hollywood melon man

Chapter 548 Sino-US Co-production
In Beijing, China, Guo Fan and Liu Ji had just finished watching "The Mystery of the Talisman 3" and were still discussing the movie.

However, the discussion had little to do with the movie, but rather the people involved in the project.

Guo Fan said: "I studied in this crew at the beginning. There were many people from Hong Kong Island in the crew. They were all brought over by director Tsui Hark."

"It seems that Director Tsui Hark is very ambitious. I heard that Director Tsui Hark has taken on a film from Universal Pictures. It is this series of films that laid the foundation for him to have the opportunity to direct Hollywood films," said Liu Ji.

After Windtalkers, John Woo returned to Hong Kong Island in disgrace. Instead, Tsui Hark directed the second and third installments of The Talisman, all of which were quite successful and earned him a ticket to Hollywood.

For Xu, this is an opportunity. For Hong Kong filmmakers, especially those working behind the scenes, this is also a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Hong Kong filmmakers have been developing in Hollywood for more than ten years, and have indeed brought many Hong Kong-specific things to Hollywood.

But now, the Hong Kong style has gradually lost its power in Hollywood. So-called kung fu movies are no longer popular in Hollywood, and audiences are tired of the fancy fighting moves.

The path pioneered by Tsui Hark is that the Hong Kong behind-the-scenes staff who followed him fully learned the Hollywood industrialized popular line production model and became one of the thousands of behind-the-scenes staff in Hollywood.

But this learning comes at a price, which is that once they leave Hollywood, they will no longer be able to apply what they have learned.

So Tsui Hark wanted to stay in Hollywood, so he naturally would not miss such an opportunity. He brought his behind-the-scenes staff with him, and most of them also stayed in Hollywood with him.

It’s just that Tsui Hark, like John Woo, can’t afford the cost of failure.

As a Chinese director, the risk of failure he faces is much higher than other Hollywood directors.

Guo Fan and Liu Ji were discussing Tsui Hark's future in Hollywood, and Liu Ji expressed great pessimism.

"I don't think Director Tsui Hark can gain a foothold in Hollywood." Liu Ji said: "The success of the "Mystery of the Talisman" series is largely due to luck.

Most importantly, the film was produced by director Gilbert Jr.

Without Director Gilbert Jr., I don’t think Director Tsui Hark can survive in the fiercely competitive Hollywood.”

Guo Fan said: "You mean, he has to return to Hong Kong Island in the end?"

"Back to Hong Kong Island?" Liu Ji said disdainfully, "Does he want to be buried with Hong Kong films? I think he should go north."

Liu Ji has always felt that the current Chinese film market is dominated by people from Hong Kong, which is a very bad situation. The main reason is that people from Hong Kong are too arrogant and look down on people from the mainland.

You guys can't make it in Hong Kong anymore, so you go north to develop and look down on mainland filmmakers? It's totally incomprehensible.

"Let's not talk about this," Liu Ji asked Guo Fan: "By the way, what are you going to do for our company's next project?
I see they are all filming a costume movie, why don’t you come too?”

Guo Fan stroked his newly grown beard and thought, "Forget it. The track of costume blockbusters is not suitable for me. I want to make a war movie next."

"War film? Will it be a huge investment?" Liu Ji asked.

"It will require a large investment, and it will also be a good opportunity to practice," Guo Fan said firmly.

Since I can't make a science fiction film for now, I'll just make a subject that I'm interested in. Guo Fan still remembers what Gilbert Jr. said, that you must shoot a subject that you're interested in, so that you'll have motivation.

Guo Fan thought it made sense. Apart from science fiction films, he was most interested in war themes, so he planned to make a war film.

"Okay, I support you. Let's have a drink with Lao Wang and get the investment done," said Liu Ji.

"Okay, we are the men of Lu Province, we are not afraid of drinking, let's go and deal with Lao Wang now."

"go!"

"Let's go!" The two of them, arm in arm, went to find Lao Wang, the coal boss who was also their investor.

The crew of "The Mystery of the Talisman 3" came to China for promotion and was warmly welcomed by fans. Every time they went to a place, they almost caused a carnival among fans.

Because of the participation of the Hong Kong production team, the media also gave the film the title of a Sino-US co-production, making it a model.

It is also because of the perfect performance of the "Mystery of the Talisman" series that the trilogy has grossed a total of US$1.6 billion at the box office, making many Chinese film companies begin to covet this piece of cake.

Huayi Brothers, which claims to be the No. 1 entertainment company in mainland China, approached Jackie Chan, who was in charge of publicity, to discuss with him whether they could contact Gilbert Jr. to make a true Sino-US co-production.

Wang Zhongjun, the CEO of Huayi, made it clear: "We can invite Lian Jie, Bingbing and Shu Chang to participate, and find a few foreign stars."

Jackie Chan has worked in Hollywood and knows that this matter is not as simple as it sounds.

He politely declined, "Mr. Wang, if you want to do this well, you have to have a good idea. For our project "The Mystery of the Talisman", the entire story was personally reviewed by Director Gilbert Jr.

He knows very well how to integrate Chinese culture with the core of Hollywood blockbusters, so as to control the overall quality of the film.

Film is about storytelling, but that’s not easy to do.”

Although Cheng Long poured cold water on Wang Zhongjun, Wang Zhongjun did not give up.

In fact, last year Huayi Brothers invested in Xing Chi Zhou's "Kung Fu". This film was also led by Columbia Pictures Asia Branch and was responsible for overseas distribution.

The film achieved good results, earning 1.73 million RMB in the mainland, 6100 million Hong Kong dollars in Hong Kong Island, and 1.05 million US dollars in the global box office.

Not only that, the film was also nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film and won several international awards, although none of them were very prestigious.

If it weren't for the "Mystery of the Talisman" series, "Kung Fu" could almost become a model of co-production films.

Although the "Mystery of the Talisman" series is called a co-production by the media, in fact, there is no Chinese producer involved, which makes it seem unworthy of the name.

So seeing that this series is making so much money and that it has also made a lot of profit from "Kung Fu", Huayi Brothers has very big ambitions.

So, the two brothers Wang Zhongjun and Wang Zhonglei discussed it and decided to send someone to Los Angeles to contact Melon Studios to see if Gilbert Jr. was interested in the Sino-US co-production.

By the time this man arrived in Los Angeles, Gilbert Jr. was already in Australia.

Anna, who stayed at the Melon Studio, knew that her boss was always interested in novel projects. After learning about the situation carefully, she called little Gilbert in Australia and sent an email with detailed explanations.

"Huayi Brothers? You want me to do a Sino-US co-production?" Little Gilbert had a question mark over his head: "Isn't this usually handled by China Film Group?"

Anna explained on the phone: "If the intention of cooperation is reached, China Film will also be involved. It is just an idea at the moment, and I think it has good prospects."

If Gilbert Jr. is willing to endorse it, the project does have the prospect of making a profit.

Little Gilbert seemed to remember that there was a movie called "The Forbidden Kingdom", in which Jackie Chan and Jet Li both participated, as well as a large number of Chinese actors including the Fairy Sister.

Unfortunately, the story of that movie was so bad that Chinese audiences didn’t like it and foreign audiences couldn’t understand it, so it was a spectacular failure.

Little Gilbert still remembers that Fairy Sister’s fans loved to praise this film as her representative work as an international movie star.

However, "Mulan" was released later and the position of "The Forbidden Kingdom" was replaced.

(End of this chapter)