Huayu: From an ordinary person to a happy director

Chapter 67: The Purge

Shi Lei thought about it for a while and agreed: "Okay, let's shoot Saw 2."

Since Wen Zairen wants fame, give it to him.

Soon, half a month passed. After 5256 days of release, "Insidious" had a total box office of 6500 million US dollars. According to Warner's professional assessment, the final box office of this film in North America will be around 1.2 million US dollars, and the global total should be around million US dollars.

It was another successful low-budget horror film. People in Hollywood began to pay attention to Shi Lei and Wan Zairen. Shi Lei was the producer + screenwriter, and Wan Zairen was the director. The two had the greatest influence on the film.

The first "Saw" was a coincidence, but the second "Insidious" was a real achievement. If they can make a few more successful low-budget horror films, Shi Lei and Wan Zairen will be famous screenwriters and directors in the horror film category.

Many Hollywood companies began to pay attention to Peach Productions.

The film "The Purge" also caught their attention.

Under the watchful eyes of many Hollywood companies, "The Purge" was released in North America and opened in 2685 theaters, which is a very high number for a horror film.

Three days later, the box office for the first weekend came out, with a box office of 1250 million US dollars, ranking fourth.

This made those who paid attention to it a little disappointed. They were disappointed not with the box office, but with the content.

A horror movie with a super low cost of 300 million U.S. dollars, it grossed 1250 million U.S. dollars in the first three days of the weekend, which was a huge hit. It paid off in the first three days of the weekend, and all subsequent box office revenues have been profitable. The media has begun to report it extensively.

However, the plot of "The Purge" can be said to be full of mistakes and omissions.

The Killing Day sounds unreasonable, but that’s fine, but the mother’s soft-heartedness is even more unacceptable.

Since she knew it was the Killing Day, the mother should have been mentally prepared.

Online audience and professional film reviews are not very good either.

[First, the audience review: "This family is so stupid! They knew about the killing day but didn't make any preparations."

"It's really stupid. If it were me, I would just place a booby trap at the door."

"Hey, you guys are too cowardly. If I had set up a machine gun on the roof, anyone who got close would have died."

"As far as I'm concerned, the best defense is offense. Just organize the people in the community and lead them to sweep all directions."

"It's too small, the scale is too small, I chose to modify a few heavy trucks, replace the heavy trucks with bulletproof tires, install steel plates, and it will be a heavy tank. Even if the protagonist's house has a security system, it will still be shattered by a collision, right?"

……

Professional film reviews from major media:
"This bloody thriller starts off well enough, but then it spirals into impossibilities." (Complete Cinema)
"The problem with high-concept movies like this is that they create a story and then the characters become side characters that follow the story." (The Boston Globe)
"It's one of those films that relies entirely on lame music and jumpy cuts but never manages to be truly scary; the characters are pale, and the plot twists are clumsy and lack much in the way of surprise." (The Arizona Republic)
……

】

Just when everyone thought that "The Purge" would suffer a Waterloo and the box office would plummet, the box office trend shocked everyone. The box office trend of the following weekend was actually a standard horror movie trend.

How is it possible that the market is performing well despite such a bad reputation?
Where does the problem occur?
Hollywood began investigating and soon found the reason.

There is a post about The Purge online, 'If you were in The Purge, how would you survive? '.

This post was very popular, and many netizens expressed their own plans. There were all kinds of plans, including building bunkers, hiding at sea, modifying armored vehicles, and establishing gangs...

Anyway, there were all kinds of strange ideas, and only a few of them were about dodging, while the vast majority were thinking about how to attack and how to kill more people.

Hollywood companies have realized that they dare not break the law in real life, so they just want to have some fun in "The Purge"!

Maybe they could make a similar video...

Regardless of whether they would shoot similar films, they had a consensus that Shi Lei was good at writing horror film scripts, and they wondered if Shuimitao Films had made similar films.

As a result, major Hollywood film and television companies called Taolin Film and Television to find out more about Shuimi Tao.

Dimension Films even invited Shi Lei to write the script for Scream 4.

Shi Lei neither agreed nor rejected the invitation to write the script. He would wait until he finished his work before deciding.

First, "Insidious" was taken off the screen with a total box office of 6582 million US dollars in North America. At the same time, "Insidious" began to be released around the world.

The total North American box office of "Insidious" has been reported back to China, causing a sensation again. The last report contained some exaggeration, but this time it is a proof of Shi Lei's strength. Shi Lei holds both the positions of producer and screenwriter. People in China regard this film as Shi Lei's film, and the report on Wan Zairen only wrote one sentence, "Director of "Insidious" movie", and nothing else.

Just like last time, a lot of calls came in to wish you a happy life.

If there was a call with Shi Lei's private phone, Shi Lei would answer it. If there was no call, it meant that one's status was not high enough and one could only call Shi Lei's public phone, which was answered by his assistant.

Liu Yan also came along this time, but she didn't want to answer those calls that were not of high enough standard.

Most of the calls Shi Lei received were for polite conversations, except for Han Sanpin's serious business.

"Shi Lei! You should focus on the domestic situation! Just let the company's people take care of the overseas situation."

"Boss Han, Million Dollar Baby is about to be released. It's an award-winning film. I'm going to stay here for a few months."

"Then what about your "Sword Rain"? " Although Han Sanpin understood Shi Lei's desire to win the award, he realized that Shi Lei's work focus was in North America, which was not acceptable.

In 04, Peach Company released four films. Not to mention "Million Dollar Baby", just the three films "Saw", "Insidious" and "The Purge" made Peach earn nearly 4 million US dollars, which is 8 million RMB. How many companies in China have a revenue of million now?

The most important thing is that these 800 million belong to Shi Lei alone. Shuimitao has only one shareholder, Shi Lei, unlike other Fortune 500 companies which are complicated and have a large number of shareholders.

This is the most addictive thing!
He was worried that Shi Lei would be like Li An, focusing on North America and only returning to China to make a movie once every few years.

So he has to remind himself from time to time.

Upon hearing this, Shi Lei immediately replied: "The editing of "Sword Rain" has been completed. I will go back and watch the film to make the final revisions."

"Then pick a time to come back and take a look. Finish it as soon as possible and submit it for review so as not to affect the release."

"No, the film will definitely be released in mid-December 05." There's a year, enough time.

"Lunar New Year period? Lunar New Year period is not possible." Han Sanpin's firm voice came out.

(End of this chapter)