The TV series "Crocodile Tears" is initially estimated to be 80 episodes, of course, if the ratings are high, it can be extended by another five episodes. The investment in urban long dramas like this is relatively high, so whether it is a wireless TV station or a beautiful TV station, because of cost considerations, they will not be too inclined to shoot TV series of this length.

But now that the two TV stations have formed an alliance, the shooting cost has been greatly reduced, so an urban long drama like this is naturally not a problem in terms of cost. And if the ratings of a long drama like this are good, then the return is also very high, so it is the preferred drama for the cooperation between the two TV stations.

The initial estimate of the cost of the TV series is 1.8 million Hong Kong dollars, and the average production cost of an episode is 20,000 Hong Kong dollars. More than half of them are used to pay the salaries of stars, and a small part is costumes and props, while the screenwriter and director are the least paid, just getting paid monthly. The cost of 1.8 million yuan, of which TVB TV paid 1 million, and Li's TV station contributed 800,000 yuan, and the income obtained in the future will be shared according to this proportion, and the two sides have no other opinions.

In terms of actors, because the artists of TVB TV are more famous, more than half of the artists are selected from TVB, but for the sake of balance, Li's actors also account for more than forty percent, and the starring role is also played by Li's master Pan Zhiwen.

Pan Zhiwen, known as "Pan Weng", is the master of Li's TV station, and he has also stayed in TVB for a period of time before, performing in TVB's first TV series "Under the Lion Rock", and later was successfully dug up by Li's wall, and was invited to become a master, and previously starred in "Top Ten Strange Cases", "Top Ten Assassins", "Waves and Sands" and so on. It is one of the more capable stars of Li.

Pan Zhiwen looks elegant and elegant. Dress up in the past and in the present. Whether it is a hero in ancient costume, a businessman of the Republic of China, or a modern rich man, he can do it. His role as Duan Zhengchun in Huang Rihua's version of "Dragon Babu", Ye Yongji in "Heaven and Earth Boy", and Rong Heng in "The Grace of the Earth" are more familiar to mainland audiences. And this person is beautiful, ATV, wireless three. And it has always been praised by TV stations, so it is also called "tumbler".

And the screenwriter of the play "Crocodile Tears" is Xiao Ruoyuan, the screenwriter saint that Xu Guanwu has been looking for, Xiao Ruoyuan is a very capable screenwriter, which can be seen from his title, the screenwriter saint sounded very powerful. And this person is not only proficient in writing TV drama scripts, but also has great expertise in writing movie scripts. Many of the works produced by Mai Jiaban are all operated by Xiao Ruoyuan behind the scenes, and he can be regarded as the chief thinker of Mai Jiaban.

And Xiao Ruoyuan left the Mai family class to develop, and also achieved very good results. For example, the "Tang Bohu Autumn Fragrance" and "Deer and Ding Ji" series cooperated with Zhou Xingchi, even in the masterpieces of Zhou Xingchi's movies. These movies can all be considered classics.

Xu Guanwu has always attached great importance to the writing of scripts, so he is quite eager for screenwriters. Xu now has a group of screenwriters in captivity and has written many movie scripts, but except for a few who are used by the company's directors for filming, the others can only be sold to small film companies. Screenwriting is a very talented profession, and it doesn't mean that as long as you work hard, you will be successful. Xiang Xu's current screenwriting department, these screenwriters are typical thankless. And screenwriter geniuses like Huang Bingyao, Huang Baiming, and Wang Jing, although the number is small, is the pillar of Xu's film industry.

The film scripts they produce account for more than 60% of the annual production volume, and they can be said to be crucial talents. And such important talents are naturally more and more for Xu Guanwu. However, due to the previous agreement with Li, it was not allowed to dig the corners of the other party during the alliance, so Xu Guanwu could only watch Xiao Ruoyuan miss out.

……

The TV series "Crocodile Tears" is divided into two parts, and after the upper part is filmed first, if the ratings are high, the second half of the plot will be filmed. This kind of filming method is not uncommon in Hong Kong, like the 83 version of "The Legend of the Condor Heroes", because the investment is too high, and the ratings cannot be guaranteed, so the TV series is divided into three parts to produce, namely "Iron Blood Pill Heart", "East Evil and West Poison" and "Huashan on the Sword".

And Li's other masterpiece "The Kindness of the Earth" is also produced in a trilogy, namely "Home in the Pearl River", "Thunder in the Ancient Capital" and "Dream of Jinshan". In addition to controlling risks and costs, this can also adjust the plot in real time based on the audience's reaction.

Of course, this is a test of the screenwriter's skills, because if the plot twist is too bizarre, or if the plot is not satisfactory and there are many hard injuries, it will seriously affect the reputation of the series. Hong Kong screenwriters are still relatively smart, and this rarely happens.

The first half of the 40 episodes of "Crocodile Tears" mainly tells the story of how Lu Wenjun, played by Pan Zhiwen, went from a high-aspiring and fledgling college student to a family with nothing to be separated.

The second half tells the story of Lu Wenjun learning from the pain, waking up, and then using various means to climb up to the ground, vowing to regain everything he lost.

The upper and lower parts echo each other, one is so good that it is painful, and the other is so outrageous that it is naturally a test of the actors' acting skills, and such a flip is naturally full of plot tension, which is easier for people to enjoy. The so-called Wen Si doesn't like to watch the mountains, in fact, it's the same when watching TV series, the more ups and downs the plot is, the more fascinating it is, on the contrary, the plot is as warm as boiled water, no one likes to watch it even if it is filmed well.

……

When "Crocodile Tears" was being filmed intensively, the time was already at the end of seven or eight years.

In the previous month, "Moonlight Panic" invested by Xu Guanwu was released in the theaters of National Entertainment Company on Halloween. Halloween is a traditional European holiday, somewhat similar to Halloween in the East, on which people dress up in all sorts of strange appearances, and children can go door-to-door to ask for candy. "If you don't give candy, you will make trouble" is their unifying slogan. And around Halloween, it's the time when horror thrillers are released.

The investment in the movie "Moonlight Panic" is only 500,000 US dollars, and the investment in this movie in the previous life is even lower, only more than 300,000 US dollars. Actors need to prepare their own clothes. Originally, Lei Shidong didn't take this cheap horror film in his eyes. So it's just being screened in more than 20 theaters under its umbrella.

But I didn't expect it to be well received after its release. Especially the main character, Michael Child. Miles wore a mask, held a butcher's knife, and didn't say a word, just a murderous appearance, which was really chilling. And the film does not use bloody murder scenes to intimidate the audience like European and American horror movies, but focuses on the rendering of horror, suspense and anger, and this invisible horror is actually even more terrifying.

The so-called unknown is the most terrifying, if people know his motive for committing the crime. Knowing his purpose of killing, he will not be so afraid, but will find a way to solve the matter. But now people don't know why he killed people, but they are desperate to die with their heads chased by him, so that kind of fear cannot be resolved.

And "Moonlight Panic" was also rated as the most scary movie in Hollywood because of its grasp of the horror atmosphere, and "Moonlight Panic" topped the list. And Michael. Miles is also known as one of the three most terrifying killers in the United States, two of which are Freddy, the nightmare demon in "Ghost Street", and Jason, the immortal in "Friday the 13th".

After the release of this movie, the word of mouth was quite good, and it was immediately spread to ten. Ten to hundred, hundreds to thousand. Thousands of men and women who came to see this movie and longed to be scared on Halloween quickly lined up at the entrance of the theater.

The ticket sales were so hot that Lei Shidong expected it, he scolded himself for being an idiot, he knew that Lu Dao was a movie invested by Xu Guanwu, so he didn't pay attention to it; On the one hand, he hurriedly ordered the opening of more theaters, and together with the 20th Century Fox Company, he gave it vigorous publicity.

Horror films have never been the favorite of the eight major film companies, and even if they do, they release suspense thrillers like Hitchcock, relying on the plot to scare the audience. Instead of relying on a homicidal maniac wearing a human skin mask and wielding a chainsaw, scaring the audience with buckets and barrels of artificial plasma, it would be a bit too low-level.

So for the release of "Moonlight Panic", 20th Century Fox didn't pay much attention to it. But now that I heard that the movie was a big hit, 20th Century Fox immediately became interested. Low-level is low-level, and the most important thing is to earn money in your pocket. So he hurriedly gave a vigorous promotion together with the National Entertainment Company.

And in the subsequent Halloween schedule, with this film, he made $65 million, which is equivalent to an increase of 120 times in terms of its investment of only $500,000, which definitely belongs to the category of making a lot of money. In the previous life, the cost of this movie was only more than 300,000, but the box office was 55 million, and it is also a classic dark horse that fights big with small fights.

In the last life, after the film was filmed, no film company was willing to release it, and finally forced the producer to set up a distribution company to distribute it himself, and hyped the popularity of the movie through various means, and finally won more than 50 million US dollars at the box office with the high reputation of this movie.

In this world, with the full cooperation of 20th Century Fox and National Entertainment Company, the box office of the film has been pushed up by more than 10 million US dollars, and "Moonlight Panic" has reaped more than 60 million box office at a cost of no more than 500,000 yuan, and has become the brightest dark horse in the North American film industry this year with a return rate of more than 120 times.

After the film was drawn, Richard. Zaniuk reported the good news to Xu Guanwu, but he was annoyed and didn't know what to say. If he had known that this movie was so profitable, he would have served as this producer a long time ago. The filming time of this movie is only one month, and if he takes out this month to make a casual cameo appearance in the crew, there will be nearly one million dollars in dividends, which is equivalent to making money for nothing.

But who called themselves so stupid at the beginning, they just couldn't look down on this kind of low-cost horror film, and now they can only sigh at the high box office.

Xu Guanwu was not surprised to hear that "Moonlight Panic" achieved a box office of more than 60 million US dollars, in fact, horror films have always been small and big movie themes, such as "Chainsaw", "Ghost Street", "Friday the 13th", "Texas Chainsaw Massacre", "Ghost Player" and other series of horror movies, the investment is far inferior to those action blockbusters, but the return on investment is quite amazing.

Lionsgate, which specializes in distributing B-grade horror films, is the most commercially successful independent film company in Hollywood, and its profitability even exceeds that of several traditional Hollywood companies, which shows that horror films not only look scary, but also have a terrifying ability to attract money. In fact, it was not only Lionsgate that released horror films, but also several major Hollywood studios that set their sights on the horror film market, which they did not care about before, as their profits became more and more meager. Columbia Pictures, Universal Pictures, and even Disney Studios have all begun to dabble in the horror film market on a large scale. (To be continued......)