Reborn in 1970, I thrived in Hong Kong.

At noon, fifteen tables were set up in the main hall on the first floor of Hongfu Restaurant, where the entire crew of "72 Tenants," employees of the Hui Brothers Film Company, and senior executives of Phoenix Film Company gathered together.

Li Huai-ren, being generous, personally ordered twelve dishes for today's victory celebration banquet, all of which were hearty dishes:

It has everything: flying in the sky, running on the ground, and swimming in the water, covering land, sea, and air.

The first dish was roast suckling pig, served whole.

The following dishes included steamed grouper, braised chicken with abalone, baked Australian lobster with cheese, and shark fin soup, totaling twelve dishes.

Michael Hui was particularly happy today. This morning, Phoenix Film Company transferred HK$10.5 million, representing the box office revenue from Hong Kong and overseas, to the Hui Brothers Film Company's account.

The feeling of suddenly becoming rich is just so exhilarating!

Without comparison, there's no harm done. Looking at it this way, damn it, how much of the box office revenue did that scoundrel Zou renege on from my three films I made at Golden Harvest?

As a result, Michael Hui drank quite heavily today. Drinking too much makes it easy to get drunk, and once drunk, he desperately tried to express his loyalty to Li Huai-ren.

That evening, Li Huai-ren and Brigitte Lin attended the premiere of "The Big Boss," while Shao Lao-kou and Zou Lao-lai showed up uninvited, just like last time.

When they left, their faces were even darker than before.

The reason is simple: "The House of 72 Tenants" is a Hong Kong street comedy, so its overseas box office is naturally not as high as that of martial arts or kung fu films of the same level.

It's obvious that the two directors were aiming for overseas box office success with "The Big Boss." The production quality is excellent, completely devoid of the rushed and perfunctory feel often found in Hong Kong films.

This is similar to the three of them being classmates, and all of them had previously achieved above-average academic performance.

Suddenly one day, one of them transformed into a top student that the other two could only dream of.

Grandma's legs are damaged. How can we all play happily together in the future?

It has to be said that Shao Lao Kou and Zou Lao Lai have a really sharp eye.

After the release of "The Big Boss," all cinemas in Hong Kong's Phoenix Cinemas were sold out; the same was true in Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asian countries; and Lee Huai-ren's 99 cinemas in shopping malls in Europe and America, under different names, were also sold out.

The film sparked riots when it was released in Thailand, and the government deployed the army to maintain order. Bangkok cinemas showed the film 24 hours a day, and tickets were scalped from 5 baht to 50 baht (on the black market).

After its release in the Philippines, it achieved a record of 120 consecutive days of sold-out screenings in Manila, and President Marcos granted permission for duty-free import of copies (of course, these are all stories for later).

Subsequently, whether in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Southeast Asian countries, or Japan, South Korea, and Europe and the United States, Bruce Lee's iconic movements and sounds of "Ah-da, Ah-da" began to appear on the streets, and more and more people imitated Bruce Lee.

At the same time, the nunchucks produced by Phoenix Hardware & Plastics Factory were in short supply at any cinema showing "The Big Boss".

As a result, a pair of nunchucks quietly appeared on the weapon racks of scoundrels in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Southeast Asian countries, South Korea, and Japan.

Among them, a little boy named Stephen Chow from Hong Kong, who was only about ten years old, was extremely fond of Bruce Lee. He used the money he earned from making movies to watch "The Big Boss" again and again, and he doesn't know how many times he watched it.

He was particularly fascinated by nunchucks and wanted to become Bruce Lee's student.

Every afternoon after school, he would run to Phoenix Film City to play minor roles with a few lines, such as passerby A or passerby B, and ask the crew about Bruce Lee's schedule.

The overseas distribution capabilities of Golden Harvest in its previous life were naturally incomparable to those of Phoenix Film Company today. Li Huai-ren now owns and operates 388 cinemas overseas, with more than 50 seats.

On November 24, the opening weekend global box office results for "The Big Boss" were released, totaling $1208.9 million.

When the news broke, Bruce Lee, everyone in the film crew, and everyone at Phoenix Film Company thought they had misheard Mane's unit. After confirming several times that it was indeed US dollars, everyone was stunned, and then jumped for joy.

Other film and television professionals in Hong Kong initially thought the news was fake, arguing that the unit in the news should be Hong Kong dollars, not US dollars. After the news was confirmed, apart from a few people who were envious and jealous, the vast majority of people were greatly encouraged.

This is the first time in so many years that a non-Hollywood film has made a large profit in Europe and America. A Hong Kong B-movie has smashed the iron curtain of Hollywood hegemony with its fist.

Many people think: If Bruce Lee could do it, and Phoenix Film Company could do it, then we should be able to do it too.

A movie grossed $1208.9 million in its opening week, while its production cost was only a maximum of $100,000.

Wealth is a powerful motivator!

Lei Juekun, Qiu Degen, and other wealthy city dwellers who already owned cinemas were tempted to enter the film industry and make a fortune, so they began preparing to establish film companies.

The 14K, Wo Shing Wo, and the Lao Xiang family, among other shady organizations, were extremely covetous of them.

The reason is simple: they discovered that making movies can be used to launder money, and big money at that!

Is it okay to inflate production costs by tens of times? And to falsify box office figures, reporting a global box office of one million Hong Kong dollars as ten million US dollars, is that acceptable?

There's so much room for manipulation here that you could launder all the illegal income from selling "flour" and the like by making movies, right?

Soon after, many shell film companies suddenly appeared in Hong Kong, and many gangsters and criminals also suddenly entered the film industry and acted in movies, such as Chan Wai-man of 14K.

Among them, the Xiang family invested the most, with their thirteenth son personally taking part in the performance.

And Phoenix Cinemas, which is owned by Li Huai-ren and has branches in most countries and regions of Asia, naturally caught their attention.

On the afternoon of November 27th, as Li Huai-ren got out of his car after school, Qiao Wu approached him:

"Boss, Tianjixing had someone tell me something: almost all the criminal organizations in Hong Kong have set up shell film companies, and they've set their sights on Phoenix Cinemas..."

Li Huai-ren understood immediately:

"Money laundering! They're trying to launder money through Phoenix Cinemas!"

"Boss, Tianjixing said that these shady organizations plan to invite you for tea to settle some scores. The invitations should arrive in the next day or two..."

Li Huai-ren was taken aback, then smiled:

"That's good. Let's take this opportunity to make a pact with these bad guys, and bring them all into the rules. Anyone who doesn't follow the rules will be kicked out!"

Senior brother, please make the arrangements. If they send someone to deliver the invitation, we won't go to the place they've chosen. Hmm, let's arrange it at Hongfulou.

Also, please reply to them for me: I only talk to their leaders and bosses, don't send some low-level people to disgust me...

November 29th was a Sunday.

Early in the morning, Hongfu Restaurant hung up a large sign:

This morning, Hung Fook Restaurant is temporarily closed to the public. We ask for your understanding.

Starting at eight o'clock in the morning, Detective Hua, the leader of the Bad Guys, and the favorite car of the chief—a Rolls-Royce that Yi Lin claims you can't buy if you're not lucky—arrived one after another at the entrance of Hung Fook Restaurant. Yi Chung, the chief of 14K, accompanied by Chan Wai-man, the eldest and thirteenth brothers of the Lao Xiang family, Uncle Shrimp, the leader of Wo Shing Wo, accompanied by Red Stick Chicken, and so on, made their grand entrance.

At 8:25, Li Huai-ren's car came to a steady stop in front of Hongfu Restaurant. Li Huai-ren and Qiao Wu had arrived!