Global Film Emperor

Chapter 455 Film Scheduling
Starting from January 5th, Zhejiang TV began to exert its efforts, with a large number of promotional videos for "Exile" appearing on various media, social media platforms, and short video apps. It also joined forces with a large number of A-list celebrities and well-known bloggers from various apps to support the film and cheer for Lu Ze's long-awaited return to the screen.

The trailer's views quickly surpassed 100 million in just a few days. This wasn't some inflated number of views, but rather verified, real data. After reviewing the reports, Mickey and his friends finally witnessed Lu Ze's power in China, which was quite impressive.

The release of this movie was somewhat rushed, especially due to significant issues with theater scheduling. January was originally a lull before the Lunar New Year film season, and theaters had already decided which movies to release to expand theater resources and increase moviegoers' choices. However, no one expected that "Exile," this prehistoric behemoth that had expanded wildly again after its frenzied marketing, would suddenly enter the January box office battle.

The theater chains looked at the pre-determined film schedule: eleven films would be released in January, but excluding those just to fill the quota, the remaining seven were:
Three domestic horror films with supernatural themes—one about an abandoned village, one about summoning a spirit, and one about visiting relatives in one's hometown—are all classic horror themes, but also themes that have been overused. It's easy to see that their box office performance will be low, and they won't make any waves at all.

One low-budget campus romance film, two rural art films, one of which is a remake of the previously released film "I Am Not Wang Mao".

Two low-budget, vulgar comedy films, the kind that feel they don't deserve to participate in the Lunar New Year battle. That's it. How do I choose?
We must make way for "Exile"!
This is a consensus reached by all cinemas. Why not increase the number of screens for movies that are guaranteed to make money? Do they really think audiences would like those horror movies that just scare people with ghosts?
Therefore, after several discussions with Universal Brothers Pictures, "Exile" has officially been scheduled for release! It will be released on January 15th and will run for one month, taking over the Lunar New Year holiday season the day after it leaves theaters!

Currently, there are over 16,000 cinema chains in China. The main market is divided among thirteen chains, while the remaining small, scattered chains have been abandoned, as there simply wouldn't be enough time to negotiate cooperation with each one individually.

These small cinema chains have very low revenue. For example, city cinemas, which are not owned by capital, have outdated facilities, poor environments, and lack 3D equipment. Even if the ticket prices are low, they will not be chosen by moviegoers.

The main focus will still be on cooperation with large groups. They now control nearly 80,000 screens nationwide, and how many screenings they can allocate is the most important thing!

The final negotiation result satisfied both parties. After all, everyone was there for box office revenue, so they wanted to maximize the number of screenings without violating the rules.

Based on the number of screens provided by major cinema chains, "Exile" has a screening rate of 64.7% in China! Although it is the off-season for movies, and with Avengers: Endgame having a screening rate of 82.6%, and some cinema chains even reaching the terrifying figure of 100% screening, a screening rate of over 60% is still quite amazing.

This means there were over 600,000 screenings during the launch period, covering more than 3.8 million seats! This is the largest theatrical release in Lu Ze's acting career to date!

When Lu Ze negotiated this contract, Mickey and his crew were stunned. In China, still the world's largest box office market! They'd secured 64% of the film screenings? This made Mickey and his friends think they'd actually died on a plane from Singapore to Beijing…

After confirming that they were still alive, the celebration began. Everyone knew that Exile could never achieve what Avengers: Endgame did, accounting for 99.4% of the national box office during its theatrical run, but the future looked promising!

After finalizing the theater deals, "Exile" officially launched its pre-sale tickets, selling over 1.7 million tickets in just three days! At 49 yuan per ticket (excluding discount coupons), this means that even before its official release, the film had already grossed over 80 million yuan! A first-day box office of over 100 million yuan is practically guaranteed!

The production cost of "Exile" was only 25 million euros. After all, many aspects were streamlined due to the investment of Gambiano Films, which saved a lot of personnel and location expenses. At the current exchange rate of 1 to 7, and without considering profit sharing, taxes, and other issues, nearly half of the production cost was recovered in just three days of pre-sales! This result once again stunned the Mendeleev brothers, who were releasing their directorial debut for the first time. All their anxieties have now dissipated, and the huge weight has finally been lifted. After all, who knows the quality of a film better than them?

So the two brothers started spending all day fiddling with their phones, constantly checking the latest pre-sale ticket information, exclaiming in surprise every time they saw it, and shouting in broken Chinese phrases that Lu Ze didn't know where they had learned from.

"Hua Xia Ying fans are really awesome!"

This achievement made Mickey envious. Damn, he had never made such a good pre-sale ticket record in all his years of making movies. What was even more incomparable was the number of screenings. Could they really do this? The happier he saw his two brothers, the more jealous he felt. He even lost his appetite and sleep.

The following days were filled with interviews and promotional activities. As instructed by the marketing team, many influential figures were invited to interview the main creative team members, especially Lu Ze. Basically, as soon as one interviewee left, another would come. However, later on, they gradually stopped interviewing Lu Ze. They even refused when the marketing team invited them to interview Lu Ze.

Because the silly team next door, led by Mickey, is more popular with casual fans, almost every short video of them interviewing Mickey can easily get over a million views.

In comparison, although the number of likes for Lu Ze's interview was not low, these big V's always felt a little scared after sitting with Lu Ze, because of Lu Ze's serious demeanor and the industry background that these big V's were all aware of.

Lu Ze was never one to smile during interviews; he always had a serious expression and looked very solemn. They didn't dare to joke with him, so they could only finish the interview questions meticulously and then immediately say goodbye to Lu Ze and run away.

Even influential figures commented after the interview that Lu Ze had such a strong presence that they immediately went to the bathroom to wash their hands and change their socks after the interview. Their palms and soles were sweaty, and they even trembled a little when holding the microphone.

As a result, Mickey and his friends also became popular, and their accounts on Chinese social networking sites quickly reached millions of followers, which made them sigh with emotion.

Amidst this busy period, time passed day by day, and finally the fifteenth day arrived, an hour before the premiere of "Exile" began.

"..."

(End of this chapter)