Exploiting Hollywood 1980

  Chapter 941 Manga Adaptation Movie

"He is my college classmate. Haven't you seen his graduation work? It's very good." Ronald read the name of the screenwriter that Samuel Godwin Jr. showed him, and found that he was in New York University. When I was in school, one of the three director students surnamed Lee, AngLee.

The encounter between people is like a river on the plain, split and join. When I was filming commercials, I asked him to work as an assistant director with the black director Spike Lee. I haven’t seen him for a few years. I already have a producer. and distribution company, while AngLee is still looking for directing opportunities for the first film.

"Really? He's your classmate? I've seen his graduation work, and I can make a movie just by looking at it. My new movie MysticPizza couldn't find someone to change the script when it started shooting. Someone recommended it to me. He, he's got a little insight into romantic comedies.

  He submitted one of his own scripts to me. After the movie is released, I plan to invest in his new film. Just use the original hero and heroine of modern Cinderella, I am very optimistic about him. "

"You're really lucky, Samuel. I didn't know he was still in America. I thought he had gone back to his hometown. If I knew..." Ronald thought that if he knew that Ang Lee had ideas, he would definitely give priority to it. investment.

  Ang Lee's graduation work is a good example of his level. There has been no director's work for so many years. It's definitely not that he can't shoot, and he can't find a production company willing to invest. Being a director is like being pregnant. You can tell whether you can shoot or not after seeing your work, and you can’t lie to others. It is estimated that he still insists on his own directorial works, and he is not willing to make any movies.

  Ronald and Godwin nodded goodbye, wrote a note in the notepad, let daydreamers pay attention to AngLee, if there is a suitable project in the future, they can also invest in it, talent is rare.

  Leaving the Producers Union, Ronald still found a place to chat with Minahan.

  Minahan now has a lot of free time, and he doesn’t need to make decisions about many things about Cannon anymore. He only cares about the movie itself now.

Maybe because he wants to understand the lessons of success and failure in the past few years, Minahan is no longer obsessed with collecting all kinds of outdated famous directors and stars, and he pays more attention to his favorite genre—comics adaptation.

"I have now collected a large number of movie adaptation rights for comics. After Yoram knows that his current approach is unsuccessful, I can make movies I like." Minahan's spirit is much better now, Ronald Seeing that he has somewhat regained his passion for movies back then.

   "This is really suitable for you..." Ronald chuckled. Minahan really likes comic book adaptations. In the past two years, he has made Superman 4, Universe King Seaman, and other comic book adaptations.

  In fact, when Minahan himself was the director, he made films with other themes, which also had an exaggerated, hypocritical, and specious caricature-like feeling. Maybe he really came to shoot this style of film by himself, which suits his performance instead?

   Think about it, at the Montreal Film Festival in Canada that year, the extremely disgusting movie "The Apple (The Apple, if it was a comic story, wouldn't the audience throw things on stage?

   "However, comic films generally require a lot of special effects shots. I didn't get much praise for the special effects in the fourth part of your Superman."

  Ronald thought of the fifty-cent special effects in Minahan's movies. If he really wanted to make a movie based on comics, he would really have to spend money on special effects.

"That movie was a mistake. I released too many movies and diluted Cannon's investment in Superman movies. Now I have learned my lesson. EMI is strong. After the merger with Cannon, as long as they realize that Hollywood needs A big investment will sooner or later give up Yoram’s line and return to the right path.”

Minahan is now criticizing his cousin Yoram a lot of thinking. He waved his hand and giggled, as if in front of him was a big screen, on which he bought Spider-Man, Captain America, Seaman Part 2, Fantastic Four and more.

   Then the audience in the audience cheered, stood up and applauded for a long time, and threw various flowers to him...

   "This is the kind of movie we want to make, and this kind of movie can make the audience like it... Ronald, shall we work together again?"

   "Um...", Ronald felt that the Israeli was a little bit bewildered. After he was seized by his cousin Yoram, he was a little bit unacceptable to reality.

  So far, Hollywood comic book adaptation movies are the favorite of low-cost producers like Roger Coleman. Those biubiubiu's green laser special effects don't cost a lot of money. Only the first two Superman series were really big productions that managed to make a lot of money.

  Blockbusters and low-budget exploitation movies, the audience's tolerance for them is completely different. You pay a dollar to see a Roger Corman sci-fi movie in a midnight theater, you know the stuff is fake and horrible, and you accept that cheap costume and make-up, focus on the plot and a sense of the ridiculous.

   But if you're paying five bucks to see a sci-fi movie from the seven studios, you're expecting at least something that looks real. This is why Superman spent so much money on flying special effects. It took weeks of repeated shooting for just one flying shot, and the cost of that shot alone can exceed a million dollars.

   "I'm not very good at shooting special effects, you have to find someone who can." Ronald still shied away, because Minahan's previous few steps in the movie caused him too much psychological damage. Ecstasy star Cassandra Peterson, on what it was like to film Minahan —

  She heard that millions of dollars would be invested in the production of special effects, but it turned out that a total of two yuan and fifty-three cents had been invested.

"Hey, you don't know, I now have the adaptation copyrights of Marvel, Mattel, several comics and toy companies. No one in Hollywood has more comics copyrights than me. Now Hollywood has not recognized this kind of movie. I have already collected their potential before they even reacted.

  Only people from Warner Bros. have a bit of foresight. They set up a Batman movie, and it happened that we also filmed a Spiderman to fight with them. Whether you want to be a director, or a producer, or participate in investment, it’s up to you. This is a good opportunity. I haven’t told anyone…

  By the way, who is the best at making special effects movies in Hollywood now? That friend of yours, the one who filmed the Terminator, can I invite him to film it? "

   "Hey, he's making a sci-fi film for 20th Century Fox right now, you can ask him after he's finished filming..."

   Ronald saw that Minahan came up with Cameron's idea to shoot Spider-Man. Knowing that this guy must have no plans, thinking of it as soon as he comes out. It's better not to participate in the cannon project.

   But he really took so many comic adaptation copyrights? This guy really has the guts to bet big. His success and failure all stem from his willingness to make big bets.

  …

   "The news you said is true. Minahan really bought a large number of film adaptation copyrights from several major comic companies and toy companies." Nisita took the results of the research and came to report to Ronald.

   "Really bought so much? The price will not be cheap." Ronald counted, the two major comic companies, plus the copyright of comic characters owned by toy companies such as Mattel, Minahan spent a lot of money on it.

"It's not cheap, these are some of the best characters in big companies," Nisita agreed, "but not many people in Hollywood recognize the value of comic book adaptation movies. Only Warner Bros. has recently approved a Batman movie. Minahan is not a big To win is to lose big."

   "This guy is always full of gamblers." Ronald recalled the past when he spent tens of millions to make Brooke Shields a desert racing movie. "When will the Warner Bros. Batman start filming?"

   "Now they are also stuck by the screenwriter's strike, and their large-scale auditions in the early stage have been suspended." Nisita handed the information of the Batman movie to Ronald.

   "Forty million? Are they serious?" Ronald was shocked when he saw the budget figure.

   "They've been wanting to do it for a long time. There was a first version of the script ten years ago. At that time, William Holden was going to play Batman and David Niven was going to play Robin."

   "Aren't they too old at the time?" Ronald imagined, and the temperament was very suitable, but the two old actors passed away in the early 1980s.

   "Later, we CAA knew about this project, so we began to recommend our ace actors, Bill Murray as Batman, and black star Eddie Murphy as Robin."

   "This..." Ronald thought to himself that this combination is the configuration of the classic Hollywood white hero, plus a black partner with a broken mouth. "Are they still acting now?"

"No, in the end Warner liked the new version of the Dark Knight comics more, and found Tim Burton, the director of 'Beetlejuice', which is now on sale, and now Batman is confirmed to be played by Michael Keaton. Massive auditions for actresses, asking for the sexiest female stars in Hollywood..."

   "It's another strike..." Ronald really felt too difficult about the screenwriters' union strike. The seven major studios had nothing to do with this industry-wide trade union forced strike.

   "Do you have any recommendations for Hollywood **** bombs? Or potential newcomers you are optimistic about? I can work it out..." Nisita knew that this project would attract many of the sexiest and most beautiful actresses.

   "Can you tell me?" The figure of Helen Slater flashed in Ronald's mind... No, Helen's temperament is not suitable for that kind of role...

   "Hahaha... When the strike is over, I will update you on their audition progress..."

  …

  It has been more than a week since Ronald finished filming the working girl, and he has not completely forgotten the way of thinking when shooting, so it is not suitable to enter the editing room now. He continued his vacation in Los Angeles, and returned to the new office building of 20th Century Fox on this day. Most of the projects he participated in over the past year were related to Fox.

   "Die Hard" was filmed on the building, and the decoration of the top floors was finally completed, and the employees moved in from the old building one after another.

  Ronald, along with Joel Silver, chatted with the people in the distribution department about the announcement of the movie.

  After watching the sample, they were very confident in the film, so they planned to move this Christmas story to the summer file, which has the largest audience in America.

   "Really that good? The plot of this movie takes place on Christmas, isn't it more suitable for the Christmas schedule?" Ronald asked Joel Silver.

"I'm pretty confident that this summer isn't very strong, with Robert Zemeckis' Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Tom Cruise's Cocktails, and Eddie Murphy's trip to America... Did you find something?" Silver smiled and gave Ronald the list of blockbuster movies that were expected to be released in the summer.

   "Well... there are no action movies..." Ronald found the problem after flipping through it.

   "Originally the Aussie's Crocodile Dundee 2 was a rival, but they decided to release it at the end of May ahead of schedule."

   Various coincidences, this summer, there are no movies starring big-name action stars. Schwarzenegger transformed into an action comedy, adding a lot of comedy elements to the movie, no longer just posing with muscles to scare people.

  Schwarzenegger felt that if he did not transform, the American audience would sooner or later reject his muscular play.

Stallone only has one Rambo third film this year. This series of films has changed from the first film about the encounters of Vietnam War veterans and reflecting the social reality, to the second purely commercial film that beats bad guys. I heard that the third sequel is also the same. , not confident that it will be released in summer, so it was moved to May.

   Stallone and Brigitte Nelson finally got divorced. This high-profile divorce was chased by the tabloids for a whole year, which seriously involved Stallone's energy. I heard that the quality of Rambo III has seriously declined.

   "It's true that God is helping us..." Ronald agreed with Silver's opinion, and let them see how to shoot a really good-looking action movie.

  …

   "Your setting in South Carolina must go through a safety assessment. I must see the report issued by the scientist."

   Coming out of the office, Ronald heard a familiar voice. Turning his head, it turned out to be his old friend Gail Hurd.

   "It's not going to be a problem, we're just using the tank there..." It was James Cameron speaking.

   "Jim, this is Fox's request. They are very dissatisfied with the constantly overrun budget. If you don't have an environmental safety assessment report, they will not allow you to set up a scene there."

   "Okay, I'll take care of that."

   "Ronald..." Gail turned her head and saw Ronald, "I have something else to do, we'll talk about it later." She picked up her notebook, exchanged greetings with Ronald, and left.

   Ronald looked back at Cameron, "You two?"

Cameron and Gail have many conflicts in film, philosophy, and life. The last time I saw him, they were in the middle of a divorce, and they were flirting with the female director Ronald hired, Catherine Bigelow. Today Seeing him and Gail seem to have restored the tacit understanding between husband and wife.

   Cameron shook his head, frowning, "She is a professional producer, and I only have a professional relationship with her now."

   It can be seen that Cameron is also very uncomfortable. This kind of deep-seated contradiction in the film concept is difficult to compromise, and he and Gail are combined because of the film.

   Now that the personal relationship between the two has broken down, and they have to take care of the production of major projects, they have to become business partners. Switching between the two attitudes makes Cameron very painful...

   "Gail handles it better than me, I see her always doing this professionally, I can't..."

  Ronald had no choice but to comfort his old friend, "This kind of thing is different for everyone, maybe Gail just doesn't show it..."

   "No, you don't know her well enough. When she looks at me, she treats me like a partner."

  Ronald touched his nose, haven't you let go of your mood and started flirting with other women? It seems that the divorce of this kind of couple is also difficult for Cameron, who has a strong will.

   Getting married and not meeting the right person is really a terrible thing. Ronald patted Cameron on the shoulder, "Go, I know a good Japanese-style barbecue restaurant, let's go eat some..."

  (end of this chapter)