Exploiting Hollywood 1980

"I think these two films are very promising projects, and it is worth completing their distribution work anyway."

Although Mike McDavoy has already gone to TriStar Pictures, after all, he was the one who promoted these two films, and he wanted to complete the two films.

So he still called Mr. Klug, the richest man, and tried to make a final effort.

"Potential? Unrealized potential is not worth mentioning..." Klug had been ridiculed by his friends. The pride he had in acquiring Orion had long disappeared, and he did not have a good attitude towards this old subordinate.

"I have watched some clips of both films. From what I have seen, both have the potential to win Oscars. In particular, Ronald is watching these two films. His understanding of directors is unmatched by other Hollywood producers.

He knows best when to intervene directly and when to trust the director and the leading actor. This ability can ensure the final artistic effect of the film. I have been in this industry for decades and have never seen a young man who handles this matter so perfectly."

Mike McDavoy still wanted to try to persuade Klug. Although he had left Orion, his name would still appear under the name of executive producer on the film, and movie fans would remember his name.

"I'm talking about the box office potential, you..." Klug swore. He invested in so many movies. Even if he got an Oscar nomination, what use would it have on the box office?

Before he bought a large amount of Orion stock, the company's "Amadeus" and "Platoon" won multiple Oscars in a row. The box office was acceptable because the box office rose after winning the awards.

But since he became the big boss of Orion, he has not won any for four consecutive years. Nomination? Nominations and awards have a far different effect on promoting the box office.

Not to mention Milos Forman, the director of "Amadeus", who spent the past two years slowly working on "Valmont", and lost all his underwear.

He invested in Orion to win at the Oscars and look forward to forming a synergy with his cable TV business, rather than constantly losing money, losing money...

"Well, if Mr. Klug doesn't want to continue to distribute, then according to the contract, we can transfer the copyright of the film to Ronald and stop the loss appropriately..."

Mike Medavoy fulfilled his last obligation to the richest man Klug. Then he persuaded Klug to let Ronald take over the overall copyright of the two films.

After that, the two films had nothing to do with Orion, whether they won awards or box office. Although they still had to put the Orion Pictures logo in the title because they applied to the MPAA Film Association.

"Okay, let's start our plan in this way." Ronald was still confident that he could recover his investment in the two films. He immediately set up two project companies and took over the ownership of the two films.

But although Ronald was confident, Columbia Pictures was not confident enough. Or rather, it was their CEO Peter Guber or Vice President Jon Peters who were not confident enough.

They said that they had just purchased the overseas and TV distribution rights from Orion, and there was no remaining funds and schedule to take over the distribution of two films that required a lot of public relations investment to win awards.

Anyway, the two of them were good friends, and Ronald couldn't tell which one had a problem with him.

Guber might have been recruited by former chairman Akio Morita, and had factional problems with Ohga's friend Ronald. Frank Price, who was recommended by Ronald, became president, which posed a threat to him. There was also a small entity TriStar Pictures within the company, and it had its own team (Mike McDavoy had just joined) to operate.

Peters might have been unhappy because Price, who was recommended by Ronald, replaced his original position and could only be relegated to vice president. Or maybe Kim Basinger, whom he had been chasing after before, was not only picked by Ronald, but was also recommended to the "Batman" crew, and her rapid rise was out of his control.

Anyway, no matter how the two communicated, they insisted that Columbia's film schedule was arranged, especially the end of the year when Ronald's two new films could not be inserted.

In fact, this reason was also very high-sounding, and Ronald was indeed blocked and had nothing to say. Such blockbusters are scheduled more than a year in advance at the Las Vegas screening. The seven major studios have a coordination mechanism to try not to let the same theme and the same type of movies collide.

In order to impact the Oscars next year, Columbia plans to release two movies that have the hope of impacting important Oscar awards in November and December at the end of the year.

One is "Dangerous Days", a movie directed by Ronald's friend Robert Reiner, adapted from Stephen King's book of the same name, and is also a psychological thriller. The story is very interesting. The protagonist is a bestseller who is tied up at home by a female book fan. It is very funny to be written by Stephen King.

Another one is called "The Silence of Heaven", directed by Penny Marshall, who is also a good friend of Ronald and once directed Diane. This is an adaptation of a true story, telling the story of a New York doctor named Thayer, who used drugs to revive patients who suffered from epidemic encephalitis from 1917 to 1928, but soon regained their rigidity.

These two films have distinct characteristics. They are both adapted from best-selling books or memoirs. The stories are highly dependent on the performances of the directors and actors, and the budget is 20 to 30 million US dollars. They are typical medium-sized productions, aiming for Oscars.

The biggest feature of this kind of movie is that it will be released at the end of the year. Because the Oscars in 1991 were established to honor movies released in 1990.

And the movies that impressed the judges the most were undoubtedly the ones released at the end of the year closest to the voting time.

Since Jane Fonda's movie "Homecoming" revealed this secret, the year-end schedule has become more and more crowded for movies that are rushing for awards.

Ronald knew both directors and knew that it was impossible to persuade them to give up the scarce schedule. He had no choice but to find his Daydream distribution manager, Michelle Cannold, and public relations consultant Michael Gray to discuss whether he could do the distribution of the two movies himself.

"It's very difficult. As you know, the year-end schedules are all booked in advance. Orion was in turmoil before, and the schedules they booked were not locked. Now many of them have been snatched away by the Big Seven.

Especially Scorsese's "Goodfellas" released by Warner Bros. and "The Fatal Gamble" by the new producer Miramax, both of which have been positioned early and have divided up a lot of year-end schedules."

"This guy, the richest man Mr. Kluge, wants to sell the company. Why didn't he tell us earlier? Warner Bros. doesn't talk about it, but we can't lose to Miramax. Their boss flattered me in Cannes a few years ago..."

Ronald is getting more and more dissatisfied with the richest man. Although Orion's business is small, it can't be disposed of so casually, right? You have nothing to do with it. Can't you just give it to the person I want to do it?

"Even if there are theaters willing to show our movies, I'm afraid the battle for public relations and marketing is not optimistic." Public relations consultant Gray also thinks the chances of winning are slim.

Like the schedule, the PR resources before the Oscar nominations are limited, and often these resources are tied to the seven major studios. For example, the two famous Chicago film critics Roger Ebert and Gene Sisco recommend a fixed number of movies in their weekly film review columns.

In order to win the awards, the seven major studios often booked the film review slots for that period in advance. Ronald could usually jump the queue when he asked them to write a film review, but it would not be so easy during the most intense year-end schedule.

Like the cinema resources, this is not a problem that can be solved simply by money, at least not in the short term.

For a while, the meeting was deadlocked. Ronald could certainly not release the movie during the year-end award season, but doing so would not only miss the opportunity for two movies with great potential to win the awards, but also these two movies were not the kind of commercial films that rely on stars, and failing to enter the Oscar competition would also have a profound impact on the box office.

After discussing for a long time, there was no good solution. Perhaps postponing it for a year and participating in the next Oscars could barely be considered a solution.

But within a year, no one knew what would happen. "Valmont", which had been postponed for a year, ended up with nothing, which made Ronald feel risky.

"Why don't we take a break, watch a comedy, and relax..." Cannold proposed the idea of ​​adjourning the meeting. Everyone was a little sleepy, and inspiration can only come when you need to relax.

Ronald nodded in agreement and pointed to the videotape cabinet in the corner of the office, where many videotapes were collected for reference.

"Watch a brainless movie..." Cannold didn't want to watch those brain-intensive comedies, so he wanted to relax. His hand reached out to David Zucker's nonsensical masterpiece "Unprecedented Flying".

"Don't watch such vulgar movies, are there any more elegant comedies?" David Simkins was in charge of scripts and production. He didn't like this kind of low-brow style movie, so he reached out to Dustin Hoffman's "Tootsie".

"It should be stylish and easy to think about. I recommend you to watch this one..." Michael Gray is also a movie lover. He reached out to a South African movie from the early 1980s.

"The Gods Must Be Crazy?" This movie was not very popular when it was released in America. Cannold and Simkins had not yet entered Hollywood and had not seen it in its entirety. The two sat down and watched it carefully.

"I have met the producer of this movie. When they came to America, it was just when the South African white government was sanctioned. It was almost not released here. Release..."

Ronald smiled. He also remembered that when "The Gods Must Be Crazy" wanted to be released in America, it turned out that no one was willing to play the movie. It was very embarrassing.

The investor of the movie, the South African film distributor, the Trosky family, had a bumpy road in the distribution of the movie in America...

"Huh..." Ronald suddenly thought of it. They were the same back then. The theaters were unwilling to show their movies for some political reasons. As a result, they relied on their own abilities to deal with the theaters alone. It took four years to turn this movie into a box office winner step by step.

"What if we don't go through the theaters and release it ourselves?" Ronald asked suddenly after the movie was finished.

"Self-release? How is that possible? This is not the time when MPAA didn't have a rating system..."

Michelle Cannold, who knows a lot about the distribution business, is not very interested in this idea. In the early days, there was no unified standard for cinemas in each state, so the film distribution business was fragmented, and each producer had to deal with cinemas in each state and city separately.

The MPAA rating agency, the famous Hays Code, was established later to unify the screening standards of each state. Only then did the national cinema chain come into being, and the distribution of films no longer had to form a distribution team and travel around the states with copies.

"There is no law that requires the cinema chain to sign a screening contract with the cinema, right?" Ronald asked.

"No, America is a free country. The reason why no one does this is because the cost is relatively high... eh..."

Michelle Cannold also suddenly figured it out. The so-called high cost is compared with the mature distribution system of the cinema chain. Now the cinema chain has no time to distribute Ronald's two films, so it would be cheaper to organize it by himself.

"If so, how much does marketing and public relations cost?" Ronald asked consultant Gray.

"The cost is higher, but if you don't release it simultaneously across the country, then many materials can be reused."

National simultaneous release is also a mandatory action after the cinema system and the gradual popularization of videotapes. Because most movies are released on a large scale, if they are not released simultaneously, then the audience who watch the movie in the later period may see the pirated videotapes first.

But those are commercial films with stars. These two movies still rely on the Oscars to increase their popularity, so there are no big concerns in this regard.

"If we slowly release them in different states at different times, we don't need to print so many copies, and we can save a lot of money." Suddenly, everyone had new ideas.

"You study it and come up with a feasibility report." Ronald gradually felt that this was feasible.

Everyone made plans for the release of the two movies. Later, Ronald summarized it here. Although he had a good idea, the cost still made him frown.

It is really not a joke to release a movie. The production and transportation of copies, marketing in various places, public relations for the Oscars, and the cost of forming a team to promote them in cinemas in various states.

Even though Ronald has connections with Hollywood theaters in several states on the East Coast, and has connections with the Palm Tree Theaters invested by Saudi princes, the huge expenditure easily exceeded tens of millions of dollars, approaching the production cost of the film.

"No wonder the medium-sized studios that want to challenge the permanent distribution business have lost a lot of money..." Ronald looked at the financial statements and saw how easily he lost a lot of money.

Please press Ronald.