Movie Master

Chapter 1 Zhuang Zhou's Dream of a Butterfly

Lance felt that his life was coming to an end.

As the saying goes, dreams lead to death, and dreams lead to death. He has been dreaming a lot recently, and today on the way back to Brooklyn on the subway, he dreamed again, dreaming that he was back in the summer of 2002, the summer when he was about to turn thirty, sitting in that cramped office space, The tight high pressure in the room almost made him feel as if he was about to suffocate, so he unbuttoned his shirt irritably, trying to get more fresh air into his lungs.

When he raised his head, he could see the bright incandescent lamp on the ceiling, falling down feebly. The pale light made him dizzy for a while, so he couldn't help closing his eyes and breathing heavily. But even so, it still couldn't calm down the anger in his heart, and the chattering words in his ears were fanning the flames even more, making the raging anger almost completely out of control.

Shut up! Lance clenched his teeth, trying to stop the endless nagging in front of him, he even wanted to tear that mouth open to make all the voices disappear completely. However, the noisy voice still didn't stop, and a few words were stuffed into his brain intermittently, like a spell, dispelling his last bit of self-control.

Bang! Lance clenched his right fist and slammed it hard on the table. The sound like thunder on the ground calmed down all the voices, and finally became quiet.

The muscles of Lance's whole body tensed up. This dream was so real. The pain was so extreme that it started to tingle, and the soreness clearly came from his right hand. He could even feel his nails slowly piercing into it The sharpness of the palm and the cold wind blowing behind him brought up thin goosebumps.

Opening his eyes, the strange yet familiar face came into view, with a polite and formulaic smile on the ordinary face, the panic in his eyes slowly dissipated, and evolved into a trace of sarcasm and pity, but the expression was He was not moved in the slightest, and obviously didn't care about Lance's reaction just now.

The memory is so old, but still vivid, of course Lance remembers him, Roger-Davis (Roger-Davis), the official representative attorney of American-Zoetrope. In the beginning, he found Roger personally, and the two parties signed a cooperation agreement, but he did not expect that in the end he would become the executioner who announced his own sentence. What a great irony.

Even in a dream, even if more than ten years have passed, the turbulent emotions in Lance's mind are still uncontrollable. He raised the contract in front of him, fixed his eyes on Roger, and tried to get out of his face. Searching for any clues in the expression, What is this?

Roger only saw Lance's blue eyes narrowed slightly, and all his emotions were hidden in that layer of mist, but the danger alarm in his heart was raised to the highest level in an instant, and he could even feel it. His neck tightened for a while, which made Roger's throat a little dry. He had to cough twice, trying to keep his calm and professionalism, Lance, this is a contract, the contract The content stated that you voluntarily gave up all 35% of the shares in Diorama Films...

Lance shook his head slightly, and called calmly, Roger. But it was this call without any emotion that made Roger swallow all his words, and he fell silent for a moment, I'm asking, 'what is this'?

Under Lance's gaze, Roger only felt that he was a prey caught in a fishing net, no matter how he struggled, he could not escape, and his heart began to grow hairy. After trying his best, Roger hid his emotions and maintained his poker face. He couldn't help swallowing a mouthful of saliva, but found that his voice was very dry, like a desert, Lance, this is The contract you signed with your own hands means that you voluntarily gave up...

My shares? Lance directly interrupted Roger's words, with an unbelievable sneer on the corner of his mouth, mocking and joking, but no one knew whether the object of his ridicule was this contract or himself, No, it's not a contract I signed! You're kidding me, right? I've only signed one contract in a while, the 'Elephant' final contract, and other than that...

Lance caught a trace of unbearable in Roger's expression, and all the memories flooded into his heart in a blink of an eye, directly choking him by the throat, all words disappeared completely, and the truth hidden behind surged.

Two weeks ago, he needed to go to New York for a business trip. Before the business trip, Ryan-Kavanaugh (Ryan-Kavanaugh) came to him with a contract—Ryan was someone he had known for more than ten years. Best friends, the two co-founded Diorama Films—which Ryan said was the final contract for “Elephant” and needed his signature so it could get into production as quickly as possible.

Elephant is a co-production between Diorama Films and Gus-Van-Sant. Although the investment is only three million dollars, the film is based on the 1999 film that shocked the world. The filming and production of the Columbine High School shooting in the United States. Lance attaches great importance to this film. He hopes to send this work to the Sundance Film Festival, and then see if it can appear on the stage of the International Film Festival in Cannes or Venice, so that the career of Diorama Films can be improved. Take it to the next level.

Out of trust in Ryan, Lance simply flipped through the contract in a hurry, and after roughly confirming that it was an elephant contract, he signed it, and then left Los Angeles. But when he came back from New York, he was told by Roger that he was no longer a partner of Diorama Films, and he voluntarily gave up all his shares.

Now, Lance realized that the first half of the contract he signed was indeed an elephant contract, but the second half was a contract in which he voluntarily gave up the shares of Diorama Films. He signed his own Judgment, since then, he has nothing, and the hard work of the past six years has been wiped out overnight.

In fact, things have long been signs, isn't it?

Since the establishment of Diorama Films in 1996, they have started from distribution and brought outstanding overseas masterpieces such as Trainspotting, Two Smoking Barrels, Beyond the Silence, and Central Station to the North American market; Dabbled in the field of production, he launched works such as Three Kings of Gold, Love Is a Bitches, Dance of the Deadman, and Ocean's Eleven, which was co-produced with Warner Bros.

Diorama Films not only gained a firm foothold in Hollywood's second-tier film companies, but also made a name for itself. But as the company's development is getting better and faster, their differences are also increasing.

Ryan is more conservative, hoping to continue on the successful path, and has always been cautious about getting involved in the production field; but Lance is more inclined to take risks, hoping to make a big splash in the production field, because he clearly knows that only based on There is no way to improve the distribution. If you want to raise the company to a higher level, independent production is the way out! And their in-depth understanding of the European and North American markets can become their advantage in the field of production!

In 1998, Lance successfully won the adaptation copyright of the original Harry Potter novel, and hoped that the company would undertake the production. He firmly believed that this series of novels would achieve great success in the film market and become a closer one for the diorama film industry. But Ryan thinks that Lance is too risky and too radical, they don't have any experience in film production, and they should slow down-for example, cooperate with a large production company.

At that time, Ryan successfully persuaded the other two partners of the company, Tucker-Tooley (Tucker-Tooley) and Jason-Berkeley (Jason-Burkle). Warner Bros. co-produced the adaptation of the Harry Potter series of films.

However, Ryan and Tucker, who were negotiating on behalf of Diorama Films, were persuaded by Barry Meyer to directly sell the adaptation rights of Harry Potter to Warner Bros. There is no room for Lance to redeem. This choice completely detonated Lance's anger, and the first irreconcilable conflict arose between the four.

This is the first signal.

Not long ago, Lance learned that Disney intends to make a pirate movie - Pirates of the Caribbean, and the differences broke out again.

Lance thinks this is not only a good opportunity to cooperate with Disney, but also an excellent challenge; but Ryan, Tucker and Jason all think that this is too risky. As a result, pirate movies have completely withdrawn from the stage of history. At present, there are so many types of movies, making pirate movies is tantamount to suicide; secondly, independently shouldering a large-scale production of 150 million US dollars, all of which bring too much pressure and risk, this is the diorama film industry that is getting better Unnecessary and unaffordable.

The huge difference in ideas led to several quarrels among the four.

The differences were at a stalemate for a while, and Lance originally thought that they would eventually reach an agreement through discussion, and one party would be able to persuade the other. But now it seems that he is not only naive, he can even be said to be stupid. The world has changed and changed, but he still trusts Ryan, Tucker and Jason unconditionally, which is simply stupid. When he came back from a business trip in New York, what greeted him was: shameless betrayal, sweeping the house, and leaving the house clean.

Ten years of friendship, six years of hard work...but after a deception, there is nothing left.

This dream is so real, so real that Lance can't tell the difference between dream and reality. One moment he was sitting in the dirty subway in New York, and the next moment he appeared in the office of Diorama Films , that violent and turbulent emotion still hit him hard, almost like a spark hitting the earth, smashing all his reason, all his self-esteem, and all his pride to pieces. Not only is he stupid, but he's ridiculous, even pathetic.

Lance stood up abruptly, Roger was startled by the oppressive feeling brought by his tall and straight body, subconsciously he also stood up, his hands were at a loss in mid-air, as if he was worried about Lance's He acted aggressively, but then he saw Lance turn around, push open the glass door neatly, strode out of the office, and walked straight in the direction of Ryan.

Only then did Roger realize that he had made a fuss, and he retracted his hands in embarrassment, but he couldn't help but follow Lance's figure and cast his gaze over - not only Roger, but everyone in the entire office focused on him at this moment. Lance's body, except Ryan.

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