Conquer America, Start with a Boxing Champion

His prize money for this match is 250 million US dollars, including 150 million appearance fees, and about 100 million US dollars in PPV, ticket, advertising sponsorship and other income.

After the match, Link returned to the United States to rest, and in early May he led the team to Hamburg, Germany again to participate in the WBC heavyweight champion defense. The opponent of this match is international boxing champion Manuel Char.

Manuel is 32 years old this year. He was born in Lebanon and later became a German citizen. He has served as a sparring partner for Klitschko and Klitschko.

He entered the professional boxing world in 2005 and challenged the then WBC champion Klitschko as a WBC champion challenger in 2012.

He was defeated by Klitschko in the fourth round by TKO and suffered serious eye injuries.

At the end of last year, Manuel challenged the WBC heavyweight world champion title again. In the qualifying round, he defeated international boxing champions such as Denis Bakotov, Alex Magikin, and Alexander Ustinov, and got the qualification to compete with Link.

Currently ranked seventh in the WBC heavyweight organization.

There is an interesting story about this man. In 2014, Manuel was shot by an extremist organization for making inappropriate remarks on the Internet. He was shot 4 times in the abdomen but survived.

Everyone thought Manuel would give up boxing, but he didn't. After recovering from his injury, Manuel continued to train boxing. He won several games in a row last year and qualified as a WBC heavyweight champion challenger.

After his deeds were reported by the media, his fame increased greatly and he became a very inspiring boxer.

If Link hadn't appeared, he would have become the WBA heavyweight champion in 2017.

At present, Manuel's data is 192cm tall, 194cm wingspan, 252lbs in weight, 28 wins and 2 losses in his professional record, and he lost to Klitschko and Alexander Povetkin successively.

The characteristics of the opponent in boxing are that his skills are average, his punches are above average, he has strong resistance to blows, and he has strong willpower in the game.

He also has a slick style of play and likes to use hugging tactics.

Once he has a clear advantage in the game, he will play passively, drag the game to the end, and win by points.

The WBC boxing championship challenge was held at the Volkspark Stadium in Hamburg. Hamburg is the second largest city in Germany after Berlin. On the day of the game, more than 30,000 spectators came to the scene, some of whom were Link's fans, and some came to support Manuel.

After the game started, Link took the lead in attacking.

This is a tactic he often uses after becoming the champion of the four major organizations.

The main reason is that this style of play is more intense, the viewing effect is the best, and it can increase the PPV ratings during the broadcast. Another reason is that the opponent's strength is generally not strong. After he uses a fast and heavy punch, few people can last more than two rounds.

This style of play is quick and decisive, and it can also avoid accidents.

Under his strong attack, the opponent Manuel's defense was quickly beaten to pieces. At 145 seconds in the first round, Manuel fell to the ground for the first time.

In the second round, Link continued to attack hard, and the combination punches were fast and fierce. Manuel couldn't hold on, so he could only keep using the hugging tactics, and even violated the rules by hitting Link's chin with his elbow.

Link was not polite either. In the second round, he knocked Manuel down twice, at 87 seconds and 108 seconds. After the second knockdown, Manuel lay on the ground for ten seconds and could not get up.

Link won the game smoothly and successfully defended the WBC gold belt for the second time.

His income from this game was 220 million US dollars, 100 million US dollars in appearance fees, plus 120 million in other income shares.

After the game, Link stayed in Paris for two days to accompany Marion and Cassel Jr., and then flew back to the United States.

——

In May, the summer vacation is coming, and "Captain America 3: Civil War" is about to be released.

Link did not have time to rest after the game, and joined the promotion of the movie.

This movie continues the plot of "Avengers 2", also known as "Avengers 2.5", which can please the fans of Captain America and meet the needs of the audience of "Avengers".

After a period of promotion, Captain America 3 was released in 4,226 theaters in North America on Friday, May 6. The North American box office was 182 million U.S. dollars in the first three days of its premiere, and the North American box office exceeded 200 million on the fourth day of its release, becoming the fastest movie to break 200 million in North America this year.

Ten days after its release, the North American box office has accumulated 306 million U.S. dollars, and it is also the fastest movie to break 300 million.

The box office performance in overseas regions is even better, with 420 million box office in 164 countries and regions overseas in 14 days of its release.

This also makes the total box office of this movie exceed 700 million U.S. dollars.

The box office is expected to be around 1.2 billion U.S. dollars.

Before filming the movie, Link signed a box office sharing contract with Disney and is expected to receive a salary of 65 million U.S. dollars.

In early May, Lionsgate also released a movie, "Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle" starring Dwayne Johnson, Jack Black, Daddario and others.

The movie tells the story of four high school students with different personalities who accidentally travel to the dangerous game of Brave and transform into game characters that are completely different from their own personalities and appearances. Facing the attacks of jungle beasts and the pursuit of evil forces, the four must overcome numerous crises under the leadership of adventurer Spencer and win the game before returning to reality.

It is a humorous and funny adventure action movie.

The production cost is 90 million US dollars. Lionsgate Films is the distributor in North America, and Paramount is responsible for overseas distribution.

The movie was released on the second weekend of May. It earned $71.91 million in 3,765 theaters in the first three days. On the fifth day of its release, the North American box office exceeded $100 million. After two weeks of release, the North American box office exceeded $200 million. It is expected that the North American box office will be more than $400 million.

In May, the box office of commercial movies in March and April came out one after another. The best-performing movie was the R-rated love movie "Fifty Shades of Grey" starring Jamie Dornan, Dakota Johnson and others.

The film was released at the end of March. The current North American box office is $165 million, the overseas box office is $425 million, and the total box office is as high as $590 million.

The production cost of this movie is only $40 million.

The profit ratio is as high as 15 times.

Although it is not as good as "The Hunger Games 1" in terms of total box office revenue, this movie has less investment and greater profit margins.

The success of "Fifty Shades of Grey" has once again made Lionsgate the object of envy and hatred of its peers.

Originally, after the end of the "Hunger Games" series, the media and the executives of the six major film studios believed that Lionsgate's total box office performance would be greatly affected, falling from the top three of the year, or returning to Lionsgate's original seventh place.

But with the success of "Fifty Shades of Grey", the executives of the six major film studios had to accept a reality:

Lionsgate's success is by no means dependent on the success of a series of movies, but has found a secret to get box office by adapting best-selling books. In the next three or four years, Lionsgate will still occupy an important position in the "Seven Major Film Studios" and become a competitor of the six major film studios.

The impact of the success of "Fifty Shades of Grey" is most directly reflected in the stock market. After the North American box office of the film exceeded 100 million, in less than half a month, Lionsgate's stock price rose from 88 US dollars per share to around 95 US dollars.

After the North American box office of "Jumanji" exceeded 200 million, it even rushed to 100 US dollars, bringing Lionsgate's market value back to around 20 billion.

Among the movies released in March and April, the second highest-grossing movie is "Arrival", which is adapted from the short story "Story of Your Life" by Chinese-American science fiction writer Jiang Fengnan and directed by Denis Villeneuve, the director of "Blade Runner 2".

Starring Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker and others.

It tells the story of 12 mysterious alien spaceships landing on Earth. The US military finds linguist Louis and physicist Ian, hoping that the two can work together to crack the mystery of the alien language and save the earth.

In early January, "Arrival" represented Lionsgate in the Berlin Film Festival and was shortlisted for the main competition unit and nominated for the Golden Bear Award for Best Picture.

The movie was released in North America in early April and grossed 24.07 million US dollars in the first week.

The start was relatively flat, but the box office reputation was good.

"Complete Movie" said, "Before "Arrival", no science fiction movie could open people's minds like this movie."

"Los Angeles Times" commented that the film "is a smart, eloquent and exciting science fiction film."

The IMDB rating is as high as 8.3, and the Rotten Tomatoes freshness was as high as 100% in the first week. Some film critics have determined that this movie is the best science fiction movie of the year.

Due to its good reputation, the box office did not fall but rose in the second week.

After five consecutive weeks of release, the North American box office exceeded 100 million US dollars, reaching 102 million US dollars.

The overseas box office is similar to that of North America. After more than a month of release, the current box office is 112 million US dollars.

The total box office is 214 million US dollars.

The production cost of the film is 47 million US dollars, and the revenue ratio is nearly 5:1, which can be regarded as a big-selling movie.

Another movie "The Shallows" released in mid-April also performed well at the box office.

"The Shallows" is starred by Blake Lively. It tells the story of a girl who was attacked by a shark while surfing in the sea and injured her thigh. After struggling, the heroine climbed onto a reef exposed to the sea. The sharks swam around the rocks. The heroine must overcome her fear and find a way back to the shore.

The film was produced by Palm Beach Pictures, with a production cost of 17 million US dollars. After four weeks of release, the current North American box office is 55.12 million US dollars, the overseas box office is 63.97 million US dollars, and the total box office reaches 119 million US dollars. The box office revenue ratio is as high as 7:1, which is considered a dark horse.

This week, when the North American box office of "Jumanji" exceeded 200 million, Lionsgate's total box office in North America in the first half of the year exceeded 1 billion US dollars, reaching 1.05 billion.

It ranks second among the six major film companies, and the first is Disney Pictures.

This year, Disney Pictures has performed very strongly at the box office. Before June, three films had a North American box office of more than 300 million.

The first one was "Zootopia" released in March, with a North American box office of 340 million and a global box office of 1.02 billion.

The second one was "The Jungle Book" released in April, adapted from the 1967 Disney classic animation "The Jungle Book", with a current North American box office of 360 million and a global box office of 960 million.

The third one is "Captain America 3", which is expected to have a North American box office of more than 400 million.

Next month, Disney will release another animated film, Finding Dory. According to the box office performance of the first film, the North American box office is expected to be over 300 million.

Compared with Disney, the advantage of Lionsgate's films is that there are many films and the production cost is not high. This year, Lionsgate and Disney, Paramount, Warner, Palm Beach Studios, Ampuna Pictures, Netflix, and Amazon Studios jointly produced 24 films.

Disney Studios plans to release 18 films, more than half of which are blockbusters with a production cost of hundreds of millions.

Lionsgate may be able to compete with Disney in terms of total box office by the number of movies it releases.

——

"Boss, what do you think of the script for "Gods of War"?"

In the office of Lionsgate, Link was looking at the first quarter financial report when Ms. Stacey Schneider, the vice president in charge of production, came in and asked.

"Gods of War?"

Link flipped through the script on his desk and found a script called "Gods of War: The Eye of Power", which was brought by Summit Entertainment. It tells the story of a mortal thief Baker who was favored by God and later helped the Egyptian god Horus to complete his revenge and counterattack to become a wise ruler.

The production department believes that the box office performance of historical and mythological films in recent years has been good, such as "Maleficent", "Snow White and the Huntsman", "The Hobbit", etc., so they are preparing to adapt this script.

The production cost budget is as high as 140 million US dollars.

After reading the script, Link remembered that there was a movie that suffered a huge loss at the box office, which caused Lionsgate's stock price to plummet by an estimated 20%. It seems to be this "The Eye of Power".

After knowing this, he will naturally not fall into this trap again.

"The cost of producing a war of gods is too high, and this kind of historical mythology film is relatively risky. My opinion is to reduce the cost to less than 100 million US dollars, or give up this project."

Link said.

Ms. Stacey Snyder had no objection to this, because Link is the boss of the company, and his words are final in Lionsgate. In addition, in the past, all the film projects he participated in reviewing had good box office results, and those without his participation were average.

This happened more and more times, and Link's prestige in the company increased greatly. Lionsgate executives have learned to obey his opinions instead of going against him.

"And "Divergent 3" does not need to learn from "The Hunger Games" and "Twilight" to be divided into two parts. The box office results of this series of movies are already average. If the ending is split and filmed, the box office results will be even worse."

Link took out the script of "Divergent 3" and said.

Seeing that the box office results of "Divergent 2" were not bad, the production department planned to follow the successful model of "The Hunger Games 3 and 4" and divide it into two parts.

But they forget that the reason why the Twilight and Hunger Games series were remade successfully is that the original works are popular and have a deep fan base, and the movies are of good quality and well-made.

Because the movies are good, fans are more patient with them, so the ending is split into two parts, and fans can accept it.

The Divergent series has been mediocre since the first part, and the ending is split again. It is possible to annoy the audience and cause box office losses.

He remembered that the third part of the Divergent series had very poor box office, which led Lionsgate to announce that the fourth part would be changed into a TV movie and broadcast on TV to reduce the cost of publicity.

"Okay, I'll notify the production department later."

Stacey Snyder said.

Link talked to her about the situation of several movies in production, including "Sing", "Get Out", "The Shape of Water", "Phantom Thread", "Wonder", "Bohemian Rhapsody", etc.

Some of these film projects were initiated by the screenwriters or directors of the films to cooperate with Lionsgate, such as Jordan Peele, the director and screenwriter of Get Out, who is also one of the male protagonists of the comedy TV series Key \u0026 Peele.

Some are good projects selected by Link from many scripts, such as The Shape of Water and Bohemian Rhapsody, and some are scripts recommended by Lionsgate's production department, such as Sing and Wonder.

There are also two good film projects from Palm Beach Studios this year, Lady Bird and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, both of which are female-themed films. Influenced by the 'me too' movement, these female-themed films have good prospects.

Link and Lionsgate's production department also regard female-themed films as the focus of the next few years.

After seeing off Ms. Stacy, Link put down the script, stretched his waist, and walked to the counter to pour a glass of ice water.

"Honey, it's time to get off work."

Evaka knocked on the door and walked in with a smile. She had loose blonde hair and was wearing a white women's business dress. She had a plump and well-proportioned figure and looked very good.