Global Film Emperor

Chapter 272 (Supplement to yesterday's chapter)

"The emergence of 'Wrong Love' led to the collapse of Lu Ze's reputation. The saying that Lu Ze's fans used to say that he was good at everything is now a thing of the past."

"I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing for Lu Ze. The good thing is that the pressure that has been troubling Lu Ze for a long time will be greatly reduced now. The glory of his classic works has come to an end, so Lu Ze can now start afresh and create his own legend again."

"We are still uncertain about the downsides. After all, we are not Lu Ze and we don't know what he is thinking. Is this collapse in reputation an incentive after entering a trough, or a fall into the abyss? We need to be prepared and not have too high expectations when watching Lu Ze's works. Maybe his next work will be even worse than 'Wrong Love'."

"After watching 'Wrong Love,' I rewatched all of Lu Ze's works. I must admit that Lu Ze's acting ability has been constantly improving with each of his works, with 'To Live' being the peak. After that, Lu Ze's performance in the movie 'Wrong Love' was noticeably declining. I don't know why."

"Perhaps he's entered a period of fatigue, or it's because he wasn't well-prepared, or it's because this film isn't suitable for Lu Ze, but he couldn't refuse the invitation. There's also the possibility that we least want to see: Lu Ze's ego has become inflated after winning the three Golden Horse Awards. All of these are possible. In short, we hope that Lu Ze's next work can wash away the failure of 'Wrong Love' and bring a better viewing experience to the audience."

Lu Ze turned off his phone and tossed it aside. He sat at the bar and took a sip of the coffee he had ground himself. Perhaps because he was a novice, it didn't taste very good. The cripple was lying on the counter, and he wondered if its belly was cold.

He reached out and petted it a couple of times. It had been shedding quite a bit lately, and he pulled out a handful of fur, which he then threw into the trash can. Lu Ze sighed, feeling somewhat annoyed.

Lu Ze originally thought that although the results of "Wrong Love" were not ideal, they were at most neither good nor bad, and would not have a big impact on him. After all, which actor has not made a few works that did not receive much attention? In fact, there are many actors in this era who have made a series of bad movies since their debut.

But it's possible that fame brings trouble. Now that Lu Ze has a work with mediocre reviews, there are actually many posts online that ostensibly encourage him but always mislead netizens, saying that Lu Ze's reputation has collapsed.

Now that Lu Ze no longer maintains his legendary record, they have plenty of things to criticize him on, making him think that he has made the worst movie of the year, as if he has fallen to the bottom and can never make a good movie again.

Although viewers know that "Wrong Love" isn't as bad as the online news makes it out to be, will it still have an impact on Lu Ze? Definitely. After all, there are hundreds of millions of netizens in China, and the number of people who haven't seen the movie is definitely much larger than those who have. If this kind of misinformation continues to spread, "Wrong Love," which isn't a bad movie, will become one.

Putting aside other things, the ratings on movie review websites like Douban have dropped significantly in the past few days. Originally, "Wrong Love" had only been released for a few days, and its rating should have been artificially high. The original rating of 7.9 has now dropped to 7.2 and is still falling rapidly. It is estimated that it will drop to the 6-point level tomorrow without any problem.

This has caused quite a headache for the main creators. They never expected that the movie they thought was good would be so terrible in the eyes of netizens. It's as if Lu Ze's movie is failing if it doesn't score eight points, and it's a disservice to the audience. Even Xiao Fengying has been sullen these past few days, but she doesn't dare to complain to Lu Ze.

She originally thought that with Lu Ze's participation, the movie would definitely be very eye-catching, not to mention that Lu Ze himself would boost box office sales, so the movie was sure to be a box office hit.

The box office was indeed good afterward, with over 60 million yuan on the opening day and less than 70 million yuan. This box office was already very satisfactory to Xiao Fengying. However, she never expected that the appearance of such posts would cause the box office of "Wrong Love" to experience a small cliff-like drop three days later, and the word-of-mouth would plummet, almost making her heart jump out of her throat.

Although Lu Ze was the culprit for the fact that the later revenue of "Wrong Love" did not meet expectations, it could be said that Lu Ze was both the reason for its success and its failure. However, she really couldn't blame Lu Ze. Now that she thought about it, the suggestions Lu Ze made back then were indeed inadequate in the script, but she didn't use them, so she couldn't blame Lu Ze. She could only swallow her pride and bear the consequences.

However, this also served as a wake-up call for other companies, prompting them to stop blindly pursuing Lu Ze. Previously, they thought that with Lu Ze involved, their films would definitely be huge hits and make a fortune. But now it seems that Lu Ze is a double-edged sword. If you have a good script, then finding Lu Ze will definitely unleash its full potential.

But if you find a mediocre script and a mediocre director, then you're doomed. It's not that Lu Ze can't act well if he takes on a mediocre script, but rather that the audience's tastes have been spoiled by Lu Ze. Mediocre is bad, good is average, and only top-notch good is top-notch.

This made things much easier for Shen Jinghan. At least those ordinary films that he thought were just testing the waters had a better understanding of the situation and stopped sending film offers to Lu Ze, saving Shen Jinghan the effort of rejecting them and reducing his workload considerably.

This will indeed affect Lu Ze's salary. If "Wrong Love" hadn't been released after he won the three Golden Horse Awards, Lu Ze's salary would definitely have increased. But now, it's a miracle it hasn't decreased.

The original bloggers who wrote these posts really hurt Lu Ze a lot, at least he lost some money on one movie. But that's a minor issue. The most important thing is that Lu Ze's reputation was greatly affected, and his box office appeal weakened. That's the biggest loss.

As for who was behind these people, Lu Ze and Qian Shijia knew the answer. It's just that the author of "Wrong Love" exaggerated a bit. You can't sue them, and you really can't refute them. You can only swallow this bitter pill.

But it doesn't matter. After all, Lu Ze only made a movie with mediocre reviews, but what about you guys? The rate of bad movies in China is still quite high. If your movie is bad, then if Qian Shijia doesn't hire online trolls to smear your movie to below 3.0, then I, Li, will write my surname backwards.

Lu Ze was somewhat frustrated, not because others had slandered him and made him doubt himself, but because he was angry about wasting half a year and suffering considerable losses. But anger was useless; what was done was done, and he couldn't change it. He could only accept it. He picked up the hair that the cripple had dropped on the bar and threw it in the trash can. Lu Ze went to the dressing room to change into a more formal outfit, because he was going to Qian Shijia to discuss the contract for "Finding You."

"Stay put and guard the house, you hear me? Otherwise, I'll beat you up when I get back."

He threatened the cripple, but it had no effect. The cripple didn't even look at him, just turned his head indifferently, and went back to his little nest to lie down.

Seeing that it ignored him, Lu Ze glared at it with amusement, slung his backpack over his shoulder, went downstairs, and drove his Porsche, which he had bought almost a year ago and had only driven a little over a thousand kilometers, toward Qian Shijia.

"Ring ring ring."

Lu Ze glanced at the phone holder clipped to the air conditioning vent. He hadn't bought Bluetooth headphones; his phone simply connected automatically to the car's Bluetooth system. After answering the call on the central control screen, Li Yumei's voice came through the speakers.

"Hey? Aze, have you had lunch yet?"

"We just ate, why are you calling at this hour? Have you and Dad eaten yet?"

"We've already finished eating. Mom just wanted to ask you something: are you coming home for Chinese New Year this year? You haven't been home for three years, and Mom misses you terribly. If you're free this year, please come back."

Just then, Lu Ze needed to turn right. His foot was on the brake, and he slowly made his way around the bend. When he heard Li Yumei's words, his body suddenly went numb, his foot went a little too hard, and the car jerked, almost colliding with the Sagitar behind him. The Sagitar driver was startled and then cursed loudly.

No matter how good your car is, let alone a Porsche worth over a million, or a Bentley worth over six million, or a Bugatti worth half a billion, if you cause any problems, an experienced driver will dare to scold you, since he's in the car and you can't hear him anyway.

Lu Ze didn't hear it either, but he was a little upset. He stepped on the gas, increased the speed to go around the bend, turned on his lights and changed lanes, and then said something with some difficulty.

"Mom, I probably still won't be able to go home this year. I recently took on a role in a movie, and filming is about to begin. I'm on my way to sign the contract, so I probably won't be able to take a holiday for the Lunar New Year. I'll go home next year... no, after this movie is finished filming. Is that okay?"

"No need, you have so many things to do. You go ahead and do your thing. A man's career is more important. These days, there are hardly any people in the village during the New Year, so there's no festive atmosphere. It doesn't really matter whether we celebrate or not. But Xiao Nan's graduate school admission results will be released in early February. I'd like you to see them too."

Hearing his mother's complaints, Lu Ze's heart clenched even tighter. He was filming "Wrong Love" when Xiao Nan took her exams, and he didn't even mention going to the capital to accompany her. The rise in his career over the past few years has come at the cost of neglecting his family. When people get busy, they forget other things quickly. He had already forgotten that he hadn't been home for several years.

Suddenly remembering what his mother had said about how the village was deserted during the Lunar New Year, he thought that if there was no holiday, he could have Lu Nan bring his parents to the place where he was filming to celebrate the New Year. Anyway, they would definitely be able to make it to the New Year's Eve dinner. However, he would have to ask his parents for their opinion on this matter.

"Mom, why don't you come out with Dad, Xiaonan, and me? Just consider it a trip after the New Year. What do you say?"

"No, that would interfere with your work. How could that be? It's okay, just come back when you have time. Everything is fine at home, we have everything we need. Going there would only cause you trouble."

"Don't cause any trouble. Just treat it as a vacation. I'm probably either filming in Henan or in Jiangsu and Zhejiang. If it's in Henan, I'll rent a villa. If it's in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, you can just go back to your home in Shanghai. I moved a year ago, and you still haven't seen it. Come and see the big house your son bought. That's settled then. I'll go now, Mom. I've arrived. I'll ask the director where he's filming and then book your tickets. I'll hang up now."

After hanging up the phone, Lu Ze drove into the underground garage and parked in his space. Looking at his phone, he sighed. He had truly been unfilial these past few years.

"."

(End of this chapter)