This director needs to apologize

Chapter 164 Debris Flow Type Film

Chen Yiming woke up from his memories, looked sideways, and met two embarrassing and lively eyes.

Da Zhuang didn't know when he had changed his position, leaning over the armrest of the sofa, staring at him intently.

Seeing Chen Yiming's response, Da Zhuang asked excitedly, "Do you understand? What should we do?"

Chen Yiming pushed the big face in front of him with one hand, "What the hell! Do you believe what I say? Are you the chairman or my chairman?"

Da Zhuang licked his face and smiled, "Yi Ming, you don't know how gossip is spread in the circle now, how evil it is.

Winning the Palme d'Or first, and then getting 3000 million first-time subscriptions are unheard of moves. Now if you say you want to make a blockbuster with a billion investment, I think there will be people who would dare to do it.

Last year's interview with "Modu Evening News" was recently unearthed. In it, you predicted that domestic comedies would be the next trend. Do you know how many comedy projects have been approved recently?

You say it, I believe it! "

Chen Yiming thought for a while and said, "I think the first thing to follow when running a company is not the industry trend, but the industry rules.

Since you said that Platinum Jue is now a film company, then we have to figure out what the laws of the film industry are. "

Chen Yiming got up and went to his desk to get a pen and paper, and drew on the paper while talking.

“Hollywood has shown the path of commercial films very clearly, and it is actually very simple.

One is the audience, which is how much demand there is in the market. This is the upper limit of the industry.

At the current stage, we have thoroughly understood this upper limit through "1951". The limit data for a single film is 3000 million moviegoers and 9 million box office.

Obviously, this cannot be replicated and can only be used as a background for our future decisions.

What we can really refer to is last year's total box office of 52 billion, which on average is 1 million in a single week.

According to the current industry practice in theaters, the average release time of new films is 6 weeks, the box office in the second week will drop by 40%, the first week of film schedule will not exceed 35%, and the average weekly decline will be 7%.

Based on this calculation, it can be concluded that when the attendance rate is not lower than the average, the benchmark box office of a single movie is around 7000 million, corresponding to 24 moviegoers.

In other words, only if an estimate of 24 moviegoers can be obtained at the beginning of the project, it will be considered a qualified project and qualified to start operation.

Moreover, this 24 is just a baseline. Theaters are expanding and audiences are growing. Next year, this baseline will definitely continue to rise, perhaps to 26, or even 30.

I think the first requirement for the directors we choose to work with in the future is that the other party must agree with this mathematical logic. He must not be a celebrity who opens his mouth and does his best but only shoots air-to-air missiles. "

Da Zhuang stared at the lines of calculations on the white paper and fell into silence for a long time.

He had never thought that an artistic director would first calculate how many movie tickets he could sell when setting up a project.

According to traditional knowledge, shouldn’t this be the responsibility of Xuanfa?

Which director could be convinced by this approach?

After thinking for a long time, he couldn't figure it out. He looked up at Chen Yiming, who was there, drinking tea.

"Master Zhu, go on, the first is the audience, what about the second?"

Chen Yiming put down the tea cup, picked up the pen and continued to draw on the paper.

“The second is of course investment, what is the upper limit, what is the minimum, and what is the stop loss line.

After determining the project goals, these lines can be deduced.

The average box office of 7000 million yuan is an average revenue of 2000 million yuan.

After deducting various taxes and marginal interest, we can set the investment limit at 1500 million. As long as the total investment is ensured to be below this amount, the probability of loss can be greatly reduced.

1500 million minus 30% of the reserved publicity funds is the bottom line, 1000 million.

Directors from China rarely have business thinking, and overspending is a common occurrence, so we have to set a stop loss line above the investment limit.

The meaning of this line is not to restrain the director, but to restrain you and me.

Assuming that the overrun ratio is set to 25%, it means that when the project expenditure will predictably exceed 1900 million, we will have to intervene forcefully.

Of course we respect the director, but we respect the investment even more. This is also the law of operation of commercial movies.

You see, I added another string of curses to the co-director, which seemed very unfriendly.

However, this is what a start-up film company must abide by, including me as the creative director. "

Da Zhuang stared at the numbers on the white paper and thought about it again and again. He couldn't help but ask, "Yi Ming, I don't understand movies, but I have a feeling that making movies this way is too restrictive and doesn't work at all." It’s like making art!”

Chen Yiming laughed, "You are right, commercial movies are not works of art, and commercial directors are not artists. We are just craftsmen selling our craftsmanship.

I have mentioned to you before that the current film industry in China cannot be said to be an industry, because there are no mature genre films at all, and a basic audience base for a certain genre of films has never been cultivated.

Nowadays, apart from Wang Xiaogang's glib comedies, there are no other genre film directors in the Mainland.As a result, Wang Xiaogang is no longer satisfied with commercial achievements and has plunged into large-scale fields to explore art.

You can study the prosperity history of Humen Pictures, a second-tier Hollywood company, and you will understand how important it is for a medium-sized production company like Platinum to deeply cultivate genre films.

For Bojue, performance is just the icing on the cake, and risk is the key to survival.

Look at the history of Hollywood, how many established companies with glorious histories have been killed by a major investment failure. "

Da Zhuang stopped retorting and asked after thinking for a while, "Is there a third one?"

Chen Yiming nodded and said, "Of course, the third one involves the direction of the wind outside the rules, but this is my inference, and I can't guarantee it if I say it in advance!"

Da Zhuang became happy when he heard the inference, "Your inference must be accurate, tell me quickly."

Chen Yiming shook his head helplessly, disapproving of the underlying laws and firmly believing in Tiekou's straightforwardness. Maybe this is human nature.

“In fact, I have mentioned similar words before. In the next few years, two industries will be deeply involved in Bojue’s business field.

One is the super large real estate companies. You can pay attention to those real estate groups that are developing urban complexes. They will definitely lead the two-in-one cinema and theater model. After passing the rapid expansion period, they will continue to be involved in the production and distribution links. .

The second is the Internet giants. Their desire for expansion is stronger than that of real estate companies. Because they have greater performance pressure, they will also compete to move upstream after completing the downstream segmentation.

You can speculate what changes will be brought to the industry if these two big financiers squeeze into the circle to play movies? "

Da Zhuang began to take the long test with a wink, and after taking it for a long time, he sighed and said, "The former will build a large number of high-end cinemas, and I guess the ticket prices will rise, while the latter will burn money to attract new users, so the ticket prices will fall.

One rises and one falls, and I am not sure whether it rises or falls in the end. "

Chen Yiming laughed and said, "Why can't it go up and down again? The ticket price has doubled to fifty, and the ticket subsidy has doubled to forty. Watching a movie only costs ninety-nine yuan. You can decide whether you like it or not."

Da Zhuang's mouth couldn't be closed. It sounded incredible, but considering the operation of Weibo, it didn't seem impossible.

Chen Yiming continued to explain, “This is a sugar-coated psychedelic drug, and it is fooled both upstream and downstream.

After the audience has developed the habit of watching movies, the Internet giants have also finished slicing up the films. When the ticket prices go back up, they can harvest whatever they want.

The same goes for the film studios. When the ticket booking platform deeply affects the movie theaters' film schedules, ticket subsidy is cut off with a click. If the film studios want to schedule films, they can only be willing to be pigs on the chopping board and let the two major financial backers take whatever they want.

Don’t think I’m being alarmist, just think about how real estate developers and game companies played in the past. These two industries are famous for their wool coming from the sheep. "

Da Zhuang was a little anxious, "Yi Ming, this is not the direction of the wind you are talking about. It is obviously a mudslide. Let alone taking off with the wind, I am afraid it will not be directly swept into the ditch."

Chen Yiming shrugged and said, "Isn't it just a mudslide? This is an irresistible trend. What we have to do is not to surf on the mudslide for excitement, but to be the first to stand on a high place and wait for the mudslide to sweep away all other colleagues.

The future is a blue world, and whoever lives to the end will live the best.

The safe place is the genre film market.

Our goal is to identify this market and then work hard to become a key player in it. "

Da Zhuang reacted and immediately asked, "Is it a comedy?"

Chen Yiming shook his head repeatedly, "Comedy is highly bound to actors. Even if we cultivate users, it has little to do with production. Once the actors leave, the audience will all follow.

So it’s okay to play it occasionally, but it’s not okay to treat it as a basic game.

Taking into account the national conditions of our country, I can think of the following types of films that can be stably produced.

First, it is a suspenseful investigation theme, which is easy for directors and screenwriters to play, and it is easy for the company to establish a reputation. It is a good high ground.

The problem is that it is difficult to pass the review. The workaround I can think of is to move the story abroad, such as Little Days, Bang Country, Southeast Asia, and even the Gallic Nut Maple Leaf Country. Anyway, it is not impossible to move the story to places where Chinese people live together. Can consider it.

As for the issue of cost control for filming abroad, this is the stage where our sister Shen can play. There is a lot of room for operation in this area. If the preparations are in place, it is possible to earn an extra tax refund.

The second is female emotional themes, which also belong to the strong director type, and are constantly scheduled throughout the year.

The problem with this category is that it is not easy to find reliable directors, and it is not easy to keep them after the project is successful. This depends on Mr. Ma’s personal charm.

The third is youth films. This genre has been relatively fully developed, so the competition is particularly fierce. However, because of this, the upper limit is relatively high.

Look at the bad movies in this category last year, summarize and refine the elements and do the opposite, and you can win a wave of goodwill next year. Even if it doesn't become a big hit, the probability of losing money is not high.

The last one is soft science fiction. This genre requires us to be self-reliant and work hard to start a business. The audience needs to be slowly built up from scratch.

But as long as we persevere and build up a scale, our family will basically be able to take advantage of it, and the moat will be frighteningly wide. "

Da Zhuang said ignorantly, "Isn't the last genre just science fiction? Why do we need to distinguish between soft and hard?"

Chen Yiming sighed, "Hard science fiction is a glutton for money and time. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been pressed for several years. Do you think we can bear it?"

(End of this chapter)