The literary era since 1979

At the end of August, Jiahe.

Cheng Long knocked on He Guanchang's office, and when he heard a "come in" from inside the room, he pushed open the door.

I saw that not only He Guanchang was sitting in the huge office, but also Zou Wenhuai was sitting opposite him.

"Godfather! Mr. Zou!"

"Aaron is here, sit down."

Zou Wenhuai pointed to the sofa beside him and his eyes immediately fell on the phone on the coffee table.

Today is the big day when "Die Hard" premieres in North America. Naturally, I want to be the first to know the box office performance of the movie's premiere day. This is not only to estimate the approximate box office of the movie, but also to adjust the release and promotion plan of "Die Hard" in Hong Kong accordingly.

"what?"

Cheng Long looked around but did not see Lin Qingxia and others.

"Qingxia is now accompanying her parents and reuniting with her uncle and sister who have been separated from her for many years in the mainland."

Zou Wenhuai explained.

Cheng Long exclaimed, feeling extremely surprised.

He Guanchang said: "Qingxia told us about this matter a long time ago, and we also agreed that she doesn't need to attend the meeting today."

"It's great that their family can be reunited."

Cheng Long's mind moved, and he suddenly remembered that his father had once intended to return to Anwan to find his ancestors and relatives.

"This is all thanks to Mr. Fang. Without his connections and power in the mainland, Qingxia's journey to find her relatives would not have been so easy."

He Guanchang couldn't help but sigh: "In such a vast sea of ​​people, finding sisters and relatives who have been separated for decades is like looking for a needle in a haystack."

Cheng Long nodded in agreement, but was suddenly shocked. Why wasn't Fangyan there at such an important moment as the North American premiere of "Die Hard"?
Zou Wenhuai said: "Mr. Fang has already contacted me. He is busy right now, so he will be present at the premiere in Hong Kong."

Noticing Cheng Long's puzzled expression, He Guanchang shook his head and said:

"Haven't you read the newspaper these days? Don't you know what the hottest news in Hong Kong is right now?"

"Godfather, you know that I have little education and I don't know many words, so I don't like reading newspapers."

Cheng Long touched his head awkwardly.

"Even if you don't read the newspaper, you can hear some gossip by just going to a teahouse or restaurant."

Ho Kwun-chang stopped playing tricks and spoke directly about the fierce debate between "Ghost Blows Out the Light" and "Wei Sili".

Cheng Long opened his mouth wide, "How dare Ni Lie? The author of Ghost Blows Out the Light is Fang Sheng!"

"Even A-Long knows this. I really don't understand what you are trying to do." Zou Wenhuai snorted coldly.

He Guanchang sneered, "Yes, Ni Xie and Ni Zhen criticized and slandered the first part of "Ghost Blowing Out the Light" so much before, and Fang Sheng did not argue with them. I didn't expect that it would encourage the arrogance of the father and son, and they provoked and provoke Fang Sheng again and again."

Cheng Long listened to the conversation between the two with his eyes wide open, unable to believe it. How could Ni Xian dare to openly challenge Fang Yan in the newspaper?

In particular, the "Ghost Blows Out the Light" which was disparaged by Ni Xu and Ni Zhen was a work that he and Golden Harvest had already booked from Fang Yan.

When he thought of this, his face turned extremely ugly, "Mr. Zou, Godfather, should we do something for Fang Sheng?"

Zou Wenhuai and He Guanchang looked at each other without saying anything. At this moment, the phone they had been waiting for finally rang.

The call came from Golden Harvest's North American branch, reporting the just-released North American premiere box office of "Die Hard".

"What! Say it again!"

Even though He Guanchang has seen many storms, he still felt a little uneasy for a moment.

When Zou Wenhuai saw this, he was suddenly shocked and hurriedly asked about the box office performance of the premiere of "Die Hard".

He Guanchang was very excited: "837 million! The box office of Die Hard reached 837 million!"

Cheng Long was shocked and could hardly believe his ears. The movie opened in 1736 theaters and the box office reached 837 million US dollars in a single day.

Even if the box office of his first two Hollywood movies were added together, it would probably not be as good as that of "Die Hard"!

"If this trend continues, won't the box office for the first weekend exceed 2500 million?!"

After Zou Wenhuai confirmed it again and again, he fell into ecstasy.

"Wen Huai, our Golden Harvest has succeeded in its attempt to enter Hollywood. It has been a complete success!"

He Guanchang slammed the table and stood up. "And it may be more successful than Bruce Lee's previous one!"

Cheng Long clenched his fists. He became more and more excited at the thought that he could finally become as famous as Bruce Lee in Hollywood and even the world.

"All this is thanks to Mr. Fang. Without him, there wouldn't be such a good script for Die Hard, and it wouldn't be possible for Golden Harvest to connect with Fox, let alone the opportunity for Golden Harvest to return to Hollywood and for Aaron to successfully enter Hollywood!"

There was a gleam in Zou Wenhuai's eyes.

Cheng Long said: "Mr. Zou, should we tell Mr. Fang the good news right away?"

He Guanchang said, "Look at you, you are anxious again. Didn't I just say that Mr. Fang should still be dealing with the matter of Ghost Blowing Out the Light at this time?"

"Speaking of this, what Aaron said just now is absolutely right. We should indeed do something for Fang Sheng."

Zou Wenhuai's mind is now full of ways to maintain a good relationship with Fangyan.

He Guanchang pondered and said, "The key is how to do it. If you do something superfluous, it will only cause trouble for Mr. Fang."

"How about we not ask Ni Xun to write scripts in the future?" Cheng Long suggested.

"That's a good idea."

Zou Wenhuai agreed without thinking. After all, Ni Xu's film scripts were just mediocre and did not make much of a name in the Hong Kong film market. Compared with Fang Yan, even if he wrote ten or eight scripts, they would probably not be as good as Fang Yan's "Die Hard".

"I remember that Ni Zhen, the son of Ni Xian, wanted to change his career to become an artist recently, and he has been following his father's path."

He Guanchang said faintly.

"If that's the case, Jiahe shouldn't give him this opportunity."

Zou Wenhuai said lightly.

Listening to the conversation between the two big guys, Cheng Long thought to himself that he should stay away from Ni Xian and Ni Zhen, the two disaster stars in the future!

………………

The news that Die Hard took the top spot in the North American box office in its first weekend of 2743 million US dollars quickly spread back to Hong Kong. All of a sudden, it overshadowed the controversy over Ghost Blows Out the Light and Wesley, and became a hot topic in Hong Kong.

Regardless of whether or not Golden Harvest had instructed it, the media were scrambling to report extensively to warm up for the release of "Die Hard" in Hong Kong, so much so that news about the filming of "Die Hard" was flying everywhere, and people gradually came to understand the ins and outs of the entire film production.

It turns out that this script is written in dialect!

It turns out that it was Fangyan who took the lead and helped Golden Harvest and Fox to connect to make such a large-scale Hollywood A-level action blockbuster!
It turns out that if Fox hadn't taken the dialect into consideration, the male protagonist of "Die Hard" would have been replaced by a white detective!
All the unknown inside information was intentionally leaked by Golden Harvest and began to spread in gossip newspapers and magazines of all sizes throughout Hong Kong.

The name of the dialect, along with the continued popularity of "Die Hard" in North America, once again resounded throughout the Hong Kong entertainment industry and even the literary and art circles.

It even affected the second round of the competition between "Ghost Blows Out the Light" and "Wei Sili", and public opinion began to develop in a one-sided direction in favor of dialects.

Seeing that the situation was getting worse, Ni Zhen was at a loss and hurriedly went to find Ni Xian:

"Dad, Golden Harvest, Shaw Brothers, and Cinema City all refused to sign me to train as an artist!"

"It goes without saying that they are afraid of offending Fangyan because of you."

Ni Xun's brows were twisted into a knot.

"Then what should I do now?"

Ni Zhen was stunned. In order to switch careers and become an actor, he quit his job at Huang Zhan Advertising Company.

"There are more film companies in Hong Kong than Golden Harvest, Shaw Brothers, and Cinema City. Recently, a company called Yongsheng was established in the industry."

Ni lied, "The Xiang family has been recruiting soldiers and horses, and has invited me to join many times. When the time comes, I can also bring you into Yongsheng."

Ni Zhen's tone was somewhat nervous, "But Dad, the Xiang family is backed by Hongxing, which is a mafia..."

"What if it's black? What if it's white?"

Ni Xian narrowed his eyes, "You still haven't figured out the situation. The reason why Golden Harvest, Shaw Brothers, and Cinema City refused to sign you is because they don't want to offend Fang Yan, a loser. They have this attitude towards you, and they must have the same attitude towards me. Now, only Yongsheng, who is eager to whitewash himself, is in urgent need of a team, and has nothing to do with Fang Yan, will accept us father and son."

"Is there no other way?" Ni Zhen said hesitantly.

"Of course, you can risk your father's reputation and ask Huang Zhan, Brother Jin and the others to help mediate. I will set up a dozen tables of wine in the hotel, apologize to Fang Yan and admit defeat, and admit that the comments on Ghost Blows Out the Light these days are bullshit. What do you think of this method?"

The words that Ni Xian spoke were almost squeezed out from between his teeth.

"This this……"

Ni Zhen knew very well that his father was a face-conscious person. After all, the fame he had earned in Hong Kong was the result of almost his entire life's hard work.

But it is obvious that dialects are completely different from the soft persimmons in the past. They are completely solid. If the competition continues, I am afraid they will become a laughing stock.

So, he weakly suggested that he should use Huang Zhan's words to find out what Fang Yan's attitude towards the father and son was.

"Your consideration is not unreasonable, so let's do this first."

Ni Zhuo was extremely conflicted, and ultimately did not turn to his mentor Jin Yong for help. Instead, he set his sights on Huang Zhan, who was in business partnership with Fang Yan.

…………

After Golden Harvest's vigorous publicity campaign, "Die Hard" finally had its premiere in Hong Kong.

There were long queues outside the cinemas of all sizes, all of which were filled with audiences who failed to get pre-sale tickets. It was a very crowded and lively scene.

In the middle of the line, scalpers would occasionally shuttle back and forth, shouting and selling the movie tickets they had worked so hard to buy.

Originally, Jackie Chan's movies had a strong box office appeal in Hong Kong. Now with the gimmicks of "Hollywood blockbuster", "dialect production", "global action blockbuster", "North American box office exceeded 4000 million US dollars", etc., the movie tickets are becoming increasingly difficult to get.

Even in some small cinemas, "Die Hard" is shown almost 24 hours a day, and the frequency of screenings is so high that it is far more frequent than "God of Gamblers".

Precisely because of this, no media outlet in Hong Kong is willing to miss today's premiere of "Die Hard".

The reporter from Ming Pao Weekly held his camera and took pictures frantically, capturing all the stars who just walked the red carpet.

"It's fine if Shaw Brothers doesn't come. After all, they are old rivals. They can't bear to see Golden Harvest succeed and break into Hollywood again."

"But why are there so few people coming from Cinema City? It seems that we only see Huang Baiming and Mecca?"

"I heard that Xu Ke and Shi Nansheng went to Shanghai to prepare for the filming of the second part of Huang Feihong. As for the others..."

Before the Oriental Daily reporter could finish his words, a violent commotion suddenly broke out at the scene.

Fang Yan, Pan Yaoming, Li Zhi and others got out of the car and walked on the red carpet amid the flashing lights.

A bunch of reporters immediately went crazy and rushed forward, asking all kinds of tricky questions, some of which were even irrelevant to the movie.

"Mr. Fang, are you the author of Ghost Blows Out the Light?"

"As the editor-in-chief of Hong Kong Joint Publishing Company, what do you think of the recent criticism of your book Ghost Blows Out the Light by Ni Xu and others?"

“I wonder when the physical book of the second part of “Ghost Blows Out the Light” will be published? Will there be any sequels published in the future?”

"........."

Faced with the bombardment of questions, Fang Yan gave Pan Yaoming a wink. This was also the reason why he brought Pan Yaoming to the premiere.

"Everyone, everyone, I am the editor-in-chief of Ghost Blows Out the Light, responsible for the connection, liaison and guidance of Ghost Blows Out the Light."

As soon as Pan Yaoming introduced himself, he immediately attracted the attention of many media outlets.

After all, in the debate with Ni Xu and others, Pan Yaoming was the main general. He was the first to put forward the argument that "Wei Sili is pseudo-science fiction". Now that he has revealed that he is the editor-in-chief of "Ghost Blows Out the Light", it is hard not to ask questions related to "Ghost Blows Out the Light".

Coincidentally, Fang Yan and Pan Yaoming had anticipated this and so they said what they had prepared in advance.

"As for who the author of Ghost Blows Out the Light is, due to the author's personal privacy requirements, we have no comment for the time being."

"But I can announce a more important news to you on behalf of the author and Hong Kong Joint Publishing Company."

"That is, the author of Ghost Blows Out the Light intends to authorize the film and television adaptation rights to Golden Harvest, and cooperate with Golden Harvest to develop the Ghost Blows Out the Light series of films, and initially considers letting Cheng Long play 'Hu Bayi' and letting Lin Qingxia play 'Shirley Yang'..."

As soon as these words were spoken, there was an uproar at the scene, and the media on both sides of the red carpet were shocked by this astonishing news.

He immediately put aside the question of "Who is the author of "Ghost Blows Out the Light"?" and impatiently asked Fang Yan and Pan Yaoming related questions.

Fortunately, with the protection of security guards maintaining order, Fang Yan, Li Zhi and others quickly walked into the lobby of the cinema.

"Fang Sheng!"

Zou Wenhuai, He Guanchang, Cheng Long and others had obviously been waiting for a long time, and their faces were filled with enthusiasm. (End of this chapter)