I’m in Hollywood

Eric did not deny it and said: Telecom and Comcast are both thinking carefully. It would be strange if Barry could successfully acquire Paramount under this circumstance.

After this incident, even if Barry Diller will not part ways with Telematics and Comcast, the cooperation between them cannot be continued for too long. Barry Diller's talent in running TV networks is unquestionable. , If he can win over it, Eric believes that he will never repeat the embarrassment after the acquisition of Disney in the original time and space.

Katzenberg was also aware of Eric's idea, and said with a smile: Your idea is very good, but unfortunately it is unlikely to be realized.

There's no chance at all without trying it, Eric replied.

While chatting, Katzenberg's assistant knocked on the office door and probed in and said, Mr. Williams, Mr. Katzenberg, Mr. Cooper is here.

Then let's go and see the demo of Mr. and Mrs. Smith, Katzenberg said, getting up.

The two had just walked out of the office when Peter Cooper walked over with a smile and enthusiastically gave Eric and Katzenberg a hug. Eric noticed that Peter Cooper's deputy, John Peters He didn't follow, and these days back in Los Angeles, he vaguely heard that there was a conflict between Peter Cooper and John Peters, which seemed to be related to Warner's Superman copyright.

In the 1980s, Warner launched four Superman movies in a row, but one was not as good as one at the box office. The fourth Superman in 1987. It even got a measly $15 million at the box office. Therefore, the Superman series was completely refrigerated, and the comics attached to the Warners system also fell into business difficulties for a time, and they were disheartened. Sold the rights to the film adaptation of the Superman series to Jon Peters, who had his own production company at the time.

Although the second film of Batman is not as good as the first film in terms of word of mouth and box office, it is also much stronger than the Superman series in the 1980s. It seems that they have seen the potential of superhero movies, and many people are against it. The Superman movie copyright in Peters' hands moved his mind.

As for the detailed entanglement, Eric is not very clear, relying on the memory in his mind. However, he knew that the name of John Peters still existed in the producer column in the end credits of Superman: Man of Steel more than 20 years later. It can be seen that Warner's mistake has become an eternal hatred, and it has never been able to take back the Superman movie copyright from the beginning to the end.

Right now, Eric can almost guess, it is estimated that Peter Cooper took a fancy to the Superman copyright in the hands of John Peters. I want to let Colombia develop, but the two should have no agreement on the distribution of interests.

After the three chatted,

We walked to the screening room together. At this time, many high-level executives from Disney and Columbia had gathered in the screening room, and of course, John Wu, the director of the film. And Nicole and Pierce Brosnan, the two leading actors, did not come to the test screening because they had already started the film's publicity work.

After learning of Eric's affirmation of John Wu's success in filming, Peter Cooper changed his dissatisfaction with Eric's insistence on using John Wu, and greeted John Wu with a smile on his face.

Eric didn't make much changes to the plot of Mrs. and Mrs. Smith, and the film still started with the Smiths, who had been married for five or six years, conducting marriage counseling.

but. Just because Eric didn't change the plot of this movie much, it was very amazing in the eyes of the audience in the screening hall. Because of a series of high-tech equipment that appeared in the movie. Although for the sake of the times, many shots are completed in the digital field using special effects technology, but this is so cool, even more cool than 007, which uses high-tech equipment as its selling point.

John and Jane, who work for two rival killer groups, meet at first sight in the chaotic Colombian capital, marry quickly and lead a seemingly ordinary middle-class American family life, though. Behind this life is a series of assassinations that the two have concealed from each other.

Although John and Jane kept their identities well hidden from each other. But this incident was learned by the killer group behind the two. In order to get rid of their two unstable factors, the two killer groups cooperated and launched an operation.

John and Jane quickly understood each other's identity. After some twists and turns, the two had a confrontation in the villa where they had lived for six years. Then they also understood their feelings for each other, and in order to survive, they started a battle. fight back.

In the tense and exciting plot of the movie, there is also occasional warmth and small humor. After Eric's re-editing, the plot of the movie becomes more compact.

After 120 minutes of watching the movie, the movie ended with the sound of hot rock music. The executives in the auditorium patiently waited for the subtitles to finish playing and the lights to turn on before applauding.

Mr. Wu, thank you for bringing us such a wonderful movie, Peter Cooper complimented John Wu who was sitting next to him while clapping his hands.

John Wu, adhering to the habit of Orientals, said a few words of modesty, but he could still see the smug and contented look on his face.

The schedule and announcement plan of Mrs. Smith have been determined before the completion of the film. The release period is set during Christmas on December 18. This test film is only for all executives involved in this project to conduct one last time. Confirmed, in order to fine-tune the original publicity plan, but after watching the movie, neither Disney nor the few people brought by Peter Cooper of Columbia have any plans for the movie's $25 million publicity budget. Opinion.

It is worth together that Warners seems to be making gimmicks for each other, and also put the Bodyguard that Eric served as executive producer in order to get the contract of Jurassic Park actor Sam Neill on the 12th. On the 18th, he fought with Mr. and Mrs. Smith.

Now that the executive producer is named, Eric certainly can't ignore the film. Although Warners just wanted to use Eric's fame to increase the box office of Bodyguard, it did not really want Eric to participate in this project, but a few days ago, Eric was specially invited to participate in the film's test piece. Eric felt that the biggest selling point of the movie was Kevin Costner, the last Oscar winner for best director and best actor, and of course, several songs by Whitney Houston, except for Besides, Eric didn't think there was anything special about this story.

Throughout October, Eric spent almost all of this busyness. In addition to keeping an eye on the movies to be released by the end of the year, start discussions with Firefly's management about next year's production and distribution plans.

end of October. Roland Emmerich has been filming for nearly 20 weeks and finally closed the film. Emmerich has never mastered such a large-scale film, so compared to Eric's shooting of Jurassic Park went smoothly, but Emmerich was much more cautious. The filming process was also very slow, but fortunately, Roland Emmerich did not overrun the budget, and the film quickly began post-production work in the digital field.

November is coming soon, with the Thanksgiving-Christmas schedule approaching the end of the year, and Halloween at the beginning of the month, Firefly, like several other big studios, have released their own small-scale horror movies, but Eric doesn't pay much attention to these investments yet. The small production of less than 10 million US dollars was safely handed over to the management of Firefly.

Except for movies. Another important event for the United States also happened in November. On November 3, the results of the quadrennial US presidential election were released. Republican presidential candidate William Jefferson Clinton was elected the 42nd President of the United States by a narrow margin of 42%, beating out the Democratic candidate Bush Sr. with 37% support.

Eric finally breathed a sigh of relief. The historical process has not changed. If Clinton was not elected president, many things would be unpredictable. Perhaps the United States will also not have the fastest decade of economic growth in history.

In the Sharphorn Manor, Eric was chatting with Katherine Bigelow, who had come to visit: Now, believe my words. I have already said that, even if Riot is not released in advance, Clinton can still win the election because his economic policies trump the Bush team.

Katherine Bigelow just gave Eric a light glance and took a sip of the boiled water in her hand. Clinton's election was almost a narrow victory. Even before the final vote, Bush's approval rating was higher than Clinton's, so The end result surprised many people.

In the process of making a documentary about the riots in Los Angeles, Kathryn Bigelow gradually became a supporter of Clinton. In fact, many directors and stars in Hollywood are supporters of Clinton, including Spielberg, George Lucas and others. .

Therefore, after finishing the production of the Riot documentary, Kathryn proposed to Eric to release the documentary in September in support of Clinton, but was rejected by Eric, who was still in France at the time.

After a detailed investigation and analysis, the documentary Riots blamed a large part of the riots in Los Angeles on the high unemployment in the south of Los Angeles, and although the Bush administration won the Gulf War, it has been since World War II. The American people who have not won several wars are fiercely excited, but the economic policies implemented by Bush Sr. during his four-year term have all failed. The current unemployment rate in the United States is as high as 9%. It runs a deficit and even owes $4 trillion in national debt, which is $4 trillion when the dollar was strong in the early 1990s.

After a while, Catherine said: It's only a 5% lead, and you may fail if you don't pay attention. Didn't you say that you are also a supporter of Clinton, why did you object to my release of this documentary?

Because your purpose is so obvious, it may even backfire.

How is that possible? Catherine was a little surprised.

Eric remembered the Fahrenheit 9/11 about his previous life. Michael Moore forced the release of this documentary about the 9/11 incident under pressure during Bush's re-election process, sharply criticizing the Bush administration. , but in the end, this documentary not only did not play a role in suppressing Bush's approval rating, but even aroused the rebellious psychology of some voters because of the too violent views of Fahrenheit 911. In short, the result was that even Bush's opponents disagreed with Fahrenheit 911 and stood on the opposite side of Michael Moore, but in the end Bush was re-elected.

Catherine's documentary about the Los Angeles riots, although not as sharp as Michael Moore's, still points to the failed economic policies of the Bush administration, which may be exploited by Bush's campaign at this sensitive moment , turning black and white as evidence of intentional smearing by competitors. You must know that Bush Sr. is still the President of the United States, and he has far more resources than Clinton. It is not too difficult to achieve this.

The human heart is difficult to understand. Sometimes you may think that what you are doing is right, but in the eyes of others, it is a completely opposite situation. Eric thought for a while and replied.

Catherine is not stupid either. Hearing Eric say this, she quickly understood and couldn't help sighing lowly.

Eric looked at the woman's rare expression, and couldn't help comforting: Don't worry, Firefly has already planned to release this documentary in mid-December, I promise you, at least I will get one for this film. Oscar nomination for Best Documentary.

Catherine knew that Eric was well-intentioned and nodded. She also knew very well that the subject matter of Riot was too sensitive. Although it was profound, it was not something that many people wanted to see. Moreover, this documentary was about the time when the incident happened. It's too close, it's less than a year, although some people want to reflect, but most people don't want to mention this matter subconsciously, so it can be said that it's not time to reflect.

In this case, being able to get an Oscar nomination for the best documentary is already the limit, and it is not very likely to win.

Next, you can focus on Saving Private Ryan, Eric said, then smiled a little badly: One more thing to tell you, Jim's True Lies is also Last month, I joined Firefly's project plan for next year, and I plan to put it in the summer of the following year, what do you think?

It has been a year since the incident, and Catherine's hatred for Cameron's derailment has dissipated a lot. When she heard this sentence, she just gave Eric a blank look: You like to do this kind of thing. ( To be continued)