Chapter 294： It's all about the market

Early the next morning, Angel, the director of the distribution department of 20th Century Fox, had just come to work when he came to a reception room. The major theater chains that had been notified yesterday, such as Royal Entertainment, AMC Chain, and American Artists, were stationed in the Los Angeles market. The representative of the Ministry has also been seated inside.

"Hello, Doug. Hello, Steve..."

Angel greeted them one by one, and everyone took their seats.

"Sorry, Mr. Angel."

Steve from the AMC chain theater chain took the lead in saying: "What you said has been determined at the company's headquarters, and I have no right to make changes. Otherwise, you will talk to my boss?"

Naturally, he was talking about reducing the "Passion of the Christ" schedule.

Of course, the above are completely evasive words. After all, the six major companies are the main sources of AMC's films, and he does not want to offend him.

If you can fool the past, you can fool the past.

"The same is true of our Royal Entertainment, sorry, Mr. Angel." Doug and others also said similar things one after another.

Angel smiled, without the slightest dissatisfaction, "Everyone is the director of the cinema market in the Los Angeles area, and the Los Angeles area is the largest movie market in the United States, with the most important position and weight in the headquarters, can't you be in charge? Is it the theater business? My requirements are not high, how about continuing to maintain the number of screens and the schedule of "The Passion of the Christ" next week?"

Seeing that Angel didn't like this, Steve said again: "I really can't make the decision. The company headquarters has its own plans. Besides, AMC doesn't have any extra theaters now, so it must be coordinated."

"As far as I know, your company plans to transfer 500 theaters." Angel's information is quite well-informed, "Why do you need to transfer 200 theaters from the "Passion of the Christ" family? There are several other movies released, they can't Even if you exclude "The Passion of the Christ", you can completely fill the gap."

Speaking of which, Steve also understands that a large chain theater chain like AMC can't hide any trouble from an established company like Twentieth Century Fox, and he simply said: "We have our own plans, which are based on the market. The potential of the arrangement is not intended to be specific to a certain film.”

Angel frowned and said: "Planning? In this week's box office list, although "Micro Love" won the championship, "The Passion of the Christ" is not bad, ranking second, and its performance is still good now, it's fine if it doesn't increase. , instead, to reduce the number of theaters for screening, what kind of plan is this? Also, who are you going to give to these five hundred theaters, "Micro Love"?"

Steve didn't deny it, but nodded, "300 of them will be for "Micro Love", the remaining 200, and "Fifty First Love", Warner's "Police" and the film "Barbershop 2" "."

Angel retorted: "The results of "Micro Love" are good, and there is no problem in expanding the screening, but as far as I know, the cost of films such as "Fifty First Love" is not high, and the cast lineup does not have any popularity, so it can be Expand the show?"

Steve euphemistically said: "They have just been released, and there is still room for improvement."

This is very clear, Angel said: ""The Passion of the Christ" was the box office champion last weekend, and the momentum is also the biggest, why can't it be maintained?"

"But the performance of this film in the next weekend compared with the previous weekend, the drop rate reached 40%, don't tell me, you don't know what this decline data means, and, from the beginning of the film's release, the controversy has been It has not stopped, and other films have not yet released their potential, and the single-house box office of "Micro Love" is as high as 15,000 US dollars, and the attendance rate has been high."

Seeing what Angel wanted to say, Steve stopped him and continued: "Your company should know better than us, how to maintain the market, there are only so many theaters, and how to arrange the films is regular, "The Passion of the Christ" ” has passed its peak, and there is not much room to tap the movie viewing potential. It is inevitable to reduce the theater line and arrange films.”

Cinema companies are not charitable organizations. Although they have a lot of involvement with the Big Six, they can’t do anything stupid. If the decline of “The Passion of the Christ” is normal, they wouldn’t be able to transfer so much. The fact has already happened.

Angel said another word, and the major theaters have basically maintained an amazing consistency.

Seeing that nothing can be changed, they can only leave.

When Steve returned to his personal office in AMC's Los Angeles office, he picked up the relevant box office statistics and shook his head.

Speaking of which, as early as the beginning of the release, they really missed the mark.

Unexpectedly, the film "Micro Love" turned into actual market revenue by relying on audience word-of-mouth and publicity, and it surpassed "The Passion of Jesus" in the first weekend.

Thinking of this, I sighed again.

They are still conservative, the theater distribution and film arrangement are mainly based on "The Passion of the Christ", which is not bad, far less bold than the Royal Entertainment Group. In the first week, they gave "Micro Love" "Substantial support.

But who would have thought that "The Passion of the Christ" would experience such a decline.

With his years of experience in the industry, it is rare.

But a little comfort is that they are not completely unprepared, and it is not difficult for AMC to turn around and expand the screening of "Micro Love".

Although I missed the biggest bonus in the first wave, it's not too late.

For cinema chains, the market is always their first reference value.

After all, there is only traffic to the box office.

The most important thing is that the North American theater chain is very interested in the sales of high-margin products such as cola and popcorn. Unlike the mainland, their theater chain does not account for that much of the box office, so it has to be subsidized from other places. .

At the same time, the communication between Paramount people and these commercial chain theater chains is quite smooth.

Everyone has the same goal of maximizing profits.

Just at the beginning of the new week, Paramount Pictures confirmed the number of theaters for the next weekend of "Micro Love".

After the expansion, the number of theaters will reach 3,000 and the number of screens will be 3,882.

Shirley Lansing also decided to add another publicity fee, in addition to printing and copying, as well as secondary resources from the media.

So far, Paramount Pictures has spent $16 million for the release of "Micro Love".

But all of this is worth it. As long as you can make money, you need to invest part of it first to create greater benefits. This is a normal operation.

What's more, in today's market, the topic of "Micro Love" has been increasing, and it does not require a lot of publicity expenses.

All in all, it is on the positive side.