Entertainment: I just want to be the boss behind the scenes

Chapter 408: Zhou Zhiruo or Zhao Min, who is better?

For a long time, many netizens have summarized a set of standard plot and character formulas for traditional Hollywood blockbusters:
Because of his past experiences, the white male protagonist is depressed and lives in seclusion in a small town. Suddenly one day, a villain appears on Earth, and all the officials fail, so they can only choose to use the male protagonist.

The hero always refused at first, until the people around him were also hurt by the villain, then he agreed to come out. Then after a series of gunfights, fights, and car chases, he eliminated the villain at the last second and saved the world.

During this period, there will be an official female protagonist with a thin waist and long legs, a black younger brother who is responsible for making funny and complaining scenes, a taciturn Asian hacker wearing glasses, and a middle-aged leader who looks righteous but turns evil from time to time in the later period...

Almost six or seven out of ten Hollywood popcorn blockbusters follow this pattern. In many cases, as soon as the plot begins, the audience has already imagined the plot of the next 100 minutes.

For a long time, the audience felt a little tired of this fixed routine, but they could still watch it. After all, there are handsome men and beautiful women, thrilling scenes, and special effects that you can tell at a glance that you spent a lot of money. What else can you not be satisfied with?

Audiences around the world have become accustomed to the style of "American heroism" exported by Hollywood, and many even believe that action or science fiction blockbusters should be shot in this way.

Until this year's Spring Festival, when "The Wandering Earth", a film full of "Chinese sci-fi" style, was released, the audience suddenly found that the speculations about the development trend of the film plot accumulated in the past seemed to be useless.

Just like the movie reviews posted online by viewers after watching the movie -

[Rescue team member Gangzi risked his life to save "grandfather" Han Ziang. Everyone thought he would play a key role later, but he died after just taking a few steps.

When magma backflowed from the Hangzhou engine, everyone thought the protagonists would show their magic and show up at the last moment to turn the tide, and they would be looked at with admiration by the rescue team. However, in less than two minutes, it was announced that all the people in the Hangzhou underground city were wiped out.

The ultimate goal of the movie is to "restart the Sulawesi steering engine." I thought it would finally be accomplished this time, but the protagonists were all rescued before they even arrived, leaving only the captain Wang Lei's words "saturation rescue."

There is also the final dilemma. The male protagonist Liu Qi proposed a plan to ignite Jupiter, and "Little Moss" Moss said that he had already made a proposal seven hours ago.

The protagonists risked their lives to start the fire, broadcast globally to seek support, and united the people of the world. With their blood boiling, they finally started the engine. As a result, orange pillars of fire lit up in two other places on the earth at the same time.

Even Liu Peiqiang, the "Space Wolf" who looks most like an American individual hero in the whole film, was trying to get into the control room when other astronauts were doing the same thing.

After watching the whole movie, do you think the protagonists are useful? It seems to be somewhat useful.

So, is it okay without the main character? It seems that it is totally fine.

After two hours of hard work and a lot of deaths, we didn't actually accomplish anything in the end.

For a viewer like me who is used to watching heroes saving the world alone, this is a very unconventional movie-watching experience. But after watching it, I think it should be like this...】

This comment received tens of thousands of likes, and many people left comments saying "It really hits the nail on the head."

There is no doubt that "national mobilization", "solidarity and cooperation", "saturation rescue"... these concepts are scenes that can only be seen in "Chinese science fiction movies". And once you accept them, you will obviously feel uncomfortable with the previous Hollywood blockbusters of individual heroes.

It is precisely because of this reason, coupled with the weakness of the plot itself, that Cameron's highly anticipated new work "Alita: Battle Angel" has not received high reviews in China, and its box office performance has been greatly reduced.

The film company itself expects the film to gross around 2 billion yuan, but looking at the current trend, it is still a question whether it can break 1 billion yuan.

On the contrary, the box office growth rate of "The Wandering Earth" has returned to stability after experiencing fluctuations in the first two days. So far, the cumulative total box office of the movie has exceeded 45 billion, and the daily box office has remained at around to million, but it has been declining slightly every day.

At the same time, the authorities also officially issued a document approving the application for a secret key extension. It was even more straightforward than the previous "Wolf Warrior 2", approving a two-month extension at once.

……

"Wow, two months extension?"

In the living room, Zhu Xudan looked up at the ceiling and did some mental calculations for a long time: "Doesn't that mean the movie won't be released until May Day?"

"Yes, it premiered on February 5th, and ended on May 5th, completely covering the May Day period."

The authorities granted "The Wandering Earth" a two-month extension, and the first goal was to see if it could surpass the 2 billion of "Wolf Warrior 56". Of course, everyone knows that this goal is difficult, so it is more about the 50 billion threshold.

"We already have 45 billion now, and we are less than million short. In more than two months, we can save up the amount at less than million a day," said Zhu Xudan.

"That's not how it works." Meng Bai smiled and shook his head. "Wolf Warrior 2 was also delayed for two months, but actually starting from the second month, the box office growth was minimal. After a month and a half, the daily box office was only about one or two million, and it didn't even increase by million in a month."

There is a limit to a movie's box office potential, especially for those that break out of the crowd. Audiences who can hold out for a month without watching a movie despite the discussions around them will not go to see it any longer.

What's more, in more than a month, there will be a real "king" coming out - "Avengers 22: Endgame", the "final work" that Marvel has spent ten years and 4 movies to create.

As long as it's not really filmed into a mess, the audience will definitely not miss it.

This is the true value that a top IP can derive. In comparison, the traffic gameplay in China in recent years can only be said to be buying the casket and returning the pearl.

"Well, that's it." Zhu Xudan said with a smile: "There is still half a month of growth time. I believe it will definitely exceed 50 billion!"

"Okay, I'll borrow your good words." Meng Bai said with a smile: "If you can really surpass me, I will agree to one of your requests."

"Really?" Zhu Xudan's eyes suddenly lit up, and she put her arms around Meng Bai's arms, rubbing her chest left and right: "Then I want you to move in with me, senior brother."

Feeling the warm touch on his arm, Meng Bai raised his eyebrows: "Why, now that it's changed to this small house, are you still afraid?"

The two of them were now in the small house that he had given the girl before.

Of course, although it is called a "small" house, it is actually about 170 to 180 square meters, which is more than enough for a family of three. Moreover, this community is close to the airport, which is just right for artists to travel around.

Hearing Meng Bai's teasing, Zhu Xudan puffed up her lips. Was the key point of her words at that time about the size of the house? It was obviously about having the senior brother accompany her "every day". Although she got the body of the senior brother and knew that this "scumbag senior brother" had other girls around him, she always felt that she got too little attention, so she always wanted to stick to Meng Bai.

And there was the "scandal incident" last year. She was obviously the girlfriend of her senior brother, so why was her name not included in the revelations? Instead, her name was put on the list along with Bai Lu and Yang Chaoyue, who had nothing to do with her.

During that period, she secretly read the comments in the comment section of several women who were exposed every day. Every time she saw fans saying things like "Sister, hurry up and catch brother-in-law Meng Bai", she couldn't help but get angry.

Later on, she even thought about exposing herself so that everyone would know about her relationship with her senior.

Of course, this idea was suppressed by the agent without hesitation, and was also reported to Meng Bai. After the senior "educated" her, the girl finally realized her mistake and rolled her eyes and promised that she would not think like that again.

"You just said you would agree to my request, but now you're not keeping your word..." Zhu Xudan pouted and muttered softly.

"What are you mumbling about?"

"Hey, it's nothing." She smiled sweetly, "If you can't move in, I'll change my request... I also want to make a movie."

"Make a movie?" Meng Bai was a little surprised, "Why did you suddenly think of this?"

"It's just... I think she's pretty good at making movies." Zhu Xudan said, "I saw that girl who played Han Duoduo, she's really popular online recently."

This is true. With the popularity of "The Wandering Earth", in addition to the director Guo Fan, the leading actors of the movie have also become popular.

Needless to say, Wu Jing has always been one of the most influential actors in recent years, and this has completely solidified his position. Wolf Warriors 2 and The Wandering Earth have directly helped him break the billion box office record for his leading roles.

Of course, he is not the only one. Shen Teng and Huang Bo also broke through with him, but their numbers are slightly lower.

These three are now the three actors with the highest box office in the entire Chinese film industry. Below them are Wang Baoqiang with 98 billion and Deng Chao with 97 billion.

Unknowingly, this group of middle-aged actors who have grown up in the past decade have all reached the "10 billion mark".

As the real core of the cast of The Wandering Earth, Wu Jing is naturally the most popular. However, his popularity was not low to begin with, so the change is not big.

After Wu Jing, there are the two young leading actors of the film, Qu Chuxiao and Zhao Jinmai.

Qu Chuxiao had just graduated and had only played supporting roles in a few small web dramas. When Guo Fan asked him to play "Liu Qi", his salary was only 50 yuan. Unexpectedly, after this movie, he turned around and became an actor with a box office of nearly billion yuan. It can be said that he rose to fame overnight.

Compared to Qu Chuxiao, Zhao Jinmai's popularity was higher before. After all, she had several popular dramas and movies, so her achievements were higher. Together with the previous "Psychological Group: City Lights" and "Take My Brother Away", the cumulative box office has reached nearly 60 billion.

Many people were shocked when they first saw this number. This number would rank high in the entire film industry. If only the actresses were counted, it would even be in the top five.

The only ones ahead of her are Bai Baihe, Zhang Ziyi and Shu Qi, all of whom have been famous for many years. Zhang Zifeng, who is also a "00 flower", has made more movies, but her box office performance is much worse.

Of course, Zhao Jinmai's box office performance is still a bit exaggerated. No matter which movie it is, the audience does not watch it just for her.

But it is precisely because of this that she is more enviable, and by the way, it also makes many people understand the importance of personal connections in the film and television industry.

Many people believed that if she had not collaborated with Huguang on a web drama before and had not been favored by Mr. Meng, there was no way a little girl with no background would have been able to take part in such a big production.

Apparently, many people have automatically forgotten what Guo Fan said in the interview, that he only paid the girl 50,000 yuan for making this movie.

"Mai Mai is indeed very popular recently." Meng Bai responded, then looked at Zhu Xudan, "But it's not appropriate for you, the newly promoted 'Zhou Zhiruo', to say this. The girl is only popular in China, but you have become popular in Korea."

When Zhu Xudan heard Meng Bai mention this, he couldn't help but cover his face and laughed.

Due to the explosive popularity of "The Wandering Earth" during the Spring Festival and the subsequent controversy, many viewers' attention was drawn to the movie, but that does not mean that everyone is only paying attention to this one work.

As the holidays come to an end, everyone goes back to work or school, and the popularity of movies has gradually stabilized. The new year's TV series, web series, etc. have also re-entered the audience's attention.

Speaking of the two most popular dramas recently, one is the new spy war work "Secret and Great" which was just aired by Arc Light Film and Television, and the other is the new version of "The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber" starring Zhu Xudan.

As the second TV series of Arc Light, the former has a lot of attention due to the support of its predecessor, Peace Hotel. The ratings of the first episode broadcast on CCTV reached 0.9, and then the second episode broke .

The deepest impression of the audience on this drama is that it is not like a spy war, but more like a workplace drama. The male protagonist Gu Yaodong has just graduated from college and is working for the first time. The character he developed in school has a great conflict with the old people in the workplace, which is also the biggest highlight of the drama.

Many viewers even remembered the spy war masterpiece "The Disguiser", the only difference is that Yu Zecheng is the "survival story of a veteran in the workplace", while Gu Yaodong is the "growth story of a rookie in the workplace."

"Secret and Great" has a high score of 8.3 on Douban, making it another spy drama that is both popular and well-received.

The reason why we chose to broadcast it on CCTV this time was mainly to repay the favor done to "Peace Hotel". After all, it was thanks to CCTV's willingness to take over that it was able to be broadcast smoothly.

Anyway, there is only this one series. Later on, Arc Light will transfer the TV series part to Apocalypse Entertainment. If there are any new projects, they will be sold according to normal standards to whichever satellite TV station offers the highest conditions.

If "Secret and Great" became popular because of its excellent plot, then the new version of "The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber" that was broadcast online was completely supported by several leading actors.

In particular, Zhu Xudan, who played "Zhou Zhiruo", and Chen Yuqi, who played "Zhao Min", are two equally popular female protagonists in Jin Yong's works. Just like "The Legend of the Condor Heroes" two years ago, they have also become the new popular "90s flowers".

In comparison, Zhu Xudan is more popular. One reason is that this version of "Zhou Zhiruo" is better than "Zhao Min" in terms of plot, and the other reason is that the strength of the agencies behind the two is different.

(End of this chapter)