director of the millennium

"Hey, if there's a $20 million box office split, that's not bad."

Wu Yuan, who was far away in Beijing, was very satisfied after receiving the box office data of the large-scale release of "Bruce Lee".

He doesn't have high ambitions. Even if he could only get $3 million at the global box office, he would be happy enough.

Don’t be fooled by the Hollywood blockbusters that often make over 1 billion U.S. dollars worldwide and think that a few hundred million dollars in box office revenue is not worth mentioning.

In fact, there are not many movies that can break 100 million US dollars in global box office each year, and they are concentrated in two major countries on both sides of the Pacific.

Being able to break $2 million at the global box office is already worth bragging about.

Especially low-budget movies, which can be called box office dark horses.

"Twenty million US dollars is almost 1.3 million RMB. It can be used to subsidize the Guangying Times Cinema Chain for half a year." Wu Yuan said with satisfaction.

Guangying Times Cinema Chain is almost a wholly-owned company of his. Even though it now has more than 300 cinemas, he only introduced Guangying Times as a shareholder.

Although he also distributed options to senior executives, when the company was in trouble, he was of course the only one who could pay to alleviate the company's financial pressure.

Fortunately, for the next six months to a year, the financial pressure on Guangying Times Cinemas is not that great, and it can withstand a loss of 300 to 500 million yuan.

"However, we also need to increase revenue and reduce expenditure." As he said this, Wu Yuan turned on the computer.

Today is a rare working day for him, and he began to deal with recent company affairs in his study.

Wu Yuan has been relatively free in the past month, taking care of the children at home with Liu Yifei every day.

The couple finally heard their daughter calling "Mommy" and "Daddy" late one night when she woke up and cried loudly, which fulfilled Wu Yuan's wish.

However, during a month of leisure and baby-sitting, there are always a few days when you still have to work.

Although we are facing an unprecedented epidemic, it does not mean that the company will not work at all. It will just stop all out-of-home work and transfer other work to online processing.

For example, the review of submitted scripts.

Guangying Times now has a very complete film investment system. Whether it is supporting new screenwriters, investing in new directors, or attracting famous directors in the industry, it has its own system.

However, the films that are finally selected and determined to be produced still have to be reviewed by Wu Yuan. Only after he confirms that it is acceptable and signs it, can the project actually start paying for it and enter the project preparation stage.

This is also the best choice Wu Yuan made to avoid losses in the company's investment. After all, at least until this year, his golden finger for seeing through the future is still there, and it can last for another one or two years.

Two years later, when the timeline has exceeded the experience in his dream, he will no longer have too much say in the company's final selection of investment films. He will really just take a look at them. As long as the script is not the kind that looks like a loss-making one, he will no longer reject it and leave the investment selection completely to the company's group of professionals.

Sitting in front of the computer, Wu Yuan simply flipped through the movies that had been approved within the company.

Most of them were movies he didn't know.

In the Chinese film industry, there are too many films created every year, many new directors, and many directors who have failed but still want to continue. Guangying Times is one of the largest film companies in the industry, so hundreds of scripts are submitted to Guangying Times every year. In fact, after reaching the level of Guangying Times and becoming a giant in the industry, even without Wu Yuan's foresight, it is difficult for the company to make mistakes in the general direction.

Because every year a large number of films and directors choose Guangying Times, even if there are some works that lose money, from the overall base, the company will definitely make money.

Unless Wu Yuan makes a major decision-making mistake, he could end up bringing the company into trouble.

But he is cautious and still has to personally screen the film projects that are finally to be approved.

This also gives him a sense of pleasure of "digging for treasure".

Just before he had turned the pages for long, he saw a very familiar movie.

"Life Events" - Screenwriter and director: Liu Jiangjiang.

"Mo Sanmei went to jail for fighting with his girlfriend, but was dumped by his girlfriend after he was released from prison..."

After seeing this movie, Wu Yuan suddenly became energetic and immediately turned to the page about the director's introduction and the script creation concept.

After graduating from university with a degree in journalism in 2008, Liu Jiangjiang worked in Hebei Provincial Radio and Television, shooting the TV series "Village Affairs" for the TV station, and worked there for 11 years.

The program was discontinued in 2017, and he subsequently entered the film industry, where he wrote and directed "Going to Heaven", a film set in North China's funeral culture. He then submitted the script to the venture capital unit of the Dali International Film Festival.

The venture capital unit of the Dali International Film Festival was only established last year. Its main purpose is to provide a platform for emerging directors to shine. Any director who thinks his project is good can submit it to this unit. If selected, Guangying Times will invest in filming.

"Going to Heaven" is the work selected for the venture capital unit in 2019, and then Guangying Times signed a contract with Liu Jiangjiang. The formal project of this film also began to go through internal approval and was finally sent to Wu Yuan.

In the project book, there were even details about why Liu Jiangjiang wrote the film script and the reasons for doing so, as if he wanted to impress Wu Yuan with these.

According to the project book, Liu Jiangjiang started writing the script in March 2019.

One day, when Liu Jiangjiang got off work, he saw a funeral clothing store next to the TV station. There was a car parked at the door. The car was probably moving or unloading goods, and there were wreaths and urns. In the evening, through the door and window, he saw a little girl sitting next to the coffee table, doing homework. That scene touched him directly, and he felt as if he had seen a theme. After having this idea, he quickly wrote the first version of the script.

Funeral director is a mysterious and niche profession. He wants to film the stories of this profession and the warm side behind it so that the public can understand this profession and the warmth of the funeral industry, and not be so afraid of and misunderstand funeral directors.

Well, the concept is actually similar to that of Wu Yuan's "Departures". However, compared to "Departures", this script, renamed "Life Events", has undoubtedly taken commerciality more into consideration, and chose the very classic setting of an uncle and a lolita, rather than a realistic old master and a newcomer.

Moreover, from the perspective of story structure, this movie is also very commercial. It is a comedy but not without tear-jerking moments. The comedy of the film not only enhances the fun of watching the movie, but also contains a positive attitude towards life, while also emphasizing the importance of emotions between people.

It can be said that just by looking at the script, you can tell that this movie is a good work.

There is really nothing wrong with being selected by the Dali International Film Festival and finally being passed to Wu Yuan.

Wu Yuan agreed to the project without any hesitation.

However, the original plan to start filming in June this year will most likely be postponed. The exact start time is still uncertain, but we can start preparations! (End of this chapter)