I’m in Hollywood

'Titanic' was a fiasco at the box office, with $29.18 million in its first weekend, and the total North American box office may not exceed 100 million.

The Eric Williams movie magic failed, and the epic got off to a bleak start.

Firefly Pictures suffered the biggest box office loss in Hollywood history, with a cumulative loss of nearly $200 million.

The return of word of mouth is hard to stop the box office falling. Titanic's first weekend box office in North America was not as good as that of Star Trek: First Contact in the same period, and the production cost of the two sides differed by five times.

James Cameron led the 'Titanic' team to a promotional event in London. The press conference was haggard and suspected of having a nervous breakdown.

Firefly Group CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg issued a statement that Firefly Pictures will not fire Titanic producers Jon Landau, William Stewart and other main creators, and will continue to work with director James Carr. Mellon remains cooperative.

Eric Williams hasn't appeared in public for many days, and the production of Casino Royale may have been suspended in the late stage, and the film may follow the footsteps of Titanic.

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On December 23, the day before Christmas, with the release of the three-day box office data of Titanic in the first weekend, the North American entertainment media launched a new round of bombardment on topics related to the film.

If it were other films, it was 29.18 million in the first weekend and three days, which is not a failure by any means, but it is Titanic, a film with a total investment of 265 million US dollars and a global box office of 800 million to achieve a break-even cost of film history. Supreme Movie.

But at this time, the box office of Titanic was only $29.18 million in the first weekend, which was not even comparable to Star Trek: First Contact released the previous week, and Star Trek: First Contact produced and distributed by Paramount Pictures. One Contact, which cost $45 million to produce, grossed $30.71 million at the box office in the first weekend. The box office dropped by only 42% in the second weekend, and received another $17.8 million. At the same time, the cumulative box office for ten days of release has reached $60 million.

Most of the media have issued predictions that although the film reputation of Titanic has improved compared to before its release, because the long three-hour film length has made most audiences lose their motivation to watch the movie, the box office of Titanic in the next week will be higher. The drop is likely to exceed that of Star Trek: First Contact, by more than 50%.

According to this box office trend, Titanic may only gross $80 million to $90 million in North America. As we all know, the overseas distribution of Titanic is also hindered by many obstacles. Only 9 overseas countries were released in the same period, less than half of the number of overseas synchronization countries of Mission Impossible 2 a month ago.

The failure of Titanic at the North American box office will also affect the film's overseas box office trend. As the enthusiasm of distributors and theater operators in unreleased countries decreases, the global box office of Titanic may stop at less than 200 million US dollars.

The global box office is 200 million, and the share that Firefly can recover is only about 70 million US dollars. It is impossible to talk about future income such as video tapes/dvds, TV broadcasting rights, etc. The media expects Firefly to lose 200 million US dollars on this film, which is not an exaggeration. Even within the Firefly Group, most of the management reluctantly accepted this 'reality'.

If it was another major Hollywood studio, after the first week of Titanic was released, facing a huge loss of up to 200 million US dollars, the person in charge might have been swept out at this time, and even the entire studio may have to face Bankruptcy and reorganization. However, this is of course impossible within the Firefly Group. After all, Titanic is a project that Eric himself forcibly pushed, and it seems too difficult to fire his own boss.

Although there is no need to explain to Wall Street or the company's shareholders like other film companies, in the face of the imminent huge loss, the company's executives always have to make some adjustments and follow-up to avoid repeating the mistakes of Titanic in the future.

Just after Christmas, and although the holidays were not over yet, Katzenberg began daily convening executives of the group's film division to discuss the company's future production and distribution strategies.

It can be said that after the first weekend box office was released, most people have marked Titanic as a doomed failure, and because of the Christmas that followed, very few people paid special attention to the single-day box office of this film. , Even the distribution department responsible for box office statistics within Firefly Group is quite puzzled by Eric's insistence on letting them report the single-day box office summary every day. Is it possible that the boss is still looking forward to a miracle? ?

Although very puzzled, no one dared to perfunctory Eric's request. Every morning, Eric's e-mail box will appear in the box office statistics report of the previous day.

Perhaps considering Eric's mood, women no longer mention any movies in front of him these days. Except for the routine holiday greetings, the executives of the Firefly Group did not ignorantly mention Titans to Eric. Nick, therefore, the festive Christmas is also lively and warm.

In a blink of an eye, the time has come to December 27, the third day of Christmas.

Eric got up early in the morning as usual, washed and went to the study.

Today is Friday, the first day of the week following Titanic's release.

Turning on the computer on the desk, waiting for the moment to turn on, Eric looked at the white writing board on the wall of the study.

At this point, seven sets of data, including the midnight field, have appeared above.

Needless to say, this week started last weekend.

On Dec. 23, $5.57 million.

Because it was Monday, there was a 40% drop from the $9.3 million the day before, echoing the box office trends for most films.

On Dec. 24, $3.5 million.

On Christmas Eve, basically no one will go out to watch the film, and it is not surprising that the single-day box office has dropped sharply again.

Then, on December 25, Christmas Day, the box office grossed $7.03 million in a single day.

Compared with the box office on December 23, there was a significant increase. When I saw this number in the early morning yesterday, Eric's mood that has been a little irritable recently suddenly became a lot easier, but he was not too excited. , Just as people don’t go out to watch movies on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day is usually a good time for people to go out to eat, drink, and have fun. On this day, the single-day box office of movies has increased. It is difficult to say that the factor of the movie itself is still stimulated by the festive atmosphere.

Therefore, on December 26, that is, yesterday, the box office data of the last day of the first week of Titanic is particularly important. The box office of this day will also prove that after a week of word-of-mouth fermentation of Titanic, Is it possible to reproduce the former glory?

If this day's one-day box office falls again, matching Monday's $5.57 million one-day box office, then all expectations will be in vain. If the single-day box office rises, even if it is even the same as Christmas day, then it will also indicate that the big ship that has created an unprecedented box office miracle in the original time and space will once again.

Eric stared at the writing board on the wall for a moment, the computer on the desktop was already turned on, and in the process of entering the password to open the Yahoo mailbox, although Eric felt that he had roughly adjusted his mentality these days, but at this time, he Only then did he realize that he couldn't take it lightly after all, and he even felt that his fingers were shaking slightly with excitement because of the coming of some kind of 'judgment moment'.

The page opened, and the eye-catching unread emails from Firefly's distribution department lay quietly in the mailbox.

Eric moved the mouse, tapped lightly, and the content of the email expanded.

The first thing that appeared in front of him was the total box office of the first week released by the distribution department. Eric skipped the total of $54.33 million and looked down.

Staring at the page quietly, after a few seconds of silence, Eric took a deep breath, got up and walked to the writing pad, picked up the pen and quickly wrote the last number of the first week of Titanic on it.

$9.05 million.

This Thursday's box office figures are up 4% relative to the first day of Titanic, 11% relative to Christmas Day, and 38% relative to the most comparable Monday!

Eric couldn't help but scan the first-week seven-day box office numbers again.

$8.65 million, $9.67 million, $9.3 million, $5.57 million, $3.5 million, $7.03 million, $9.05 million.

The one-day box office of $3.5 million seems to be a freezing point, but in Eric's view, it is more like a spring that is compressed to the extreme, accumulating all its strength and turning a movie destined to represent a miracle. , struggling to throw into the sky.

Titanic, official!

Throwing the water pen into the pen holder, Eric walked out of the study, thinking to himself, next, maybe there is no need to record the daily box office.

How tiring that would be.

A new day, for Hollywood, although it is a Friday, it is also a new week.

Many people wake up from their sleep and inadvertently look at today's newspapers, and may notice the first-week box office figures of Titanic that appeared above. However, for this film, which has been characterized as a failure by most of the media, Except for more and more movie fans who are moved by the film, most people don't think that the figure of $54.33 million is a big deal. After all, last month's Mission: Impossible 2 had a box office of more than 80 million in its first week. U.S. dollars.

Los Angeles, although three hours later than New York, Katzenberg and Eric saw the box office statistics of the first week of Titanic almost at the same time. Of course, he also noticed the last day of the first week. The box office of $9.05 million was unexpected and even a little confusing. At first Katzenberg even thought that the distribution department had counted the number wrong. After all, there is no movie that has a higher box office on a weekday than its first day of release, although it is Christmas. Holidays, but most people’s movie viewing habits are still kept on weekends for three days.

After calling the on-duty staff in charge of box office statistics to confirm, and listening to the determined voice of the person in charge of the distribution department on the phone, Katzenberg confirmed that the number was not wrong.

However, Katzenberg did not think in a more optimistic direction, but took this number as the result of the Christmas holiday effect again. After all, December 26 is also the second day of Christmas.

Later, the executives of other Hollywood studios who also kept a close eye on Titanic also noticed the abnormal box office of the film on December 26. Even some of the media with keen attention have also thought of Katzenberg.

Although he thought it was just an accident, Katzenberg called Eric in New York for the first time and reported the good news. After all, the North American box office predicted by the box office agency for this film is 80 million to 90 million US dollars, but it received an unexpected $54.33 million in the first week. The original forecast number will definitely rise, and it is almost certain that North America will break 100 million. Katzenberg felt that it was always good to lose less.

Eric also didn't tell Katzenberg about his judgment, thinking that it was a surprise for everyone. If God didn't joke with him, then the surprise came, maybe it was just tomorrow.

On the phone with Eric, Katzenberg said goodbye to his wife and twin sons and drove to the Firefly headquarters in Burbank, where he made an appointment with New Line Cinema president Kenneth Horn this morning to discuss New Line's production next year. and release plan.

This year, New Line has almost achieved box office performance comparable to that of the two major studios, Firefly Pictures and Disney Pictures. Coupled with the box office failure of Titanic, starting from next year, the group will definitely need to increase its support for New Line Pictures. support. In discussions over the past few days, Katzenberg, Frank Wells and other executives have finalized a plan to increase the New Line's average annual film production budget to $500 million over the next three years, Eric said on the phone. The plan was also tentatively agreed, and today they are going to discuss the details in more detail.

As for the two major production companies in this department, Katzenberg and Frank Wells mean to reduce the budget of large-scale production films, in fact, to compress the production scale of Firefly Pictures, while re-emphasizing the production of Disney Family Carnival live-action films After all, Disney's entire industrial chain from peripheral stores to Disneyland requires a large number of family-friendly movies to provide enough peripheral goods and copyright images, which are not just cartoons, live-action movies are equally important.

Eric was not as busy as Katzenberg. After breakfast, he left the manor leisurely with a book and walked towards a cafe on the edge of the community.

There were no customers in the coffee shop in the morning. Eric greeted the old man behind the counter who was also bored and flipped through the newspaper, and sat down at his usual seat.

A waitress brought coffee to Eric and backed out quietly.

Eric took a sip of warm coffee and leisurely opened the book Financial Alchemy in his hand.

The old man behind the counter who had always been taciturn took the initiative to speak up this time and said, Eric, it seems that the box office of 'Titanic' was not bad in the first week.

The man, who looks to be in his sixties, is Matthew Braga, the owner of the cafe. However, Eric knew that the other party was not far from his home and also had a manor of a similar size. This old man was originally from Brazil and was a very famous local entrepreneur. His family ran a large natural rubber business in northeastern Brazil. , At this time, he has handed over the family business to his children, and he retired with his wife to retire in the United States. Opening such a coffee shop is more of a pastime.

After all, the two were not acquainted, and Eric could not reveal anything to him. He replied with a smile: If it is another movie, of course it is not bad, but this is Titanic. I may lose a big one this time. The pen, otherwise I wouldn’t be hiding here now and wouldn’t dare to see anyone.”

Matthew Braga laughed, but with a bit of shrewdness in his eyes, he said, I've never seen you miss a hand.

I hope so.

After saying this, the two sides were quiet again, Eric continued to read the boring book on finance in his hand, and Matthew Braga still read his newspaper.

About an hour later, a blond white girl in a white down jacket hurriedly pushed the door and walked in. Seeing that Eric was already sitting here, she hurried over and apologized before it was too late: I'm so sorry, Mr. Williams , my car broke down, and I had to ask my classmates to take me here.

It's okay, Sabrina, please sit down, I just have some doubts and need you to help me explain.

Oh, of course, Sabrina Rand sat down opposite Eric, took out the exact same Financial Alchemy as Eric from the carry-on bag, and a notebook at the same time, and patiently asked Eric Rick answers many seemingly simple financial questions.

Of course, these questions are just simple for her, a graduate student in finance at Columbia.

Because of his upset mood recently, Eric also had no intention of sorting out the plot of Marvel's comic universe. Instead, he chose a boring book on finance to kill his leisure time. The cold financial theory makes it easier for people to calm down. .

However, if it is written in Chinese, it is fine. It is just based on the literal meaning and can be understood through repeated reading. But for professional English financial works, if you want to understand, you must know all kinds of professional and even uncommon English words in finance.

At most, Eric only has some basic financial knowledge in his mind. In order to understand this book, he specially hired a finance student from Columbia University, that is, Sabrina Rand in front of him, a tall and beautiful face. Nice blonde girl. The most important thing around Eric is beautiful women. Of course, he will not have any intentions for the girl in front of him. The reason why he chose Sabrina from the candidates recommended by Colombia is purely for the sake of 'red sleeves' The idea of ​​​​a seductive and beautiful girl reading with you is definitely more comfortable than a same-sex.

As for the book Financial Alchemy that Eric is interested in recently, it has a famous author named George Soros. (To be continued.)