Shay pushed open the door to the conference room and walked out, and instructed Lisa, the assistant who was following him, "Give Jude a call, and I'll invite him to dinner in the evening." ”

"Sir, I'm afraid this won't work."

Lisa's answer caused Shay to stop and turn her head with a displeased expression.

"Why?"

"Because Director Locke went to England." Lisa explained.

"What did he do in England?" Shay looked puzzled.

"As you already know, Director Locke has a British girlfriend ......"

Lisa was interrupted by Shay before she could finish her sentence.

"I know that, but didn't she come to America with Locke? Is there anything to do between the two? ”

"It's Christmas soon, sir." Lisa had to be reminded again.

Shay was stunned, only then did he realize that 1994 was almost over, and in a blink of an eye, he and Jude had known each other for almost half a year.

During this period, Jude shot a total of two films, "This Man from Earth" is actually only a trial work, the experimental nature is very strong, the one-shot shooting technique can be successful, in the final analysis, it also takes advantage of the script, although the film in the overseas licensing and home video market have made New Line Company money, but this film did not let the industry really recognize Jude's strength.

Now this "Two Big Smoking Guns" is Jude's first film in the strict sense, as long as the film is launched on the market, Jude will no longer be the unknown little director he used to be, and more companies will find ways to win him over, and whether he will continue to cooperate with the new line company is a big question.

Finalizing the next step of the collaboration with Jude before the release of "Two Smoking Guns" is Shay's current plan.

"When Locke comes back from England, I'll make an appointment with him right away...... No, you just get the news of his return and let me know as soon as you hear about it, and I'll call him personally. ”

――

Jude and Kate arrive in England three days before Christmas, where Kate takes him to meet his mother and stepfather's family, who are then warmly left behind to spend Christmas.

The next afternoon, Jude and Kate were decorating the Christmas tree when their cell phone suddenly rang.

Jude was standing on a ladder about to hang a star on the top of the Christmas tree, so he asked Kate to answer the call.

"It's Ritter."

Kate walked under the tree and handed her phone to Jude on the ladder.

"Good morning!" Jude took off his gloves, took the phone and said hello to Litt on the other end of the phone.

London time was eight hours ahead of Los Angeles time, so Jude was sure that Leeter had just woken up at this time.

"I wanted to call you last night, but considering that you were sleeping at the time, I waited until now." Leeter sat at the dining table and spoke to Jude on the phone as he unfolded the Los Angeles Times he had gotten this morning.

"Something to do with Two Smoking Guns?"

"Rest assured, the post-production of the film is going very smoothly, the subtitles and sound effects are exactly according to your requirements, the new line company has been completely conquered by the editing samples you provided, they even asked me if I could advance the release time of the film to February before the Oscars, at that time the film is estimated to be qualified for release through the rating, they are ready to put the film to the market without leaving any publicity time, confidence is not ordinary." Li Tet comfortably picked up the coffee in hand, and the attitude of the new line company towards him in recent times has been completely different from the past, and many things are being discussed with him in a consultative tone, which makes him finally regain a little bit of the feeling he used to have when he worked at CAA.

Jude tucked his phone between his face and shoulder, and hung the golden star on top of the tree in both hands.

"So you must have turned them down, right?"

"Of course, when it was released in February, it collided directly with the Oscars, and in March, the situation was completely different, there were no big productions released in the same period, and there was plenty of time for promotion."

Litt put down his coffee cup, got up and took the heated bread out of the oven, ready to eat it while reporting to Jude about the situation.

"How much is the new line company going to invest in the promotion of the film?" Jude climbed down the ladder, handed the gloves to Kate, and began to concentrate on talking to Leeter on the phone.

"This is also the issue I want to talk to you about, the new line company has not yet come out with a specific publicity plan, but Shay White has talked to me about this issue privately, and he said that the amount of publicity funds for this "Two Big Smoking Guns" is completely up to you." Leet's voice became serious.

"When did New Line become so generous? I said that the promotion fund for this movie should not be less than 10 million dollars, are they willing to do it? Jude joked.

"If you agree to the other party's request, maybe they will really agree, if the new line company really invests 10 million in the promotion of the film, the money you get will shrink by more than half when the final account is divided, unless the box office of this film is a big hit, and the North American box office is directly hundreds of millions, then you just didn't say what I just said."

Of course, Leet is joking, he and Jude have discussed this issue, Jude himself estimates the box office of "Two Big Smoking Guns" in the North American market to be between 40 million and 50 million, after all, this is a small-budget R-rated film, and it is not impossible to break the box office of 100 million, but it has to be the cumulative global box office.

In particular, there are a lot of tricks in the box office of Hollywood movies, and many big-selling movies often show a deficit in the accounting statements when the theater box office is settled, which means that they lose money.

The reason for this is that before the revenue sharing process, Hollywood studios have a magic trick in distribution, and the big studios will set up a separate project company for each film - the project financing will be invested in this project company, and the account sharing will also be attributed to this project company when it is settled from the terminal to the distribution end.

An independent production company like New Line will also set up a separate project department, which is similar in nature to a separate project company.

Before the production company receives the theatrical account, the project company will first complete the deduction of two parts - the distribution commission and the distribution fee because it undertakes the distribution work.

If a $30 million film reaches $100 million at the global box office, the final share to the producer is about $50 million, but this money must first be paid to the distributor commissions and distribution costs, including advertising fees for the purchase of television stations, newspapers and other media, film processing costs, overseas taxes, dubbing costs, and logistics costs for transshipment overseas, which alone must be deducted at least $30 million.

The $30 million investment eventually recouped only $20 million, and of course it was a loss on the books.

But in fact, the film companies are not at a loss, because they have already made money from the project company responsible for the distribution of the film, but the other investors who share the accounts according to the contract must have lost money.

Because the production cost of "Two Big Smoking Guns" is only 2 million US dollars, as long as the final box office can exceed 20 million, even if the distribution costs are deducted, the film company will definitely make money.

Of course, Jude and Leete are not fools, they have clearly agreed on the priority of account sharing in the account sharing agreement they signed with the new line company, that is, Jude's account sharing priority is ranked before the project company responsible for distribution, and after the theater account sharing arrives, the money will be distributed to Jude according to the pre-agreed account sharing ratio, and then the distribution company will deduct the distribution expenses, and finally go to the film company to divide it again.

Otherwise, Hollywood's big-name directors and big-name stars are not fools, knowing that the film company's account sharing is such a cat, they will agree to share the account, so this trick is generally used to trap those outsiders who don't know the inside story.