Is it luck, or is it really magical? 》

Frank, the head of Universal Pictures' China region, put down his hand to report the multinational explosion of "The Silence of the Lambs" and the newspaper that director Wang Wei "officially" responded to the "surrender incident".

He took off from Shanghai, made a transfer, and it took half a day and a night to return to Los Angeles.

didn't care about resting, Frank first asked about the promotion of the film in North America,

"There's only one national newspaper with a headline?"

"Yes." The answer to him was Benjamin, Frank's old friend in the distribution department.

"You're too careless." Frank couldn't help but grumble.

"It's nice to have one. This is a national newspaper, if it weren't for the fact that the topic of this movie was really discussed, and you wanted to make headlines on the front page by public relations? Don't even think about it. ”

Benjamin compared the difficulty, and then said: "What's more, there are dozens of regional newspapers, although not all of them are in the headlines, but they have also carried relevant reports, and the publicity momentum is not small." ”

Frank scoffed: "If the magical story around 'The Silence of the Lambs' had taken place on the home turf, it would have made the front page headlines of all the newspapers!" ”

His old friend couldn't deny it, shrugged his shoulders and said, "You also said, this is not a story that happened in North America itself. ”

Frank was speechless.

He didn't know that the American people were notoriously unconcerned about the world outside of the United States.

Probably because of North America's isolated geographical location, or because of the isolationist tradition, the American people instinctively look down on the rest of the world, and all thinking is absolutely centered on themselves.

Of course, the common people of almost all countries do not care much about international affairs and only care about their own lives, but isn't it useless for them to care?

And the United States, as one of the world's leading countries, is often desperately ignorant of the overseas world!

Frank, who doesn't have much family feelings, doesn't feel hopeless, he just has a toothache because Universal Pictures headquarters can't make full use of the overseas momentum of "The Silence of the Lambs" to carry out publicity.

"In the final analysis, the investment in publicity and distribution is too small." Frank continued to grumble.

The distribution rights of "The Silence of the Lambs" in North America were handed over to Universal Pictures, and the investment in publicity and distribution naturally had to be borne by Universal Pictures first.

After watching the film, the distribution department of the main department also readily agreed to the introduction of this movie, however, in terms of publicity and distribution, it is not happy at all!

"It's only 10 million dollars, which is obviously not enough!"

According to Frank's plan, why can't you start with thirty or forty million? Now at least two-thirds of the way has been cut, and it's no wonder that the publicity is much lower than he expected.

Benjamin took it for granted: "To be honest, 10 million publicity investment is already a lot, you know, this is a film made by Chinese people after all." ”

Frank breathed a sigh of relief and said, "It's not that you haven't seen it, it can be regarded as a Hollywood work made by Chinese people!" ”

"But the characters are basically oriental faces, aren't they? Generally, the imported Chinese films are publicized and distributed according to this scale. ”

"Well, you're right. But I think the company will regret it, and it will definitely regret it. Frank chattered about his displeasure.

Benjamin still shrugged.

Of course, he knew where his old friend's resentment came from.

Frank's main work in China was to open up the Oriental market.

Exploring a new market is certainly more valuable, but it also requires a lot of resources and a very long time, and if Frank doesn't want to stay in a foreign country for the rest of his life, he has to do something as soon as possible - such as bringing in a few big hits.

In the final analysis, opening up new markets is also for profit, and if you can introduce a number of popular works, the money you make in the local area is also money; As a gatekeeper, Frank will definitely be rewarded, and maybe he will be able to transfer out of the unfree East.

And in a sense, if a movie wants to be a big hit, publicity is even more important than the movie itself.

It's just that his ideas belong to him, and the shrewd businessmen don't see rabbits and don't scatter eagles.

For imported films, just like original films, in the absence of local box office data support, even the Big Five Hollywood do not dare to rashly place heavy bets on publicity.

They usually prepare two sets of plans -

If the box office data of the first day and the next day of the movie are average, or even poor, the investment in publicity and distribution will be gradually reduced or even directly cut off, so as to quickly stop the loss;

On the contrary, if the data is good, they will quickly invest the funds and manpower that have been prepared long ago, and hype up the popularity of the movie as soon as possible to obtain more profits.

Although, like China Entertainment, according to the sharing habits of distributors and theaters, with the extension of the screen time, the box office revenue obtained will be more and more distributed to the latter.

In other words, waiting until the film is released for large-scale publicity is not good for both the production and distribution companies in terms of revenue.

However, the first thing investors consider is always the safety of capital, so regardless of whether it is the distributor of China Entertainment or Hollywood, they will still choose to do so.

- Unless it's a sequel to a hit work.

It's not that Frank doesn't understand this, the problem is that he thinks "The Silence of the Lambs" is the kind of hit that is very topical and deserves the same treatment as the smash sequel.

But including his old friends, the distribution department of the headquarters is more disapproving.

"I also think the three 'murderers surrendered' are magical, but as its director said, it's just a momentary luck, and after the initial heat, it's a normal thriller."

"Actually, it's already four." Frank looked at his old friend, paused, and said the latest news he had just received when he got off the plane,

"You can probably see the news in the media tomorrow - this movie in Annan, continuing its magical record: another serial killer, after watching the movie, ran to the police station and turned himself in!"

"Watts?" Benjamin straightened up, which was a bit of a surprise.

"You mean, it might really have some kind of magic?"

This time, it was Frank's turn to shrug his shoulders,

"Who knows? Anyway, I have a hunch that the company will definitely regret the caution in the publicity and distribution. ”

He can be regarded as giving face to his old friend, replacing "cowardice and fear of death" with "cautious".

After all, the distribution department was almost stuck in the lower limit of the distribution agreement he negotiated with Dunhuang, and only won more than 2,000 open screens.

It is true that it is not impossible to fight for more films after the box office hit, but as mentioned above, if you strive for it after the big hit, you will not be able to grab the maximum benefits.

"The premise is that the film really has the magic to replicate the magical record in North America." Benjamin's attitude became a little more serious.

"Then we'll see." Frank shook his head.

At this point, all he could do was pray.

What to pray for?

Of course, it's a prayer that the criminals line up to see the film - so that even if its "magic" is discounted, it can "hit" one or two criminals.

……

It's hard to say whether North American criminals will line up to watch "The Silence of the Lambs"; But North American fans who like to watch horror movies are really lining up to see it after the movie is officially released.

After all, because of the attribute of "a serial killer", this film has been branded by Universal Pictures as the "most terrifying oriental movie".

Under such publicity, other audiences anon, horror movie lovers flocked to the cinema.

Thanks to a large horror film audience in North America, "The Silence of the Lambs" won more than $12 million on the Saturday of its premiere.

The next day, Sunday, he made persistent efforts to win a single-day box office of more than 10 million US dollars.

Moreover, its reputation has maintained quite well.

In particular, North American film critics have given quite high evaluations, saying that this is an oriental thriller that is "stunning", "deeply thematic", and "full of Western elements".

However, Universal Pictures, as the distributor, was not too happy.

Because—

"Audiences who like horror themes don't care about the comments of film critics." Benjamin said.

Frank was silent.

He also knows that this is true.

For complex literary films, or dazzling action movies, audiences may need the help of critics to distinguish which ones are bad and which ones are worth watching.

But for genre films with a very fixed audience such as horror films, the influence of film critics is actually limited.

Not to mention, most critics don't appreciate horror movies very much either—don't look at the fact that they give a good rating of an oriental thriller, to a large extent, it's just based on curiosity.

And what disappoints the world even more is -

"It's been two days, and the magic of this movie to attract criminals to surrender has not bred on the land of North America after all." Benjamin looked at his old friend Frank with a little sympathy.

As the saying goes, the greater the expectation, the greater the disappointment.

The film's explosive ...... "basically ends here." ”

In fact, this is also the unanimous opinion of many box office forecasters in North America.

They combined the size of the film's release with the level of interest in North American audiences shown by a random survey conducted on the streets, and gave a relatively conservative box office expectation.

INTERVIEWER The film's North American box office is expected to reach $50 million to $60 million.

Judging from its performance in the first weekend, it is equivalent to their belief that the box office performance of this movie will fall sharply on weekdays, even far more than the decline of ordinary Hollywood movies on weekdays, and the decline rate is even faster!

Of course, they also said that if all the characters are replaced by white actors, its North American box office may rush to 90 million to 100 million US dollars.

To be honest, this is already a high evaluation for a thriller - even in the current North American film market, with a box office of more than 100 million US dollars, it is definitely a successful and blockbuster.

And if the North American box office can reach 60 million US dollars, it can also rank in the top four among the imported Chinese films - if you take into account the scale of investment in the top three, this oriental film can no longer be successful in North America.

It's just that in front of Hollywood's first-line productions, its volume is a bit insufficient.

At this time, in an interview, a vice president of Disney Studios was asked "Is "The Silence of the Lambs" the biggest competitor in the same schedule, he laughed and said,

"I haven't seen that movie yet, and we're one of the competitors right now, so it's hard to judge anything, but I really don't think it's our biggest competitor."

When the reporter reminded him that "this movie is said to have some kind of magical magic and has a fatal attraction to murderers", the vice president said even more disdainfully-

"Magic, you say? I think it's an evil force from the East. It is only in that land in the East that the evil forces are attracted by the evil forces! ”

"And in our North America, the people are simple, the level of law and order ranks among the top in the world, the violence between people has dropped to a record low, and there is no soil for breeding evil forces at all!"

- Such a high profile is because it was released at the same time, but with a weekend box office performance of more than 40 million US dollars, there is no suspense on the head of "The Silence of the Lambs", and the film that tops the box office list is produced and distributed by Disney.

Moreover, it is one of the few live-action films that has been a big success for this animated film company.

Therefore, suppressing and belittling the opponent is just a trivial matter for Disney, which is now proud.

In this regard, Frank, who strongly advocated the introduction of this movie, remained silent.

He was waiting, waiting for a turning point.

……

At the Dunhuang headquarters on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, Wang Chuanqi and Wang Wei were also waiting for news from the other side.

In their opinion, they are engaged in a difficult battle, and the movie "The Silence of the Lambs" is their army, and the film markets of various countries are the battlefields they want to conquer one by one.

Nowadays, the Eastern Battlefield can already be determined to be "totally victorious", and in order to capture the Western Theater, the North American Theater must first be captured.

So, at the end of May Day, "The Silence of the Lambs" finally launched an "offensive" on the North American battlefield.

Oh no, there is no May Day in North America.

Because as we all know, although May Day, the world's first workers' festival and working people's holiday, originated in North America, the North American people are the only ones who can.

Of course, this is not a "simple folk custom", but there is also a well-known reason behind it -- the capitalists have always been afraid of such concepts as "proletariat" and "working people".

Ahem, it's far away.

Anyway, after Wang Wei heard the saying "our North American folk customs are simple", he almost laughed out of his abdominal muscles!

"Either it's our North American counterpart, and the thickness of my skin makes me ashamed; Either our definition of 'folk customs and simplicity' is completely different! ”

Lao Wang almost laughed: "I guess it's the latter." Because Texas, where everyone carries guns and is full of martial virtues, it is said to be the most simple place in North America. ”

"Hahaha......"

There was a joyful atmosphere in the office.

After a while, Wang Wei stopped laughing with difficulty and asked, "What does Universal say?" Such an outrageous stepping on people, if they don't want to do it, I'll do it myself! ”

In his mind, he already remembered the famous sentence - the people are simple and Gotham City, and there are many talents!

And Lao Wang saw the eager expression on this guy's face, and he only felt a headache.

He just wanted to stop this guy's "non-centrific thinking" - after all, a Hollywood giant like Universal must know the preferences of the North American market best, so don't help casually.

Then, the secretary came in.

He sent the latest news from North America.

Lao Wang looked at it, his mouth opened wider and wider, and finally he could stuff a duck egg.

For a moment, he looked at Wang Wei's curious gaze and swallowed with difficulty: "I was wrong, the folk customs of North America are simple, and they are really not covered!" ”

……

I...... Alas......

(End of chapter)