Hollywood legendary director

When Firefly organized the screening of its projects in an orderly manner, Xie Yi, the president of New Line Pictures, threw the market report on the table a little unhappy.

The company’s performance in the second half of last year was really terrible. Except for projects like "Reaper 3" and "Texas Murder Prequel", which are not bad, the remaining 5 independent productions all add up to a loss of almost 42 million. And this will definitely affect his position in the company.You know, it’s not a day or two for Warner to completely swallow the new line.

In 1993, Xinxian was acquired by TV giant Warner. In 2000, AOL merged with Time Warner, so Xinxian also entered Time Warner Group.

However, when Xinxian was acquired that year, Xinxian's management still held part of the equity of Xinxian and enjoyed the company's independent management rights.

Therefore, although the new line belongs to Time Warner, its film operations are not related to other film companies within the group.

In other words, although Xinxian and Warner are a "family", they are separated from each other, and at best they have complementary resources.

Warner’s management has never wanted to let the new line get out of control and want to have absolute right to speak, so the relationship between the two is somewhat unmanageable.

To integrate business and reduce unnecessary overlap and waste, it should be kicked out of part of the management, especially President Shay.

This kind of stark crisis has always been on his head, and he himself does not want to change from the leader of a fairly good studio to an executive in a certain department.

Would rather be a chicken head than a phoenix tail, right?

Warner?It's so messy.

However, if there is no achievement, it is inevitable that he will fall off the tongue, which also makes Xie Yi inexplicably bored.

Some people just play this set behind the scenes every day, and don't think that making a project must be risky. As long as you do something, there will definitely be time to go wrong.

But they don't care about it.

Yingying buzzing verbal harassment cannot be ignored.

The new line enjoys the right to operate independently, but the premise is that the asset is valuable. At the beginning, it was not a complete protection in order to win the conditions. It can even be said to be a gambling agreement.

Anyway, if the business is good, then continue to operate, where is the business not qualified to operate?

Shay looked at the piles of unprocessed approval documents on the table. Of course, the Warner executives could force and exert pressure, but he couldn't ignore it.

But how to restore the downturn in the production business?

Of course it is to develop new movie projects.

What can I shoot?

Shay is a little hard to choose.

The new line's script library also has a bunch of scripts, but it doesn't mean that if you have a script, you can make a profit.

The risk of original projects has always been high, which is why studios increasingly prefer to choose literary novel adaptations with traffic blessings.

Because this is indeed a lot of convenience.

Looking at various planned projects, Shay still feels that something is missing.

In other words, he doesn't feel that these projects will get very high returns. At best, they are just making money offline, not to say that they have not started to waste manpower.

Everyone wants to make money. If you don't give others a chance to make money, the internal management may be messed up first.

These years, the cost of job-hopping is getting lower and lower.

Xie Yi stood up silently, stood at the window, and looked at the distant scenery, only to relieve the sulking in happiness.

Alas, a big production is needed to declare the independent status of the new line.

This thought came to Shay's mind, and then he couldn't ignore it anymore.

Warner wants to see the results, just show them.

It was done, and in exchange for several years of calmness, but not. Anyway, the situation has been so bad. The performance has declined for two consecutive years, and it was even worse last year.

Xie Yi picked up the phone and called the production manager to come in.

"The "Golden Compass" project proposed at the time can be approved." Shay continued: "I will arrange the budget immediately, and then discuss the release with Warner."

The production manager heard that there was no obstacle at all, and came out.

Because as early as the "Lord of the Rings" went on sale, the new line was conscious of hoarding the best-selling magical works on the market, but everyone was fast, and the big studios had more financial resources than them, and the new lines were more likely to be sold after a round of sweeps The harvest is the trilogy of fantasy novel "Dark Matter" written by British writer Philip Pullman.

As for this project, the script adaptation began as early as 2004. The reason Shay did not establish the project was because the budget was too high. According to the ideas of the production department executives, if you want to restore this magical work, you can expect to achieve it. The box office market of "The Lord of the Rings" is less than 150 million, and it is a bit too much. If a few big-name actors are invited to raise the topic, the cost will have to increase.

Such a high investment definitely requires careful consideration.

As for why the project is to be established now, it is not because the new line urgently needs a masterpiece to stabilize its position, coupled with the fact that the large production has big profits.

Think about it, because of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, Xin Xian broke up with the British magic literature writer Tolkien's estate management fund. They directly filed a lawsuit in the Los Angeles court, accusing Xin Xian of concealing the movie "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy. In order to avoid paying the box office revenue commission to the original copyright holders.

In addition, Harper-Collins, the American publisher of the novel, participated in the lawsuit as a co-plaintiff.In the indictment, the two plaintiffs, in addition to demanding $150 million in compensation from New Line Films, also demanded that the court impose a certain amount of fines on New Line Films and terminate the prequel "The Hobbit" owned by New Line Films. "And other film adaptation rights of Tolkien's other works.

In addition, the two plaintiffs claimed that the gross income of the movie "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy was as high as 6 billion US dollars.But according to Xinxian, the gross income of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy is less than $3 billion.

Of course, there are tricks.

For these non-industry people, it is more common for studios to steal more money.

But it was quite embarrassing to be caught.

For this reason, several parties wrangled endlessly, and the "Lord of the Ring" prequel project that was originally planned to be launched in 2007 and 2008 was stranded.

But there is no way, life has to pass.

In fact, Xin Xian knows better than many studios how profitable a masterpiece series is. It is said that it is a trivial one after three years. Therefore, when Shay encounters difficulties, the first thing he thinks is to move another major production. And it is the "Golden Compass" with a similar theme.

He thinks that even "The Kingdom of Narnia" can be popular, and "Golden Compass" is not badly known. The audience just happens to be young and middle-aged people who are in control of part of the social resources at this time. Their wallets are bulging. big.

It can only be said that Warner's pressure made Shay more determined to develop "Rokin Compass".

The only regret may be that the director Peter Jackson was wicked.

Shay actually admires Peter Jackson very much, but once the benefit is increased to a certain degree, or if it is operated a little bit, tens of millions are easily credited. Who can resist the temptation?

The "Lord of the Rings" trilogy can also encroach on the interests of the director and even the creator behind the scenes.

After all, Xinxian did conceal the accurate profit of the project in order to save money.

But what Shay didn’t know was that something deceived once and never returned to the past, not to mention that Peter Jackson’s temperament hates similar things. At the beginning Miramax interfered with his creation, until now both. The relationship hasn't been eased, let alone this kind of behind the knife?

Another reason for not establishing a project for "Rokin Compass" is that the most promising director of the new line, Peter Jackson, refused to cooperate.

Perhaps it was also the remake of "King Kong" that was criticized. In short, Peter Jackson tinkered with his documentary, and cooperated with Weta Digital on new special effects visual technology.

But this time he didn't want to wait anymore.

He feels that Hollywood is not a place where it can't work without a director.

What's more, magical themes are very popular at this time. Once "Golden Compass" succeeds, even if it is not a box office explosion, even if the box office cannot be recovered, as long as it is popular offline, all the troubles will not be trouble.

You know, "The Golden Compass" is only the first part of "Dark Matter", and there are at least two parts to be discovered behind it.

Shay cheered up, thinking about the birth of another magical series, frowning gradually unfolded.

At that time, let alone Warner, if the new line can really bring billions of cakes, who should not give a good face?

Furthermore, Warner is involved in the issuance work, so will they have trouble with their own money?

As long as everything goes well...