Entertainment: I am the peak

Chapter 604 I Have Better

Although Li Qiutang has made it clear to the relevant person in charge of Wanda that he will not have time in the future and will not subjectively direct "Mojin: The Lost Legend 2" again.

However, over the past six months, Wan Da has been actively trying to bring back the original cast.

Any conditions are negotiable.

Wan Da understands better than anyone the appeal of the original cast to the audience, so he is very willing to spend money on the second installment. As long as you ask, Wan Da can provide the budget.

Wan Da naturally knew that the most crucial factor for the smooth start of the second installment was director Li Qiutang. With Li Qiutang in place, the three tomb raiders wouldn't have much of a problem.

However, Li Qiutang has made it clear that he will not have time to film other movies for the next five years, and the company's board of directors will not allow him to take on roles in other companies' productions.

But Wan Da still believed that anything was possible and continued to try to win over Li Qiutang. Since Li Qiutang himself wouldn't budge, he started with his wife, Liu Yifei. However, Liu Yifei listened to her husband on this matter. She enjoyed playing Shirley Yang, and the role had brought her considerable rewards. It would be great if she could continue playing the role, but if the director wasn't her husband, she wouldn't be interested. Moreover, Hongxingwu didn't want Liu Yifei to play a supporting role for someone else without Li Qiutang directing.

Since Liu Yifei's approach was not feasible, they started by targeting Zhang Zhao, Chen Zhixi, and other influential executives at Qiutian Film Studio. Wan Da even considered lobbying the relevant directors of Qiutian Film Studio, hoping they would relax the restrictions on Li Qiutang. They argued that since they were both making movies and earning money, why restrict Director Li from taking on outside projects? They could simply give him a larger share of the profits from the second film, making it a win-win situation for everyone.

Wan Da even secured Chen Minghao's return for "Mojin: The Lost Legend 2." That's all they managed to get Chen Minghao on board. Xia Yu is semi-retired; whether he acts or not doesn't matter. He'll act if Wan Da can assemble the cast, otherwise he won't. Liu Ye and Liu Yifei are both fully booked and unavailable.

Wanda even offered Li Qiutang a sky-high contract with a fixed salary of 2 million yuan plus 12.5% ​​of the box office revenue.

However, they were still rejected by Autumn Pictures.

Li Qiutang is the most valuable intangible cultural asset of Autumn Pictures, which cannot be bought even for 300 to 500 million.

It's fair to say that six months have passed since the official announcement of "Mojin: The Lost Legend 2," and there has been absolutely no progress.

Even Zhang Jialu, the screenwriter of the first film, withdrew. Zhang Jialu and Chen Guofu co-founded Kungfu Pictures, and he now spends most of his time on films produced by his own company. The reason why Zhang Jialu was able to participate in the screenwriting of "The Wandering Earth" is twofold: firstly, Li Qiutang and Zhang Jialu had worked very well together on "Mojin: The Lost Legend"; and secondly, Li Qiutang had Kungfu Pictures participate in the co-production of "The Wandering Earth".

However, a lot of people are eyeing "Mojin: The Lost Legend 2".

For example, Yang Ying.

She was initially cast as Ding Sitian in Huayi Brothers' production, but was personally rejected by Li Qiutang's team and replaced with Jing Tian.

In the second installment, she had even bigger ambitions; she wanted to play Shirley Yang!
Shirley Yang is a mixed-race American girl; she is indeed mixed-race, at least more so than Liu Yifei.

The problem now is that Wan Da and Huayi are at odds. Although Wan Da isn't petty enough to target any of Huayi's artists, she needs to think things through before she tries to get a piece of the pie.

Therefore, she cannot follow Huayi's path. Boss Dong of Huanxi Media has extensive connections and influence, but the other party is, after all, Wanda. "Mojin: The Lost Legend 2" is Wanda's major project, so Boss Dong's influence may not be effective with Wanda.

But gotta give it a try.

Yang Ying doesn't have much passion for acting; otherwise, given her current popularity, she wouldn't have stopped taking on any roles after finishing "General and I" this year.

She simply uses acting as a means to gain fame and maintain her public profile.

The same applies to her now-seeking role in "Mojin: The Lost Legend 2". She may not be particularly passionate about the role of Shirley Yang, but she knows that the "Ghost Blows Out the Light" IP is huge. The first movie sold 26.8 billion yuan, and the second movie will definitely attract a lot of attention. She will definitely not lose money by acting in it.

Her main focus is on variety shows and marketing—beauty marketing and fashion marketing.

By the way, after returning to China from Australia, she took on another role: founder of the Y&Y beauty brand.

This is the tactic that Boss Dong came up with to whitewash Yang Ying's crazy Weibo post on Huang Xiaoming's wedding day—the female boss persona!

After leaving Huang Xiaoming, Yang Ying founded her own beauty brand, becoming her own boss, while her daughter strives for self-reliance. Y&Y primarily sells face masks, but also offers other women's beauty products such as serums, lotions, and shampoos and conditioners.

The brand was launched less than a week ago, but Yang Ying said she had been preparing for it for two years, and the products were carefully selected and personally tested by her.

In just one week, Y&Y's signature face mask sold 5 units.

What is monetization? This is monetization!

How much money do you make acting?!
From now on, I'll call him Boss Yang.

Her success in the beauty industry gave her more confidence to talk to Wan Da about Shirley Yang.

…………

The most anticipated film of this year's Lunar New Year season is undoubtedly Zhang Yimou's "The Great Wall." This film brings together Chinese and foreign stars such as Matt Damon, Jing Tian, ​​Andy Lau, Lu Han, and Wang Junkai, and has been jokingly referred to as "half of the entertainment industry playing minor roles."

With the Imperial Advisor protecting them, there was no reason for them to lose.

Therefore, before the film's release, LeTV and some industry insiders predicted that "The Great Wall" was likely to break the record of "The Mermaid" and reach 40 billion yuan at the box office!
LeEco even regards "The Great Wall" as a "comeback project," attempting to alleviate the company's financial pressure through high box office returns. Last month, Lei Jun revealed that LeEco owed suppliers 150 billion yuan and could not repay it, and the suppliers were going to sue. Jia Yueting also admitted in a letter to all employees that the company's cash flow and financing capabilities were in trouble.

This is the first time that Mr. Jia has publicly acknowledged that LeEco has run into problems.

The film market has been sluggish this year, and a blockbuster is indeed needed to revitalize market confidence. "The Great Wall" is certainly suitable for this role in terms of its appeal.

Whether it's 30 billion or 40 billion, to break records, "The Great Wall" must gross 2 million on the first day and reach 5 million by the end of the first weekend, otherwise it will never reach the 30 billion+ mark.

But what about the first-day sales figure of 1.71 million?

How can we turn things around? How can we explain this to the shareholders?
Don't be fooled by the 2100 million yuan gross of Huayi Brothers' new film "The Wasted Times," which was released on the same day. Can the two films be compared?

The Great Wall also received poor reviews on its opening day.

"Beautiful Jing Tian, ​​you are the only one in the film."

"A condensed version of the Olympic opening ceremony, relying on the usual large-scale human wave tactics, with nothing new."

"All that's left for moviegoers to discuss is the female lead's background. A disastrous performance."

"I don't know why Zhang Yimou took on this job."

Don't you know? That's understandable. Many people in the industry don't understand why he took on this role.

Li Qiutang, however, knew.

"Now an opportunity is presented to you: a $1.5 million investment, a Sino-US co-production, to be released in at least 100 countries and regions worldwide, to film the Great Wall, to film a monster unlike anything ever seen in the history of Chinese cinema. Will you take it?"

The crew members were speechless when asked. Yes, with such a tempting offer right in front of them, anyone would be tempted.

"Director, would you have taken this role?"

“I won’t,” Li Qiutang said with a smile, “because I have better options.”

(End of this chapter)