The king of ghost horse comedy

Chapter 521 Christmas schedule

When Xu Guanwu saw this movie, he couldn't help being a little dazed. As far as he knew, it seemed that Wang Jing had made such a movie in his previous life, and it was made by his best friends Chen Boxiang, Cao Zhali, and the stunning beauty Zhong Chuhong. Zhang Manyu co-starred with Rosamund Kwan and others. It is a lively and interesting romantic comedy. It also won the top ten blockbuster movie awards of the year.

Unexpectedly, this movie was shot by Zeng Zhiwei now, but although the storyline is similar, the actors are not as good.Golden Harvest doesn't have many beauties, so this filming is also a collaboration with Li's TV station. Ma Min'er, who is famous for the TV series "Chameleon", and Wei Qiuhua, a beautiful woman in costume, were selected as co-stars.

Wei Qiuhua is Gu Tianle, who played Huang Rong in Li Yutong's version of "The Legend of Condor Heroes". At the same time, she also played the role of Japanese female spy Wang Xiuzhi in the TV series "Heroes Huo Yuanjia".

And Ma Min'er was a student of Li's artist training class before. Because of her outstanding qualifications, she was still in the training period, and she was appreciated by TV producer McDonald, who promoted her to star in the martial arts TV series "Shen Shengyi".Later, because "The Change of Silkworms" also required her to play a role, her role in "Shen Shengyi" had to disappear midway.When filming "The Change of the Silkworm", because people were dissatisfied that she and Pan Zhiwen were not together in "Chameleon", they wrote to the TV station to protest together, which made the TV station quickly add a sequel to "Chameleon", which made Ma Miner In "The Change of the Silkworm", the character disappeared midway again.

This aspect shows that Ma Miner is very popular with the audience, and many TV dramas rely on her to boost their momentum.On the other hand, it actually reflects the star shortage of Li TV station. There are only a few actresses available, so each TV series uses these actresses, making these actresses have no skills at all, and they have to let their roles die without a problem. .

After Zeng Zhiwei's "The Frog Prince" was released, it took part of the box office of "The Bald Detective", which caused the attendance rate of "The Bald Detective" to drop slightly.However, considering that "The Bald Detective" has been released for a week, and there are still more than [-]% of the attendance rate, it is actually quite reasonable.

……

In addition to Golden Harvest and Xu's new films being released, Shaw also launched its own Christmas and New Year movie called "Five Blessings".Telling the daily life of a family of five, a down-to-earth movie like this is relatively rare in Shaw Brothers movies.Moreover, the plot setting is somewhat similar to Huang Baiming's "Eight Stars Annunciation", and also somewhat like Gao Zhisen's "Rich and Rich". In short, it is a comedy describing social life.

Most of the comedy films describing the lives of ordinary people were made by leftist film companies. In the early days, they reflected the lives of ordinary people in Hong Kong, and they had the meaning of criticizing reality and praising the people.Later, with the gradual decline of leftist movies, Hong Kong movies rarely paid attention to the lives of ordinary people. Most of them were knights, righteous men, heroes, or the love life of beautiful beauties and passionate sons, etc., which were far from the daily life of ordinary people. far away.

The reason for this change is, on the one hand, that martial arts and kung fu movies are lively and action scenes are more attractive to the audience.On the other hand, comedy movies are more difficult to shoot. It is very difficult for filmmakers to shoot the daily life of ordinary people and extract enough jokes from it.

Xu's comedy movies in the 70s were so popular, but there was still a window of a few years, because comedy movies were not easy to make.If it is too far from reality, it will not be enough to impress the audience, if it is too close to reality, it will not be hilarious enough, and if the writing is too close to reality, the screenwriter must have rich life experience in order to write a convincing and hilarious movie.

It's like "People on the Journey", which was once hit in the mainland, although this small-budget film sold tens of millions of box office in the end, it was a rare dark horse at the box office that year.But because the screenwriter is from Hong Kong and doesn't have a deep understanding of the mainland, there are frequent mistakes in the movie. Although people laughed at the time after watching it, the plot really doesn't stand up to scrutiny.

Shaw's "Five Blessings" is also about the daily life of a family of five. The children have different personalities. There is a loyal and honest elder brother, a second brother who steals and cheats, and a clever and lovely third sister. Life was originally plain.But because the eldest brother and his girlfriend got married and wanted to buy a house, the originally happy family immediately fell into chaos.

There are tears in this film, it is a rare and warm work, and it is also a rare sincere work of Shaw Brothers in recent years, but the film is made by a young female director of Jiayi TV, named Xu Anhua .

……

When Xu Guanwu saw Xu Anhua's name, he couldn't help being taken aback. He knew that there were not many female directors in Hong Kong, so any female director is quite remarkable, and Xu Anhua can be called great even among all directors in Hong Kong.

Xu Anhua specializes in female dramas, and has made many high-quality art films with the delicate perspective unique to female directors, such as "Women Forty", "Sister Tao", "The Story of Hu Yue" and so on.

Director Xu Anhua is also a leader among Hong Kong's new wave directors. He once filmed a suspense film "Crazy Robbery" and a ghost film "Crash into the Right", which later inspired Hong Jingbao to film "Ghosts Fighting Ghosts" " and other fantasy kung fu movies.

Xu Guanwu has always admired director Xu Anhua, because she is one of the few directors in Hong Kong who can continue to shoot movies, and she is also a director who has strict requirements on her works.From the two films "Crash into the Front" and "Crazy Robbery", we can see that Director Xu's commercial films are also top-notch, but she did not only focus on making money to make commercial films, but has been committed to making literary films.Of course, this also makes her famous enough, but her income is far less than that of her peers.

I once tried to make a movie "Day and Night in Tin Shui Wai", and asked countless film companies, but no one was willing to invest money. In the end, Wang Jing, who has always been famous for making commercial films, invested millions of dollars so that she could finish the filming. .For director Xu, who has been in the industry in the 70s and has a very high reputation, this is undoubtedly a very emotional thing.

However, despite the success of films such as "Day and Night in Tianshuiwei", director Xu Anhua has always insisted on making literary films. It is really admirable that he can persist for 30 years under the temptation of money.

It is worth mentioning that in the first movie "Mad Robbery" directed by Xu Anhua in his previous life, Zhao Yazhi played the murderer.At that time, she was deeply involved in the film when she was filming the movie. When she was walking on the road, she would be scared to cry when children saw her.

……

The Christmas schedule is relatively happy and romantic, and it is also a festival for lovers and family members, so happy and funny comedy movies like "The Bald Man" and "The Frog Prince" are more popular, and they have achieved good box office after their release.However, although "Five Blessings" has a festive name and is also a comedy, the box office of this movie is still not satisfactory because of its heavy theme. The box office of this movie was only 80 Hong Kong dollars in two weeks of release, barely keeping the capital.

In comparison, "The Bald Detective" was screened continuously for one and a half months, and its box office was as high as HK$400, while "The Frog Prince" also had a box office of more than [-] million. "Five Blessings" can only save capital. For Shaw Brothers, it is already a big defeat.This made it even more difficult for the already precarious Shaw Brothers.

In comparison, Golden Harvest is a bit high-spirited, and they have reached a cooperation agreement with New Line Films of the United States. Within the next five years, New Line Films will invest in Golden Harvest's films, and the films they shoot will also be handed over to Distributed by New Line Films.

Founded in the 60s, New Line Films mainly distributes low-cost horror films to American college students. It has gradually grown in recent years before entering the film production industry, mainly shooting horror films.The cooperation with Golden Harvest Film Company this time was also inspired by Xu's "Project A".

The popular screening of "Project A" made Hollywood film companies see the potential of Hong Kong films, so many small and medium-sized film companies came to Hong Kong to seek gold.

However, these American filmmakers came here in high spirits, but went back dejectedly.Because they found that although Hong Kong movies are now prosperous, compared with the orderliness of Hollywood movies, Hong Kong movies are more like weeds growing wildly in the wild, and there are not enough rules established at all.

These weeds competed with each other for nutrients and seized each other's territory. They grew completely disorderly and wild. This level of chaos was comparable to Hollywood in the 30s and [-]s, completely disorganized and undisciplined.Surprised these Hollywood filmmakers.

In their view, Hong Kong films lack institutional management and the necessary legal protection. Directors can make films without scripts, and stories can be copied from well-known European and American films. Actors never sign any contracts, and they have to do even dangerous moves... …

Moreover, except for a few well-known film companies in Hong Kong, other film companies are basically equivalent to leather bag companies. The entire company often only has a few people. Recruited from everywhere.

There is no investment value in such a bag film company. If the investment fails, the United States will lose money for nothing, and they will not even get compensation.

Except for the well-known film companies, most of the works of other companies are shoddy. Even if such a film is made with money, it is still a question of whether it can be released in the United States.After all, these small and medium-sized film companies do not have theaters under their banners, so even if they want to release, they have to discuss with the theater companies.

But if the film is really bad, the theater company is not willing to release it, because if the attendance rate is not high, then the theater company will also lose money.If Xu Guanwu hadn't caught Lei Shidong's pigtail back then, he couldn't have forced him to let the movie "Rocky" be released.

Because of the various problems of Hong Kong film companies, a Hollywood film company was very disappointed. In the end, only Golden Harvest was able to reach a cooperation with Hollywood film companies.

Shaw Brothers wanted to cooperate with a Hollywood film company, but Shao Yifu's offer was too ruthless, demanding an investment of tens of millions of dollars, which immediately scared off the originally interesting film company.

The reason why Shaw Brothers opened his mouth like a lion is actually a little forced.Given the difficulties Shaw Brothers is currently facing, it urgently needs a large sum of money to save money, because the movies it produces now make money and lose money, and many of its theaters are old, not only the seats are seated It is wobbly, and it has been in disrepair for a long time. Rats crawl everywhere. Audiences dare not put their feet down when they go to the theater to watch movies, for fear of being bitten by rats on their toes.

Naturally, the people who go to this kind of mouse theater to watch movies are the kind of people who are at the bottom of society and are not willing to spend money.And the ticket price of the mouse theater is really cheap.

Xu's Brilliant Cinemas is well decorated, with comfortable seats, clear screens, strong three-dimensional sound, and good service, so the ticket price is now around [-] yuan.Student tickets and elderly tickets are only half of the price. Of course, there are occasional five-yuan tickets for a day in the off-season.

Although the movie theaters under Golden Harvest are a little old, they are still hygienic, and the ticket prices are around two or three yuan.In comparison, the ticket price of the Mouse Theater under Shaw Brothers is only [-] cents, which can be said to be quite cheap.

(End of this chapter)