China Entertainment special effects started in 1997

Los Angeles, Beverly Hills.

Jiang Heng lay on the rocking chair in his courtyard, leisurely enjoying the afternoon sunshine.

He bought this after receiving a share of the box office revenue of "The Matrix" in North America. It cost less than four million US dollars. It is a luxurious and exquisite French-style villa, covering an area of ​​0.68 acres, approximately 2,750 square meters. Built in 1987.

Entering the carved gate, there is a circular driveway built around the fountain. There is a leisure cabin in the courtyard with a barbecue venue and an outdoor dining area. But what excites Jiang Heng the most is the beautiful swimming pool with spa and waterfall landscaping.

It's a pity that reality is not like the scene in "Various Star King", where a beautiful neighbor wearing a swimsuit comes to borrow the swimming pool.

The person here is Li Yu, who is currently preparing for "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon".

In terms of funding, currently only Jiang Zhiqiang of Eucalyptus Pictures is willing to invest, but it is far from what Li Yu expected.

Someone suggested that he ask Jiang Heng. Everyone knew that he had made a lot of money from his two movies, so he might be willing to invest.

Jiang Heng was indeed a little surprised when he received the call, because in his impression, this film was invested by Columbia Company.

Little did they know that there were eight investment companies in the film, and the proportion of foreign investment did not exceed half. It can be regarded as a genuine Chinese-language film.

As for the emergence of Sino-US co-production, it also has the background of the times.

Hong Kong films are in decline, and the best ones have gone to Hollywood. Naturally, many major productions are short of funds and have been shelved.

It was against this background that Hollywood capital tried to enter Hong Kong and the mainland.

The reason is simple. The quota of 10 imported blockbusters each year is too small for them.

They want to bypass regulations and gain unrestricted access to the Chinese market.

Historically, "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" created a new model of cooperation between Hollywood production companies and Chinese-language film companies.

Later, the filming and distribution of Zhou Xingxing's "Kung Fu" also adopted the same model as "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon".

Although Zhang Yimou's "Hero" did not receive investment from the United States in terms of production, the North American copyright of the film was sold for more than 15 million U.S. dollars before filming.

The total investment in his film was only 30 million US dollars, and half of the cost was directly recovered. In essence, there is no difference.

However, if given a choice, most Chinese-speaking directors are unwilling to accept Hollywood investment.

After all, it is a producer mode, and the director does not have the greatest authority.

Just look at Zhang Yimou's "The Great Wall". If Zhang Yimou had more authority, the film might not be that good, but it wouldn't be that bad. It would be too subpar.

Ang Lee has been living in the United States for many years, so he naturally knows the virtues of Hollywood blockbusters.

After he turned 30, he stayed at home for five or six years, during which time he also went to the studio to do odd jobs.

But more often than not, I write scripts at home and then show them to big companies. They pick out a bunch of flaws and ask them to go back and correct them. After repeated corrections, there is no result.

Then he was asked to write another one, and he wasted five or six years like this.

Seeing that he couldn't get ahead in Hollywood, he ran back to Taiwan and directed the film "Pushing Hands". He was nominated for the 28th Golden Horse Award and became somewhat famous.

After that, he directed many films one after another and won international awards one after another.

However, these days of discourse movies are already in decline.

Both market box office and investment scale have been significantly reduced.

After 1995, he returned to Hollywood and directed many low-budget films.

But deep down in his heart, he always wanted to bring the martial arts world he understood to the big screen.

Several Hollywood companies were interested in his script, but when they saw the amount of investment required, they gave in.

Li Yu had no choice but to go to Xiangjiang to seek investment, but only Jiang Zhiqiang from Yule Pictures was interested.

But faced with such a huge production cost of 15 million US dollars, Jiang Zhiqiang did not dare to take all of it and advised Ang Lee to look for it again.

After calling various trustees, Jiang Heng was contacted.

"Director Li, what are your preliminary plans for the film?"

"I would like to ask Jet Li to play Li Mubai and Shu Qi to play the female lead!" Li Yu said sincerely.

Jiang Heng smiled and said to himself that in the end, none of the two people you were looking for were invited!

In the original history, Li Lianjie rejected Li Yu because his wife was pregnant.

As for Shu Qi, she was rejected by her boyfriend and manager Wen Ruo, and the two broke up because of this.

Jiang Heng knew this, but he didn't say anything more. He just said he wanted to read the script.

Li Yu hurriedly handed over the prepared script. Jiang Heng took it and looked at it briefly, and then said: "How much investment do you want?"

Li Yu became nervous instantly after hearing this.

In fact, before coming here, he also made some inquiries and learned that many Xiangjiang filmmakers had recently come to Jiang Heng to seek investment, but all of them had been rejected.

He just wanted to give it a try, but he never expected that Jiang Heng meant that everything would be included!

"Mr. Jiang from Eucalyptus Pictures invested four million US dollars...!"

"Then, how about I pay 11 million?"

He originally wanted more, but when he didn’t have enough, he took it again!

But thinking about it, the province still had to save money to prevent Li Yu from spending money lavishly, so he couldn't bear it.

"That really couldn't be better!"

Li Eucalyptus was overjoyed and thought for a while and said, "Director Jiang's commercial film is very good. Would you consider being a producer?"

Jiang Heng waved his hand, "Forget it, I don't have that time!"

Li Yu was even more happy. Hearing this, he wanted to be the boss of the company, so he asked Jiang Heng what he was busy with!

"Nothing, I just write manuscripts and scripts every day, stroll around, go shopping, and plan to take another half a month off before returning to Beijing to prepare for a new film!"

Li An looked at the mansion in front of him, and his heart became more and more envious.

To say that he has made a lot of money in the past few years, it is still very difficult to buy a property in Beverly Hills.

What makes him even more envious is that Jiang Heng was successful at a young age. He has achieved such success at the age of 20.

When he was 30, he started to be unemployed!

"Director Jiang's life is really enviable!"

Jiang Heng laughed, "People should be busy and enjoy their lives!"

"Director Jiang lives a free and easy life!"

Jiang Heng smiled, "Not bad!"

First, he stood up to write a check to Li An, who hurriedly took out two contracts and filled in several key information. After both parties signed and stamped their fingerprints, he took the check.

"I have to say, thank you Director Jiang for your trust in me!" Li An's expression was very sincere.

Eleven million US dollars, converted into RMB, is almost 100 million.

One hundred million RMB in 1999 was really a lot of money!

In just a few words, he decided to invest hundreds of millions of yuan. How could he have such great confidence!

Even Li An himself did not have such great confidence.

He did not even dare to think about what to do if the box office was not good after the film was released!

Jiang Heng was very calm, "Hey, it's not a big deal. Just let it go. I promise not to interfere with your creation. Of course, the financial aspect still needs to be done according to the rules!"