Literary Master 1978.

Chapter 470: Only One Million or Eight Hundred Thousand Dollars
"What's the idea?" Lin Chaoyang asked.

"Don't you and my sister know a lot of celebrities in Hong Kong? Can we invite a few celebrities to the anniversary celebration of the clothing store next year?"

Lin Chaoyang looked at Du Feng in surprise. He didn't expect that he would come up with such an idea.

Mainland stars can’t satisfy you now, right? You have to invite stars from Hong Kong.

"It's a good idea, but it's too impractical."

"Why?" Du Feng was puzzled.

It is true that the fame of many Hong Kong and Taiwan stars spread to China in the 1980s, but their works did not become very popular. The trend of chasing after Hong Kong and Taiwan stars in China only started in the late 1980s.

If we talk about the Hong Kong and Taiwan stars who had the greatest influence in mainland China in the early to mid-1980s, it was actually the singers who had much more influence than the movie stars, and their works were more familiar to people.

For example, Teresa Teng, Luo Dayou, Feng Feifei...

But the problem is that many people may have heard their songs but may not have met them in person, so it is difficult to create a sensation by inviting these people.

Moreover, it is not certain that you can invite her even if you spend money. Even if you can, the cost will be much higher than that of inviting mainland movie stars like Liu Xiaoqing, so it is not cost-effective at all.

Du Feng was so focused on making a big move that he ignored the actual feasibility.

“Don’t even think about Hong Kong and Taiwan stars in the next one or two years. Just focus on the Spring Festival Gala and invite whoever is popular.

In recent years, the Spring Festival Gala has always invited unknown singers from Hong Kong and Taiwan. You can contact them. The effect will definitely not be worse than inviting those real Hong Kong and Taiwan stars."

Lin Chaoyang remembered that Fei Xiang would be performing on the Spring Festival Gala in a few months. Wouldn't it be more cost-effective to invite him than to invite those stars from far away?

The effect was absolutely sensational, and the young girls and wives at the scene were probably so excited that they fainted.

After Lin Chaoyang's persuasion, Du Feng gave up the idea of ​​inviting Hong Kong and Taiwan stars, "Okay, then I'll invite those who perform at the Spring Festival Gala."

At noon, Lin Erchun came back early one day. Du Feng saw that he was in a hurry and couldn't help asking:
"Uncle, you came back early today!"

"Haha, today is the house-changing meeting. The government has made some kind of computer to change houses, which is much faster than before."

As mentioned earlier, house-changing is a last resort for Yanjing residents to solve the inconvenience of going to work or school or to improve housing conditions. It is usually a voluntary negotiation between the two parties.

In order to facilitate citizens, Yanjing City began to organize house exchanges among residents as early as the 1956s. In , a special allocation department was established in the Housing Authority as a dedicated agency for house exchange.

By the 82s, Yanjing's population continued to grow and housing shortages further intensified. Starting in , the Housing Authority held housing exchange conferences at the Working People's Cultural Palace.

Residents and enterprises in the eight districts of Dongcheng, Xicheng, Xuanwu, Chongwen, Haidian, Chaoyang, Fengtai and Shijingshan can exchange houses through the house exchange conference.

The house-exchange conference was warmly welcomed by the citizens of Yanjing. Although housing prices seem to be not expensive nowadays, they are still out of reach for the vast majority of the working class.

On the other hand, the supply of commercial housing is pitifully small, and everyone only has one house. The property rights of many houses are still public, so it is difficult to have the opportunity to change houses.

In 1982, the first housing exchange conference attracted more than 7.5 residents, of which 1368 households were replaced.

By last year, this number soared to 3151 households. And this is only a small part of the annual house-changing in Yanjing. Last year, more than 37000 households in Yanjing changed houses.

Originally, the matter of house-changing had nothing to do with Lin Erchun. It was when he went to watch the house-changing conference two years ago that he discovered a business opportunity.

Changing houses is all about going to work, going to school, and living in a spacious place.

However, the proportion of residents who can change their housing after participating in the house-exchange conference every year is very low, and they have a real need to improve their housing. These people are all potential rental customers of Lin Erchun.

A room-changing conference is enough to keep Lin Erchun and his men busy for half a month.

Comrade Lao Lin is no longer the lone commander he used to be. He now has several old men and women under his command.

Du Feng chatted with Lin Erchun for a while and complimented him: "You really know how to make money!"

"Hey, it doesn't matter whether you make money or not, just find something to do for yourself."

Lin Erchun spoke modestly, but he couldn't hide the pride in his eyes.

After lunch, Du Feng was about to say goodbye when Lin Chaoyang suddenly remembered and said, "By the way, your sister asked you to buy more black windbreakers."

"Black windbreaker? What are you doing in that thing?"

"You'll know in two months."

There is a time lag between the pirated videotapes in the mainland and Hong Kong. Many videos may take three to four months at the fastest, or half a year or a year to be transmitted to the mainland.

Given the popularity of "A Better Tomorrow", this speed may be much earlier.

After a few more days, the autumn wind gradually became bleak, and winter was approaching in Yanjing.

Liang Zuo suddenly ran to Lin Chaoyang's house and said that he wanted to invite him to a class reunion, and Lin Chaoyang happily went.

After getting married, Liang Zuo lived in a large courtyard in Xinxian Hutong, Dongcheng District. To enter the hutong, one had to pass through a public toilet, and the smell was not very pleasant even in winter. This is also the norm in most hutongs in Yanjing today.

After entering the house, Li Tong had just arrived. Liang Zuo talked to the two of them for a while, then got up and went outside to the bathroom.

At this time, Wang Xiaoping came and brought a familiar face who had not been seen for a long time.

"Xiao Cha!" Li Tong shouted excitedly.

Everyone greeted each other. Liang Zuo came back and wanted to shake hands with Cha Jianying when he saw him. Wang Xiaoping slapped his hand away in disgust.

"Didn't you just go to the bathroom?"

"Then let's follow American customs."

Liang Zuo smiled and hugged Cha Jianying.

After a while, two or three more people came from Liang Zuo's family, and finally everyone was there.

Lin Chaoyang only realized after listening to everyone's conversation that the main purpose of today's gathering was to welcome Cha Jianying back to China.

When they were at Yanjing University, Lin Chaoyang and Cha Jianying were not very familiar with each other. When they met, they just greeted each other politely, but Cha Jianying looked at him twice.

Cha Jianying went to the United States to study in 81, and it has been five years since then.

During this period, she first obtained a master's degree in English from the University of South Carolina in the United States, and then studied comparative literature at Columbia University and obtained her second master's degree.

After graduating this year, she was hired by The New York Times. She came back this time because The New York Times decided to send her back to work in the Yenching office.

When talking about work, it is inevitable to talk about salary. When everyone heard Cha Jianying say that her salary was 1800 US dollars, they were all dumbfounded.

1800 US dollars, converted into RMB, is 6000 RMB!
"Xiao Cha, you made the right decision to study abroad. Your annual salary is enough for us to earn in a lifetime." Wang Xiaoping's tone was full of envy.

Among the class of 77 of the Chinese Department of Yan University, not many decided to study abroad when they graduated. After all, studying abroad at one’s own expense was just beginning at that time.

Many people are unsure about going to study abroad in a foreign country.

In the past two years, there are more and more people studying abroad, both at their own expense and at government expense. Even people like Wang Xiaoping who have been working for a few years are eager to try, not to mention the successful example of Cha Jianying.

With the identity of a "sea turtle", Cha Jianying became the focus of this gathering.

She talked to everyone about her experiences studying and living in the United States over the past few years, and everyone who listened was filled with envy.

"You should really go to the United States if you have the chance. It is really different from China."

There was a hint of superiority in Cha Jianying's words, but he was still restrained.

Considering the economic gap and social development between China and the United States in the 1980s, it was normal for her to have such a sense of superiority.

"It's not as easy as you say! There were only a few of you who decided to study abroad. Now everyone is getting married and having children, so it's even more impossible," said Wang Xiaoping.

Liang Zuo smiled and said, "Xiaoping, you might as well just click my name."

"You're not the only one getting married and having kids."

"Who else? Li Tong, my master... Never mind. My master doesn't count. He can go abroad anytime he wants. He has settled in Hong Kong."

Lin Chaoyang quickly said, "That's not true. Don't make up rumors about me. I'm just a guest in Hong Kong. Aren't I sitting here with you guys now?"

"What about my master's wife?" Liang Zuo asked him.

"She lost her job and had no choice but to start her own business."

Wang Xiaoping joked: "We also want this kind of opportunity to go into the sea helplessly."

While several people were telling jokes to each other, Cha Jianying's eyes lingered on Lin Chaoyang with interest.

She stayed in the United States for several years, but she never lost communication with China and always kept in touch.

When she corresponded with her classmates, she would occasionally talk about Lin Chaoyang. She knew that his fame in recent years had become greater than before. What surprised her even more was in June this year.

She received a letter from Wang Xiaoping in China saying that the film written by Lin Chaoyang won the grand prize at the Cannes Film Festival.

Cha Jianying was very surprised to hear the news. She usually didn't pay much attention to entertainment news, so she made a point to check it out and indeed found the award information for "The Truman Show". She was a little surprised at the time.

Because none of Lin Chaoyang's works had been adapted and released when she went abroad to study, in her impression Lin Chaoyang was just a writer. Unexpectedly, a few years later he had won major awards at foreign film festivals.

What surprised Cha Jianying even more was that a few days later, she actually saw a movie poster for "The Truman Show" in front of a movie theater on a street in New York.

"The Truman Show" is going to be released in the United States?
Out of curiosity, Cha Jianying went to watch the film within the first few days of its release. It was unexpectedly good and left a lasting impression.

At that time, Cha Jianying was still thinking in his heart, no wonder it could win three awards at the Cannes Film Festival.

A few days later, Cha Jianying found that many of his American classmates and even professors had watched this movie.

This phenomenon was completely beyond Cha Jianying's expectations. In her impression, Americans rarely watched foreign films, and Hong Kong films only had a market in Chinatown.

Cha Jianying couldn't help but talk to the classmates around him, and only then did he realize that the scale of the release of "The Truman Show" in the United States was not small, at least it was definitely much larger than those Hong Kong kung fu movies that were only shown in Chinatown.

In the movie, Truman's desperate attempt to escape from Utopia and her pursuit of freedom were highly praised by her classmates.

Only then did Cha Jianying realize that the popularity of "The Truman Show" in the United States was largely due to the values ​​of the film.

Ke Cha Jianying thought carefully about the plot of the movie and felt that Americans might have only seen the four words "pursuit of freedom" but failed to see the absurdity and irony behind the movie.

Cha Jianying even asked her classmates to send her a copy of the original novel of "The Truman Show". After reading the novel, she became more certain of her feelings and began to explain the hidden meanings in the movie and novel to her classmates.

Whenever someone questions her popular science, Cha Jianying would say, "You know, the screenwriter of this movie and the author of the original novel are my friends. We studied in the same classroom back then!"

At this time, those doubts would immediately disappear. This worked every time, allowing her, who had always been an unknown figure in school in the past few years, to become the center of attention a few times.

"When The Truman Show was released in the United States, I went to see it. It was well written and well filmed," Cha Jianying praised.

Lin Chaoyang thanked him, but before he could say anything, several people around him started asking questions.

“Is The Truman Show still being shown in the US?”

In this era without the Internet, the dissemination of information was greatly limited.

"Yes, the box office was pretty good. I remember it was almost breaking 10 million US dollars," said Cha Jianying.

Everyone was shocked when they heard this. "Ten million dollars? My God!"

Liang Zuo stared at Lin Chaoyang with shining eyes, "Master, how much of the 10 million dollars did you get?"

Everyone's eyes were also fixed on Lin Chaoyang.

"This kind of movie is released after the overseas copyright is bought out. The box office revenue has nothing to do with me."

Everyone couldn't help but feel disappointed when they heard this, "It doesn't matter!"

At this time, Cha Jianying asked, "The box office doesn't matter, and the copyright buyout price doesn't matter either?"

Her question made everyone's attention focus on Lin Chaoyang again.

"It's about one tenth of the relationship." Lin Chaoyang said truthfully. Wang Xiaoping asked curiously, "How much is one tenth?"

"It's about one million to eight hundred thousand dollars."

Everyone couldn't help but gasp.

One million and eight hundred thousand dollars?

The impact of this was much greater than Cha Jianying's monthly salary of 1,800 yuan. Everyone present knew before that Lin Chaoyang's royalties for writing books were very high, but no matter how high the royalties were, they were always within everyone's cognitive range.

But nowadays, movies adapted from novels are so profitable, which is really beyond everyone's understanding.

Everyone calmed down for a while before Liang Zuo murmured, "No wonder you ran to Hong Kong, Master. If it were me, I wouldn't bring you back."

"It's not as exaggerated as you think. The Truman Show made so much money because it won an award at the Cannes Film Festival. It's an isolated case."

Liang Zuo shouted, "That's one million dollars. It's enough for just this once in a lifetime. This much money is enough for my grandchildren to spend!"

Everyone couldn't help but burst into laughter.

After laughing, when everyone looked at Lin Chaoyang again, it was difficult for them to look at him as an equal. Unconsciously, they began to look up to him.

Even Cha Jianying, who had just returned from the United States and was somewhat arrogant, was like this.

Seeing this, Lin Chaoyang had no choice but to guide everyone to change the topic and started to care about everyone's personal lives.

Among the people present today, the only two who are not married are Cha Jianying and Wang Xiaoping.

Li Tong asked Wang Xiaoping if she had a boyfriend, and she said no.

"We haven't talked about it yet, are you planning to be an old maid?" Li Tong said sarcastically.

Wang Xiaoping glared at him and said, "You're a policeman, but you're quite nosy!"

"How about I introduce one to you?" Li Tong didn't care about her tone, and instead planned to be a matchmaker.

"No need." Wang Xiaoping said firmly.

Everyone sensed something was amiss and after careful questioning, they finally pried Wang Xiaoping open her mouth. It turned out that she had been dating a young man from the Yanjing Television Studio since last year.

"Just talk about it, why are you hiding anything from us?" Cha Jianying complained.

Wang Xiaoping said with a blushing face: "They are very harsh in their words. Who knows how they will make fun of me?"

Several other people were also shot while lying down, shouting that it was injustice.

We got together after lunch and chatted until the evening.

Liang Zuo was preparing to go eat, and Li Tong shouted "Donglaishun", which won everyone's unanimous approval.

The Crown driven by Lin Chaoyang had attracted a lot of attention at Liang Zuo's wedding two years ago. It could carry four people, but because there were female comrades, everyone couldn't squeeze in, so three people had to go by bicycle.

As soon as winter came, Donglaishun's business was booming, and it was packed with people, and everyone had a lively meal together.

After dinner, Liang Zuo arranged for them to go watch "The Truman Show" together.

It has been more than half a month since the release of this movie. Although it was affected by pirated videotapes before, it is still a movie that won a grand prize at the Cannes Film Festival.

"The Truman Show" is still warmly welcomed by many movie fans, especially book lovers and literary young people, who praised the movie to the sky.

The film itself is of excellent quality, has the aura of winning awards, and has a wave of loyal fans following it.

After the release of "The Truman Show", a wave of movie-watching quickly emerged. This wave was different from the nationwide wave of movie-watching like "The Garland on the Mountain". It was a bit of formalism in pursuing fashion and style.

It's a bit like the feeling of literary young people in later generations showing off in a cafe with a book by a writer like Marcel Proust.

Coming out of the cinema, Liang Zuo exclaimed: "It's such a great film!"

In fact, most of them watched this movie more than once, and they all agreed with Liang Zuo's evaluation.

This may be because the film won an award, but a considerable part of it is also due to the recognition from the heart.

"I remember there was quite a lot of debate after The Truman Show was published, but it seems there has been no movement recently."

There was a hint of sarcasm in Li Tong's tone.

"It's not that there is no movement, it's mainly that there is no more trouble.

Many critics previously said that the content of "The Truman Show" was out of touch with reality. But when it was made into a movie, foreigners liked it and it even won awards, which really slapped them in the face.

Now that the movie is released, images can express it more directly than words.

The imagination displayed in "The Truman Show" does indeed surpass the thinking of ordinary people, but what it talks about is very practical.

Facts speak louder than words, what else can they say?"

Liang Zuo is a brainless fan of Lin Chaoyang. He feels extremely relieved when he sees that all the critics who once criticized "The Truman Show" have become silent.

"Recently, there seem to be more magazine reviews praising The Truman Show than before."

Wang Xiaoping said something that confirmed Liang Zuo's words, and everyone laughed.

After talking about the movie, time was up and everyone prepared to say goodbye.

Zha Jianying suddenly said to Lin Chaoyang: "Chaoyang, if you have time later, can I arrange an interview with you?"

Lin Chaoyang hesitated for a moment and said, "Okay."

After everyone separated, Cha Jianying and Wang Xiaoping stood together, and the two of them were going home together.

Wang Xiaoping saw that Zha Jianying was still looking at the direction of Lin Chaoyang's taillights and asked, "What are you looking at?"

"Nothing, I just think he has changed a lot." Cha Jianying's eyes were a little complicated.

"Big? Not bad. Wasn't he famous in school?"

Wang Xiaoping thought back to the time when he was in school. Because Lin Chaoyang didn't like Misty Poetry, Cha Jianying had a lot of opinions about him.

The words came to her lips, but she held them back.

"But some things are really unexpected. How do you think he maintains such strong creative energy? Not only novels, but also scripts are so well written."

Wang Xiaoping's tone was full of envy and admiration.

She has been writing since she was in school. After graduation, she was assigned to work as an editor at People's Literature, where she became a colleague of Tao Yushu.

Unfortunately, he didn't achieve much as a writer or editor, so she knew better the talent and dedication Lin Chaoyang needed to achieve his current success.

Cha Jianying's lips moved, but in the end he said nothing.

For some people, acknowledging the excellence of others is equivalent to making them acknowledge their own shortcomings.

On the second day after the beginning of winter, Lin Chaoyang brought his baby back to Hong Kong.

After not seeing each other for more than half a month, both kids miss their mom a little.

After putting both children to sleep at night, Tao Yushu and Lin Chaoyang sat on the balcony to enjoy the night view of Victoria Harbour.

The temperature in Yanjing is now below zero, but the temperature in Hong Kong is still around 22 or 23 degrees, and the evening breeze is intoxicating.

"'The Romance of the Condor Heroes' is scheduled to be released the day after tomorrow. Golden Harvest initially wanted us to compete with Cinema City's 'Heroes'.

I am not worried about follow-up films like "Heroes' Story", but we can't just let Golden Harvest manipulate us like this. We are not their satellite company.

I said that at worst we can just go to Shaw and Shuangnan Line. Anyway, the market is not very hot during this period, so it doesn’t make any difference whether we go earlier or later.

Seeing my tough attitude, they moved "Youth in Tide" to December."

Lin Chaoyang looked at Tao Yushu with gentle eyes and asked, "Are you angry?"

Tao Yushu looked relaxed, "There's nothing to be angry about, it's all business. Golden Harvest just wanted to avoid risks. They only invested 200 million in The Romantic Comedy, but 500 million in Youth."

"Golden Harvest controls the cinema chain, which means they have the initiative. This kind of thing will definitely happen in the future. For us, the best way right now is to get closer to Silver Metro and Shaw Brothers."

Tao Yushu nodded and said, "Michael has been in contact with me recently and wants to work with you again."

Lin Chaoyang asked with a smile: "Has he finished enjoying the applause?"

Since Xu Guanwen returned home with honors, he has been participating in endless activities every day, not only in Hong Kong, but also in Taiwan, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore...

With the popularity of "The Truman Show", he has traveled to various countries in East Asia and Southeast Asia in the past few months and has become extremely famous.

"The flowers and applause will eventually come to an end. It has been half a year. He said he has received many scripts in the past six months, but he didn't like any of them."

With the success of "The Truman Show", Xu Guanwen naturally looked down upon the crude commercial film scripts popular in Hong Kong.

Winning the Cannes Best Actor award is a great honor, but it is also a shackle for him.

"What Lin needs now is rapid development. We can't put too much energy into art films. We should wait for a while before discussing cooperation."

Tao Yushu held the railing and felt the night breeze. "I thought so too. I plan to wait until "The Romantic Comedy" is released before opening two more movies."

"One is for Wang Jing, what about the other one?"

"I recently met a couple who studied abroad and made a low-budget movie called "Illegal Immigrants" last year, which did well at the box office."

"Mabel Sylvia Chang?"

"Yes. The couple wrote a script, which I think is good. If it can make a profit, they can bring it to our company."

"Have you contacted the director of Cinema City?"

In recent years, Cinema City has been full of talented people, and many well-known directors in later generations came from them.

"There is no connection with the popular stars like Ringo Lam and John Woo. If you poach them, isn't that the same as declaring war on Cinema City?

There is a director named Johnnie To who is very interested in our Lam Group. He shot the third installment of Happy Ghost this year, which did average at the box office, and Cinema City has no plans to give him a movie. "

Ah Du, your sword is so powerful that it can be used by gods and ghosts, Lin Chaoyang thought with some disgust.

Forget it, the company is short of people right now.

Hearing the name Johnnie To, Lin Chaoyang couldn't help but think of the King of Sunglasses. He should be working as a screenwriter at Cinema City now, right?
The Lin family certainly can't afford to support such a scumbag now, so they'll have to wait until they have money in the future.

The couple chatted about company matters and didn't go back to their room to sleep until late at night.

It is already mid-November. The popularity of "A Better Tomorrow" when it was released in Hong Kong has gradually passed, but its influence remains.

Walking down the street, all you see are little guys wearing black windbreakers and holding toothpicks in their mouths.

If nothing unexpected happens, this scene will appear on the streets of many countries and regions in Asia in the near future.

Two months after "A Better Tomorrow" was withdrawn from theaters in Hong Kong, Lam Films finally received the box office revenue settled by Cinema City, including several countries and regions where the film had already ended its screening, including Hong Kong, Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore, etc.

Among them, "A Better Tomorrow" earned NT$1.15 million in Taiwan, which is more than 5500 million Hong Kong dollars when converted into Hong Kong dollars, topping the box office performance of movies in various countries and regions overseas.

In this round of screenings, the total box office of "A Better Tomorrow" reached HK$1.87 million, and the box office share belonging to the producer was HK$8245 million.

According to the investment ratio, Lam Pictures earned nearly HK$2200 million in box office revenue, and its cash flow suddenly became abundant.

In the future, with the overseas release of "A Better Tomorrow", Lin's Pictures will also receive some overseas box office revenue and copyright buyout revenue.

(End of this chapter)