Huayu: Starting with mentoring female stars

Soon, it was April 29th.

At 10 a.m., the movie "The Nameless" began its simultaneous screening in theaters across the country.

Chen Zhou, Liu Yifei, and the others were naturally not idle either.

Promotional activities are definitely essential.

Chen Zhou made two plans.

First, following the traditional promotional model, when a movie is released, one would go on a roadshow and interact with the audience on-site.

Second, adopt unconventional methods, which are currently not valued, such as promotion through online bloggers!

Chen Zhou used his remaining funds to contact bloggers, Baidu Tieba administrators, forum moderators, and so on.

Invite them to the cinema to watch "The Unknown" for free.

The only requirement was to write a review online after watching the film.

But Chen Zhou will not restrict their speech.

If they think it looks good, then praise it.

If you don't like it, then complain, then criticize.

Just speak your mind.

In the afternoon, Chen Zhou's family called him.

Because my family knew about the release of "The Unknown," they also encouraged people in our hometown to go to the cinema to see it.

Tian Xiwei also chatted with Chen Zhou for a while, saying that she would mobilize all her friends to support Chen Zhou's movie.

Chen Zhou must have felt very warm inside from the support he received from his hometown.

Even if this is just a drop in the ocean.

After a long day of roadshows, Chen Zhou and his team finally got to rest around 9 p.m.

Chen Zhou and others were having dinner together at a hot pot restaurant.

From morning until now, everyone has only eaten some cookies and the like to fill their stomachs, and hasn't had time to have a proper meal.

Right now, Chen Zhou is looking at a news article.

The title says that Lu Chuan posted a movie review on his Sina blog, writing: "The unknown are indeed unknown."

Chen Zhou couldn't help but laugh when he saw it. It seemed that his comment about "rare" had really made Lu Chuanche remember him completely.

It often takes three sentences to make a man remember you for a lifetime.

He only needed two words.

That's an achievement too.

Then, he started browsing movie reviews on the anonymous website:

"This movie is amazing! The opening scene with the two bumbling thieves robbing a mobile phone store almost made me die laughing. Wearing a motorcycle helmet and smoking, they were just incredibly stupid."

The scene where they were arguing on the rooftop and shouted "I love you, Mom, you're selling fried dough twists!" was both funny and heartbreaking.

I felt a lump in my throat after watching it, but also a strange warmth. I can't quite explain it, but it was just beautiful!

"Liu Yifei is completely different from Wang Yuyan in this movie. She plays a paralyzed girl who is very good at cursing and has a killer look in her eyes. But when she is vulnerable, she is also very pitiful. Especially when she finds out that she is not dead and sees that painting, her smile is amazing!"

The two male characters are also fantastic. Zhu Yilong's act of pretending to be tough but being afraid of pain is so realistic. Wang Jingchun, that silly big-headed guy, is willing to do anything for love.

There aren't any big shots in this movie, just small characters, but they all feel like they're living among us, and their acting is so realistic!

"The biggest surprise of the year! I thought it would be a corny comedy, but I went in laughing and came out crying. There were so many laughs, especially the part where they applied safflower oil to the wound and the motorcycle flew off the wheel."

But the tearjerker moments were even more intense: the rooftop argument, Ma Jiaqi discovering she'd been tricked, and the final scene with fireworks—the tears just wouldn't stop.

The director is simply brilliant; he told the story of a group of "bad guys," yet made you feel that they deserve to be remembered.

"I thought it was a pure comedy before watching it, but I was really moved by it. A group of losers got together, each with their own difficulties. The way these nobodies desperately tried to live a decent life made my nose tingle."

Chen Zhou watched with great interest.

However, Liu Yifei and Zhu Yilong didn't look much better.

"What's wrong with you all? Why are you all so listless? Today is the big day for our movie's release, shouldn't we be happier?" Chen Zhou asked.

"Director Chen, are you really not concerned?" Zhu Yilong asked rhetorically, feeling that Chen Zhou's mental state was the rather strange one.

"What do you care about?" Chen Zhou replied.

"The Nobody Knows only grossed a little over 100 million yuan at the box office that day."

"Although our film only has a budget of 300 million, at this rate, we will definitely break even. But I know our film is great."

"I really can't accept such a dismal box office performance."

"The Unknowns should shine brightly, shouldn't they?"

Zhu Yilong said.

Chen Minghao strongly agreed, saying, "Such a good movie should be recognized by the market, instead of being able to break even as it is now."

Chen Zhou looked at the others: "Do you all feel the same way? You all feel that today's box office was too low, so you're all feeling very upset?"

"Hmm." Liu Yifei nodded. "To be honest, what I regret more than the box office performance itself is that Director Chen's directing ability is obvious to everyone. How could the audience not see it?"

Upon hearing this, the others nodded in agreement.

Just as Liu Yifei said, what really makes everyone feel uneasy is that they genuinely think Chen Zhou is very strong and capable.

Given the current situation of "The Unknown", if the box office continues to decline, the final box office result will only be enough to break even.

If this outcome occurs, Chen Zhou's future directing career will be extremely difficult.

After all, investors are profit-driven, and box office performance is their only criterion for evaluation.

Therefore, for the vast majority of directors, the success of their debut film basically determines their fate.

"But I think today's results were very good," Chen Zhou blurted out.

Upon hearing this, everyone else was very puzzled and couldn't understand Chen Zhou's thoughts.

Chen Zhou didn't mince words and spoke directly:

"While you guys are always focused on box office figures, I've also been keeping an eye on the online reviews of our film 'The Unknown'."

"Let me put it this way, the reputation is excellent, and it has already developed into a form of spontaneous word-of-mouth promotion."

"The bloggers I contacted before all praised us nobodies in their articles."

"As the saying goes, 'To forge iron, one must be strong oneself.' I believe that it won't be long before our film achieves a box office comeback. We must have absolute confidence in ourselves."

"In addition, I also looked at other data. Starting from the afternoon, the attendance rate of The Unknown Man rose sharply, almost approaching that of the two popular works, The Warlords and Assembly."

"So, don't be so tense."

"A director is a director, his mentality is truly invincible, we should all learn from you." Chen Minghao laughed, his face full of admiration.

"What are you all standing there for? Start eating! People need to eat, otherwise you'll get hungry," Wang Jingchun chimed in.

Turning their anxiety into appetite, everyone enjoyed a hearty meal.

The next day.

Just as Chen Zhou said.

The word-of-mouth effect of "The Unknown" is beginning to take hold!