Chinese Entertainment: Academic Director

Chapter 367 Return to Venice

The 64th Venice International Film Festival opened on August 29. A week before the opening, a piece of news from Cannes, France, instantly sparked widespread discussion and attention.

A Cannes-based media outlet reported that a Chinese-language film was made despite not having full copyright, and absurdly, it was even nominated for the main competition at the Venice Film Festival…

They also revealed that the film involves a Chinese director with great international renown and significant influence in Hollywood.

The media outlet concluded by asking how a film festival with a long history and enormous international influence could do something so amateurish.

It seems that the decline of some film festivals may have been inevitable.

Finally, the speaker changed the subject and cited the Cannes Film Festival as an example, saying that in the 60-year history of the Cannes Film Festival, the selection of films has always been cautious and serious, and such an amateurish operation has never occurred before.

Although this Cannes media outlet didn't reveal the film's name, this kind of thing is definitely easy to find out.

Of the five Chinese-language films selected for the main competition at the Venice Film Festival, only Lao Tian, ​​Jiang Wen, and Li An have achieved international recognition.

Lao Tian is the first to be ruled out among those who have both international renown and significant influence in Hollywood. Jiang Wen is only well-known in Cannes and China; his influence in Hollywood is quite limited.

So, only Li An remained on the list.

Just as the media was preparing to investigate and begin following up with reports, a local media outlet in Venice, after analysis, identified the "suspects" as Li An... and Cao Yang.

That's right, Cao Yang was dragged into it too.

What they said makes a lot of sense. Although Cao Yang was not nominated for the Venice Film Festival as a director, he was the producer, supervisor, and screenwriter of another nominated film, Pietà!

The Cannes media said: This film involves a Chinese director with great international renown and significant influence in Hollywood…

See, Cao Yang fits the bill perfectly. After all, the Cannes media didn't specify whether he was a director, screenwriter, or producer.

Cao Yang's "joining" instantly captured the world's attention.

This is a manifestation of influence.

Even Cao Yang, who was far away in Los Angeles, was overwhelmed by the countless phone calls wanting to interview him.

After learning a little about the details, Cao Yang was quite... well, not exactly impressed, but he was full of sighs.

Old Ma is really going all out to increase the influence and attention of the Venice Film Festival.

Letting the Cannes media make the first move is a perfectly reasonable tactic.

As for why it wasn't Berlin, it's simple: Li An had won the Golden Bear in Berlin and was considered a close ally of Berlin, so of course Berlin wouldn't target him.

As is well known, the relationship between the three major European powers is not good. They would not say they want to destroy each other, but they certainly hope that the other will die quietly.

There are countless instances of people undermining each other.

To give a familiar example, the Venice Film Festival once awarded the Golden Lion to a film that was withdrawn from Cannes, namely Zhang Yimou's "Not One Less".

This kind of embarrassing situation has happened many times among the three major European countries.

Therefore, it is quite "normal" for the Cannes media to report on a film that was selected for the main competition at the Venice Film Festival but did not have full copyright.

However, in order to gain attention and influence, Lao Ma pulled another stunt, "forcibly" dragging Cao Yang into the mix.

Of course, Lao Ma was quite sensible. He soon called Cao Yang to explain the situation and even hinted that he would definitely compensate Cao Yang.

Fine, Cao Yang's prepared complaints vanished without a trace when the other party offered compensation.

The incident escalated over three days. Venice held a half-day meeting, followed by an emergency press conference that evening, which was personally attended by Maradona.

The press conference can be summarized in two points:
Firstly, due to negligence, the Venice Film Festival did not expect that director Li An, who has international influence, would submit a film for which they had not obtained full copyright. The festival apologized for its oversight.

Secondly, the film "Lust, Caution" was disqualified from selection, and a person in charge of the matter at the film festival was dismissed.

This has revealed the truth.

However, Cao Yang still couldn't quite figure out the Italians' thought process.

This blatant self-exposure of their ugliness, a scandal they deliberately created themselves, and even used their fame to generate hype to avoid low attention...

Is it really a good idea to damage the prestige of your own film festival in order to gain attention and influence?
Okay, perhaps from Lao Ma's perspective, this is the optimal solution.

After all, the leaders of the Venice Film Festival usually only serve for two sessions, a total of eight years, unlike Cannes or Berlin, where the leaders serve for at least twenty years.

From Marcel's perspective, the Venice Film Festival can decline under anyone else's leadership, but it cannot decline during his tenure.

Furthermore, this incident can also be used to increase the Venice Film Festival's visibility, and incidentally eliminate a competitor who posed a threat to Marco Polo... a win-win situation?
If we disregard the negative impact on Venice, it might be a win-win situation.

As for the negative impact... this is the fourth year of Mahathir's first term, which is also the last year of the first term, and he will be running for the second term soon.

If he doesn't increase Venice's visibility and influence, especially by taking down his competitors, he might be ousted from power. So why bother with negative consequences?
Just do it!

The uproar at the Venice Film Festival has had a significant impact not only on the festival itself, but also on Li An.

As an internationally renowned director with considerable influence in Hollywood, the copyright of a film is not a big deal for him.

Logically speaking, given his influence in the arts and entertainment industry, even without copyright, as long as he makes a film, the copyright holders would eagerly come to negotiate, since collaborating with him would indeed expand their own interests.

He never really took this matter seriously.

Who could have predicted that the other party would be so "assertive," nor that Cannes would interfere so unexpectedly?

The current situation has certainly given them a global exposure, but it has also made them somewhat infamous.

What can be done now?
The best way is to pay a high price to acquire the copyright from the other party, and then hold a press conference to say that you have been discussing the copyright issue for a long time and reached an agreement a long time ago, but you haven't signed a contract.

This is the best way to minimize the negative impact.

This matter needs to be addressed as soon as possible.

However, before Li An and the film company behind him could take any action, the small company that owned part of the copyright held a press conference first.

They didn't say much, only that they did indeed have some copyrights, and that the copyrights were still in the company's hands and had not been sold to any person or organization.

Okay, this press conference directly defined the nature of Li An's "Lust, Caution".

Li An's team could only urgently devise a response strategy and issue a statement saying that when Li An purchased the copyright to "Lust, Caution," he did not know that he had purchased an incomplete copyright and always thought it was the complete copyright... In short, he denied it.

There's nothing we can do about it; we can only try to shirk responsibility.

However, it wasn't long before the media revealed that Zhang Ailing had two executors in her will: one was Taiwanese writer Pai Hsien-yung, and the other was Song Yilang. In other words, both of them owned the copyrights to the novel.

Li An's copyright was acquired from Pai Hsien-yung. Prior to this, another executor of the will, Sung Yi-lang, had been involved in a lawsuit with Wanwan's Era Company.

The reason is that Era Films sued Song Yilang for fraud—they bought the copyright to "Lust, Caution" but found that Song Yilang's copyright was incomplete without prior notice, and they wanted to own the complete copyright.

Of course, the case ended with Era Company losing the lawsuit. Song Yilang himself didn't even have the full copyright, so how could he give Era Company the full copyright?

This incident caused quite a stir in Taiwan at the time.

In other words, when Li An purchased the copyright from Pai Hsien-yung, he should have known that Pai did not have the complete copyright, because the copyright incident at the time was quite a big deal.

This also means that Li An filmed "Lust, Caution" knowing that he did not have full copyright.

The fact that the media uncovered this matter has been quite detrimental to Li An's reputation.

Then Li An's team came out and said that Li An had been living in the United States for many years and was unaware of what was happening in Taiwan, and that no one had told him that the copyright of "Lust, Caution" was fragmented...

In short, the media, Li An and his team, and small companies that own some of the copyrights have been pulling in and out of the water, and in the process, they have also dragged in Pai Hsien-yung and Sung Yi-lang, the executors of Zhang Ailing's will.

With all parties involved and exchanging insults, it's virtually impossible for "Lust, Caution" to be released.

Furthermore, it caused substantial damage to Li An's reputation, severely harming his name.

Amidst this uproar, the latest weekend box office rankings for North America have been released.

This weekend saw the release of several new films in North America, including the well-known "Mr. Bean's Holiday" starring Mr. Bean, and "The Nanny Diaries" starring Scarlett Johansson and Chris Evans.

In addition, there is another film, "The Wandering Swordsman," starring another international kung fu superstar, Li Lianjie.

These three films, released on the same day, seemed very competitive, but their box office performance was disappointing, with each one underperforming the others.

"The Nanny Diaries," starring Black Widow and Captain America, only grossed $780 million over the weekend, ranking seventh on the weekend box office chart.

Li Lianjie's "The Wanderer" only grossed 920 million yuan in its opening weekend, with the highest single-day box office not exceeding 500 million yuan. Even on its first day of release, it barely earned 370 million yuan.

"Rogue" ranked one place higher than "The Nanny Diaries," placing sixth in the weekend box office charts.

"Mr. Bean's Golden Week" failed to break 1000 million in its opening weekend, only earning 980 million in box office revenue, ranking fifth on the weekend box office chart.

Jackie Chan's "Rush Hour 3" grossed $1060 million over the weekend, ranking fourth at the box office.

This is the third week of Rush Hour 3's release. Compared to the 2100 million box office revenue over the three-day weekend last week, the drop is about 50%, which is acceptable and within the normal range.

With the addition of 9.3 million over four weekdays, the total box office finally surpassed 100 million, reaching 10,840 US dollars.

In Hollywood, Jackie Chan's status and influence are indeed far beyond what Jet Li can match, as can be seen from the roles they receive and the investment in their films.

Of course, the box office figures are more telling. Even in its third week, "Rush Hour 3" still grossed more over the weekend than "Rogue" did in its opening weekend.

In third place is the "comeback" Bourne III. Last week, Rush Hour 3 was one place above it, but this week it has moved up one place.

However, the box office revenue wasn't much higher, only 1100 million.

The Bourne Ultimatum has already grossed $1.82 million in North America, and based on its current performance, it should easily surpass $200 million.

Second place went to Sony Pictures' "Superbad," which grossed $1700 million.

"The Fault in Our Stars" continues its strong performance, taking in another 1870 million yuan at the box office over the weekend, a 44% drop from last week, which is considered a normal decline.

Including the box office revenue from the four weekdays, "The Fault in Our Stars" has now grossed $1.48 million.

Based on the current box office trend, even if it were to be shown in second-tier cinemas for an extended period, it would be difficult to surpass 200 million.

Of course, as a low-budget art film, even if it stops at its current level, it's still a huge hit, isn't it?

Cao Yang was even a little worried that at next year's Oscars, "The Fault in Our Stars" might miss out on some major awards because of its "too high" box office.

"The New Pirates of the Caribbean" has been completed and its release date has been set for four days before Christmas, on December 21st, which happens to be a Friday.

With Nolan and Ning Hao, the executive producer representing Cao Yang, involved in "The Batman," Cao Yang didn't need to worry about anything.

There's no rush for the other Joker film either; he's already reached an agreement with Warner Bros., and filming will most likely begin after February next year.

This movie will definitely be released after Nolan's "The Batman 2" is released, with at least a three-month gap in between, to allow the influence of "The Batman 2" to spread fully.

As a result, Cao Yang had nothing to do with the Americans for the time being.

Just then, Old Ma called him, inviting him to the Venice Film Festival, and hinted that if he went, he would receive a surprise.

What surprise?
Pietà should be a shoo-in for the Golden Lion, right?
Would you call this a surprise?

Whether it counts or not, I'm going back to China anyway, so it's fine to stay in Venice for a few days on the way.

On September 2nd, the fifth day of the 64th Venice Film Festival, Cao Yang disembarked at Venice Marco Polo Airport.

He was greeted by Marco Müller, the president of the Venice Film Festival, and Lao Tian, ​​who was smiling broadly next to him.

That's the good thing about foreigners. A Venice Film Festival president and a director whose film was selected for the main competition walked together at the airport, where reporters were waiting for them. They weren't afraid of rumors spreading at all.

In China, people would avoid such things like this as much as possible, let alone dare to walk together openly during a film festival.

Once in Lao Ma's car, Cao Yang jokingly asked him with a smile, "What's the surprise you were talking about? Can you tell me now?"

Old Ma laughed and said:

"Do you still remember the first time you and Lao Tian came to Venice? I wasn't the president of the Venice Film Festival back then. Four or five years have passed in the blink of an eye. Isn't it the biggest surprise that the three of us are reunited?"

Then he asked Lao Tian, ​​"Don't you think so, Lao Tian?"

Old Tian rolled his eyes and coughed deliberately before saying, "Old Ma, as long as you give me the Golden Lion in a few days, whatever you say is right."

"Hey, hey, Lao Tian, ​​is the Golden Lion really that important?"

Old Ma asked with a smile.

Old Tian nodded without hesitation, "Of course! I gave up drinking for a long time for this movie, so you tell me if that's important or not?"

"Okay, I'll think about it, I'll think about it some more, since we're such good friends."

The three of them made random jokes along the way, and the slight estrangement that had formed between them and Cao Yang some time ago vanished in the midst of their banter.

(End of this chapter)