Hollywood Hunter

"People's imagination is very limited. For example, Hollywood, as an outsider, you may think that Hollywood is full of flowers, but if you understand it deeply, you will find that Hollywood has been going around for a hundred years."

It was still in the underground screening hall, the wormhole screening ended, Simon continued to hold Zhu Momo in his arms, and said to Ren Jingxi beside him: "Let's not talk about it too far, let's just talk about the success of Star Wars in the past 20 years. A large number of sci-fi movies appeared. The Godfather succeeded, and a large number of gangster movies appeared. Field Platoon succeeded, and a large number of Vietnam War movies appeared.”

Before Simon finished speaking, Zhu Momo in his arms said mischievously: "Simon, you succeeded, but it's a pity that no group of Simon Westeros appeared."

Simon kissed the girl's neck, and continued to say to Ren Jingxi, "Anyway, do you know what this means?"

Ren Jingxi thought for a while and said, "It's important to develop new genres, right? You said it, Simon."

"No," Simon shook his head, and he didn't give too much away, and continued: "Actually, as I just said, human imagination is very scarce. Before Star Wars, there were no science fiction movies? Before the Godfather, there were no gangsters." Are there any war movies before Field Platoon?"

Ren Jingxi understood a little bit, but still couldn't grasp the key point.

Simon quickly continued: "I mean, all the types of movies that humans can imagine, in fact, whether it is Hollywood or the once very prosperous European film market, they have actually all been done. The difference may be from silent to sound and Technological progress from black and white to color. Then there is China, because all types of people have already explored, so China does not need to repeat this exploration, you only need to study, then imitate, and then transform into your own things.”

Zhu Momo interrupted again: "Simon, are you encouraging plagiarism?"

Simon bit the girl's slender neck as a punishment this time, and then looked at Ren Jingxi again: "You don't have the psychological barrier that Momo just said?"

Ren Jingxi smiled and shook his head: "No."

"Very good," Simon said, "The biggest advantage of human beings is that we have a strong learning ability. The so-called learning is to transform the knowledge accumulated by the predecessors into our own. In this world, after achieving this level , further, there are very few people who achieve innovation. Therefore, learning to the extreme is enough for most people. Of course, in the industrial field, a group of people build another internal combustion engine based on one internal combustion engine. Problem. However, the field of film and television still needs some changes, and it happens that this kind of change is not difficult compared with the industrial field."

"I always feel," said Mo Wuling, who was sitting on the other side of Ren Jingxi, "Simon, you are teaching Jingxi to do bad things."

"I am enlightening," Simon said, giving out an index finger: "The hand of God, let you understand this world."

Seeing Simon's movements, Ren Jingxi smiled, and stretched out a finger cooperatively, touching the fingertips of the man.

Everyone smiled, somewhat enviously.

Zhu Momo also wanted to be enlightened, so she stretched out her slender index finger, but Simon opened his mouth to bite, and retracted with a smile.

Mo Wuling couldn't help opening his mouth again, feeling like a snack in his heart, and wanted to change the subject: "Simon, what do you think of the movie just now?"

"It's great, it's low cost, and it's already very good to be able to achieve this level," Simon said. "The next thing is marketing. If it can be done well, the box office of 30 to 50 million may not be a problem."

"Can it be so much?" Ren Jingxi himself was a little surprised: "I think I will be very satisfied if I can sell 20 million, and the cost is only 2 million."

"It depends on whether you have the courage to spend 5 million or more for marketing," Simon said: "The Chinese film market is not mature enough, so it is more likely to be a dark horse, because many things are uncertain. For example, this movie, you just The cost of 2 million is just a publicity point, an outstanding young filmmaker finally raised a cost of 2 million after many efforts, and shot his first feature film, which is a very inspirational story first of all.”

Jill, who was seated in the back, interjected: "It's like Simon's Lola Run back in the day."

"That's right," Simon nodded and said with a smile: "Although I was not as rough as the outside world imagined when I filmed Run Lola Run, what the audience needs is a story. Besides, this is a very innovative film. Although Around the world, ideas about time are very common, but in China, this is innovation. Finally, the film itself is also very interesting. Did you feel impatient during the viewing process just now?"

The girls around shook their heads together.

Simon said: "This is the most successful part of the film. The rhythm is well controlled and completed in one go. I have told people around me more than once that this is actually the commercial film I admire the most. It makes the audience feel that two hours have passed. , After being hearty, when the subtitles came up, I realized that two hours had passed. According to my experience over the years, any film with this quality is often very commercially successful."

Teacher Yu in the front row said, "This kind of thing, Simon, depends on luck, right?"

"Luck, the script in the early stage, the ability of the main creator, involves a lot of things," Simon didn't deny it, and said, "However, there are actually certain salvage methods in the later stage, that is, test screenings, test screenings by management, test screenings by film critics, and random audiences. Test screenings and so on, and then make changes."

Jill in the back row said: "Simon, you are teaching Jingxi to do bad things again."

Everyone here obviously knows what Jill is referring to.

after all a little

If you understand the inside story of the film and television industry, you can know many cases about the failure of Hollywood studios to cut the classic films of a certain director into garbage, such as the most typical American past.

Seeing that the girls were all clear, Simon didn't explain Jill's words, and said directly: "The problem is that if you want to count the projects that are completely let go to the director, there are also a lot of failure cases. As for Hollywood, if you go deep into Among them, you will find that there are very few projects that have not been edited by the studio at all, and the key is a matter of balance. First of all, to intervene in the high-level editing, you need to understand the film, you let a lawyer or accountant do the job, If they intervene indiscriminately, the possibility of failure is of course very high, but if you understand film itself and understand how to balance business and art, you can do this job very well.”

Zhu Momo shook his head: "It's not easy."

Once again, it echoes the discussion about the development of the Chinese film market before watching the film.

Simon smiled and didn't respond this time. Instead, he hugged the girl and stood up, saying to the others: "Let's go to rest early, Momo and I will go to the east swimming pool to take a bath, and discuss some life ideals by the way."

Zhu Momo giggled and was carried out of the seat. When he was almost at the door, he grabbed the man's arm and looked over here: "Youhu, Jill, you come too, I can't stand him alone."

Said to have gone out.

The atmosphere in the screening hall was a little weird for a moment, Li Youhu got up first, and with a smile, he directly pulled up Teacher Yu next to him: "We will go too."

Teacher Yu half pushed and half agreed.

Gil Pector even got up directly, and pulled Zhao Anni up, and in a blink of an eye, there were only Ren Jingxi and Mo Wuling left.

Ren Jingxi quickly lowered his head and memorized some of the words the man had just said in his notebook. After a while, he raised his head, glanced at his best friend, and curled his mouth: "How about we go too?"

Mo Wuling rolled his eyes.

If there is no Mo Mo over there, no, even if there is, it can't.

So he got up: "I'll go back to the upper yard first."

Ren Jingxi closed the notebook and held Mo Wuling's arm: "I think it's best to go up with you, lest you get lost and go to the wrong place."

"You're the one who got lost."

"I don't need the excuse of getting lost."

""

The next day is November 23rd.

Tuesday.

Simon is still in Beijing. At the same time, this is also a very special day for China.

Simon is not sure what day it was, but this time, on November 23, 1999, China and the United States formally signed a bilateral agreement on China's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), declaring that the biggest obstacle in China's journey to join the WTO has been successfully overcome. Pass.

Of course, after that, things will not be easy.

After all, after finalizing the bilateral agreement with the United States in 1999, it was not until 2001 that China completely dealt with all WTO members and officially joined the WTO.

Compared with these major events, Simon's schedule here is still very easy.

I didn't get up until after seven o'clock in the morning. After all, it was winter, and the reason for staying up was very legitimate.

In the morning, go to Jinshu.

The several projects identified last time are progressing very quickly. In addition, this time it is the same as last night, watching another sample.

It's not the Tongtian spectrum of a Mongolian director. Although Simon is more interested, Jinshu is still focusing on the two major pillars, Zhang Guoshi and Feng pants. This time I'm watching a new film by Feng pants that will be released at the end of this year. , or Fung's comedy, called Crashing Ground, still from Wang Da's book, tells the story of a small owner of a clothing store who is trying to find a way between two women, but fails to steal the chicken.

The core of it is a satire on some social phenomena in China today.

Furthermore, this is a film completely out of butterflies.

The quality of the films of the Feng Wang Group is very guaranteed. What's more, the current director Feng Da has not yet reached the state of getting older and more angry, and he is still down-to-earth. In addition, the current market is recovering rapidly. With a box office of 100 million yuan, there are great hopes.

After watching the film, at the dinner at noon, apart from the high-level executives of the Jinshu Department and some big names in the circle, Simon also met Old Freak Xu who came here specially from Hong Kong.

During the dinner, we discussed the story of Di Renjie's god, the Dragon King, face to face.

Simon didn't keep it either, and talked about some of the outstanding features of the previous versions in his memory with everyone sitting here. Next, of course, is the performance of Old Freak Xu.

Furthermore, regarding actors, Simon also made a statement directly in front of Mr. Xu, trying to use the mainland as much as possible to cooperate with Simon's idea of ​​cultivating mainland film talents last time.

As for Hong Kong, it’s still the same sentence, Simon doesn’t have much prejudice, he just thinks that the accent there is not suitable for mainland-style ancient costumes.

I talked more and more, so I didn't forget about the styling.

In the former Di Renjie series, what Simon couldn’t stand the most was Wu Zetian’s appearance. Anyway, this time it must not be Karina Liu. From her appearance to her character, she can only be described as a mean and bitter woman.

And styling.

Some people may refer to some pictures of ladies and say that they are very restored. However, if you look at the Tang Dynasty TV dramas such as Tang Minghuang and Wu Zetian in the 1990s, look at those looks, they are beautiful, and they are also beautiful. It is recorded on the map. After all, different regions and even different regions in different periods

In the works of the same painter, there are actually different shapes of Tang Dynasty women.

Why choose the ugly and creepy one?

Anyway, Simon couldn't bear it. Since he could intervene, he would never allow this kind of thing to happen again.

After lunch, there were some routine schedules again, until after three o'clock in the afternoon, Simon rushed to the airport and flew to Shanghai.

A meeting of the Human Society was arranged here, in the evening.

Still eating, drinking and having fun.

By the way, I watched a performance by the girls of the Guofeng Art Troupe.

Recently, it was the first Shanghai International Art Festival, which mainly focused on operas, dramas and other traditional folk arts from all over the world. The Guofeng Art Troupe was invited and came here at the end of October.

After the two major themes of "Book of Songs" and "Tang Yun", Simon did not arrange specific goals for the Guofeng Art Troupe.

Well, the instinct of a man to like the new and dislike the old.

Although I still watch it occasionally, and the girls also spend a lot of money to support it, but they are not as interested as they were at first.

Therefore, more arrangements are made by the small team of Guofeng Art Troupe. Including accepting the invitation of the Shanghai International Arts Festival this time, it was also a decision made by this side alone. Shirley, who has completely become the leader of the art troupe, led the team here in person.

Last night, I socialized until late at night, and woke up in the building at No. 18 on the Bund the next day.

Surrounded by one big and one small, Shirley and Miu Miao.

Although I haven't reached the age to eat the little girl, but because of my excitement, I felt that I could teach Nizi some things that I should know last night. Well, it is actually logical, and then it is logical.

After breakfast, this trip to China also came to an end.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, of course I still have to go back to Los Angeles to accompany the women and children. However, it is expected that they will come again during the Chinese New Year. Back then, I spent a Spring Festival with Lin Su's mother and son, and Chen Qing's side, this time Simon can't be partial.