National Tide 1980.

As the saying goes, if you try to plant flowers, they may not bloom, but if you plant willows by accident, they may grow into a shade.

This kind of situation does happen in life.

Sometimes we put effort into doing something, but we may not necessarily get the expected results.

Sometimes we don’t have any special expectations, but we often get unexpected gains inadvertently.

This is Ning Weimin’s current situation.

Perhaps it was because in the negotiations and cooperation with the Shanghai Film Translation Studio, he used real money to fully demonstrate his sincerity in taking care of his compatriots and using foreign capital to give back to the country.

Such generous and pragmatic performance impressed the leaders of the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation, making them trust his character.

Perhaps it was because he successively facilitated the two big-budget co-production film projects "Li Xianglan" and "Crazy Rich Asians", and also obtained a large number of rich European films from overseas, which indirectly provided a lot of "nutrients" for promoting the development of the domestic film industry.

This also greatly increased the confidence of the leaders of the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation in his ability to get things done.

In short, the leaders of the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation couldn't help but want to strengthen cooperation with him.

So after he signed the contract with the Shanghai Film Translation Studio, they took the initiative to propose to him the idea of ​​promoting domestic films to overseas markets through him.

Of course, the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation are mainly targeting the Southeast Asian film market, or mainly the Japanese film market.

After all, Ning Weimin's wife Matsumoto Keiko has an extraordinary status in the Japanese film industry.

Not only is she currently the most popular movie star in Japan, she also owns her own film studio.

In the minds of the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation, Matsumoto Keiko should have certain methods for film distribution.

And this is probably the main reason why they attach great importance to Ning Weimin.

  Where can we find such suitable people who are moral, capable, and have certain conveniences in going overseas?

In fact, they were not wrong.

The good relationship between Matsumoto Keiko and Shochiku Films not only ensures that the films produced by Kiri Studios can have a good and high-quality release period in Japan and will not be withdrawn early, but also that Ning Weimin himself is unconsciously making such business attempts in private.

At least after Ning Weimin and Matsumoto Keiko purchased the film copyrights in France, they reached a verbal agreement with Shochiku's President Sakomoto over the phone.

In view of the fact that Shochiku is currently seriously lacking in quality films for release, President Sakakimoto also has a certain desire to use some of the French films they brought back to fill the gap in Shochiku's schedule where there is a lack of quality films for release.

In addition, Ning Weimin is also planning to add subtitles to Chen Peisi's films and screen them in independent theaters in Tokyo.

After all, movie tickets in Japan are expensive, and Chen Peisi's film production costs are low, so he can cover a lot of filming costs by simply selling them.

Don't say too much. If the movie really sells 10 million yen at the box office, it means that he is using the Japanese film market to feed our own filmmakers and support our own film creation.

Ning Weimin loves to do this kind of thing of using other people's power to lay eggs.

What's more, the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation are also quite self-aware.

They all know the current state of domestic films - heavy on ideology and lacking in commercial elements.

At present, apart from a few martial arts films and historical films co-produced with Hong Kong and cities, other types of domestic films are difficult to sell well overseas.

To understand the specific situation, just look at the operating conditions of the mainland-based Yindu Institution in Hong Kong.

The most profitable film recently is still "Li Xianglan" by Keiko Matsumoto.

Although the Hong Kong market is not very fond of this type of historical film, the box office in Hong Kong only sold 14.5 million Hong Kong dollars, which is slightly worse than "The Last Emperor" and "The Burning of the Summer Palace" a few years ago.

But it is one of the very few movies this year that can make money for Cinema.

Therefore, the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation did not have high expectations for whether this matter could achieve brilliant results in the short term, and they had no requirements for economic returns.

What they actually want is just to have an extra leg to walk on.

As long as we can find a trustworthy middleman first, we can try to establish a distribution channel in Japan.

After all, there are only two Chinese-language film companies in Hong Kong that can distribute Chinese-language films in Japan: Golden Harvest and Shaw Brothers.

From the perspective of the development of mainland films, if we can break this invisible monopoly and have our own cultural window, or a cultural propaganda base, in Japan, that will be enough for the time being.

And now it seems that Ning Weimin is such a person, someone worthy of their trust and entrustment.

I just don’t know if Ning Weimin has this intention.

So they are all trying their best to win over Ning Weimin.

Even China Film Corporation, which has always monopolized the domestic distribution profits and never shared them with others, offered extremely generous conditions this time.

They said that if Ning Weimin was willing to do it, he could choose five new films produced by major film studios across the country this year, and he could obtain the overseas distribution rights for these films without paying any money.

When the movie sells well overseas, he can just hand over part of the box office profits to China Film Corporation.

Needless to say, Ning Weimin was delighted with such an honor.

He just couldn't ask for more.

Because no matter from which angle you look at it, this is like pie in the sky.

First of all, officially speaking, he immediately became an official agent backed by the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation.

With this semi-official status, not only will his own embassy look upon him with new eyes, but it will also be much easier for him to deal with companies and institutions in the film and television industry in Japan in the future.

After all, with the overseas distribution rights for domestic films, the scope of cooperation and transactions between him and the Japanese has become wider and the methods have become richer.

To put it bluntly, if the Japanese want to cooperate with China in the film industry in the future, won’t they have to look for him?

  what is this?

This is market monopoly.

From then on, he had a lot of room for development in the distribution of films at home and abroad.

Secondly, from a personal perspective, his holding this job concurrently is equivalent to the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation giving him money for free.

Since these films are shown for free, then it's a profitless business.

  Besides, who else can know the real box office data and profit distribution except him?

How much to divide and how to divide it, isn't it all up to him?

Besides, no one said that he couldn’t eat both ends.

While promoting domestic films overseas, it would be great to buy out some foreign films, accumulate a film library, and engage in reverse import.

Finally, his doing this will definitely be of great help to Keiko Matsumoto's personal career.

A wife's status depends on her husband. As long as he stands firm, he will always have a vested interest in the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation.

This means that the domestic market will be completely open to Keiko Matsumoto, and there will no longer be any real obstacles. In principle, the film and television works she participates in and the music albums she records will all be given the green light.

Even if the time is right in the future and Matsumoto Keiko really decides to give up her Japanese nationality and naturalize in China, it will be much more convenient.

In short, this matter has only advantages and no disadvantages. If you look at the long term, the benefits will be even greater.

Once the information age comes, as long as he steadily accumulates his film library, he will easily become the only streaming media tycoon in Asia.

How could Ning Weimin live in such a low-end place with such temptation?

In fact, even the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation did not realize at this time how huge the benefits contained in the policy loophole they were about to open for him were.

So Ning Weimin’s response was also quite positive.

After fully understanding the intentions of the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation, he thought about it for a while and came up with a more practical implementation plan. He planned to register a copyright agency when he returned to Japan and then start trying to operate this business.

We will test the waters on a small scale this year and then set next year’s goals based on market feedback.

Of course, he will bear all the operating expenses alone. Not only will the country not have to pay a penny, he will also unconditionally donate 40% of his shares to China Film Corporation.

Therefore, in the face of Ning Weimin's sensible and proactive attitude, the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation were very satisfied, and the intention of cooperation between the two parties was basically reached.

But there are also differences.

Because I think that domestic production companies are having a hard time, and I'm worried that they will give up on the current system and go from bad to worse, I wonder if I can change the current dire situation.

Ning Weimin also took the courage to make a suggestion.

The question is whether we can give a portion of the overseas box office revenue directly to the production companies to encourage them to actively create and make more excellent films.

However, the leaders of the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation were very embarrassed about this issue. After thinking for a long time, they still did not agree.

If nothing else, everyone knows that the domestic film industry has long had major problems with its distribution system.

But when it comes to ideological issues and the question of redistributing the cake, no one dares to touch this hot potato.

Otherwise, if you are not careful, you will offend many people and end up in irreparable trouble.

Although Ning Weimin wanted to use the joint venture's overseas box office to feed back to the domestic market, it does not involve the domestic distribution system and is a roundabout way.

But both the people from the Film Bureau and China Film Corporation knew that this method of allowing production companies to directly take a share of the box office revenue would lead to "endless trouble."

Under the current institutional environment, once a loophole is opened, people will definitely change their minds, which will cause countless troubles.

God knows whether those production companies will be encouraged by this and will re-divide the domestic box office with China Film Corporation?

  God knows whether someone will seize on this point and criticize the existing domestic distribution methods?

These situations are so uncontrollable.

Leaders don't want to see such a chaotic situation.

So there was no other possibility, they could only give the kind-hearted Ning Weimin a cold shoulder.

But then again, Ning Weimin's original intention was good after all.

His suggestion, in essence, is to support the development of the domestic film industry as much as possible, even at the expense of himself and willing to take less money in order to put the money to good use.

So with this in mind, the film bureau leader finally gave him a reminder.

He said that although his suggestion cannot be adopted, from another perspective, they do not prohibit those production units from seeking sponsorship themselves, nor will they prevent certain units that want to support domestic cultural undertakings from actively donating to production units.

As a result, Ning Weimin understood immediately.

This time, even he couldn't help but secretly call himself "stupid".

To put it bluntly, things can still be done this way, it's just a matter of paying the money in a different way.

What the leader meant was that as long as it was not in the name of box office revenue sharing, he could decide who to give his profits to and do what he wanted with them. That was his personal freedom.

Isn't this almost the same as what he did not long ago when he took the initiative to express his willingness to share his dividends from Tan Gong Restaurant with several old friends who are investors?

If we are flexible and take a roundabout way to save the country, there will be no policy obstacles.

  Otherwise, facing this era that is destined to undergo a major process of change, how can we be truly insightful?

The most important point is that you should not be too straightforward in doing things, but should know how to judge the situation.

While maintaining the original intention, we must also start from the perspective of adapting to the social environment and actual needs.

Sometimes you just have to take a detour.

Otherwise, if you only have enthusiasm and are stubborn, you won't be able to accomplish anything.

As for the specific selection of the first batch of films to be taken overseas, except for "Old Well" and "King of Children" by Xi'an Film Studio which were specifically recommended by the leaders of the Film Bureau, Ning Weimin was unable to refuse and nodded in agreement.

As for the selection of the other three films, Ning Weimin chose to give priority to his hometown film studio, Beijing Film Studio, and chose "The Drum Singer" and "The Golden Dart Huang Tianba", which have already been completed.

The last one, of course, was "Father and Son" filmed by Chen Peisi a few years ago.

The people from the Film Bureau and China Film Group Corporation took a tacit attitude towards Ning Weimin's little "selfishness" and did not openly oppose it.

However, people from China Film Corporation pointed out that "The Drum Singer" contained many anti-Japanese war plots, and they were worried that if it was sent to Japan for release, it would be met with disgust and rejection from the Japanese and not many people would come to watch it.

However, Ning Weimin has his own opinion on this point.

In his opinion, at least for now, the right-wing forces in Japan are not as arrogant as they will be in the future, and they dare to lie with open eyes and deny the heinous crimes committed by the Japanese army.

After all, there are still many people who have experienced the war and are still alive.

The trauma of war has penetrated deep into the bones, and those who have survived by chance are all afraid.

Even many old Japanese soldiers who participated in the war of aggression against China now realize that they have committed grave crimes and have become staunch anti-war activists.

Ning Weimin personally witnessed an old Japanese man scolding a group of ignorant Japanese youths on a busy street in Tokyo.

It's because these young people were parading through the streets of Tokyo wearing old military uniforms and waving the "Rising Sun Flag", attracting attention.

When the old man saw it, he started cursing at the person without any hesitation.

Although he was as thin as a turkey, his fierce look intimidated all the young people.

"Assholes! Don't do this. This is not Japan's glory, it is Japan's shame! You young people should stop worshipping these things. War will only cause disasters! If you continue to do this, we will be abandoned by all of Asia sooner or later! Hey, you assholes, get out of here, or I'll call the police!"

When these young people met such an old man, they really ran away in a panic.

From this we can see that if the police had come at that time, they would have interfered with these young people showing off the "Imperial Army's Military Honors."

This incident is enough to prove that Japanese society at that time was still filled with guilt about the war.

Otherwise, the box office of "Li Xianglan" would not be so strong.

  With these people around, Japan's right-wing elements have no chance to fully display their power and can only lie dormant with their tails between their legs.

At this moment, they did not have the courage to openly whitewash those war criminals.

At best, we can keep as silent as possible.

They hope that their own nation will gradually forget this history, and they also hope that others will forget this history.

They believe that even lessons learned at the cost of millions of lives can be forgotten in just one generation.

Therefore, for domestic films, this is actually the best time to release anti-Japanese films in Japan, as there will be more audiences.

I can curse you Japanese and earn some yen from you. How can I miss this opportunity?

In addition, Ning Weimin did not want the Japanese to get their wish, so he really treated these things as past events and gradually forgot about them.

He has to do his best to remind the Japanese and let the young Japanese know more about the crimes committed by their fathers and grandfathers.

Although it is always unpleasant to owe someone a debt, the Japanese generally hope that historical debts will be forgotten as soon as possible.

But for us victims, forgetting history means betrayal.

So in the end, seeing that Ning Weimin spoke so clearly and seemed to have a certain degree of confidence, China Film Company just let him go. (End of this chapter)