Saving the world is not as good as chasing stars [US Entertainment]

It has been four weeks since "Butterfly Effect" was released, and its box office reputation is overwhelming.

Rarely, the domestic box office in the United States is actually higher than the total overseas box office, which shows the strong enthusiasm of the theaters in the United States.

What is even more noteworthy is that "The Butterfly Effect" was rated as R due to its thrilling plot and tragic ending, which means that it is considered unsuitable for young people under the age of 17 to watch, and parents are required to accompany it.Obviously, this is not a commercial blockbuster to please teenagers, so its popularity is particularly noticeable.

Even the ending song "Stop Crying Your Heart Out" has remained popular recently. This song was composed by the Oasis band in 2002. It was a consolation song for the failure of the England football team to go to the World Cup. With the popularity of "Butterfly Effect", it was airborne in the UK immediately. , North American singles chart champion.

And "The Butterfly Effect" exceeded everyone's expectations, making the two top managers of Focus Pictures, Margaret and James Summers, praised by the industry as the golden winners in the independent film industry.

The producer and starring Margot is undoubtedly the biggest contributor to this 1300 million small production sci-fi thriller.

"Butterfly Effect" will be released for at least three to four weeks. It is only a matter of time before the box office breaks through 1300 million and approaches [-] million. It is simply a miracle that [-] million production investment is exchanged for [-] to [-] million box office.

With MGM continuing to sell weaker, Universal Pictures returned to the top spot in Hollywood.

Focus Pictures, a subsidiary of Universal Pictures, is highly valued by the parent company. Universal Pictures even agreed to merge its other two independent labels into Focus Pictures, under the sole leadership of Margaret and James Summers.

In recent days, there have been frequent changes in the top management of Focus Pictures. Margot and Summers have drastically reorganized the cabinet, while people in the independent film industry are very happy.

These two talented pioneers in the independent film industry have always liked to take risks, and the films produced by the two in recent years are either critical favorites or dark horses at the box office, making the industry's development prospects more and more bright.

This is a new opportunity for the entire independent film industry. The territory of independent films will expand more and more, and in the future it may even be as influential as any major studio.

With the high profile of "Butterfly Effect" and Focus Pictures, religious figures who opposed the ending of "Butterfly Effect" once again rallied to protest against the plot of suicide and abortion in the film, which attracted many fans to refute their doubts——

These religious people protest this and that when they have nothing to do. The film itself is a work in the field of art. Such protests and boycotts are simply absurd and speechless.

Soon, women's rights and human rights organizations also stood up and expressed their support for the ending of the film.

It is obviously not the first time that women's rights activists and religious organizations have stood on the opposite side. This time, they emphasized again: "Struggling for the freedom of abortion is one of the most important goals of feminism."

And human rights organizations point out that—

"Everyone should cherish life. Authoritative organizations have concluded that if one person commits suicide, five people will suffer great harm. This kind of grief and injury will take at least 15 years to truly heal.

But suicide is not within the scope of the law, but a comprehensive social issue. On the premise of not endangering the interests of society and others, citizens can freely control their own bodies, which belongs to personal freedom. The ending of the movie "Butterfly Effect" did not infringe anyone rights and interests, there is no need to apologize to anyone, and there is no obligation to make changes. "

After human rights organizations stood in line to express support, religious figures who insisted on protesting resorted to the old method——

Just like the original boycott of "Fingering Love", he ran to the entrance of the Kodak Theater again and asked the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to cancel the selection qualification of "Butterfly Effect".

But the organizing committee of the academy, which has finally escaped from the scandal in the past two years, is obviously not prepared to obey these religious figures holding red banners again——

On January 2005, 1, the nominations for the Academy Awards were announced.

The biopic "The Aviator," directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, won eleven awards including Best Actor, Best Director and Best Picture Nominations lead.

And "The Butterfly Effect" was nominated in seven categories: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Original Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, and Best Song, which aroused heated discussions from all walks of life.

The conservative and stubborn academy actually gave a sci-fi thriller film seven nominations?Even all the much-anticipated heavyweight awards other than Best Song?What's going on with the average 62-year-old conservative college voter this year?

In fact, the academy made such a compromise entirely out of considerations of viewership, attention, and influence.

After the 75th Oscar won a super-high ratings by playing Margaret, the 76th Oscar's ratings plummeted due to scandals and other issues. New low record.

In recent years, the declining ratings of Oscars, Emmys, Grammys, Tony Awards, Golden Globes and many other award ceremonies have become irreparable. This year, the film industry is particularly lacking in masterpieces. Before the nominations are announced, The media even directly declared——

If the conservative academy continues to ignore the sci-fi thriller "The Butterfly Effect", the biggest suspense of this year's Oscars ceremony will not be who can win the best prize among the mediocre box office "The Aviator", "Million Dollar Baby" and "Sideways" The best film, but how many viewers are willing to watch the award ceremony.

Now that the nominations are officially announced, the media circles are obviously in an uproar. They never expected that the academy would really nominate "The Butterfly Effect" for best picture.

But soon, the media discovered that this was Oscar's helpless move——

Without the cover of "Butterfly Effect," which is expected to hit 20 million at the global box office, this year's Oscars will be the first in seven years without a high-grossing film, and it will also be the five films nominated for best picture in [-] years. The year with the lowest grossing average.

As we all know, the fewer audiences who go to the theater to watch movies, the fewer audiences will pay attention to the awards at the awards ceremony. Only with high-grossing movies in the audience can a considerable number of viewers at the awards ceremony be guaranteed.

The seven nominations of "The Butterfly Effect" maintained the face of the Academy Awards, but it made the extreme religious people even more angry, and they were short of a sit-in demonstration in front of the Kodak Theater.

At this moment, a very surprising thing happened in the Western religious circles——

Western Christian churches, including Catholicism, Orthodox Church, Anglican Church, Martin Lutheranism, Protestantism, Baptists, etc., have publicly stated——

The modern church is increasingly peacefully co-existing with society and people with other viewpoints. Religion has no right to judge people, let alone threaten and intimidate others in the name of faith. Christians are asked to learn to respect people from all walks of life.

As soon as the church statement was released, the religious figures who had gathered outside the Kodak Theater for several days immediately died down.

However, the popularity of "Butterfly Effect" has become more and more popular. Many viewers who were not interested in science fiction and thriller movies at all, also walked into the theater out of curiosity, which unexpectedly caused the box office to drop in the sixth week of release. "Butterfly Effect" once again It raked in 3800 million yuan, and it still sits firmly at the top of the North American box office.

By the eighth week, the box office remained stable at 3500 million, showing no sign of fatigue. In the ninth week, it even rebounded slightly to reach 3600 million. The strong box office performance finally made the North American theaters make a decision——

If the screening period is extended, unless the weekly box office of "Butterfly Effect" falls out of the top five in North America, it will resist the pressure and stick to the release.

North American theaters made this decision, obviously not to support Margaret and Focus Pictures to create a box office miracle, but the longer the release time, the more beneficial it is for the theaters to share their accounts. Take the 3600 million in the ninth week as an example, five to five The share of the account will bring a high income of 1800 million US dollars to the theater, which is almost equal to the sum of the accounts of other films.

The North American theaters said - I want to make money, but other studios are dissatisfied with their rivals being too strong?I control you to death.

"Butterfly Effect" has been released to the tenth week, and the global box office has reached 4000 million. As an R-rated film, it is currently second only to "The Matrix 2", and its low-cost production cost of 1300 million US dollars, obviously It is another successful example of a small soldier making great contributions.

On February 2, the No.27 Seventh Academy Awards Ceremony was held as scheduled. The Kodak Theater, a modern comprehensive film and entertainment center with 70 seats, was full of seats and star-studded.

The Oscar statuettes are on display, and the illuminated bridge hangs from the ceiling, which looks resplendent and resplendent, fully revealing the extraordinary charm of Hollywood.

In order to increase the ratings of this year's Oscars, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences did everything possible, not only chose comedian Chris Rock as the host to enliven the atmosphere, but presented the first award "Best Art Director Award" At that time, Leonardo and Marguerite were even sacrificed at the same time.

The guests at the scene and the audience in front of the TV watched Leo and Margot walk up to the awards stage together. On the largest stage in the United States with a width of 120 feet and a depth of 75 feet, these two superstars were extremely beautiful and charming.

The blond-haired and blue-eyed Leo wears the classic "Xiao Li" hairstyle, and part of the dazzling blond hair hangs on his forehead, making him look more radiant, free and unrestrained, exquisite and full of aura, forming a unique and inexplicable beauty.

At the same time, he is mature and wise, with hidden insights, and those clear blue eyes seem to never be polluted in the slightest.

Margaret is even more surprising. This actress who has been a god at a young age seems to be more and more amazing as she grows older. Compared with her appearance when she debuted at the age of 19, her current appearance is even more beautiful. Capturing.

Looking at these two top human beauties on the stage, the audience in front of the TV couldn't bear to look away, let alone feel bored and change channels.

In a way, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has succeeded in its purpose.

On the awards stage, the blond-haired, blue-eyed heartthrob held an envelope in his hand, but he didn't mean to be in a hurry to present the awards. Instead, he said to Margot in a very regrettable tone, "Why can't you add another best award to the Oscars?" As for the kiss scene award, I feel that the Academy owes me two important awards."

Margo raised her eyebrows, "Which two terms?"

"Of course it's "A Beautiful Mind" and "How to Get Away with the Law." Leo's blue eyes were shining, and he had a mischievous smirk on his face.

Before the words fell, there was a burst of booing from under the stage.

Margaret looked at him with disgust, "Come on, Mr. DiCaprio, I don't want to win the Best Kissing Scene award with you. How did you answer when I asked you if you brushed your teeth? ?”

"I was just joking that I just smoked three cigarettes," Leo complained dissatisfied. "Who would have thought that you would go to the director to ask to cancel the kiss scene, and claim that I was the worst kiss scene! Tell me Kissing is really bad luck for eight lifetimes!"

Margo was surprised, "I said that?"

"You once publicly praised Johnny Depp as a master kisser, much better than my wife!" The beautiful blond man's tone became more and more unpleasant, but the audience burst into laughter.

This is only the first award, and the ratings of this year's Oscar awards ceremony have climbed to a considerable number that surprised the academy and ABC TV station.

On the stage, Margaret shrugged helplessly, sighed, and said close to the microphone, with a sincere and serious tone——

"Here, I openly apologize to Mr. Leonardo DiCaprio, actually, he is really good at kissing."

After finishing speaking, Margot folded his arms and looked at Mr. Heartthrob, and said coldly, "Satisfied now?"

The blond-haired, blue-eyed superstar looked at her aggrievedly, "How can you be so perfunctory."