Reborn as a tycoon in Hong Kong

Lin Baicheng originally invested 20 million Hong Kong dollars in Star Pictures, and spent 1 million Hong Kong dollars to acquire Wu Siyuan's company, and gave Wu Siyuan 2% of the shares. Therefore, this company is not exclusively controlled by Lin Baicheng, but has partners. Although The partners' shares are very small.

In 1978, Star Pictures produced a total of two movies, "Snake" and "Drunken Master" starring Cheng Long. Both movies were profitable at the box office, with a total box office of about 10 million Hong Kong dollars.

The total box office is 10 million Hong Kong dollars, and the box office share is 5 million Hong Kong dollars. The production, shooting, publicity, copying and other costs of the two movies are 1.4 million Hong Kong dollars. The main reason is to give some bonuses to the production team after the box office is a success, otherwise the cost can be less Some. But there is no need to be so stingy. It is an unspoken rule to give red envelopes as bonuses to the production team if the film sells well.

As a producer, in addition to box office share income, there is also video distribution and overseas income. In this era, there is no concept of advertising placement in movies, and TV stations do not purchase movies from production companies for screening. They all produce their own TV screenings.

As for the peripheral income from toys, dolls, clothing, accessories, etc., there is no need to think about it. First, the film is not that popular. Second, pirates will piracy after seeing the benefits, unless the film company gives authorization in the first place. , allowing genuine products to enter the market earlier.

As for combating piracy, it is not an easy task. Many people who do piracy in this era are related to gangsters. If the background is not strong enough, who would dare to fight with those people.

Because Star Cinema’s channels have not yet been deployed overseas, Star Cinema’s two movies, “The Snake” and “Drunken Master”, were sold at once in Wandao, Southeast Asia, Japan, South Korea and other places. Cut off to distributors in various countries.

As for Western countries, only the United States authorizes Morning Star Pictures to distribute video tapes. The licensing fee collected is basically negligible. The main purpose is to familiarize more audiences with the starring role of Cheng Long and lay the audience foundation for the starring role of Cheng Long to enter Hollywood in the future. .

All in all, the video distribution and overseas income of the two movies totaled 3.3 million Hong Kong dollars, which is not a small amount. The overseas income of a film usually means that the higher the local box office in Hong Kong, the higher the overseas income will be. If the box office is too low, other distributors will not want to introduce it at all.

"Drunken Master" is second in the box office rankings, and most of the overseas revenue is contributed by this movie. However, Cheng Long is almost not famous in Southeast Asia and other countries, so overseas revenue is not high.

If Cheng Long becomes more and more famous, even reaching the level of a Hong Kong superstar, even if Star Cinema does not open its cinemas in a certain country and cannot share the box office, the money it can earn from a one-time sale will only be more. It can't be compared now.

In addition to its two self-produced films, Star Cinema also distributes three films released by Hui's Pictures and Seven Little Fortunes. These three films are not released directly by their respective companies at Star Cinema. They must be handed over to Star Cinema for distribution. Star Cinema will take the films to Star Cinema for release and is also responsible for publicity and distribution.

In this way, Star Pictures can earn a profit of 10% of the box office share. Costs for copying, promotion, etc. are all paid for by Star Pictures first. After the film is released and the box office share is received, Star Pictures will deduct it. In other words, 10% of the profit is pure profit.

The box office of these three movies, "The Pledge of Allegiance", "Tiger Frog" and "Mr. Zan and Looking for Money", was more than 13 million Hong Kong dollars, so as a distribution company, Star Pictures easily earned more than 1.3 million Hong Kong dollars.

In addition, after letting Star Pictures distribute the film, the copyright of the film will belong to Star Pictures, so Star Pictures also participated in overseas distribution and peripheral licensing, and also earned 10% of the profit.

Don't even think about peripheral licensing at present. There are only two incomes from overseas sales and video tape distribution. The 10% profit of the two incomes of the three movies still contributed about 600,000 Hong Kong dollars.

The fact that distribution companies are at the top of the film industry is not just talk.

In other words, in 1978, the total revenue of Star Film Company was more than 8.9 million Hong Kong dollars, and the expenses on employee salaries and other aspects were not much. The total amount was less than 300,000 Hong Kong dollars, mainly because of the small number of employees.

However, Star Pictures' profit in 1978 was not as much as HK$8.6 million.

First of all, the company spent 1 million Hong Kong dollars to buy Cheng Long's contract from Luo Wei Pictures, and then gave Cheng Long a signing fee of 2 million Hong Kong dollars when signing the contract. Just for Cheng Long, it spent 3 million Hong Kong dollars, which is enough. Made six or seven movies.

Of course, signing Cheng Long also got the rewards he deserved. After "Snake" and "Drunken Master", Cheng Long can be said to be in the forefront of the Hong Kong film industry, not to mention that these two movies have brought great success to the company. The profits have far exceeded the investment in Cheng Long.

In addition to spending on Cheng Long, Xingchen Pictures also purchased advanced production equipment and invested in three film companies: Xu's Pictures, New Art City, and Seven Little Fortunes, all of which cost a lot of money.

After such calculation, Star Pictures' profit in 1978 was only about 3 million Hong Kong dollars.

Fortunately, Xingchen Pictures also invested in three companies, Xu's Pictures, Seven Little Fortunes, and New Art City. New Art City was not counted. Both companies, Xu's Pictures and Seven Little Fortunes, made money in 1978. In particular, Hui's Pictures has made a lot of money. Unfortunately, Star Pictures only has 20% of the shares of Hui's Pictures, so it only gets HK$500,000. The remaining funds will be reserved for the company to recruit people, purchase equipment and produce next year.

Star Pictures actually owns 51% of the shares of Seven Little Blessings Film Company, but the profit of Seven Little Blessings Film Company in 1978 was only HK$3.2 million, and 51% was only a little over HK$1.6 million. And all the money will be reserved for filming the movie next year, so there is no share.

In other words, Star Pictures' profit in 1978 was only HK$3.5 million. Fortunately, there is no need to calculate many costs this year. In addition, there will definitely be more than two movies shot throughout the year. Unless most of the movies fail, the revenue and profit will definitely be higher.

Although Star Film Company did not make much money in 1978, after nearly a year of development in 1978, the company not only added a lot of equipment, but also made Cheng Long famous, and even owned different proportions of shares in three film companies. It can be said that the company has grown a lot.

If Star Pictures is valued, based on the fact that Star Pictures currently has about 23 million Hong Kong dollars in its company account, the company's valuation can at least double. The main reason is that the uncertainty of movies is too high. No one can be sure whether the movies produced and distributed by the company in the future will make money. If it fails, it is entirely possible to lose money.

However, no matter what the valuation of Xingchen Pictures is, Lin Baicheng will definitely not sell it. On the contrary, he will not take any profits from Xingchen Pictures. In a few years, the company's profits will be used for the development of the company.

Overall, Star Pictures was doing pretty well in 1978.

(Thanks to ‘Time 1979’ for the huge 500 point reward support!)