Exploiting Hollywood 1980

"Night of the Comet" grossed more than $5.5 million in its first week, Ronald heard the news on Sunday. Some more screening theaters were added in the middle of the week, and the average box office per theater for the week has reached 5,000.

This result was far beyond Atlantic's expectations. In the few days of the week, the box office did not drop much compared to the first weekend. This indicates that the film has a good reputation and is likely to do well at the box office in the second weekend. Will last longer than the first weekend.

This kind of box office trend made Ronald's second directorial work a Sleeping Beauty-style box office structure (Sleepg Hit). If Atlantic could invest more marketing dollars and get more screenings, the opening weekend potential could be even greater than that.

But this is all hindsight. I originally chose Atlantic City because they were the only ones who believed that I could film science fiction subjects well.

"Your performance has attracted the attention of Mr. Ovitz. Someone from the seven major studios has also taken the initiative to contact CAA. Your choice for the third film will be much wider." Agent Niceta was in the office , said to Ronald.

"Of course that's very good." Ronald was happy. A person's status in the industry is often determined by his past history.

“In the film industry, because of the huge difference in box office, practitioners often have a roller coaster experience.

For example, you are familiar with director Peter Bogdanovich, a former Oscar Best Director and Best Screenplay nominee. Since he failed to find a distributor for his girlfriend Stratten's posthumous work "They All Laughed", he Five hundred thousand was spent to buy the distribution rights of the film.

Then Peter used his production company to independently distribute the film. After spending three million US dollars, Bogdanovich was on the verge of bankruptcy and was now wandering around major film companies, hoping to take on another directorial project to earn more money. Money pays debts. "

Niceta said to Ronald.

"Is it so miserable?"

"Yeah, he just left CAA, and he's a little desperate now. I think his mansion will be replaced soon."

As Niceta answered, she took out a black envelope from the drawer and threw it over.

"This is an invitation to the premiere of Star Wars - Return of the Jedi. It's from Lucasfilm. It seems that George Lucas is also very optimistic about you." Niceta invited Ronald to come this time; the main reason was Send him this invitation.

"It's a pity that Helen is not here." Ronald took out the invitation letter from the envelope, a large black letter, and folded it in half. There was a red "Return of the Jedi" logo on the cover. Ronald opened it and found a premiere ticket and a T-shirt inside.

The navy blue T-shirt also has the words "Return of the Jedi". It seems that Lucasfilm hopes that everyone attending the premiere will wear T-shirts.

"Thursday at eight o'clock?" Ronald looked at the time on the invitation.

"Yes, you are the first lucky ones among all Californians to see "Return of the Jedi." Audiences in all other movie theaters have to wait until early morning to watch the midnight show.

"All movie theaters?"

"Yes, almost all the same-day filming in theaters was given to Return of the Jedi, which is after all the much-anticipated finale of the Star Wars trilogy."

"I have to make a call and ask." Ronald looked solemn, picked up the phone and called the president of Atlantic Pictures.

"Tom, I heard that starting from Thursday, all California movie theaters will be showing Return of the Jedi? What about our movie?"

"It doesn't start on Thursday, but on Thursday. Our movie schedule will resume from Friday, but the number of screenings will be greatly squeezed. There is no way around it, Ronald. When the weekend is over, we will start next week It will be released in theaters, and it will be compressed, unless the quality of 'Return of the Jedi' is not as good as expected, but that's Lucas."

"Okay, how low will it probably go?"

"We are fighting for it, but with Star Wars on top, the number of theaters showing it may have to be reduced to less than 900."

"Okay, okay. No, I'm not angry. There's nothing we can do about it. Who let us encounter this Big Mac?"

Ronald put down the phone, still feeling a little unwilling. For such a good movie, it was gaining momentum. Who would have thought "Star Wars" would have such a huge appeal in theaters?

Fortunately, I still have a weekend and a midweek where I can make a lot of money at the box office.

Monday soon came, and the box office results for the second weekend were tallied. Compared with the first week, the weekend box office was almost unchanged, still a little over 3.5 million US dollars. Atlantic also transferred some theaters from "Valley Girl", bringing the total to 968 theaters.

The scary thing is that the box office of "Flashdance" in its sixth weekend did not decline but rebounded a bit. It just surpassed "Night of the Comet" by hundreds of thousands of dollars, pushing Ronald's movie to fourth place.

"How did they do it?" Ronald looked at the box office data on the "Hollywood Report". "Flashdance" did not increase the number of theaters showing this week. In its sixth weekend of release, it suddenly exceeded its fifth week. More than half a million, things are picking up again.

Ronald thought for a while and called producer Don Simpson. Compared to the fact that he had helped him so much, he should be able to explain the reason.

"Aha, Ronald, you are the fourth person to call me today to ask about this matter. You are very perceptive." Don Simpson answered with a yawn as if he had just woken up at noon.

"Who were the first two?"

"Michael Eisner and Katzenberg of Paramount, and Michael Ovitz, the president of CAA. No one else has my phone number, hahaha."

"What is the reason? Did you do any marketing? It doesn't seem like it." Ronald asked.

"I am telling you the 100% truth, without any discount," Don Simpson seemed to be blowing his nose on the other end of the phone, "We only did one extra thing last week, which was to release the videotape."

Ronald hung up the phone and began to think about this question. The seven major Hollywood studios spent a huge amount of money and influence to prevent VCRs from becoming popular in America. Who knew that "Flashdance" would be released on videotapes immediately when the movie was still in theaters, which actually led to an increase in box office sales. It was really an unexpected thing.

The only answer is that many viewers who watched the videotape once chose to watch it again on the big screen in the cinema. They thought that watching in the cinema would be much better than watching on a small TV at home.

Invisibly, the videotape became a promotional channel. Anyway, most of the customers who bought or rented the videotape watched it with their family and friends, and thought it would be better to go to the cinema to buy a ticket to see the better screen effect. As a result, a videotape brought several moviegoers.

"Ring, ring, ring..." The ringing of the phone interrupted Ronald's thoughts.

Ronald picked up the phone, and it was Aunt Karen calling him.

"Ronnie, you haven't called your aunt for a long time. Your aunt misses you."

"My fault, aunt. I've been busy with the release of the movie these weeks. By the way, did you and Donna go to see it?"

"Donna went to see it and said that you shot it very well and Comet was great. But that's not my cup of tea. I just want to see a movie that reflects family life."

"Well, aunt, you know, I'm only 23 years old this year. When I'm older, I will definitely make a family-themed movie. Then we can go to see it together."

"Of course, of course, you are a good boy. I'm waiting for that day, but if you succeed in the film industry in the future, or if you don't succeed, you promised me that you must go back to get a college degree..."

Ronald chatted with his aunt for a while and felt very happy. It was still his family who thought of him. His aunt must have called to congratulate him when she knew that the new movie was released. Next time, Richard should remind himself to call his family first when the new movie is released.

Ronald continued to work on the screenwriter of the new karate-themed movie.

After chatting with Vidal for several days, Ronald gradually had an idea. The villain who bullied the protagonist Danny is also a karate practitioner.

And he practices the kind of karate moves that are mainly fierce and unreserved. So Danny is very afraid of him, dare not resist, and is powerless to resist.

In the end, Danny found a Japanese teacher and finally learned the method of Gangju Flow, defending and counterattacking, and defeating the villain.

Don't actively attack the enemy, but learn skills, and wait for others to bully you, and then fight back. This is also in line with the Eastern philosophy of Gangju Flow. Learning martial arts is to prevent bad people from attacking you, not to attack others.

Ronald felt that this story had a deeper content than the one he wrote originally. The competition between the two is not just a competition between two boys for a girl, but a competition between two philosophies, two methods, and two wisdoms.

One is the American tradition of preemptive strike, relying on force to attack those who are not as good as themselves. The other is the traditional Chinese wisdom of strike back, focusing on doing your own things, and practicing force is also to avoid being attacked by others.

In this way, the contradiction of the story can have another level. The masters of the two protagonists are actually competing, not directly, but who can teach a better apprentice. Such a structure can add a lot of dramatic conflicts and emotional experiences.

"Tony, let me tell you a story. A little boy transferred to Los Angeles to attend high school. He met a beautiful girl at school and they had a good impression of each other."

Ronald went to the hair salon he often went to, found the hairstylist Tony, and told his story. Ordinary listeners are not like professional screenwriters. They listen to your story from an appreciative perspective. If it is not interesting, they will not listen, and Ronald knows where to improve.

Tony kept responding to Ronald's story with hums, and sometimes asked a few questions.

"Danny found a teacher who is from Japan. He taught him the philosophy of Goju-ryu karate, which is to fight and attack at the same time, and to have both offense and defense."

"What?" Tony didn't understand, and continued to look at Ronald in the mirror and trim his hair.

"It's just attack and defense, just one move."

"How is that possible? When you punch someone, they have an opening to hit you."

"That's right, just turn around like that."

"Hey, don't move, I'll cut it if you do that."

"Okay, okay." Ronald ended the story in failure. It seems that we have to find a way to tell this journey of learning and the Eastern wisdom philosophy of karate in a way that ordinary audiences can understand.