Entertainment upstart

Chapter 670 Returning to China, Feeling Good

Although he was teased about that aspect, the filming over there was ready, and Zhou Xia had no time to worry about it, so he hurried over to participate in the filming.

Due to the increase or decrease of characters in the third part of "The Expendables", both the scenes and the story line began to shift towards Jennifer and Zhou Xia, paving the way for greater adjustments in the next part.

After all, kung fu superstars such as Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Mel Gibson, and Jet Li are all old, and their action performances are not as good as they were at their peak, nor are they as appealing as before.

Just relying on feelings to attract fans, the mediocre box office performance of the first two films has proved this point.

Moreover, many newspapers in the United States have also commented on this.

The New York Times believes that the audience has long since lost interest in this group of veteran stars, and the works they have gathered to play their remaining interest have already exhausted the audience's goodwill.

"Rolling Stone" magazine said: It's time to put an end to this brain-dead series of movies.

"Austin Chronicle" commented: The ultimate significance of this movie is that when the audience finally puts Rocky, Terminator, Indiana Jones, Mad Max, Blade Runner, Zorro, Hercules and Very Human Trafficker in the Together, discoveries simply demonstrate the truth that the sum is less than the parts.

In addition, the "Hollywood Reporter" even commented: the task was completed without imagination, the action scenes were in a traditional style, and it was only about the number of explosions, not the details of execution. There were too many explosion scenes, making the whole film No other highlights!

These comments are very pertinent, pointing out the shortcomings of the "Expendable Squad" series of movies, so now this third movie gives Zhou Xia and Jenferni more roles, and it is also trying to attract younger new audiences. A new growth point for the series.

Although the roles of the eldest cousin Jenny and Zhou Xia have been added, the main plot of the story has not changed much.

The story begins with the old members of the Death Squad led by Barney first rescuing a black teammate, and then driving a train into the prison, destroying the enemy's base, and then the Death Squad faced the dangerous task of the former teammate "Stonebanks".

In order to defeat powerful enemies, Barney recruited young newcomers, deleted other new characters, and only added Jenferne "Luna" and the Spanish "Speed ​​Car".

This can be regarded as injecting new blood into the Death Squad, and it can also be regarded as the gathering of all members in the tavern at the end of the film to sing, indicating the meaning of the transition from old to new.

Zhou Hua played by Zhou Xia and Luna played by Jennifer will also have feelings in the battle, and finally leave a foreshadowing of coming together, so if the third part is successful, then the fourth story will have more possibilities.

After shooting in the United States, the film also had a large number of shots shot in Romania and Bulgaria.

When filming "The Expendables 2", the railway built in Bulgaria will still come in handy, and the scene of driving the train into the prison will be filmed there.

Filming in the U.S. is extremely busy, and we still have to continue filming on Saturdays and Sundays. Of course, the holidays have higher pay, and only statutory holidays will we have holidays and stop work.

Zhou Xia didn't meet any statutory holidays, so it was impossible to go to USC to give a speech, but he still discussed with Sophia another time, and he will give a speech when his play is finished.

And after Liu Yufei came to the United States, Zhou Xia didn't spend any other time with her except that they could get along when they went back after filming at night.

A month is not too long or too short.

In the last scene, after the whole task was over, Stallone and the old guys around the table looked at the young people's table where Zhou Xia and Jenny were, and said to the old guys, "You used to be the best, It may be true now, but it will definitely not be in the future." It means that it is inevitable for the older generation to retreat behind the scenes.

The old Schwarzenegger, who was full of vicissitudes, could only smoke a cigar and fly the plane to help him. Yin Yang, played by Li Lianjie, was with him, and he was considered to quit the Death Squad and serve as an assistant in the back.

Things like feelings are worthless after being sold once, not to mention that the old guys have already sold one for the third time at the rate of two years!
In "The Expendables 3", the identity plate hanging in the cabin appeared many times. It is a symbol of the death squads who died in the past operations, just like those kung fu stars who disappeared on the big screen, reminding them of their past. The glory, but it has all become the past.

Everything shows that long before Zhou Xia proposed that "The Expendables 3" should invite young female stars with more box office appeal to participate, Stallone, the producer, and a group of screenwriters have long been thinking about this issue.
So in the next "The Expendables 4", the fathers will be the ones to release the mission, and the work of charging into the battle will be left to the young and middle-aged backbones such as Zhou Xia, Jennifer, and Speed, which is an inevitable choice.

Otherwise, the box office and reputation of the next film may be even worse.

The filming of "The Expendables 3" ended, Zhou Xia was not in a hurry to return to China, and was invited by Sophia to give a speech at USC.

"Starting Line" has already applied for Oscars. After all, it is a foreign language film. If it can be recognized by more American filmmakers, it will definitely help the awards.

After the trip to Southern California ended, Zhou Xia went to Industrial Light & Magic to supervise the post-production of "Sword of Heaven". It was not until November 20th that he returned to China without delay.

In three more days, the Golden Horse Awards Ceremony will start, and the time is just right when I return to China for a short rest.

The plane flew over the Pacific Ocean for nearly a day, and after landing at Pudong Airport, Zhou Xia got out of the airport and got in the company car to pick him up, feeling a burst of relief all over his body.

After staying in the United States for more than a month, I babbled in English all day long. I really missed the environment where I could speak my mother tongue freely.

But the reason why he is in a better mood is that "Starting Line" has been released for 20 days a month, and the box office has already exceeded 12 billion, and with the arrival of the Golden Horse Awards, the box office has rebounded recently, with an increase of about 2000 million per day.

Zhou Xia never thought of this!

In his estimation, "Starting Line" is a literary film, even if it takes a long time, it is estimated that the box office will be between 7 million and 10 billion.

In addition, the just-released "Zodiac", because Zhou Xia and Erdi starred, and Xia Hua Film and Television's stronger announcement, the box office is also 8.4 million higher than the 3 million in that time and space!
The two National Day films of Xiahua Film and Television have a combined box office of nearly 25 billion, which once again proves that the films produced by Xiahua Investment still have a high rate of return.

And for the 25 billion box office, the other film and television companies that were hostile to Xia Hua lost as much as 5 million in box office revenue because they couldn't show it later.

Not to mention, not being able to show Xia Hua's films in the future will cause more long-term losses to their theaters.

Just like buying and selling goods in a supermarket, you are afraid that you will lack some popular products that are widely acclaimed. If not, then customers will definitely go to other supermarkets, and even abandon this supermarket completely in the future and only shop in other supermarkets.

Once a customer forms a shopping habit, it will be difficult to recover after the loss. Such a large loss has forced these companies to find middlemen one after another to communicate with Xiahua Film and Television.

But Zhou Xia refused. If he didn't agree to the conditions he raised earlier, then there was no talk.

(End of this chapter)