Exploiting Hollywood 1980

Although he didn't have much hope, Ronald still went to meet two old friends who were running small studios.

One was Roger Corman, who set up his own film company after selling New World. He still used the old money-saving production method to shoot new films.

Roger Corman was still the same. He drove to the office early in the morning and personally controlled the progress of each project. In his company, there was no concept called management. Only he made various decisions based on experience and intuition.

The other subordinates who were nominal production managers were more like Corman's secretaries than producers. They didn't have much decision-making power. They just passed orders and went to the crew to help Corman keep an eye on the crew to prevent overspending and overtime, otherwise they would notify Corman to come and tear up the script scenes that could not be filmed.

"Ronald, welcome to my office. I remember you came twice." Corman asked his secretary to make a cup of cheap coffee for Ronald, and the two began to get down to business.

"I have a very controversial film project, and none of the seven major Hollywood studios have the courage to try it. I met Gail that day, and she said to me, why don't you go to Roger? In 1962, he dared to film the racial segregation of blacks in the South, and in 1966, he dared to film motorcycle gangs... There is no left-wing progressive theme in Hollywood that he dares not film."

Ronald took two sips of coffee. He is not as good at distinguishing coffee as black tea. He is also very happy to drink cheap coffee.

He first gave Roger Corman a challenge and threw a bait to attract Corman's attention. This is a negotiation strategy that Ronald had thought of in advance, so that he would not be scared by the controversial plot of the Jewish girl.

Roger Corman has two characteristics. The first is that he likes left-wing progressive themes. As long as the movie challenges the conservative and decadent ideas of society, he will naturally be interested. Second, he likes to save money and does not like big productions of 20 or 30 million. He thinks that Hollywood wastes a lot of money.

"Of course, this is a small production. I calculated that it will cost about 4.5 million to produce. If you can give me a distribution contract, I can find someone willing to invest. I personally think that this movie will be a big hit."

Roger Corman put on his glasses and took the script of "Dirty Dancing" to read it carefully.

"Isn't this very controversial?" Corman spent 20 minutes quickly flipping through the script and asked Ronald a question.

Coleman didn't think that Jewish girls couldn't fall in love with dancing handsome guys like other ethnic groups.

"The story happened in the 1960s when JFK was the president. A girl from a middle-class Jewish family fell in love with a poor Irish boy who was a dancer at a resort. Wasn't this considered heresy at the time?"

Ronald was overjoyed, but he still deliberately reminded him of the words "Jewish girl" and then concentrated on how Corman answered.

"This is not controversial at all. I'm never afraid of these when making movies." Corman waved his hand, as if to dispel Ronald's concerns.

Then Coleman took off his glasses, sighed, and said to Ronald, "If you had brought this script three years ago, I would have gotten the distribution rights.

But now. You have to wait. It will probably take me until next year to completely regain the right to distribute movies in America."

"Why, you can't distribute movies in America now?"

Roger Corman explained the troubles he encountered. He sold New World Pictures for $16 million a few years ago. He and the new bosses of New World had some preferential terms in the sales contract.

New World wanted to help distribute the movies produced by Coreman with a 15% preferential share.

But New World did not really fulfill this condition afterwards. The movies produced by Coreman's new company were not distributed. So Roger Corman sued the other party for compensation for losses and asked the other party to return New World Pictures to him.

On the other hand, Corman had to reorganize the distribution department and start distributing movies himself.

New World Pictures seized this loophole of Corman and counter-sued Roger Corman, saying that he violated the contract and did not hand over the film to New World for distribution as per the contract, but became a distributor again, and competed with New World for the distribution business, and demanded that Corman compensate New World for its losses.

Since last year, the two cases have been scheduled for trial. Now Corman's new company, Concord Pictures, has suspended its production and distribution business to prevent the other party from catching the handle.

"I am very optimistic about the outcome of the case. They said that I secretly bypassed New World and distributed the film myself in late 1984 and early 1985. But the only purpose of selling New World to them and leaving favorable distribution terms was that I did not want to engage in the high-cost and energy-consuming distribution business. I wanted to regain the feeling of being a director and producer and focus on making movies.

After discussing with me, my lawyer concluded that they should either compensate me for my losses and return New World. Or they should reach an out-of-court settlement with me, compensate me with a sum of money, and then we can each do our own business."

Ronald had only one word of admiration for Corman in his heart. He had the opportunity to get huge compensation even if he did not make a movie.

"Then your production and distribution business have been greatly hindered?" Ronald asked one more question. He knew that with the wealth Corman had accumulated over decades of making movies, he could have quit the film industry long ago and enjoy life with his wife Julie and their four children.

Now he has to resume the distribution business, so the only reason why he has conflicts with New World is that he likes to make movies.

"Hey, who says it's not?" This was the most distressing thing for Coleman.

"I could have produced 15-25 movies a year and screened them in drive-ins and small theaters. Occasionally, one or two movies would win the favor of mainstream theaters and enter the big screening channel. Now everything has stopped.

Let me tell you, I originally had an agreement with Marvel, the comic company, to adapt "Spider-Man". Because of this case, the production rights also expired, so I had to give it back for free.

How could I deliberately pick up the publishing business and compete with the New World? I wish I could get rid of all this baggage and concentrate on making movies. "

Coleman had an accident here, and Ronald had to go see Cannon's Minahan.

Minahan Golan has been very busy since he received US$300 million in financing. After finally catching him in the office through his agent Richard, Ronald quickly took the script to discuss with him.

"Quack, quack, Ronald. Did you bring me any good news? We haven't seen each other for a long time. Let me show you the new movie we are going to make."

Minahan was still very enthusiastic. He put his arm around Ronald and took him to the newly rented office on the first floor, an extra-large office he shared with his cousin Yoram.

Ronald was half relieved when he saw that he was still so enthusiastic about him. At least he won't have anything to do with himself because of the improvement in his financial situation.

"Look, this is our series, the second and third parts of 'America Ninja'." Minahan pointed to two large posters on the wall. A white young man was wearing a ninja headband and wearing a ninja shirt. clothes, and posing while holding a ninja sword.

“This is the third and fourth installment of ‘The Wild One’ with Chuck Norris. This is the third and fourth installment of ‘The Wild One’ with Chuck Bronson.”

Cannon has already had several successful series of movies like this, and Ronald knew that as long as the quality of such movies could be guaranteed, it would be easy to make money.

"I've upgraded now. I wouldn't have considered a movie with a budget of less than 10 million two years ago."

"Ten million?" Ronald turned his head and looked at Minahan. Is the cannon so powerful now? Shoot dozens of movies every year with an investment of more than 10 million, and then distribute them yourself?

"Ten million is still a small amount. Look at these two series, big productions that we produced and distributed by Warner Bros."

“This is Stallone’s second big production with us, ‘Over the Top (

Over

the

Top), we are prepared to invest a production budget of thirty million US dollars. "

"What place are you saving this time? Which bad guys are you fighting?" Ronald felt a little uncomfortable. Stallone was in Cannon, and it was true that every film was a big-investment movie.

"Gaga, you guessed wrong. Stallone will not kill bad guys again this time. I had a deep talk with him and we plan to transform. This is a family film. He plays a divorced father who has not seen his son for a long time. She took her son with her, drove a truck, and participated in the National Arm Wrestling Competition... In the end, she not only won the championship, but also improved her relationship with her son. "...

"Arm wrestling?" Ronald touched the beard on his chin. Is this a plot thought up by that idiot? Audiences spend three or four dollars to buy tickets to watch Stallone arm-wrestling? "

"How about it? It's a good idea, I came up with it. I will personally direct this movie, quack quack..."

"So it was you who came up with it..." Ronald held back his laughter. Minahan's old habit has returned. He always uses foreign eyes to evaluate the American audience's thoughts.

This kind of arm wrestling is indeed popular among truck drivers. But why would the public be interested in this kind of plot?

How to shoot the final battle? Is it that Stallone was about to lose when you pulled him over at first, but then he saw the beautiful woman and his son, gained strength again, turned defeat into victory, and defeated the other party? so boring……

"Maybe we can make a sequel." Ronald held it in for a long time before he said something he thought was humorous.

"Yes, yes, we can also make a sequel, so we have a third star." Minahan looked proud.

"Sequel? The sequel is about upgrading the difficulty of the game. How to upgrade the arm wrestling? Is it... is it a two-hand wrestling?" Ronald held it in very hard.

"Gah ga ga, it seems you think it's good too." Minahan looked at the way Ronald wanted to laugh but didn't, thinking that he and Stallone still had a grudge and didn't want to see him become a bigger star.

"That's another big movie we're preparing. It's awesome... I bought the rights to the 'Superman' movie series, the first Superman movie produced by Cannon, and we're going to bring back Christopher Reeve to star in it. Investment of US$40 million.”

"Which bad guy will Superman fight this time?"

"This time it's not a specific villain. We plan to have Superman find all the nuclear weapons in the world and then send them to space for destruction."

"Um……"

Ronald felt the change in Minahan's mentality after he got $300 million. He no longer had the spirit of Coleman to shoot small productions, and was obsessed with big productions, blockbusters, and sequels of blockbusters.

He might not be interested in the small production of "Dirty Dancing" that he wanted to ask him to invest in, which cost less than five million.

"Why don't you distribute these two movies yourself, but ask Warner Bros.?"

"Hey, this is also because it is not convenient to schedule blockbusters in the theater market in America. Warner Bros. is now unable to produce blockbusters and can only rely on distribution channels to give large blockbusters to others. A large part of their studio in Burbank has been taken away by Paramount and Universal. So they have to go abroad to shoot small productions."

"We are in a hurry to get financing, and we don't have time to book the schedule a year and a half in advance. When we recover the cost of these movies next year, we can distribute them ourselves."

"Who is the person talking to Warner Bros. now? Is it Robert Daley again?" Ronald didn't deal with Warner much, so he took the opportunity to inquire.

"He is not in charge of specific matters. Daley found a capable Jew named Terry Semel, who is now in charge of Warner's affairs. What? Do you have something to ask him?"

"I'm just asking." When Ronald heard that it was a Jew, he didn't want to continue to explore.

"Ronald, you should come and work with me. Now that we have the conditions, I can give the green light to your project. There is no problem in investing in a movie with a production budget of 15 million.

What do you want to shoot? Let's find Tom Cruise, and you can work together on another air combat movie?"

"I don't have any other plans for the time being. The project at hand is a feature film. I have signed a contract with MGM. As for Tom, you still have to find his agent."

Ronald declined Minahan's invitation. He felt that Minahan was very different from what he remembered. He was super confident and even a little crazy.

When the two chatted, there were staff members constantly looking for him to sign and ask for instructions on work. There was no super focus on a project when the two worked together on "Breakdance".

Besides, this kind of small production, even if Cannon released it, could not squeeze into the good schedule of mainstream theaters. Even Minahan's cannon now depends on Warner Bros. to make real blockbusters.

If possible, it would be better to let Daydream Pictures set up a simple distribution department, just like Roger Corman, and try to distribute a movie at a low cost.

"I just don't know how much it costs to produce and distribute a movie by yourself?"

"Are you really not coming? I have a good new project here. I bought the Spider-Man production rights from Marvel. Are you interested?" Minahan rarely saw Ronald pondering and not speaking, and began to promote his own project again.

"Spider-Man?" Ronald thought to himself, didn't Marvel just take it back from Corman?

"Yes, I bought the production rights for five years. If you are willing to be the director, we can start looking for someone to write the script. In this way, Superman and Spiderman, the two most popular heroes in America, will all belong to Cannon."

"If there is no script, I'd better forget it. I don't have the energy to write a new script now. I'll do it after I finish the project at hand."

Ronald did not disturb Minahan's precious time, nor did he embarrass himself by taking out a small-budget script worth less than five million. He shook hands with him and said goodbye.

－－－－－－Digression－－－－－－

Only one chapter today