director of the millennium

He said that he would celebrate the New Year first, but in fact, after resting for a few days with Liu Yifei who had returned home, Wu Yuan continued to be busy preparing for "Ready Player One".

The original version of "Ready Player One" took a full three years from the beginning of preparation to filming and release.

Although part of the reason is that it is not urgent, considering that the current technology is not as good as it will be later, Wu Yuan actually has to go through a long preparation period for filming "Ready Player One" this time.

Not to mention anything else, the special effects alone would definitely require a three-year production cycle.

Of course, most of this will be produced after the filming is completed, so Wu Yuan can still complete the actual wrap-up before October 2014.

In this way, he will have another year to shoot "Ride the Wind" and do the post-production of "Ride the Wind".

"Riding the Wind" is a movie that does not require any computer special effects. It can be completed within a year from the start of shooting to post-production and then to release, but time is still very tight.

So Wu Yuan became busy again after a long time, trying to sort out all the complicated issues of "Ready Player One" in a very short time.

Almost every day he holds various meetings with the creative team and organizes the crew to set up scenes in Shanghai and Chongqing.

For example, in addition to the selected filming location in Chongqing, the set of the stacked building area also had to be built, using a large amount of steel as the supporting structure. More than 5 RVs were stacked in a completely random manner to form 6- "semi-finished products" about four or five stories high.

This "semi-finished product" actually looks like the slums where the protagonist lives in the movie.

Cyberpunk-style slums must be high and compact, similar to the "pig cage city" that appeared in early Hong Kong movies, but a technological version.

Of course, the reason why it is called a semi-finished product is that these "semi-finished products" provide enough real elements for the close-up shots and real-life interactive shots. Digital Domain expanded the scope of the stacked building area to hundreds and thousands, and through further optimization, it looked shaky.

What will be shown in the movie is hundreds or thousands of such "pig cage buildings", and even repeated floors will be virtualized on them to create a cyberpunk flavor.

This kind of special effects needs to be produced during the preparation period before filming starts, and all of this needs to be confirmed by Wu Yuan.

The special effects production of "Ready Player One" will not only involve the special effects company of Light and Shadow Era, but also Industrial Light & Magic and Digital Domain from the United States, and a huge number of manpower will be needed.

The budget for special effects alone exceeded 2.5 million RMB.

The total budget of this movie is as high as 4.2 million RMB. It can be said that it will not make any money unless the box office reaches 12 billion.

Of course, although the domestic box office market has already reached 12 billion per film, Wu Yuan is targeting the entire Asian market this time, not just thinking about making a profit.

But we have to admit that this also shows how great the pressure is to make a profit when making science fiction films.

How could other mainland films that have no Asian market to speak of possibly attract so much investment to make such a sci-fi blockbuster?
Even if they were to pay for it themselves, I'm afraid few companies would dare to take the gamble.

With so much money, wouldn't it be good to make seven or eight comedy films?
As long as one of them becomes a hit, the investment will be recovered. Wouldn't the pressure be much less?
In his previous life, Wu Yuan was very "pretentious". He felt that the domestic film market was ruined by a group of producers who loved to make low-budget comedies and romances. He had no high-level pursuits and, like most netizens, felt that movies like "The Wandering Earth" should appear more often.

But he reached a high position in this life, and he can understand why the Chinese-language film market has been dominated by comedies and romance films for nearly a decade.

Before 2016, the mainland film market could not support science fiction blockbusters. This is an objective fact and there is nothing that can be done about it.

When the market matures, science fiction blockbusters like "The Wandering Earth" will naturally appear.

What kind of market will naturally produce what kind of movies, just like the European film market will never produce science fiction blockbusters.

Don’t they want to shoot?
There is no such condition!
Fortunately, China has a huge population base of 14 billion, and generation after generation of outstanding commercial film directors have emerged to cultivate the Chinese film market.

Without these excellent comedies and romance films to attract audiences to the cinema, there would not be such a great success as "The Wandering Earth".

There is no need to criticize and blame directors who make comedies and romance films just because of the excellence of "The Wandering Earth". Their contributions are equally important.

Just because science fiction blockbusters are the pinnacle of commercial films, we cannot despise and look down on other commercial films.

Of course, there is nothing much to say about directors who make bad movies, so curse them more!

Wu Yuan chose to make "Ready Player One" in order to stay true to his original aspiration and to accelerate the maturity of the Chinese film market.

This is what he has always done.

The Light and Shadow Times Cinema Chain has added more than 200 cinemas to China.

The films he invested in accelerated the development of the Chinese film industry by three to five years.

The science fiction films he shot also allowed the world to see the pinnacle of Chinese commercial films.

To date, "Gravity" is still the Chinese-language film with the highest cumulative playback volume on major video platforms!

Now, he has to climb a higher mountain.

"We made this film Ready Player One not just for Chinese audiences, but for audiences across Asia, mainly for audiences in Japan, South Korea, Southeast Asia and Greater China."

"So in the movie, we need to be more international. Although the story takes place in the future Chinese world, there are no national boundaries in the virtual world of 'Oasis'."

"So when constructing the world of 'Oasis', we need to add some Japanese and Korean-style buildings, and the virtual characters we meet on the road should also have Japanese and Korean styles."

"For example, users who dress like ninjas, users with exaggerated Korean-style looks, and buildings with Southeast Asian style, etc."

"As for the European and American-style characters and buildings, you don't have to worry too much about them, because our film won't be shown in Europe and America anyway."

"Just assume that in the future world of the story, only Asian countries still exist."

"Have you ever seen Hollywood's futuristic science fiction movies and Japanese comics?"

"The worldviews of their works are either completely European and American, or completely Japanese, as if the whole universe speaks English or Chinese."

“This time, our Ready Player One is a purely Asian world where everyone speaks Chinese!”

"As the birthplace of Asian culture and the de facto sovereign, this makes sense, right?"

At an internal meeting, Wu Yuan said confidently. (End of this chapter)