The top of fame and fortune [Comprehensive British and American]

In early April 1997, Erica and Ovitz officially started operations, intending to acquire Columbia Pictures, which shocked the entire Hollywood and Wall Street, and ignited heated discussions in various media, which can be called a huge momentum.

Two months later, Erica Parker successfully reached an acquisition with Sony for US$28 billion, officially entered Columbia Tristar Pictures, brought the goddess of the torch and the symbol of Pegasus under his command, and won the title of Columbia Film Company covering more than [-] classic films. huge movie library.

"Next, we need to talk about The Fifth Element, which is currently showing in theaters." At the beginning of June, in the conference room of Columbia Pictures headquarters on West Washington Avenue, Erica sat at the top and talked about the company's sci-fi The movie "The Fifth Element".

And the executives at all levels in the conference room couldn't help feeling a little anxious, after all, the North American box office of this movie was not satisfactory.

With a production budget of US$300 million, the box office in the United States can only reach 6000 million. Fortunately, after its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in early May, it performed well in France, an old Hollywood box office.

Erica, the latest chairman and CEO of Columbia Pictures, obviously also believes that if "The Fifth Element" wants to reverse the box office revenue, it needs to start at the global box office. ""The Fifth Element" will premiere in the UK this week. Other than that, I hope the movie will hit Japanese theaters as soon as possible."

In addition to the old British box office, Japan has quickly become Hollywood's largest overseas box office market since the 70s.

Erica said to the director of the overseas distribution department, "I hope that the global box office can at least recover the cost. As for the profit, it depends more on the downstream income of trains, planes, TV broadcasting rights, and DVD sales."

Even if "The Fifth Element" was Erica's film project before she took over Columbia, she certainly hoped to stop the bleeding of this repeatedly loss-making studio and gradually make it profitable.

"The next item is "Men in Black" and "Air Force One", which will be released in North America in July." Erica looked milder. "I saw the latest director's cut version, which is very good."

She cast her eyes on the director of the publicity department, who seemed a bit sloppy, and said politely, "I hope the publicity staff will not repeat the experience of "The Shawshank Redemption" a few years ago. Due to the failure of publicity, the box office of the film was only 72 US dollars in the first week. .”

In the conference room, the management personnel who were subconsciously relaxed because Erica Parker was only 26 years old, looked a lot more serious.

At this time, the executives at all levels of Columbia Pictures realized that this movie superstar, who had never lost since joining Hollywood, might not be able to accept the so-called "unacceptable" continuous losses like Sony .

When her dark green eyes, stained with gray, fall on you, they seem to say grimly: whoever causes her to fail, she will let him go.

At the conference round table, Michael Ovitz, the president of Columbia Pictures, seemed to agree with Erica Parker completely, and had no objection to her arrangement.Talk to her about the next matter soon, "Regarding the various profits of "The English Patient", the global box office has reached [-] million US dollars."

"Before the release of "The English Patient", I have reached an agreement with the producer Saul Zaentz that the profits of this film will be invested in the production of "Lord of the Rings" as soon as possible." Kayla Brown, the chief financial officer on the left, said.

In the past two years, Erica has paid director Peter Jackson a pre-production salary. In addition to the salary for writing the script, Jackson has also traveled to New Zealand, where the film was shot, for various preparations and constructions.

The production cost of "The Lord of the Rings" will be as high as nearly [-] million U.S. dollars. Whether it is pre-production or shooting, it will obviously be a long journey.

And now in front of Erica is the rough cut preview of James Cameron's recently completed "Titanic" movie——

"Now you believe what I say, we can use it to occupy the top box office in any country and any period." In Cameron's studio, he pointed to Erika at the rough cut movie screen on the monitor, "and we It's really unlucky to see a movie in the same period as this giant ship, and it will probably be blown into cannon fodder by it."

And Erica couldn't help but look at a sharp blade attached to the monitor. Cameron wrote on it, 'If the movie sucks, use it', well, it can be seen that this movie is for him enormous pressure.

"Not long ago, Harrison Ford, the star of "Air Force One", did ask me about the release time of "Titanic"," Erica had to admit that Cameron's arbitrary "arrogant self-confidence" was the source. In terms of sheer strength, "Ford is clearly concerned that Titanic will be released at the same time as his Air Force One, and if we do have Titanic in the summer, he's explicitly asked Columbia to delay it."

It can be seen that although the media has repeatedly reported the negative news of "Titanic", Hollywood has secretly reached a consensus that this giant ship will most likely become an astonishing box office bomb.

But even so, Erica and Cameron are still at every step, and the two discuss in detail some post-production work that the film has not yet completed, almost to the point of forgetting to sleep and eat.

During dinner time, the two held pagoda paper boxes from Chinese restaurants. Cameron talked about the film promotion plan, "In order to avoid the prejudice caused by the negative news broadcast by the American media, I plan to organize two premieres outside the United States. In Tokyo and England, I even tried to invite members of the British royal family to the London premiere, although it was not an easy task."

"Members of the British royal family?" Erica heard about Cameron's plan and realized that she might be able to provide some assistance. After all, she had Mr. Holmes who was the 'last official' in the British government.

At night, Erica drove away from Cameron's studio and called a certain British official. The voice sounded very friendly, "Mike, I'm afraid I need your help."

Mr. Holmes, who is far away in the Palace of Westminster, seems to have gotten used to the fact that "brothers and children are all a group of drags". He'll do it for her too.

But McCoff soon discovered that Erica was just hoping he could invite members of the British royal family to the film premiere for her, which was really overkill. "It's very easy."

He seemed not interested in talking about this trivial matter, and instead asked about a previous scandal with Erica, "About that Dr. Strange who was active in New York as a occult scholar, I hope you haven't deepened your relationship with him." friendship."

"If I'm back in New York, I'd love to have a drink with him at a jazz club," Erica said half-truthfully.

Mycroft raised his eyebrows, "Then I'm afraid you need to explain something to your little uncle, such as whether you have some inappropriate feelings towards him."

"Is he frightened?" Erica's tone was almost gloating.

Mycroft, who was distracted by his official business, almost felt sorry for his brother, while Erica continued to add jealousy, "For the London premiere of "Titanic", I decided to invite Charlie and Strange to attend. "

Erica is looking forward to the London premiere more and more, and before that, at the Tokyo International Film Festival in November, "Titanic" opened the prelude to sweeping the world.

"Everyone is crazy, it's like seeing the Beatles." Even Cameron himself was shocked by the rave reviews of "Titanic" in Japan.

Two weeks later, Erica flew to London to attend the celebrity-packed UK premiere in Leicester Square.

On the huge screen, the goddess of the torch of Columbia Pictures appeared. Erica was sitting between Cameron and Leonardo. As long as she turned around, she could see the two gentlemen with almost identical faces not far away——

Sherlock was staring at her, and Dr. Strange smiled gracefully at her.

You see, despite the similar appearance, the doctor's personality looks much stronger than that of the detective.

At the London premiere, "Titanic" once again won numerous praises. Not only the guests present and the media were moved by the film, but even the crew members who saw the finished film for the first time were shocked by the spectacle and touchingness of the film. British actress Frances Fisher, who played the role of Ruth's mother, cried so hard that she had to borrow tissues from Prince Charles, who was seated next to her.

Cameron and Erica, who had already watched various edited versions hundreds of times, were most concerned about the whole night, undoubtedly, whether they could warm up the North American release of "Titanic" as much as possible for the praise of the British media.

Finally, on December 1997, 12, "Titanic" officially landed in North American theaters, and won the single-week box office champion with a box office of 19 million US dollars in the first weekend.

But this result seems a bit specious and suspicious.

In 1993, "Jurassic Park", which won a global box office of 8000 million US dollars, had a box office of more than [-] million US dollars in the first week, which shows that the box office of "Titanic" was far from a success in the first week.

Can it be said that it faces failure?Even some media that have been bad-mouthing "Titanic" for a long time, faced with a box office of 4000 million, can't confidently call this movie a huge junk.

And in the atmosphere of suspicion, "Titanic" began to create a miracle——

In the second week of its release, the box office bucked the trend and rose to 5000 million US dollars. For several weeks since then, the rule of box office decline seems to have completely failed for "Titanic". However, the North American theaters frantically insisted on continuing to screen this giant ship.

"It's a fantasy kingdom unimaginable without the movies, and you're not just watching Titanic, you're experiencing it. You can't take your eyes off this remarkable thing." --Chicago Tribune

"This is a great contribution of modern technology to theatrical narrative. It leaves the corporate port and reaches the other shore of art. "Titanic" may well be the greatest romantic epic ever." - "Variety"

"A colossal, soul-stirring three-and-a-half-hour viewing experience that unquestionably lures viewers into its world of spectacle and heartbreak, lost. Titanic is strictly a miracle." — -"New York Times"

In February 1998, when the global box office forecast of "Titanic" reached 2 billion US dollars, the nomination list for the 20th Academy Awards was announced. James Cameron missed the nomination for the screenwriting category, and Erica and Leon Nadeau, even more upset, was not nominated for Best Leading Role.

The critics couldn't believe it for a while, "The academy chose to ignore the performances of Erica and Leonardo completely? This is as incredible as not acknowledging the performances of Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable in "Gone with the Wind."