Huayu: Hard fight against Zhang Weiping at the beginning

Chapter 502 Acquisition of Streaming Media

The next morning, Zhang Chen appeared at the door of Chen Xi's hotel room.

After returning to Taiyuan, he would definitely stay at home. There was no reason for him to stay in a hotel. However, it was not appropriate for Chen Xi to stay at home, so he stayed in a hotel.

Ding dong, ding dong, ding dong...

"Are you awake? If you are, open the door for me. I brought you something delicious..."

Zhang Chen rang the doorbell and shouted outside the door, holding breakfast in his hand.

Not long after, footsteps were heard inside.

Then there was a 'click' sound and the door opened.

When Zhang Chen opened the door, he saw this terrifying face with a facial mask on.

"Why did you come so early?"

"I'm afraid you'll be hungry~"

"Why worry about it? The hotel provides breakfast~"

"I was afraid you wouldn't be used to it, how about you? How do you feel?"

Zhang Chen asked as he put breakfast on the table.

"It's OK. I'm a little hungry..."

After chatting yesterday, we naturally had to have a meal together.

How can we enjoy a meal without wine?

The coal bosses were all good drinkers, and Zhang Chen was no match for them at all.

Fortunately, they have Chen Xi who can fight ten people at once.

After a fierce fight, Chen Xi performed beyond his level and fought against twenty opponents alone.

More than twenty coal bosses were defeated.

Chen Xi, however, acted as if nothing had happened.

Watching Chen Xi picking and choosing among the breakfast items, Zhang Chen hurriedly asked, "Are you really okay?"

"It's okay, that little bit of wine is nothing..."

"Forget it, you should have a bowl of porridge first to nourish your stomach~"

Half a minute later, the two sat at the table and had breakfast.

"How was the result of yesterday's battle?"

Chen Xi smiled and said, "Almost all of them have been taken. Speaking of which, this trip to Taiyuan was really not in vain..."

When talking about this, Chen Xi's whole body glowed.

If a cinema chain wants to develop, franchising is undoubtedly the fastest way.

Of course, Golden Harvest also builds its own stores, but they are generally flagship stores.

Zhang Chen also felt that this was a brilliant victory.

According to Chen Xi's estimation, they would eventually be able to negotiate with about 20 companies, but these 20 companies do not necessarily mean 20 cinemas.

Many coal bosses are wealthy and like to show off. They may open two or three coal mines at a time.

Anyway, 10 or 20 million is just a drop in the bucket for them.

"I am confident that Golden Harvest will be among the top five cinema chains in mainland China next year, and it is even possible that it will be among the top four. If the acquisition of Tianhe Cinema Chain goes smoothly, it may be able to go even further..."

Chen Xi's words were full of confidence.

"As for Tianhe Cinema Line, if we can acquire it, we will do so. If the price is too high, we don't have to rush. We can just leave them alone..."

Wuhan Tianhe Cinema Chain is a small cinema chain with 17 theaters and 55 halls. Its box office last year was 1159 million, accounting for 11.47% of Wuhan cinema box office.

If Golden Harvest wants to acquire a cinema chain, its first choice will definitely be the box office cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Wuhan, Chengdu and Hangzhou.

Wuhan Tianhe is a good choice.

It is not large in size, but most of its cinemas are new. Unlike another chain, Silver Star Cinemas, which has many cinemas, most of them are old and shabby cinemas with only one or two halls, which have to be upgraded and renovated after they are purchased.

Zhang Chen is not in a hurry because the subprime mortgage crisis will happen next year. If he cannot reach an agreement this year, buying next year might be more cost-effective.

But the best result is of course to get it quickly.

This can contribute significantly to the upcoming "Pacific Rim" and next year's "2012".

Zhang Chen tore off half a sweet hemp leaf and handed it to Chen Xi.

This thing is called sweet oil cake in other places. I don’t know why it changed its name in Taiyuan.

Chen Xi took a piece of pickled vegetables with chopsticks and took a sip of porridge. "It feels different to have a cinema chain in hand. During the Lunar New Year period, Zhang Weiping wanted to increase the share of the box office and threatened not to provide me with any film. Am I afraid of him? It just so happens that without Curse of the Golden Flower, I will schedule Painted Skin for five shows a day. I want to see who will be anxious in the end. Guess what, he still gave me the secret key..."

During the Lunar New Year holiday, Zhang Weiping once again performed a magical operation, relying on "Curse of the Golden Flower" to force other theaters to increase their share of the profits to 42%, otherwise they would not supply the film.

All other major cinema chains have surrendered, except Golden Harvest, which has held on to 41% without increasing even a single point.

Since New Picture did not supply films to Golden Harvest, Golden Harvest was rehearsing Painted Skin all day long. Zhang Weiping got anxious and finally gave them the secret key.

"When I was making movies before, I wished I could split the profits with the cinema chains in half. Now that I run my own cinema chain, I realize how despicable Zhang Weiping is. This is only in our country. If it happened in the free America, maybe someone would shoot him in the back..."

Zhang Chen said, "Come on, you're still not satisfied. In our country, the cinema's revenue sharing ratio is the highest in the world."

"The tallest?"

"What do you think? Even though Hollywood has a tiered distribution system, on average it's about 50-50. Only in our country do theaters take the lion's share...

In a sense, Zhang Weiping is doing the right thing.

When he was filming "Hero", he dared to increase the profit sharing ratio to 40%.

House of Flying Daggers mentioned 41%, and Curse of the Golden Flower was 42%. It's a pity that he and Zhang Yimou had a falling out, otherwise we would definitely see 43%, 44%, or even 45%..."

This was the situation in the original time and space. In the end, he wanted to increase it to 45% with "The Flowers of War". Later, the General Administration could no longer sit still and personally stepped in to force the film producers to share no less than 43%, while theaters and cinema chains would get the remaining 57%.

This put an end to this farce.

Why Zhang Chen dares to say that cinemas will be a sunrise industry in the next 20 years.

Because this is national policy.

The country has a goal in developing the cultural industry.

2018, "Opinions on Accelerating the Construction of Cinemas and Promoting the Prosperity and Development of the Film Market":
By 2020, the total number of cinema screens joining urban cinema chains across the country will reach more than 8, and the distribution of cinemas and screens will be more reasonable, more in line with the urbanization level and population distribution.

From a policy perspective, investing in cinema chain construction is like taking advantage of the favorable conditions and making money for free.

Although it is not as crazy as the Internet boom, even pigs can fly.

But as long as you have enough food and clothing, there will be no problem in becoming a rich man.

And even if we put all these aside, just looking at Zhang Chen's industry, he must complete the cinema chain.

In the entire industrial chain, although cinema chains are not the most important link, they are also an important link and are indispensable.

……

At the end of the month, Xingchen Entertainment held a meeting.

"The box office potential of The Man from Nowhere has been basically squeezed out, and it currently stands at 180 million..."

This is what the May Day schedule looks like.

It exceeded 100 million in five days, but that was because people concentrated their consumption during the May Day holiday.

After May Day, people's spending power plummeted.

The only reason why there are still theaters willing to schedule screenings for him is because Star Entertainment uses a tiered profit-sharing method.

After the "Painted Skin" campaign, the company has basically confirmed the feasibility of the tiered profit sharing system.

Subsequently, most films produced by Star Entertainment adopted this approach.

They agreed with the cinema that in the first week on weekdays, the producer would get 60% and the cinema would get 40%.

第二周五5:5，第三周6:4，第四周7:3，依此类推。

In other words, the longer the film is shown in theaters, the higher the profit sharing ratio will be, up to a maximum of 28.

But there are special cases. For example, during the four periods of May Day, National Day, summer vacation and New Year's Day, the revenue sharing ratio in the first week is 7:3. The purpose of doing this is of course to facilitate the producers to quickly recover costs.

At the same time, it also forces the producers to increase publicity. If the publicity is sufficient, the box office in the first week will be the strongest. But if the publicity is not strong, then the first week will be a failure.

但接下来的第二周，分账比例马上就变成4:6，第三周3：7，第四周2：8……

This scheduling method can benefit both producers and theaters, but currently only theaters dare to do this with Star Entertainment's films.

Nothing special, good quality.

Only if the quality of the films is good can theaters benefit from the long-tail effect.

Otherwise, in the first week, the producers take the lion’s share, but in the second week, word of mouth collapses and the theaters are left with nothing.

"Tell me about the summer schedule~"

"Wulin Wai Zhuan is scheduled for early June, and Ip Man is scheduled for early August, mainly to avoid Transformers in July.

But there is "Pirates of the Caribbean" in June, which is unavoidable. "Zhang Chen reminded us in advance to avoid "Transformers", and Dong Jianqiang did the same.

The power of Transformers is just too great.

Robots are literally every man's dream.

The childhood dream will one day appear on the big screen, and men must see it no matter what.

This led to the incredible box office success of "Transformers".

In July, "Transformers" was invincible, and anyone who touched it would die.

"Also, I have an idea. I want to hold the premiere of "Wulin Waijia" together with the launch conference of "Hurricane 2"..."

Dong Jianqiang asked, and Zhang Chen agreed.

"Wulin Waijia" actually doesn't need much publicity.

This is a fan film.

The target group is the audience who likes to watch "Wulin Waijia".

As long as these people know about it and have the time, most of them will buy tickets to support it.

After all, "Wulin Waijia 1 and 2" are now known as electronic pickled mustard, and many people watch them over and over again without getting tired of them.

"Oh, there's one more thing~"

This time, Zhang Chen looked at Chen Xiaowei.

"You can start preparing for the acquisition of the streaming platform..."

Zhang Chen's original plan was to wait until the subprime mortgage crisis to pick up bargains, but after thinking about it, he realized that the subprime mortgage crisis would probably have a significant impact on him.

It would be better to act now and take down one first. When the subprime mortgage crisis breaks out, those platforms will not be able to raise funds and will be wiped out.

Chen Xiaowei is targeting 56.com.

But Zhang Chen told her to change her target.

56.com was shut down for a month due to license issues, during which time a large number of users left. After the license was restored, its glory was gone.

The water is too deep here.

Zhang Chen, a reborn person, did not dare to wade into this muddy water.

There are only four left: Tudou, Youku, PPS, and PPLive.

After some discussion, the scope was finally determined to be between PPLive and PPS.

PPLive now has 2000 million registered users, and PPS has 1800 million.

As for Tudou and Youku, we passed them up after just a few words of discussion because they have too many troubles.

If we really get it, we'll just have to clean up their mess.

"Okay, Director Zhang, I will try to contact these two companies first..."

Now that she has the opportunity to return to the Internet business that she is best at, Chen Xiaowei's spirit and energy are different.

But Zhang Chen had promised her that he would let her be solely responsible for this matter from now on.

As we were chatting, the phone suddenly rang.

Zhang Chen took a look and saw that it was a call from Shanghai Film Group.

It would be bad not to answer, so Zhang Chen pressed the call button: "Mr. Ren, do you want to talk to me?"

Ren Zhonglun's voice came from the other end of the phone: "Zhang Chen, I hope I didn't disturb you. I'm really sorry..."

"It's okay. You're treating me like an outsider when you say that~"

"Haha, well, I'll get straight to the point then~"

"You said~"

Zhang Chen was also curious about what Ren Zhonglun wanted to talk to him about.

Movie share? That doesn't sound like it.

Moreover, the shares have already been distributed, and in front of everyone. Even if he wants more, he can't ask Zhang Chen to give up his share to him.

Ren Zhonglun said: "To be honest, I begged you to come today..."

Zhang Chen said hurriedly: "Mr. Ren, this is meaningless. We are partners and we must help each other. There is no such thing as asking for help. Just tell me what you need. I will definitely do everything within my ability..."

"Well, this is definitely within your capabilities."

"Your words make me feel like I've fallen into a trap~"

"Haha~, I'm here for the Shanghai Film Festival. They sent you an invitation, but you haven't replied yet. So I can only call you in person. How about taking some time to come and be a guest?"

"Oh, I haven't been in Beijing these two days. I went back to my hometown, so my reply was a little late."

Zhang Chen thought to himself that this was the case, but he rarely participated in film festivals, and people in the industry should know about it.

"But I'm not in the capital right now~"

"It's okay, the Shanghai Film Festival doesn't start until mid-June~"

"I'm going to Hollywood again soon~"

"It's okay, the Shanghai Film Festival doesn't start until mid-June~"

"You just said that you would help within your ability."

Ren Zhonglun's words choked Zhang Chen, who was speechless.

"Ok."

Zhang Chen realized that the old man was trying to blackmail him, so he had no choice but to agree.

"It's a deal then, you can't go back on your word."

"No regrets, I will definitely appear at the award ceremony."

After hanging up the phone, I thought about it and felt that Ren Zhonglun was really working hard. He ran around for a hopeless person, but in the end, he still didn't make much of a difference at the film festival.

……

In early June, the long-awaited "Hurricane 6" finally held its launch conference amid great anticipation.

Director: Lu Yang

Assistant Director: Yang Qing
Starring: Liang Jiahui, Zhang Jin, Director Chen Ming

The heroine is Jing Tian.

Thanks to the loving donations from kind-hearted people, Jing Tian’s role was greatly increased.

However, Zhang Chen has read the script and found that it is a relatively important supporting role and does not affect the plot.

Zhang Chen is listed as the nominal producer.

For movies produced by Xingchen Entertainment, the producer column is always signed by Zhang Chen.

In the previous life, many domestic films had Han Sanping’s name as the producer.

Because between 2004 and 2010, China Film Group invested in 60% of domestic films, truly playing a role in supporting domestic films.

These films are all invested by China Film Group, and Han Sanping, as the boss of China Film Group, is naturally qualified to be the producer.

Moreover, after these movies are named after Han Sanping, they will face less resistance from all sides.

But Star Entertainment’s movies don’t need that.

The value of Zhang Chen's golden signboard is higher than that of Han Sanping.

Before the press conference started, a group of people gathered backstage to chat.

Mango TV will not be producing "Super Girl" this year and will instead produce "Happy Boy".

It’s still the same approach, almost all the seeded players have signed long-term contracts with Tianyu.

If you don’t sign, you won’t be able to enter the finals.

With the precedent of Jane Zhang taking advantage of a contract loophole to terminate the contract last year, it is almost impossible for these boys to terminate the contract smoothly this year.

Mango TV also contacted Zhang Chen, hoping that he would continue to be a guest.

In fact, I just want to continue to get his songs for free.

How can it be?

He's not in the music industry.

Before, she was willing to be taken advantage of for free in order to take advantage of the influence of "Super Girl". Now, of course, she doesn't need to sell herself out for that anymore.

Reject decisively.

Some people also talked about the selection of characters in Dream of the Red Chamber, which was also a mess.

A lot of investors wanted to join the crew, but director Li Shaohong had no say at all.

As far as I can remember, neither the male or female lead of this drama became famous.

(End of this chapter)