Chapter 817： Someone, Rich, Willful

"The production cost is 130 million, and Firefly can promise to spend another 30 million for pre-promotion, but in North America, Universal only accounts for 13% of the offline market revenue, not involving the box office. In addition, the copyright belongs to Firefly, and Universal only has three years. authorized use rights.”

"The publicity is going through Comscart's advertising channels, so we agree."

Lehmann stated his first condition. After several executives of Universal knew that Firefly could not give up the North American box office market, they also gave up this idea. In short, it was the relationship between supply and demand. Relatively speaking, it is relatively weak. Since they have decided to cooperate, it is better to earn benefits for the company in other aspects.

Like advertising business, undertake hard broadcast, laying, help contact TV stations to show trailers, etc., Firefly always spends so much money, Universal can make a little bit, anyway, there are so many advertisers on the market, it is better to look elsewhere. "My own person" is divided.

Of course, as long as the effect is the same, Ryman doesn't care where the money goes, it's going to be invested anyway, he waved his hand, and continued: "I'll let Liam connect with you at that time. In addition, the Christmas house The number of films to be opened, Universal guarantees that it cannot be less than 4,000, and the film can hold several internal test screenings in the theater, we guarantee the project, and you guarantee a sufficient share of the film."

The scale of the joint screening of 4,000 theaters is not too much today, because the number of screens has increased, and the number of movie openings will only increase rapidly. Universal can still provide this resource.

Seeing that the other party has no objection, Lehman added: "Universal shall not interfere with the project shooting, but can monitor the capital expenditure - Firefly has indeed spent so much money on filming; if the advertising business is connected by your side, it must provide matching funds for traffic promotion support. , the specific requirements are that the preview screening of the TV network must be placed at the end of the hit episode, and the hard broadcast must be in the area with large traffic in cities and states..."

Similar requirements are reasonable.

The money is spent, the grade has to be raised, and the publicity treatment of 30 million cannot be the same as 5 million.

Firefly has cooperated with so many studios, and many things are clear. Universal has no intention of pitting it. It is just that with such a service, if you make some business money, it should be used to generate income for other departments.

Finally, Lehman mentioned another point, that is, the first distribution must be settled within one month after the film is drawn, which is a bit unreasonable and not as normal as the previous conditions.

Because of the sharing of accounts, the cinema chain is slow. After a period of delay, it will be delayed for a while after handing over to the distributor. Moreover, such a large amount of money can be saved in the account to generate income. It’s better to slow down. Therefore, generally speaking, the film industry is At the end of March, you may be more active if you want to cooperate more.

This kind of feeling is like the project revenue issuer did not get all the profits, and as a result, the issuer had to pay for the producer's share first.

Lehman also knew that the last point was a bit too much, but there was no way. The Universal family had a big business, but Firefly was in a period of rapid development, and many places had to spend money, not to mention that he still wanted to buy a wave of buildings in the second half of the year. of cash.

Because after the collapse of property prices, many people only recognize this.

In addition, Marvel is a big blood-sucking family. Without projects to generate income, many assets are unhealthy. Usually, Firefly has to continue to set up movies, engage in publicity, and occasionally charity, environmental protection, refugee issues, etc. Don't you have to spend money to make donations to enhance the brand's image?

In a word, there are too many places to spend big money in the second half of the year. In order to protect the capital chain, this year's film, we have to quickly recover the cost and get profits, and we can no longer divide the account slowly as before.

Not only Universal, but at Warner Bros., Firefly will also urge more.

Fortunately, it’s just about dividing the money in advance. As long as there is money to be made, Universal doesn’t care who gets the money first, so it just joked about Firefly’s eager account-sharing model and agreed.

After finalizing the details, the two parties signed a screening contract.

The rest is even simpler. It is nothing more than signing a film completion guarantee with the Fire Protection Foundation, and Universal dispatching a few financial personnel to supervise the capital expenditure during the crew period to prevent Firefly from messing around—for example, a good 130 million, we Only given so many resources, you only spent 8 or 9 million. It was a deception, and the plan did not match the standard.

After spending two days negotiating cooperation with Universal, Lyman called again and asked Johnson to ask if Andy Serkis had a schedule. If so, only the intelligent alien prawn in "District 9" needed. He came to provide facial expression capture, reducing the stiffness of pure post-production effects.

In the original film, Lehmann did not see how much the wise prawn was different from other similar ones. The only thing was that the body shape was different, but in fact, it could be done better, such as enriching expressions.

......

Entering April, the North American film market still did not have a very bright performance. Compared with previous years, the market was only due to a slight increase in the production volume.

On the weekend of the third week, "Death Penalty" has accumulated 28.58 million in North America, 17.68 million in overseas accounts, and 46.26 million in the world. According to this screening situation, 70 million in the world should not be a problem. The magic profession was successfully introduced.

Likewise, Lyman has not been idle these days.

New Line Studios.

The crew was arranging the shooting scene. Lyman looked at the concept map of the alien weapon on the round table, frowned slightly, and then called Arman, the head of the props team, "It's too small, what I want is roughness. The style of the weapon can be similar to the appearance and temperament of a prawn."

How should I put it, the current concept map feels a bit like those big-headed alien laser guns in "Independence Day", but it's in the hands of a prawn Just imagining that picture is incongruous, too Exquisite, not in line with his conception of the alien race in "District 9".

Lehman thinks the original style is good, but the premise is that Fu Huadao keeps up with it, and don't make things made of plastic.

Arman nodded and turned to redesign.

The work of the prop team is like this. It is common to be rejected, especially for science fiction movies. What you come up with in your mind may not be consistent with the director. Even if you understand a similar style, you may not be able to quickly satisfy the director.

In short, it is a process of interpretation that is easily maddened by constantly being overturned and slowly pieced together from trivial inspirations.

Because the prop master never knows what novel ideas the crew director will have, but fortunately, Lehman is not easy to change his mind. Today, he is rough, and tomorrow he will be small, torturing his own prop team.

Outside, which is actually the inside of the studio, the set team built the laboratory at the MNU headquarters, as well as Wiggs' home, and the interior of the spacecraft cabin. These scenes will be solved in this way.

After a few days, the actors were in place, and the crew quietly started.