Big names rise

"It's normal for them to react slowly. People need to watch English subtitles." Jeff took it for granted. The movie uses the original Chinese soundtrack. For foreign audiences, they can only understand the plot through English subtitles, and North American audiences have never liked to watch subtitles. , it is not difficult to understand why there are so many super classic movies in the world, and the box office in North America is not too high. Language is a big problem, and the story told in "Zibuyu" is relatively difficult for North American audiences. Novelty, never seen before, so inevitably a little dull.

When He Mu first filmed "Zi Bu Yu", he was interested in the global market, so in the film, the camera language is more than pure language narrative, and the focus is more on the film's spectacle and exquisite pictures, which reduces some difficulties in understanding. Fung's comedy, which relies heavily on dialogue to promote the development of the plot, will make the scalp tingle for foreigners.

Jeff intends to win the North American copyright of "Zi Bu Yu", but after thinking about it, he still gives up. It is still difficult for Rubik's Cube to distribute films on a medium scale. Originally, foreign language films are not easy to achieve results. It would be even more in vain for such a good movie, and Chinese movies have not been doing very well in the North American market in recent years. Whether "Zi Bu Yu" can catch the pulse of Hollywood, even he, an old distributor, is hard to say. Maybe even he himself has to pay for it.Jeff’s suggestion to He Mu is that if possible, it’s best to sell the film to those big film companies, or at least to those well-known independent film studios with distribution capabilities, such as Lionsgate and Summit, even if this time they eat a little Lost, as long as the fame is established, the second and third parts will be able to earn back all of it.

The two were talking.A short Asian came over to He Mu. He Mu recognized at a glance that he was a Japanese. The Japanese introduced himself to He Mu in English.It turned out that he was Oda Ikeuchi, the director of Sony Pictures Entertainment Co., Ltd. who was in charge of purchasing the films for this Toronto Film Festival, and he took a fancy to He Mu's "Silent Words".

Sony Pictures Entertainment (spe) is a subsidiary of Sony (USA) Co., Ltd., and Sony (USA) Co., Ltd. is a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of Japan, which is equivalent to Sony Pictures Entertainment being a subcompany of Sony Corporation of Japan, even if it is only a subcompany , but Sony Pictures Entertainment still has great energy. In 1989, it spent $60 billion to acquire Columbia Pictures. In 2004, it bought the MGM film company for US$50 billion, with two major Hollywood studios in hand, making Sony the number one film company in the world.In addition, Sony Pictures Entertainment also owns Sony Classical Pictures, Samsung Pictures, Sony Online Entertainment, axn TV network and other companies, and is a well-deserved global film and television media giant.

Sony Pictures Entertainment is mainly engaged in film and television production and distribution, and has global distribution capabilities.He has released the world's best-selling movies such as the "Men in Black" series, the "Spider-Man" series, and "007: Quantum of Solace".Its strength does not need to be questioned at all, and it is much stronger than the Lions Gate and Focus mentioned by Jeff.

Oda Ikeuchi came up and first introduced himself and Sony Pictures Entertainment behind him, and then explained his intentions. He was shocked after watching "Zi Bu Yu" just now. He is also Asian and deeply influenced by Chinese culture. For Japanese, the story of "Zibuyu" is not difficult for him to understand. The most important thing is that Oda Ikeuchi has read the original manga of "Zibuyu".like very much.Because of the name translation, Oda Ike Uchirai did not link this movie called "i-see, i-don`t-say" with that manga before.He came here entirely because of He Mu's influence in Asia, and it is worth paying attention to, and he has nothing else to do today, so he came here to join in the fun. After a look, he knew that He Muyong's story was recently in Japan. The very popular Chinese cartoonist Xia Da is serializing "Zi Bu Yu" in "Ultra Jump" magazine. The comics are already excellent, but in the hands of He Mu, the original loose stories have become a very A heart-catching movie, it can be said that this is the most comfortable movie-watching experience in Oda Pond since coming to Toronto.

As a film distributor with rich experience and an astonishing number of films, and has a long life experience in Japan and the United States, Oda Ikeuchi is very optimistic about "Zi Bu Yu", the style of this film is very similar to the classic of Master Hayao Miyazaki The most famous work "My Neighbor Totoro" is an adventure experienced by a girl after she first arrived in a small town. It seems to be interspersed in two different worlds. No matter how cruel and cruel the real world is, that world is always so beautiful and innocent, which makes people watch There is a faint warm feeling afterward.

"He Mujun, I hope that Sony can get the distribution rights of "Zibuyu" outside of mainland China. I can pay 500 million US dollars for the price!" Although He Mu is a big star and has a relatively high reputation in Asia, he is a new director after all, and the main actors are a group of teenagers. Such a film cannot be compared with those Chinese blockbusters.Sony is considered to be a company that is very active in the copyright transaction of Chinese-language movies. Before that, Sony Classics, a subsidiary of Sony, bought the copyrights of Zhang Yimou's "House of Flying Daggers" and "Full City with the Golden Armor" at a high price. The price of the land rights is 2250 million US dollars, and it is said that "Golden Armor" is even higher.

Sony was able to spend so much money on the film all because of Zhang Yimou's global fame and influence and the film's strong cast, but even so, it took great risks. The box office couldn't recover the high buyout price at all, and it still relied on DVDs It was only through the sale of rights to TV stations that the shortfall was slowly filled.

Those managers who buy films for the company also depend on their performance. If the box office of "Zi Bu Yu" is many times the purchase price, then his bonus will be very generous, so Oda Ikeuchi is unlikely to give too high a price , but will not be mentally handicapped to think that others are mentally handicapped, and insult other people's IQ with a very low price.

Oda Ikeuchi's price of 500 million US dollars is considered very high. You must know that although he is talking about the global distribution rights, but with the identity of the Chinese film "Zibuyu", the content of the story, and the cast of actors , the three most promising markets are Japan, North America, and Hong Kong, which may account for the vast majority of "Zibuyu"'s overseas box office.

Among them, the capacity of the Hong Kong market is too small, and since the end of the golden age of Hong Kong movies, Hollywood movies have become popular, so I am afraid that "Zibuyu" will not be able to do much.

Although in the Japanese market last year, two "Red Cliffs" added luster to Chinese-language films and won more than 10 billion (yen) at the box office. The box office is higher than that of the mainland, and the sales of DVDs far exceed those of the mainland, but this is also due to the glory of the theme , the Japanese love the Three Kingdoms too much. Except for this movie that swept Japan, the rest of the Chinese movies did not perform too well in Japan. The days when Jackie Chan could make a box office of 4.3 billion (yen) for any action movie are gone. It’s back, and now it’s worth hundreds of millions, and in recent years, the Chinese-language films that have grossed over 6.38 million in Japan are basically costume fantasy films ("The Promise" 4.95 million), war films ("Ink Attack" 2.4 million), action movies ("Huo Yuanjia" 147 million) or works of international famous directors ("Lust, Caution" 304 million), He Mu's highly rated "One Shot [-]" also has nearly [-] million in Japan box office, but there is no successful precedent for a Chinese-language film like "Zi Bu Yu", because there have been no Chinese-language films of this type before, but there are many similar successful cases in Japanese films, such as "My Neighbor Totoro", " "Spirited Away" ([-] billion), in terms of subject matter, they are all similar, and the Japanese market is also Oda Ikeuchi's favorite.

In the U.S. market, after the trend of Chinese-language blockbuster movies triggered by "Hero" and "House of Flying Daggers" faded, the box office of Chinese-language movies in this land was very embarrassing. The highly anticipated "Golden Armor in the City" only had a box office of more than 600 million US dollars. The box office of "Yangtze River No. 20" alone was more than 7 yuan, which was enough to give Sony a blow. Red Cliff is finished, but He Mu's niche literary film "One Shot 147" has become the highest-grossing Chinese-language film in North America in the past two years because of its good box office in Canada, with more than 300 million, which is long gone The glory of the year.

Therefore, Oda Ikeuchi didn't have much hope for the North American market. If it weren't for "Lengxin" starring He Mu showing signs of becoming popular, the price would definitely be lower. He was willing to spend 500 million mainly because he wanted to gamble on the Japanese box office. .

500 million US dollars, more than 3000 million yuan, is almost the production cost of "Zi Bu Yu". In terms of the current worldwide reputation and box office scale of Chinese films, this is definitely high. If He Mu gritted his teeth and stomped his feet, If he sells the film to Sony, then he will no longer have the pressure to recover the cost. In the future, the share of the domestic box office will be the company's pure profit. Even if it only sells 1000 million, the company will still make money. If you don't have much confidence in your own film , I am afraid that I have rushed to agree.

"Sorry, just now Mr. Stark from Rubik's Cube Films offered 600 million US dollars, and he only wants the copyright in Japan and the United States." He Mu wanted to bet that Oda was very optimistic about "Zi Bu Yu", so He will not be scared away by the high price He Mu fabricated.

Jeff and He Mu cooperated well. As soon as He Mu finished speaking, he said dissatisfiedly to He Mu, "Mr. Wood, how could you leak my reserve price? This is not what a partner should do."

"I'm sorry Mr. Stark, I just hope that Mr. Oda can get out of trouble. I believe "Zi Bu Yu" will belong to you. After all, our previous cooperation has been very satisfactory." He Mu explained.

Oda looked at the two people who sang together, and fell into a dilemma... (To be continued...)

ps: [ps: first update, please correct it: the director of "The Piano of Steel" is Zhang Meng, and it was wrongly written as Wang Meng, please make a statement~]