Lance felt that his life was coming to an end.

As the saying goes, dreams die to live, and dreams live to die. He's been dreaming a lot lately, and today on the way back to Brooklyn on the subway, he's dreaming again, dreaming that he's back to the summer of 2002, the summer when he's about to turn thirty, sitting in that cramped office space, the tension in the room almost suffocates him, so he frantically unbuttons his shirt and tries to get more fresh air in his lungs.

When he looked up, he could see the flickering incandescent lamp on the ceiling, which was spilling down weakly, and the pale light made him dizzy for a while, and he couldn't help but close his eyes and breathe heavily. But even so, it still couldn't calm the anger in his heart, and the chatter in his ears was fanning the flames, making the surging anger almost completely out of control.

"Shut up!" Lance gritted his teeth and tried to stop the endless nagging in front of him, and he even tried to tear that mouth apart and make all the sounds disappear completely. However, the noisy voice did not stop, and only a few words were intermittently stuffed into his brain, like a magic spell, extinguishing the last bit of self-control.

"Bang!" Lance clenched his right fist and slammed it on the table. The sound of thunder on the ground calmed all the sounds, and it was finally quiet.

Lance's muscles tightened, this dream was really too real, the soreness that was so painful that it began to tingle clearly came from his right hand, he could even feel the sharp feeling of his nails slowly piercing into his palm, and the cold wind blowing behind his back brought up a thin layer of goosebumps.

When he opened his eyes, the strange and familiar face came into view, with a polite and formulaic smile on his ordinary face, the panic in his eyes slowly dissipated, evolving into a trace of ridicule and pity, but his expression was not moved at all, obviously not caring about Lance's reaction just now.

The memory is so long and yet still vivid, and Lance certainly remembers him, Roger-Davis, the official lawyer representing American-Zoetrope. At first, he personally approached Roger, and the two sides signed a cooperation agreement, but he didn't expect that in the end he would become the executioner who announced his sentence. What a great irony.

Even in the dream, even if more than ten years have passed, the turbulent feelings in Lance's mind are still uncontrollable, he held up the contract in front of him, staring at Roger with his eyes, trying to search for any clues from his facial expressions, "What is this?" ”

Roger only saw Lance's blue eyes narrowed slightly, all his feelings were hidden in that layer of mist, but the danger alarm in his heart was raised to the highest level in an instant, and he could even feel his neck tighten for a while, which made Roger's throat a little dry, he had to cough lightly twice, trying his best to keep himself calm and professional, "Lance, this is a contract, and the content of the contract says that you voluntarily give up all thirty-five percent of the shares of Diorama Pictures......"

Lance shook his head slightly, and shouted calmly, "Roger." But it was this cry without any emotion that made Roger swallow all his words, and he was silenced for a moment, "I am asking, 'What is this?'" ”

Under Lance's gaze, Roger only felt like a prey in a fishing net, unable to escape no matter how much he broke free, and his heart began to slowly hair. It took all his strength for Roger to hide his love and maintain his poker face, he couldn't help but swallow a mouthful of saliva, but found that his voice was very dry, like a desert, "Lance, this is a contract signed by yourself, which means that you voluntarily gave up ......"

"My shares?" Lance directly interrupted Roger's words, and the corners of his mouth pulled out a sneer of disbelief, mocking and joking, but no one knew whether the object of his ridicule was this contract or himself, "No, this is not the contract I signed!" You're kidding me, aren't you? I've only signed one contract in recent times, the final contract for 'Elephant', and other than that, ......"

Lance caught a trace of unbearability in Roger's expression, and between the lightning and flint, all the memories came to his heart, directly choking his throat, all the words disappeared completely, and the truth hidden behind it came surgingly.

Two weeks ago, he needed to go on a business trip to New York, and before that trip, Ryan-Kavanaugh came to him with a contract — Ryan, a close friend of his friends for more than a decade, who had co-founded Diora Pictures — and Ryan said it was the final contract for the "elephant" that he needed to sign in order to get into the production process.

"Elephant" is a collaboration between Diorama Pictures and Gus-Van-Sant, and although it only costs $3 million, the film is based on the 1999 Columbine High School school shooting that shocked the world. Lance took the film very seriously, and he hoped to send it to the Sundance Film Festival, and then see if it could appear on the stage of the international film festival in Cannes or Venice, so that the career of Diorama Pictures could be taken to the next level.

Out of trust in Ryan, Lance just briefly flipped through the contract in a hurry, and after roughly confirming that it was the contract of "Elephant", he signed it, and then left Los Angeles immediately afterward. However, when he returned from New York, he was told by Roger that he was no longer a partner in Diorama Pictures, and that he had voluntarily given up all his shares.

Now, Lance understands that the first half of the contract he signed is indeed the contract of the "elephant", but the second half is the contract of his initiative to give up the shares of Diorama Pictures, and he signed his own judgment, and since then, he has nothing, and six years of hard work have come to naught overnight.

Actually, there have been signs of things for a long time, haven't they?

Since founding Diorama Pictures in 1996, they have started with distribution, bringing outstanding overseas titles such as "Trainspotting", "Two Smoking Guns", "Beyond Silence" and "Grand Central Station" to the North American market; He began to set foot in the field of making zuò, and launched works such as "The Three Kings of Gold", "Love is a Son of a Dog", and "Dance of Death Row Prisoners", including "Arhat Eleven", which teamed up with Warner Bros. to make zuò.

Diorama Pictures has not only gained a firm foothold in Hollywood's second-tier film companies, but has also made a name for itself. But as the company grew better and faster, their differences grew.

Ryan is conservative and wants to follow the path of success, always cautious about getting involved in the field of manufacturing; But Lance is more inclined to take risks, hoping to be able to show his strength in the field of production, because he clearly knows that there is no way to go to the next level based on distribution alone, and if he wants to take the company to a higher level, independent production is the way out! And their in-depth knowledge of the European and North American markets can be their advantage in the field of zuò manufacturing!

In 1998, Lance successfully won the rights to adapt the original Harry Potter novel, hoping that the company would undertake the production, and he firmly believed that the novel would be a great success in the film market and become a further development opportunity for Diorama Pictures. But Ryan thinks Lance is too adventurous and aggressive, that they have no experience with filmmaking, and that they should slow down – for example, with big studios.

Ryan succeeded in convincing two of the firm's other partners, Tucker-Tooley and Jason-Burkle, and the isolated Lance was finally persuaded to agree to work with Warner Bros. on the "Harry Potter" film series.

However, Ryan and Tucker, who negotiated on behalf of Diorama Pictures, were persuaded by Barry Meyer to sell the rights to the adaptation of "Harry Potter" to Warner Bros. at a fixed price, and signed the contract on the spot, without even giving Lance room to recover. This choice completely detonated Lance's anger, and the first irreconcilable contradiction arose between the four of them.

This is the first signal.

Not long ago, Lance learned that Disney was interested in making a pirate movie, "Pirates of the Caribbean", and the disagreement broke out again.

Lance sees this as not only a great opportunity to work with Disney, but also a great challenge; But Ryan, Tucker, and Jason all thought it was too risky, because pirate movies had completely withdrawn from the stage of history, and making a pirate movie was tantamount to suicide at a time when genre movies were diverse; Second, shouldering a large-scale production of 150 million US dollars independently brings too much pressure and risk, which is not needed and cannot be borne by the diorama pictures, which is gradually improving.

The huge difference in ideology led to several quarrels between the four people.

The disagreement was at a stalemate for a while, and Lance originally thought that they would eventually reach an agreement through discussions, and one side would be able to convince the other. But now it seems that he is not only naïve, but even stupid, the world has changed from human to man, but he still trusts Ryan, Tucker and Jason unconditionally, which is simply stupid. When he returned from a business trip in New York, he was greeted with shameless betrayal, sweeping the floor, and leaving the house.

Ten years of friendship, six years of hard work...... But after a deception, only chicken feathers remained.

The dream was so real that Lance couldn't tell the difference between dream and reality, one moment he was sitting in the filthy and tattered subway of New York, the next moment he was in the office of Diorama Pictures, and the violent and turbulent love still hit him hard, almost like Mars hitting the earth, smashing all his sanity, all his pride, all his pride. He is not only stupid, but also ridiculous, even pathetic.

Lance stood up suddenly, the feeling of oppression brought by the tall and straight body made Roger feel shocked, and subconsciously stood up, his hands were overwhelmed in the air, as if he was worried about Lance's radical moves, but then he saw Lance turn around directly, simply pushed open the glass door, strode out of the office, and took a straight step in the direction where Ryan was.

Roger realized that he had made a fuss and retracted his hands in embarrassment, but his eyes couldn't help but follow Lance's figure - not only Roger, but everyone in the office was focused on Lance at this time, except for Ryan.