The King of Huayu Science Fiction

Chapter 382 Co-production of the Ninth District

DreamWorks Chairman's Office.

"Douban's score has hit a new low."

Tian Xinye looked at the phone screen and sighed.

Chen Jingxing was flipping through the list of project teams for "The Ninth District", and he comforted him: "The subject matter is limited, so there is no way around it, and it will definitely increase."

The premiere of "The Walking Dead" in China has aroused great enthusiasm. The plot of the first two episodes is not only novelty-seeking, but also family affection and touching. In terms of broadcast volume, it has exceeded the data of the previous DreamWorks TV series premiere. This is also because The reason why DreamWorks' web drama brand has indeed been established.

Although those who are older, or those who don't pay much attention to online dramas and animations, may not have any filters for DreamWorks.

In fact, most viewers usually don’t pay attention to the producer and producer behind it when they watch a film and television series, and each film and television work is isolated to them.

However, with the release of high-reputation film and television works in the past few years, especially whether it is a movie, TV series or animation, there are DreamWorks logo titles, so the brand image of DreamWorks still takes root in the hearts of many people. .

In this way, "The Walking Dead" itself has more influence and popularity than ordinary TV dramas and online dramas before it goes online because of the theme and DreamWorks. Maybe the coverage is not as good as some popular star dramas, but it is still very popular on the Internet. Considerable.

Therefore, the number of broadcasts of "The Walking Dead" is on the one hand the outing of the novelty plot, and on the other hand it is standing on the shoulders of giants.

However, compared to creating the best premiere data in the history of DreamWorks, the Douban score of "The Walking Dead" is not so impressive.

Although the score of 8.7 ranks among the top three TV dramas that have been aired this year, I have to say that the level of TV dramas this year has indeed exploded. Excited.

But such scores are not enough compared to DreamWorks' previous TV series. The drama versions of "Signal", "Black Mirror" and "Suspect Tracker" are all above 9 points, and "Battleship", "Star God II" and "Evolution "Not to mention animated dramas like "The ratings of animation themes have always been inflated.

But in Chen Jingxing's view, this is the price for the minority to become the public.

The scale of drama viewing for mainstream audiences in Huaguo is highly consistent with that of star dramas and big screens, and is much more conservative than that of many overseas countries. The drama scale of European and American cable TV networks is not smaller than that of online film and television dramas.

If "The Walking Dead" is a foreign drama, it will be difficult to enter the mainstream's attention, and it will only spread among a small group of viewers who like British and American dramas or Japanese and Korean dramas, then the evaluation will be very high, and it will even be regarded as a divine drama .

But who has made DreamWorks famous? "The Walking Dead" is also broadcast on three networks, and it has sparked heated discussions, so it will inevitably enter the audience of the public.

A large part of these audiences rarely even watch foreign dramas, and usually watch mainstream domestic film and television dramas. The novelty and seriousness of "The Walking Dead" will overload or make many audiences uncomfortable.

However, according to the observation of the marketing department of DreamWorks, since the second episode was broadcast, there have been some subtle changes in Douban's classification.

Obviously, the first episode directly getting to the point is a bit hardcore for many viewers, and when the second episode starts to use oriental narrative techniques to discuss family affection, human nature and sensationalism, it enters a cultural comfort zone, which can make Hua It is a story that can be accepted and moved by Chinese audiences regardless of elegance and vulgarity.

Therefore, the score of 8.7 will definitely start to rise slowly. As long as the following episodes can always grasp the scale of entertainment and depth, heavy and popular, it will not be a problem to become another 9-point masterpiece of DreamWorks.

In fact, Tian Xinye was not too worried about this, he just sighed casually. The goal of "The Walking Dead" is not to get a high Douban score.

At least judging from the current public opinion, the prospect of this drama is still very bright, and it seems that Chen Jingxing's original grand vision is not impossible to realize.

It will take time to prove whether "The Walking Dead" can create a subculture IP that is popular among young people around the world, and overseas is also an important part.

After all, if "The Walking Dead" is going to be adapted into a movie, it will face domestic censorship issues. Although the censorship standards here are a bit looser than those in Chen Jingxing's previous life plane, "Resident Evil" in the previous life plane can enter the theaters, but this plane is not without it possible.

Therefore, overseas markets will be an important part of determining the commercial value of this IP.

Thinking of this, Tian Xinye was also concerned about the overseas distribution of "The Walking Dead": "Have you negotiated with Netflix?"

Chen Jingxing took out a pen to sign the document, and nodded at the same time: "It's almost done, there are only some minor technical problems left."

According to Chen Jingxing's idea, "The Walking Dead" will naturally be sold to Netflix. After all, Netflix's coverage is indeed the widest and most powerful among all streaming media.

In China, you can shop around. Except for Netflix, which is the avenue to the sky, the rest of the overseas is a narrow path.

When "The Walking Dead" was filming, Netflix and DreamWorks were already negotiating overseas network copyrights, but the two parties have not reached an agreement.

The main problem is that Netflix's development strategy conflicts with DreamWorks' high-quality drama strategy.

Since last year, Netflix has set a strategic route to expand self-produced content, to reduce the proportion of copyright purchases, and to reduce the budget for purchasing dramas.

Of course, its so-called self-made content is basically a "contract system", which is nothing more than signing a contract with some production teams. The "team" produces ideas and manpower, and Netflix pays for it.

The advantage of this is that Netflix does not need to spend a lot of money to compete with other streaming media for copyright, thereby raising the price of copyright to sky-high prices, and letting its own profits be emptied by competition.

However, the copyright price of DreamWorks dramas is getting higher year by year. How could they be willing to sell it to Netflix at a low price?

Netflix's reduced cost of purchasing dramas and DreamWorks' high asking prices have naturally become irreconcilable contradictions.

If it is under the fierce competition of domestic video platforms, if there is no butcher Zhang and butcher Li, the producer of the superior content has the right to bargain.

Except for Netflix overseas, the rest of the streaming media is a little bit worse than Netflix, and streaming media like Apple and Disney, which are backed by big forces, also tend to make their own content. The drama is not very positive.

Chen Jingxing didn't have the guts to say that you couldn't afford the price of Netflix, so I'll find someone else.

Who can I go to?

Similarly, Netflix is ​​not willing to be willing to produce high-quality content like DreamWorks, especially since it is also making efforts to develop the Asian market. Currently, Netflix does not have many local dramas that can attract East Asian audiences.

However, such wrangling and contradictions had a chance to be resolved after DreamWorks went public.

Shortly after DreamWorks went public in Hong Kong, it reached a share swap agreement with Netflix, and DreamWorks directly became the No.14 major shareholder of Netflix.

Netflix has also become the fourth largest shareholder of DreamWorks, second only to Chen Jingxing, Huanshiwang and Penguin Pictures.

Moreover, Netflix continued to purchase DreamWorks' outstanding shares in the Hong Kong stock market. After "The Walking Dead" was launched, it became the second largest shareholder after Chen Jingxing.

This is also the reason why DreamWorks has ushered in a round of continuous stock price rises after the release of "Edge of Tomorrow".

Because Netflix took the lead, Huanshiwang and Penguin Pictures are frantically buying shares in DreamWorks.

The market value of DreamWorks even rose from 486 billion on the first day of listing before the release of "Edge of Tomorrow" to more than 750 billion in less than a month.

Let Hong Kong stock investors and the media exclaim the monster stocks.

Correspondingly, DreamWorks also allocated part of the funds raised in the listing to Nasdaq, and continued to purchase Netflix shares after the two companies exchanged shares.

DreamWorks and Netflix seem to have a feeling of reaching a strategic partnership.

In this way, after negotiations between the two parties, DreamWorks has become a special content contractor for Netflix in East Asia. Although Netflix cannot afford the sky-high copyrights of domestic video platforms, it has made a big contribution to DreamWorks in terms of the share of accounts. concession.

In this way, Netflix can obtain the high-quality content produced by DreamWorks in the future without paying too high procurement costs. For Netflix, which is expanding rapidly, exploring the Asian market, and increasing the number of members, high-quality content that can bring membership growth This is the biggest benefit, and it can also bind DreamWorks to the Netflix platform.

Both sides are considered winners.

Chen Jingxing has been very busy during this period, filming "Matrix II" during the day, and after work is over, he has to go back to the company to handle the preparations for "Inception" and deal with the cooperation with Universal Co-producer.

The cooperation with Netflix does not need his concern, this is Xu Wenshen's job.

But matters related to the movie must be checked by him. Even if it is pushed to the president's office, Xu Wenshen will ask Chen Dong to make a decision.

Chen Jingxing's authority in film and television drama projects is convinced by everyone in the company.

What needs him to make a decision today is the co-production of "District [-]".

"The Ninth District" has been officially approved as a project. Tian Xinye is the director. DreamWorks and Universal each send a producer. The background has been discussed in South Africa after the perfect script creation. There is no way to put the background of this movie in China. Consider South Asia or South Africa.

The background of this kind of slum itself is very suitable for Tianzhu or South Africa. The white slums in South Africa are very famous.

Later, considering the need to co-produce with Universal, it was changed to South Africa.

The "villain agency" in the film is of course the agency of the United Nations to deal with the alien slum-"Ninth District".

Under such an international background, apart from the actor Chen Jingxing who insisted on using Chinese actors, many other roles will use Hollywood union actors.

This is also an important reason why Chen Jingxing decided to co-produce with Universal.

And in front of him is the list of the main creators initially determined for the "Ninth District" project.

The white and black actors are provided by Universal, and one or two of them are well-known Hollywood actors and B-list stars.

Tian Xinye is in charge of casting the male lead and his girlfriend.

After Tian Xinye's selection, Zhang Yi was finally decided.

Zhang Yi is a relatively high-level acting school in China, and he was also selected as the leading actor by Guo Fan in the ongoing filming of "Operation Red Sea".

The disadvantage is that they are not famous enough, and they are not well-known internationally. Universal's opinion is to invite Cheng Long, Li Lianjie or Luo Chen.

However, they were all rejected by Tian Xinye.

He thinks that "District [-]" is going to be filmed well, and the starring role is very important. The male protagonist should be a civilian staff member of the UN alien processing agency stationed in the [-]th district in charge of demolition. They did not treat them as human beings, and even burned the "superborn" eggs of aliens.

After coming into contact with extraterrestrial matter, they gradually turned into aliens, and looked at their encounters from the perspective of aliens little by little, and their inner conscience was constantly awakened. After going through all kinds of hardships, they realized The change in the way of thinking about his own redemption is deduced.

This performance is quite difficult, and Tian Xinye believes that Zhang Yi is a very suitable actor for this role.

Chen Jingxing also agrees with Tian Xinye's casting. As the leading actor with a Huaguo face in the whole movie, acting skills are indeed very important. Not only can he not be suppressed by other Hollywood actors, but he must be as brilliant as possible.

(End of this chapter)