net profits to Firefly. Most importantly. Before that. Firefly has already registered the trademark for all the toys in this animated film, and Eric is well aware that the profits from the licensing of animated characters in "Toy Story" are definitely no less than the box office revenue of this animated film.

Compared with the fanfare of "Toy Story", "Cut Throat Island" seems to be much more low-key, and after the internal test film, although Disney does not have much confidence in the film, it does not think about the box office dud. Although Disney used the reason that the movie still needs to be revised in details. There was not much of a test screening, but there was no relaxation at all in terms of publicity such as TV teasers and billboard posters.

As a significant investor in "Cut Throat Island", Robert Shea has determined that "Cut Throat Island" will bring losses, and after so many years in Hollywood, he can also imagine that the movie will be a big hit, once it loses at the box office. Disney will definitely do everything possible to pass on the loss to him, an outsider. So he bit a penny and refused to pay it again, and even had an argument with Michael Eisner.

The idea of increasing the publicity budget was proposed by Michael Eisner. But at this moment, he definitely won't let Disney bear the cost alone, so he took out the contract as a weapon and forced Robert Shea to pay a budget according to the proportion of the capital increase. Robert Shea could only swallow this dumb loss, and he knew that if he was unwilling to pay at this time, then Disney would have more reason to pass on the box office loss to him.

According to Disney's predictions, "Cut Throat Island" has a Hollywood blockbuster gimmick with an investment of more than 100 million yuan after all, even if the plot is ...... Okay, it's a bit scattered, but it's not without precedents in Hollywood history that the plot is scattered but it's a big hit. So Disney is optimistic that "Cut Throat Island" will be able to get at least $80 million at the box office, and the overseas box office is expected to reach this figure. After the release of the two important box office channels, although there will be some losses, there will certainly be no problem in recovering the cost within two years after the subsequent sale of videotapes and TV broadcast rights.

Even after the "Toy Story" movie received a very good reputation, although Disney felt that its monopoly in the Hollywood animation industry would be threatened, because "Toy Story" and "Cut Throat Island" were two completely different audiences, Disney did not feel too much pressure.

Entering late June, the summer season of 1991 has lasted for a month, and this summer file began with the sequel to "Toy Condor 2" released by Fox at the end of May.

At the end of last year, the first part of "Fight the Condor" won a global box office of nearly $200 million with an investment of more than 20 million, and the profit was higher than Fox's main "Die Hard 2" last year, so Fox couldn't wait to start the second part. However, the last time he asked Eric to choose the script, he paid 30% of the capital investment, and as a result, Eric made a profit of about 50 million with an investment of more than 8 million, which made Fox hurt hard. Therefore, the producer of the sequel, Fox, directly pretended to be deaf and dumb about this matter, and didn't even mention it, Eric was busy, and there was no specific contract for this matter, and Eric didn't bother to pay attention to it.

After the last spoof of "Top Gun", the sequel still continued the original style, choosing to spoof Sylvester Stallone's "First Blood". But unfortunately, Fox took this sequel away, although the sequel's spoof Cheng Dù was even crazier than the first one, and the cost increased to $40 million, but I don't know why, the audience just didn't buy it, from the end of May to the end of June, three weeks after its release, "Toy Condor 2" only got $28 million at the box office in more than 2,100 theaters, and the failure was a foregone conclusion. Of course, everyone was happy about the success of the film, but surprisingly, the sequel failed, and because it failed so completely, a large number of shareholders wrote to the Fox board of directors, condemning Fox management for not leaving Eric behind and developing a sequel to "Toy Condor" alone, so that the promising film series was devastated.

Not only "Toy Condor", but in the summer for a month, none of the films released by major film companies are too good, and at this time, the total weekly box office in North America should have exceeded $100 million. But not until a week before the release of Toy Story. The weekly box office is only more than 80 million. Of course. The reason is very clear to all.

On June 21, after overwhelming publicity and good word of mouth, "Toy Story" opened in 2,400 theaters in North America, and before that, "Toy Story" had been screened on a small scale, accumulating a box office of more than $1.5 million, although this figure seems a little insignificant, but on average in less than 30 theaters, the average game reached a staggering $50,000.

Because there are no competitors in this summer file. In the first three days, "Toy Story" earned $30 million at the box office, and a week later, the box office accumulated to 47 million, easily exceeding the film's production costs.

As the first 3D animated film, "Toy Story" achieved such amazing results as soon as it debuted, causing a huge sensation in Hollywood and even the whole world. And Pixar, which has been obscure, has quickly become the focus of attention throughout Hollywood, and many professional magazines have evaluated the potential of "Toy Story" if it chooses to go public. The animation studio will not have a market capitalization of less than a billion dollars.

The media quickly unearthed the fact that Eric had bought Pixar from Steve Jobs for $20 million, and that Jobs was still struggling to run his own NeXT computer company. In the face of the reporter who suddenly appeared in front of him to ask about his feelings, Jobs, who heard the cause and effect, did not say a word.

However, privately, Jobs quickly personally called Eric in Cyberpunk City, and after congratulating Eric, Joe did not hesitate to seize the opportunity and asked Eric to provide an order for NeXT.

After "Toy Story", Pixar will definitely expand again, Jobs's computer company also produces professional-level computers, hearing Jobs's request, Eric agreed very happily without thinking about it, just to make a favor investment in advance for the future layout of Apple, although there is little hope for Jobs's character appreciation. As the world's largest Apple company by market value in the future, Eric did not plan to let go at the beginning, but now is not the best time to meddle in Apple, and Eric does not have enough funds and energy for the time being.

A week after the release of "Toy Story", on June 28, after a huge premiere, "Cut Throat Island" was also released in 2,500 theaters in North America.

Compared with "Toy Story", which was screened with great fanfare and accumulated word of mouth, although "Cut Throat Island" has invested $35 million in publicity funds on various publicity channels, it has only held a few public test screenings, and invited media and film critics who have a good relationship with Disney. After getting the benefits of Disney, of course, these people can't say bad things about "Cut Throat Island", but they can't boast about this movie with great fanfare, which will be slapped in the face in the future. Therefore, there are film reviews about "Cut Throat Island" in the newspaper, and the focus of the next pen is basically focused on the grand scenes and beautiful scenery of the movie, as for the plot, basically not many people are willing to talk about this.

Although the news of the investment of "Terminator 2" exceeded 100 million yuan was first reported, "Cut Throat Island" was the first Hollywood blockbuster released with an investment of more than 100 million, so on the day of the movie's release, a large number of fans with huge expectations for this movie walked into the cinema, so on the first day of the movie's release, "Cut Throat Island" won $9 million at the box office.

But then the situation took a turn for the worse, and after the movie was released, Disney could no longer control the word-of-mouth public opinion of "Cut Throat Island". The next day, there was a one-sided crusade against "Cut Throat Island" in the media, and even many prominent film critics unceremoniously made sharp criticisms, calling "Cut Throat Island" an "expensive visual garbage" piled up with $100 million.

Some ordinary fans who were interviewed after watching the movie expressed extreme disappointment with "Cut Throat Island", claiming that it was a scattered comic strip with no plot.

The film industry in North America has been developing for nearly a hundred years, because of the low ticket price, watching movies in the United States is a very civilian entertainment, plus there are many choices, so it means that in this mature market, bad movies do not have much room to survive.

Therefore, on the second day of release, the box office of "Cut Throat Island" plummeted the next day, falling to more than $5 million, and again to just over $3 million on the third day.

In the first three days, "Cut Throat Island" earned $17 million at the box office, which is not too miserable if you don't look at the box office trend.

But three days later, the attendance rate of "Cut Throat Island" has slipped to the edge of being almost forced to draw, and after the first week, the total box office of "Cut Throat Island" has accumulated 20 million, which means that in four days on weekdays, the film only got a pitiful 3 million box office. In the second week, 1,000 theaters directly painted this movie that had no attendance, and the remaining 1,500 theaters could only grit their teeth without tears because they signed a two-week contract with Disney.

I don't know if the quality of "Cut Throat Island" is too poor, and the many situations in the early publicity for "Toy Story" and "Terminator 2" have aroused the audience's rebellious psychology, "Cut Throat Island" The word-of-mouth slipped into the abyss at the same time, "Toy Story" was released in the second week, not only did not decline, but increased, after the end of the second week, "Toy Story" once again got a box office of more than 49 million US dollars, although it took advantage of the fact that there were no blockbusters released in this summer file, but this kind of achievement of almost breaking 100 million yuan in two weeks once again made many people breathe a sigh of relief.

"Terminator 2" has also been promoted with a gimmick costing more than 100 million yuan before, and this time fans have also become cautious, therefore, on July 3, the first day of the release of "Terminator 2", the box office was not very good, only more than 8 million, but Cameron's carefully carved thrilling plot and the appearance of liquid metal machine Qì people made "Terminator 2" It quickly earned a lot of accolades, with $14 million and $11 million over the next two days, after $8 million on the first day, and $33 million over the weekend's total even more than the previous Toy Story.

As for "Cut Throat Island", it got more than $5 million at the box office again in the second week, and then collectively painted, and was completely swept into the ranks of Hollywood's big bad movies, and the two-week release brought a total of $25 million to "Cut Throat Island", and the total investment in the production and distribution of this film reached $140 million, because of the one-sided bad reviews of word-of-mouth, "Cut Throat Island" Not to mention overseas distribution, the revenue from videotapes and television rights is better than nothing, so Disney and Robert Shea will jointly bear a huge loss of up to 120 million. (To be continued......)