At noon, film reviews about "Titanic" from North America came to Venice one after another. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

Compared with Europe, Eric and Firefly executives are more interested in the evaluation of this movie by the North American media, after all, "Titanic" is often the first to be released in the North American market than in overseas markets, and its box office performance in the North American market also affects the overseas market to a large extent.

However, the media commentary on "Titanic" in North America is also not optimistic.

While there was no shortage of newspapers such as USA Today, The New York Times, and The Hollywood Reporter praised the film, the New York Times even praised the film as "a masterpiece worthy of 'Gone with the Wind'." But similarly, newspapers such as the Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post have unabashedly criticized the film as a bad film with a mediocre story and a lengthy plot, and the Los Angeles Times has even openly questioned whether the film is really worth $215 million.

Eric only remembers the infinite scenery after the release of "Titanic" in his previous life, and what happened to this film before its release was roughly only in Cameron's bumpy production stage, which was the result of media reports, as for the reputation of "Titanic" before its release, Eric didn't know much about it.

Therefore, at this time, he couldn't help but feel apprehensive when he saw the film appear polarized in Europe and North America at the same time.

Eric has a lot of polarized word-of-mouth movies in his memory, and this type of movie often has a common feature, that is, fan movies adapted from original works such as novels and comics, and the box office of similar films basically has the characteristics of high box office in the early stage but serious lack of stamina under the strong promotion of the film company.

"Titanic" is definitely not a fan movie by any means, so the prospect is even more unpredictable under the current polarized word-of-mouth.

After all, fan-based movies can also rely on the popularity accumulated by the original work to reap a large box office in the first few weeks of opening, and even if the stamina is insufficient, the total box office is often not too bad. But "Titanic" does not have this advantage, it is impossible to get a high box office similar to a fan movie in the first few weeks of its release, once the word-of-mouth in the later stage is still polarized, then in the case of lack of stamina, the cumulative box office will definitely be much bleaker than that of fan movies.

The next day, Peter Ritchie sent a questionnaire to Eric about the dozens of ordinary movie fans and viewers during the film screening, and most of these questionnaires gave positive comments on "Titanic", but a small number of viewers complained that the film was too long, and the foreshadowing was slightly bloated.

Afternoon, July 29th.

Eric is about to fly to London at seven o'clock in the evening, which is the last meeting of the "Titanic" crew.

The film is confirmed to be released on December 20, and the public publicity has announced this date, and there is no possibility of changing it again. At this time, Eric, Katzenberg, James Cameron, and several other middle managers accompanying the Firefly Group sat in the living room of the Eric Suite at the Lido Hotel.

"It's not a good situation right now, but I want you to follow the established communication strategy and focus on reaching a younger audience." Saying this, Eric looked at Katzenberg and several other executives, remembered some details in the original time and space, and added: "One more point, no matter what the outside world says about "Titanic", but I don't want the voice of the firefly to tear down its own stage, if I find out that any executive is indiscriminately expressing something to the media, then he will wait to pack up his things and leave." I'm done talking, what do you think? ”

"Mr. Williams, that's right," a senior channel in the distribution department said: "Yesterday I received a call from a senior executive of Toho International in Japan, who wanted to buy out the Japanese distribution rights of "Titanic" in advance, including theatrical distribution and videotapes, DVDs and other peripherals. ”

Eric raised his eyebrows slightly, and the executive thought that Eric didn't know about Toho International, and said, "Toho International is one of the major publishers in Japan. ”

"I know this," Eric nodded, even though he was a little apprehensive now, but he definitely didn't mean to sell the distribution rights in advance like Fox in his previous life, but Eric still asked curiously, "How much did they offer?" ”

"3 billion yen," the executive said, looking down at the memo, "about $25 million." ”

When Katzenberg heard the other party's offer, he began to calculate quickly, because of the "Terminator" series, Cameron has a very high popularity in Japan, and it is estimated that this is one of the reasons why Toho International took a fancy to "Titanic" in advance, in addition, the ultra-high budget of "Titanic" and the current polarization of reviews are also the main reasons for the Japanese to make a move, and the other party is obviously going to gamble, and it is judged that Firefly is likely to accept this "bet".

$25 million is certainly just a preliminary offer, and the psychological price of the Japanese should be around $30 million. Because it is a buyout of the full distribution rights of the Japanese side, then, according to the expected price of 30 million, the Japanese people's expectations for the local box office should be around 60 million US dollars, and only in this way can we ensure that the cost can be fully recovered and profitability can be achieved in the later stage.

The $60 million box office in Japan can't reach the original $120 million of "Jurassic Park", but it definitely exceeds the average box office value of Hollywood blockbuster movies in Japan.

Moreover, for Hollywood distribution companies, according to the 35% overseas share ratio, if they want to recover 30 million US dollars at the box office in Japan, they need about 100 million US dollars at the Japanese box office, of course, this is not included in the income of Japanese videotapes and other revenues, but the peripheral copyright operation cycle of this overseas market is even longer than that in the United States, and if you calculate the time cost, it is still very cost-effective to sell all the Japanese distribution rights at one time.

Quickly clearing his mind, Katzenberg said, "Eric, I think, maybe we can think about it, we should be able to talk about about $30 million in the end. ”

"No," after a short silence, Eric shook his head and said, "No, everyone, if there is contact from other parties and wants to buy out the distribution rights of "Titanic", they will all refuse." ”

Seeing everyone's puzzled eyes, Eric spread his hands and said very shamefully: "That's it, maybe you want to explain, but I don't know how to explain, I just don't sell it." Now that we've come to this point, whether we win or lose, let's all have a bang. ”

Several other executives were a little stunned, Cameron, who had been silent, looked slightly excited, and Katzenberg shook his head with a wry smile, it was rare to see Eric's such a childish and willful side, after all, he was still a young man.

However, it is true that since it has reached the point where it is now, it is impossible to recover the cost by selling the distribution rights in advance, but it will only attract some guys who take advantage of the fire to rob, and the media will further decline under this behavior.

So, no matter how it ends, let's have a bang.

Anyway, the Firefly Group is enough to bear this kind of failure, and this failure can also be planned to reform the company's slightly aggressive production strategy, and when the time comes, presumably Eric will not object again.

After the afternoon meeting, Eric flew to London, Katzenberg went to Paris, and Cameron will return to Los Angeles tomorrow with the crew of "Titanic" and the staff of the Firefly distribution department to begin preparations for the official publicity of "Titanic".

Taking off from Venice at seven o'clock in the evening, and two hours later, the private business jet landed at London Heathrow.

Venice was still warm at this time, but in London at the end of August and early September, the night temperature had dropped to about 10 degrees, and the producers of the 007 series, Barbara Blockley and Michael Wilson, came to pick up the plane together, and after a few pleasantries, they drove to the Pinewood Studios, not far from Heathrow Airport.

Speaking of the 007 series, in addition to the Brookley family, which created this legendary spy film series, we have to mention the Pine Grove Studios located in the northwest suburbs of London, England.

Beginning with the first "Dr. No" in 1963, most of the interior scenes of the sequel to 007 were almost filmed at Pinewood Studios. The 007 series also became the main income support of Pinewood Studios for a time, allowing it to survive the impact of factors such as the rise of the television industry and the decline of European cinema. Because of the great significance of the 007 series to the studio, in addition to the iconic 007 special studio, there are many buildings named after 007 elements in the Pine Forest Studio, and several main roads in the park are basically contracted by the 007 series, which are called 'Blockley Avenue', '007 Avenue' and 'Goldfinger Avenue'.

Settling down in the town next to the east of Pinewood Studios that night, the Brockley siblings took Eric into the studio campus the next morning, and there were no plans to shoot today, and Eric was mainly familiar with the filming location for the next two months.

Taking Eric around the 30-hectare campus and inspecting a few sets set set for Casino Royale, Barbara Blockley said, "It's going to get colder and colder here in London over the next two months, so we've got Bond and Vesper's underwater scene in three days' time. ”

Pinewood Studios has the largest underwater photography facility in Europe, with a capacity of 1,200 tons of water, which was also built specifically for the 007 series.

Eric retains the underwater parting scene of Bond and Vesper after the collapse of the building in Venice from the original film, but it is certainly not possible that this scene could not have been filmed in Venice, but was moved to the underwater filming base in Pinewood Studios.

Eric nodded, and followed the Brockley siblings to a studio.

At first glance, the studio looks like a giant indoor swimming pool, but it's not, and any studio in the world can do it if you simply build an indoor pool. The biggest advantage of the underwater photography base of Songlin Studios is that it has a complete set of underwater shooting equipment and solutions.

Anyone who has ever made a movie knows that whether it is shooting on water or underwater, as long as it is wet, the difficulty of shooting will be greatly increased, just like Cameron's "The Abyss" and Kevin Costner's "Future Water World", as well as the just-completed "Titanic", the reason why these films are so expensive is that it involves water-related shooting.

Although the crew was still resting today, there were still a few Casino Royale crew members busy inside the underwater studio, and Eric could see his royal cameraman, Nikel Frank, standing wet by the pool in a wetsuit and discussing something with another person who was also wearing a wetsuit.

Seeing Eric and Brockley siblings appear, everyone opened their mouths to say hello, and Nickel also walked over with another person, and after greeting him, he introduced: "Eric, this is David Reis, the underwater photographer of Pinewood Studios. ”

"Hello, Mr. Reese, I might be in trouble for you in the next few days." Eric smiled and reached out to shake the other party's handshake, Nichol has been one of Hollywood's top photographers over the years, but he has never set foot in underwater shooting, so this shoot is largely dependent on the assistance of professional underwater photographers in Pinewood Studios.

David Rhys shook hands with Eric and said with the same smile, "Mr. Williams, it's an honor to work with you. ”

Eric walked to the edge of the pool, stretched out his hand to test the temperature of the water, and said, "It's relatively low now, what is the temperature of the water here?" ”

"It's about 20 degrees, which is about the same as room temperature," David Rhys explains, "but during the shoot, we can turn on the warm water circulation system and control the water temperature to a more suitable temperature." ”

Squinting his eyes and looking at the bottom of the water, Eric didn't see the bottom of the tank, and asked, "What about the depth?" ”

"This is the deep water area, the water depth is six meters," David Rees said, "because the iron cage is more than two meters, in order to avoid goofs, so the underwater set of Casino Royale is mainly in this part of the area. ”

The two chatted for a while, and Nichol said, "Eric, we've got the underwater set up, do you want to go down and have a look?" ”

Eric nodded, and David Rhys took the initiative to take Eric to the changing room, and after changing into a wetsuit, Nickel and David Rhys explained to him again, and the three of them slowly went into the water.

There was a cold all around, and Eric was in good shape, so he slowly got used to it after a while.

Although it is deep when you look down from the water, you can see the surrounding scene by diving into the water and adding a few lights.

The surrounding scenery is set up according to the wreckage of the collapsed building in Venice, and when you come to the scenic area, there are very realistic ruins scattered all around, as if a real building has just sunk to the bottom.

Nikkor and David Rhys took Eric around the water for a few minutes, then dived out of the water and discussed some details together, and Eric was about to ask David Swiss to test the underwater camera when his assistant Peter Ritchie came from not far away and gestured to Eric with his phone.

"Wait a minute, I might have to answer the phone," Eric said, following the ladder by the pool to remove the pool, taking a large towel from a staff member, wiping the water on his body briefly, and walking towards Peter Rich. (To be continued.) )