Exploiting Hollywood 1980

"Boom, boom... Boom, boom"

The heavy drum beats began to beat, and Ronald, who was lying on the bed, tried to open his eyes. Did he drink too much champagne at the party and forget to turn off the TV?

A skeleton warrior made of silver-white metal appeared on the TV, with only two red eyes, holding a thick gun in his hand.

"Biu Biu Biu..."

The gun fired not bullets, but lasers. Huge helicopters and robots fought against humans in military uniforms.

"Huh, dreaming again?" Ronald was refreshed. Which actor did he see today that triggered the dream?

"Skynet, the computer that controls all these robots, sent two Terminators, traveling through time and space, from the future back to our time..."

A somewhat low female voice interrupted.

"Is it Jim's Terminator?" Ronald thought, "It turns out that the Terminator was filmed. I have to take a good look."

Under the blue background light, a burst of lightning intertwined, and a naked muscular man appeared.

"Isn't this the bodybuilding champion? His muscles don't seem to be as explosive as when he won Mr. Olympia." No wonder I dreamed about it. It turns out that the Terminator robot was played by Schwarzenegger.

The Terminator entered the bar, robbed someone's leather jacket and boots, and took a shotgun.

There was another burst of lightning. This time it was a handsome naked man. His luck was not good. He fell next to a police car. He knocked the police out with a punch, then put on his police uniform and drove away in the police car.

"This is probably a human resistance soldier." Ronald watched with relish. Director Jim is very good.

The human resistance found the address of the resistance leader "John Connor" through the portable computer in the police car. He is a ten-year-old boy.

"Has the script been changed? "Ronald thought, the script he had read was about coming back to kill his mother. But there was also a child's play, Jim seemed to be really good, it is difficult to direct a child actor well.

After a trance, the camera turned to the street.

The Terminator played by Schwarzenegger drove a Harley motorcycle on the street to find John Connor. He found Connor riding a small motorcycle on an elevated road and started chasing him.

At the same time, the human resistance fighters who found the address also began to look for him. They saw John Connor playing the game console in the mall at almost the same time.

The Terminator pulled out a shotgun and aimed at Connor in the aisle, and the resistance fighters on the other side of the aisle also pulled out a small pistol and aimed at the Terminator.

"Get down," the Terminator shouted, and then took the lead and shot the resistance fighter.

"Huh?" What kind of plot is this? The human protagonist was killed not long after the opening?

The "resistance fighter" paused after being hit, then stood up and continued to walk forward. The big hole in his body made by the bullet began to repair and restore.

"Oh my..., this is a robot. "Ronald thought. The suspense was well set up. At first, I thought it was a human resistance army, but it turned out to be another robot Terminator, the liquid metal robot that could transform into millions of people.

But was the script changed or something? Why did the two robots fight each other? Are they trying to steal the credit?

In another trance, John Langner took the opportunity to escape from the mall and drove away on his motorcycle.

The two Terminators continued to chase, and the liquid metal robot robbed a large truck to kill Connor. The Terminator played by Schwarzenegger appeared on a Harley, grabbed Connor with one hand and put him on his motorcycle, then loaded the shotgun with one hand, and blew up the truck tank backwards.

In another trance, Ronald was a little confused. Why didn't the Terminator kill Connor after saving him, and took him to save his mother Sarah Connor?

John Connor asked the Terminator for the purpose of saving him. It turned out that he was a robot recoded by the resistance army and was sent by the elderly Connor to protect the young.

In a big battle in the mental hospital, the two rescued Sarah, and the Terminator told the origin of Skynet. The three decided to kill the designer of Skynet chip, change history, and prevent mankind from falling into nuclear war.

The liquid metal robot arrived and killed the black chip designer in the gunfight. The two sides had another street chase battle. The liquid metal robot could not be killed no matter what, and he would repair himself.

Finally, the helpless people drove the car to the steel mill, and in the steel blast furnace, the liquid metal robot was finally destroyed. And the last chip that humans can evolve into Skynet is in the brain of the Terminator played by Schwarzenegger.

For the future of mankind, he voluntarily self-destructed.

"Dongdong, Dongdong... Dongdong, Dongdong" The heavy drum beats began to beat again. The actor who played Sarah Connor had a man's chin. She told the audience with a low voice-over that nothing happened on the day when Skynet awakened in the original history, and they had changed history.

"Ah! "

Ronald yelled, awakened by himself.

How can it be so beautiful? How can the special effects be so realistic?

The image of the liquid robot changing into other people is flawless. And he was frozen to the ground by liquid nitrogen, and after encountering the high temperature of the explosion, he returned to liquid state, and countless mercury-like droplets gathered together and restored to a robot. How was this filmed?

Is the gap between people really so big?

Even George Lucas and Spielberg can't shoot such a scene.

Ronald fell into deep self-doubt.

"Jim, congratulations, you wrote a good script. "

Two days later, Ronald found Gale Hurd's apartment and handed his script revisions to Jim Cameron.

Ronald finally figured it out. What he dreamed about might not be the Terminator, but the sequel to the Terminator.

In the first movie, the Terminator robot played by Schwarzenegger was the villain, which is why Sarah Connor ran away when she saw him in the mental hospital.

The first few scenes were a trick Cameron deliberately set up. This made the audience mistakenly think that Schwarzenegger was still the villain robot this time, so in the first half hour, he saved John Connor, which was the first major reversal of the plot, which just revived the audience's curiosity.

Ronald was quite sure that he dreamed about the sequel.

Because the special effects in it were obviously ahead of the current film industry. Lucas's Star Wars special effects, he didn't know the details of the production method, but he could always think of a general idea.

And those liquid metal robot deformation shots in the dream, there was no idea at all. Although Cameron is a genius in special effects and can produce good effects at a very low cost, Ronald doesn't believe that he can shoot that kind of shot now.

Maybe some new technology will be developed in the future to make that kind of special effect possible.

"Ronald, do you have any ideas?" Seeing Ronald's visit, Cameron took Ronald's revision suggestions and read them.

"How much budget do you plan to find for this movie?"

"Gail and I estimate that it will cost 8 to 10 million."

"That's impossible. I marked some scenes that are too expensive to realize. You can handle the special effects yourself. I just have doubts about the effects of some shots, such as the liquid robot. It will only look fake when realized with current technology."

Cameron frowned and found that the plot of the liquid metal robot had been deleted.

"Anything else?" he asked.

"You have too many scenes, Jim." Ronald pointed to the table he listed. "With so many scenes, the cost of setting up the scene and lighting each time, and the total accumulated shooting time, you can go bankrupt."

Ronald pointed to the scenes in the script and analyzed them carefully for Cameron.

"These scenes can be grouped together, so you don't need too many transitions. Each transition is very troublesome, and it wastes time and increases labor costs...

These scenes can be shot at night, mostly in shopping malls, parking lots, and streets, so you don't need to manually set up the lights, and can directly use the lights in these scenes...

Believe me, when I was shooting "Fast Pace", the progress of the shopping mall scenes was more than twice as fast as other scenes...

And if these scenes are grouped together, you can also save rehearsal time, so when you shoot the actors' dialogue shots, you don't have to wait for the lighting time, and arrange them to shoot on one day, so that the emotions can be matched when editing..."

The confusion in Cameron's eyes gradually turned into sudden enlightenment.

Everyone has worked for Roger Corman, and there are some things that need no further explanation. This modification of the script is completely based on the economic perspective of shooting, trying to shoot more economically without destroying the picture and drama.

"That's basically it. When filming, you will find that the money is spent every day like water. So overall, we are not afraid of some scenes being difficult to shoot, but we are afraid that some scenes are difficult to shoot without thinking about it in advance. If the shooting plan is delayed for one more day, your expenses will rise uncontrollably."

"In addition, I suggest that you shoot some scenes secretly and don't report them. Otherwise, the cost of LAPD clearing the scene is a huge sum of money, and there are strict time limits. Of course, if you can persuade the seven major studios and get a big budget of more than 10 million, that's another matter."

Ronald thought of the past when he was filming "Famous", when NYPD was dispatched to block the road, and he couldn't shoot for a minute more.

Cameron looked at the proposal and recalled Ronald's words, "Ronnie, this is the best advice I have heard since I wrote this script. I have to calculate it carefully. If I change it this way, Gail's chance of getting investment will be much higher."

"This is your script." Jim took out a copy of Ronald's "Night of the Comet" script from the drawer and handed it over, which was full of Cameron's notes.

"You can solve the makeup problem of actors like this...

The main features of zombies are blue faces and enlarged eye sockets. If you can avoid using erasers and plaster, you don't need special effects makeup, just let regular makeup solve it...

There is no need to use the pigment powder commonly used in Hollywood to make the ashes of people evaporated by comets. You can use an ordinary building material instead...

As for the red sky, if you shoot it for Coleman, you can actually be lazy and use a little trick to solve it, but this requires redesigning some shots, so that the audience will not be too distracted...

The difficult thing to solve is this deserted city. I thought about it for a long time and there is no way to save money and ensure the viewing effect for the audience."

Ronald read the notes carefully. Jim made detailed annotations for many special effects makeup and special effects models.

However, Ronald did not want to compromise on the scenes of the deserted city.

There are three or four concentrated scenes before and after the plot. If they are deleted or replaced with small scenes such as schools and shopping malls, it will be impossible to bring the audience into a sense of reality in the end of the world, and the overall appeal of the movie will be greatly reduced.

Ronald didn't really want to make a Roger Corman-style exploitation film, a film that cost 200,000 or 300,000 dollars. The audience came with an attitude of "I know it's a bad film, I just come to see the beauties and blood in it."

Ronald would have made this kind of film a long time ago. If he continued to make it, he would not make any progress. The mainstream film industry might forget him.

Calculating the ideas Jim gave him, he could save a lot of money. It seems that the cost of Night of the Comet can be made for less than 2 million. With the 500,000 investment promised by Roger Corman, he still has a funding gap of more than 1 million to attract investment.

Ronald couldn't help but envy Cameron. He had his girlfriend Gail to help with investment and distribution, so he only had to concentrate on artistic expression.

"Jim, I will add your name to the script. These changes are very helpful to me."

"Help each other, I will also add your name to the script of Terminator."

Ronald has more experience in directing, coordinating, and editing, and Jim also has experience in special effects makeup and special effects models. Having a friend who is also a director to help each other and give advice is very helpful to both of their creations.