Although I thought of the reason why Zhang Guozhong came, I also guessed that he might ask him for help.

But Lin Xiaozhi still didn't expect that the reception had just introduced him into the company's reception room, Zhang Guozhong just politely said two words, and after Lin Xiaozhi's secretary made a cup of black tea for him and left, he immediately begged: "Lin Sheng must have guessed the reason why I came this time, and I don't hide it, the current situation of Yineng is very bad, if possible, I hope Lin Sheng can look at the past and rescue Yineng!" ”

Lin Xiaozhi and him were not the only ones in the reception room, Chen Qiang was also left by Lin Xiaozhi. This is also his intention, although he was first arranged by Li Guoxing to enter New Asia, but in the case that Lin Xiaozhi quickly completed the annexation of Meiya by the snake swallowing elephant, Chen Qiang stayed under him for a few years and was very quiet and dutiful, and almost all the dirty work he threw in the past can be completed very well. This style of professional manager ethics made Lin Xiaozhi like him more and more, and when Media Asia went public, he rewarded him with 100,000 shares of the company, and then sold him 500,000 shares at a low price, which also allowed him to make a lot of money from Media Asia's listing.

It is also because of this trust in him that now with more and more industries under his name, Lin Xiaozhi also intends to let Chen Qiang take more responsibility for the daily operation of Media Asia, so Zhang Guozhong came to the company to ask for something, and he did not exclude Chen Qiang.

As soon as Zhang Guozhong came up, he bluntly begged for each other, which Lin Xiaozhi didn't expect, and asked with a half-puzzled smile at the moment: "Zhang Dong's words made me a little confused, the financial situation of Yineng has always been good, and it is also well-known in the industry." Although some Hong Kong film companies have recently had problems with their financial situation due to two murders, your films have been selling well in Taiwan. Where do you get this terrible statement from? ”

Although he has discovered the unclear relationship between Yineng and Macau bigwig Yin Guoju, it is true that as he said, Lin Xiaozhi knows that Yineng relies on the relationship with big-name stars such as Zhou Yunfa and Lau Dehua, and can often invite them to lower their salaries to join the filming, especially in Taiwan, the film has been selling well, and he doesn't think that the Macau bigwig's sudden withdrawal of money and leaving can immediately hit the artistry, so there is this question.

Who expected that as soon as his words fell, he saw that Zhang Guozhong's face became even more bitter. He said 'rudeness', then lit a cigarette for himself and took a puff, before he smiled bitterly and said: "It seems that Lin Sheng hasn't paid much attention to Taiwan recently, your Huanya family has a big business, and Taiwan doesn't care about the box office when you quit." But recently, those Taiwanese rotten bananas have become more and more difficult to serve, especially after making a 'small and medium-sized courtyard business alliance', they don't let people live at all! ”

With a burst of his complaints, Lin Xiaozhi and Chen Qiang finally figured out the reason for the matter, and it had something to do with him, Lin Xiaozhi and Huanya.

As we all know, Taiwan is the only non-third world country in the world, but it has not formed an economically developed region with a complete local film industry chain, which is not as good as Thailand, the Philippines and Malaysia.

There is a strange rule in Taiwan that the Taiwanese authorities can directly take 30% of the box office of movies as taxes. And in the remaining box office, only a few films by well-known Taiwanese directors can enjoy the treatment of '5545', that is, the distributor takes 55% of the remaining box office, and the theater chain takes 45%.

Such high taxes and bizarre regulations are doomed to the tragedy of Taiwan's local films. A film with an investment cost of NT$10 million must get more than NT$30 million at the box office to barely make a profit, and if you really want to make money, you have to sell at least 40 million or more in your own city (this only refers to the box office screening in your own city, not counting the distribution of videotapes and screenings in other overseas markets). Since the first film was filmed in Taiwan, except for before the Chiang family and his son entered Taiwan, only a few money-making films were occasionally released in the sixties and seventies, and the rest relied on financial subsidies from the authorities to protect their capital.

It's no wonder that the Taiwanese box office is not small, but in the past 91 years, Taiwanese local films only accounted for 7% of the total box office. 219%, which is also the reason why Taiwanese filmmakers prefer to introduce Hong Kong films.

However, since the late 70s and early 80s, when the mainland began to negotiate with Britain about Hong Kong's return to the motherland, the Taiwan authorities began to consciously suppress Hong Kong films and increase the introduction of American blockbusters and films from other parts of Asia. Thai films, Korean films, and Singaporean films all began to enter the Taiwan market during this period, and soon began to have some influence, but they are really not comparable to Hong Kong films that have won the essence of commercial films.

Although it does not have the kind of cultural integration that Hong Kong films can easily comprehend and substitute for Taiwanese audiences, American films still rely on rigorous scripts, excellent imagination, super-first-class budgets and the world's best special effects to quickly gnaw off the Taiwanese market, which was originally regarded as their own land by Hong Kong films.

Since July this year, American films have hit the Taiwan market with four blockbusters, "Instinct", "Alien 3", "Batman Shows Might" and "Predator 2", followed by "Rogue Goofy", "The Ultimate Soldier" and "Beauty and the Beast". Although the Hong Kong films released at the same time are also star-studded, they gather four super-first-class Hong Kong films: "The Legend of Deer and Ding 1", "Police Story 3", and "Smiling Proud Jianghu: The East is Undefeated".

The movie "Instinct" relied on exposing the camera and topics such as 'sex', and since its release at the beginning of the year, it has quickly caused a movie-watching boom in Taiwan, and it took 68 days to screen it and win a box office of 77 million Taiwan dollars, temporarily winning the highest box office crown in Taiwan in the first half of 92.

"Alien 3" won a box office of NT$35 million in 42 days of release, and "Predator 2", which was released for 28 days, although the box office was only NT$21 million, is still being screened because the distributor is Taiwan's four major state-run theaters. "Batman" is the most miserable, this American main theme movie only barely earned 19 million Taiwan dollars at the box office in 34 days after its release, becoming the only American blockbuster that failed Taiwan in the first half of this year.

However, compared with Taiwanese films, Hong Kong films are not much better.

"The Legend of Deer and Ding 1" has been rising at the box office since its release, and Chow Xingchi has been very popular in Taiwan in the past two years, and soon won more than 30 million Taiwan dollars at the box office, but because the screening theater is a private theater under Cai Songlin, and the stamina is already insufficient, there may be hope to hit the final box office of 50 million or even 60 million Taiwan dollars, but it is difficult to shake the super high box office of nearly 80 million Taiwan dollars of "Instinct".

"Smiling Proud Jianghu: The Undefeated East" is also applauded and popular in Taiwan, but it is also facing the same dilemma as "Deer and Ding Ji 1", and now the box office has exceeded 20 million, and its upward momentum has begun to decline significantly, and the box office is likely to be difficult to reach more than 50 million when the final picture is made, and the final box office is estimated to be at most 30 million or 40 million.

Cheng Long's "Police Story 3" should be the only Hong Kong film qualified to hit the championship of "Instinct" this year, but although the release of this movie is one of Taiwan's four state-run theaters, people also hold "Patriot Game" and "Beauty and the Beast" two American movies, it is difficult to say whether it will squeeze its schedule and number in the end.

Not only in the competition for box office rankings, Hong Kong films have been pressed very badly this year, but they have lost nearly 10% of their market share in the first half of the year alone, and the market share of Hong Kong films in Taiwan has now fallen to only about 30%. The confrontation between Media Asia, Hong Kong's largest film group, and Taiwan has also begun to deeply affect the interests of many Taiwanese film companies.

Taiwan is also one of the most developed economies among the four Asian tigers, and due to the lack of local films, the 20 million residents on the island have a high demand for movies, and they need to purchase at least nearly 300 films every year to meet the needs of the people. Most of these purchased films can only be shown to the public in the form of videotapes and TV stations, but at least more than 100 films can still be screened in Taiwan's major theaters every year, and Hong Kong films have always firmly grasped the advantage of Taiwan's largest source of purchased films.

As the largest film producer in Hong Kong, in the 91 years since its listing, Media Asia has directly produced 17 films a year with its strong financial resources, and has participated in investment and co-produced with other companies as many as 21 films, accounting for more than one-tenth of the total number of Hong Kong film producers last year (347). If you remove the films that have not been approved by the Guò Electricity Inspection Office at all, and the films that are not allowed to be released in theaters, the proportion is almost one-third.

However, after Media Asia announced the unilateral ban on Taiwanese films, Media Asia stopped cooperating with any Taiwanese film company. Not only "League of Assassins", "Black Man", "Wong Fei Hung 2", "Truant Dragon 3" and many other Taiwanese audiences have high expectations and box office guarantees of the movie will not land in Taiwan theaters, after losing the main supplier that can export twenty or thirty films to Taiwan in a year, Tainan, Taichung, Taipei and many other film companies have a shortage of films, especially during the Lunar New Year at the beginning of this year, it forced Taiwanese theater merchants to greatly extend the broadcast time of the movie to alleviate the embarrassment of having no films to broadcast.

Naturally, the Taiwan authorities are reluctant to compromise with a Hong Kong film company, and Media Asia has taken a tough and clear-cut stance. As a result, while the audience in Taiwan Province was dissatisfied with the two major fighting parties, Taiwan's courtyard businessmen suffered innocent and became the party behind the black pot. In the case of tight film sources, Taiwanese people's enthusiasm for watching movies has also plummeted, and the box office in five of the six months in the first half of this year has declined compared with last year.

In order to attract more audiences to watch the movie in the theater, Taiwan's major theater businessmen also crossed the sea to show their magical powers, which can be regarded as exhausting ideas. There are constant discounts such as popcorn and Coke drinks when watching movies, and how to get more high-quality film sources has also become the source of troubles for Taiwan's major theaters.

As the property of the Kuomintang, they are backed by the Taiwan authorities, which can be said to have deep pockets, and they can easily climb the line of the United States, and they can easily attract tens of millions of dollars to introduce and buy out many American films to supplement the insufficient film sources. Private tycoons such as Cai Songlin are not afraid, Cai Songlin's cinema chain is still above each of the four major state-owned cinema companies, and others are bold and have cooperated with many Hong Kong film companies, so they are not worried about not getting good films.

However, for many small and medium-sized businessmen in Taiwan, who have only a few or a dozen of them, they have suffered the greatest losses in the confrontation between Media Asia and the Taiwan authorities in the past six months. Some of them can only endure the 'price hikes' of Hong Kong film companies, and buy a batch of shoddy productions at a much higher price than in previous years, and those who have no money and are unwilling to accept the 'blackmail' of Hong Kong film companies can only buy a few films from the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and South Korea at low prices, hoping to find one or a few dark horses.

However, this wish is somewhat unrealistic, although since the 80s, local films in Southeast Asia and even other countries in East Asia have been learning from Hong Kong films and American films, and are making progress little by little. But if you really want to compare it with American movies or even Hong Kong films, the gap is not one or two points, and naturally there are few that can satisfy Taiwanese audiences. forced many Taiwanese small and medium-sized dealers to come to Hong Kong again after turning around, accepting the blackmail of Hong Kong film dealers, and buying out the film at a higher price than in previous years.

Don't say that the relationship between Hong Kong film dealers and Taiwan film dealers has never been harmonious, and in previous years, Taiwan film dealers have taken the opportunity to estimate and reduce prices and suppress the profits of Hong Kong film companies. Now that feng shui is taking turns, Hong Kong film companies are naturally not polite, but in the first half of the year, they raised prices fiercely and hurt many Taiwanese small and medium-sized courtyard businessmen.

As a result, people were naturally unwilling, so many small and medium-sized theaters in Taiwan united together, under the pretext that Hong Kong has been selling more and more expensive films in recent years, and began to have a tendency to bully customers, and openly formed a 'Taiwan Small and Medium-sized Theater Business Alliance', which is different from the four major state-owned theater merchants in Taiwan Province and several giant private theater companies in Taichung and Tainan, and joined hands to put pressure on the film production companies in Hong Kong and bargain prices.

As soon as the Taiwan Small and Medium-sized Courtyard Business Alliance was established, many film companies in Hong Kong were not impressed at first, but they would soon understand the power of these Taiwanese Yankees. Because in the past six months, Hong Kong film companies have raised the price of film sources too ruthlessly, which has caused many theaters in Taiwan to lose their money, so this time, several respected people in Taiwan's theater business community took the lead and formulated a phalanx of 'advancing and retreating together and unifying prices', dozens of small and medium-sized theaters in Taiwan were suddenly gathered together, and they no longer rushed to buy films from Hong Kong film companies, but formed a team to reduce prices.

Not to mention, such a film production company in Hong Kong suddenly became a mess.

Among the many film companies in Hong Kong, except for the four film companies that have successfully opened up new markets in other overseas countries and regions, other film companies that do not have the ability to develop new overseas markets regard the Taiwan market as the most important market after the city.

At this time, it happened to coincide with the two murders of the 'Huang Langwei Incident' and the 'Cai Ziming Shooting Case', which triggered the British government in Hong Kong to strike hard against the local underworld forces. With the loss of community power, many film companies in Hong Kong have not been able to get new investment in a short period of time, if they have already filmed and filmed half of the film (Hong Kong films in the eighties and nineties did have the practice of selling the film before the film is finished, gambling on luck) and holding it in their hands, they will not be able to sell it again, and the funds will not be returned, then there will really be no way to live.

As a result, the 'happy' life of the Hong Kong film companies did not last a few days, and they were immediately beaten back to the prototype, even worse than before. Some Taiwanese people resent that at the beginning of the year, the film companies in Hong Kong raised prices to sell films, and tried every means to lower the prices of films in retaliation, relying on the fact that they had the Taiwan market in their hands, they simply put on a face of 'love to sell, not sell', and took advantage of the recent crisis of broken capital chains in Hong Kong film companies, and took a very tough attitude to lower prices, and the prices were even lower than a few years ago.

Although Yineng relies on his excellent connections in the industry, he can occasionally invite Zhou Yunfa and Liu Dehua back to his 'mother's home' to make films for his self-reduced salary, but this is a little less favor. Therefore, like many small and medium-sized companies in Hong Kong, most of the films invested and shot are small- and medium-cost follow-up films. This kind of film has become less and less popular in Taiwan in recent years because of its shoddy production, and one of the major shareholders of Entertainment is still Media Asia, and they have become the object of hatred by Taiwanese Yankees with this heavy identity.

If you accept it, it is almost equivalent to working for Taiwanese theater companies for nothing (most theater companies buy films and flowers directly and do not share them), but if you don't accept it, you may lose the Taiwan market.

This Zhang Guozhong is also a smart person, he knows that his company is not capable of wrestling with the Taiwanese Yankees, but if he has no artistic ability, he will not be able to do it. Seeing the recent crisis in Hong Kong's film industry, most film companies are getting more and more difficult day by day. He simply took the opportunity to come directly to see Lin Xiaozhi, hoping to get some money from the pocket of this rich man who was not bad for money.

Lin Xiaozhi sat on the sofa next to him, listened to him finish his complaint with an unchanged face, and immediately glanced at Chen Qiang, and both saw the smile in the other party's eyes. People, he knows that his company is not capable of wrestling with Taiwanese Yankees, but if he has no artistic ability, he can't do it. Seeing the recent crisis in Hong Kong's film industry, most film companies are getting more and more difficult day by day. He simply took the opportunity to come directly to see Lin Xiaozhi, hoping to get some money from the pocket of this rich man who was not bad for money.

Lin Xiaozhi sat on the sofa next to him, listened to him finish his complaint with an unchanged face, and immediately glanced at Chen Qiang, and both saw the smile in the other party's eyes.