Entertainment: I am the peak

Chapter 654 The Art of Harvesting
Fun fact: There are two product placements in the scene between Liu Peiqiang and Han Ziang on the beach.

Actually, it's not really product placement. The props were lent to the production team by the merchants for free. If the production team had purchased them, they would have removed the brand logos.

One is the tent next to the father and son. This tent has a name that fits the movie "The Wandering Earth" very well: Space Fortress.

Measuring 5 meters long and wide and 2.5 meters high, this tent can accommodate 10 people at the same time. It is a uniquely designed and beautifully crafted tent developed by a local entrepreneur in Qingdao, truly deserving of the name "Space Fortress".

This tent is very expensive, with a market price of 1.58 yuan. The merchant not only lent the tent to the film crew for free, but the owner also personally helped the crew set up the tent free of charge.

The second "product placement" was the all-electric SUV parked on the beach. NIO lent it to the film crew; it was their new ES8 model, which is scheduled to launch this December.

The two manufacturers lent their products to the film crew for free not out of grandiose reasons like "supporting Chinese science fiction films," but simply to use the film crew's platform to expose and promote their own products.

After filming the beach scenes for three days and two nights, Wu Jing left, agreeing to return to film the space scenes for "a few more days" after recovering from surgery.

When Wu Jing left the crew, it was already the end of August, and the summer movie season was coming to an end, with foreign blockbusters like "Cars 3" and "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets" taking over.

It's worth mentioning "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets," a film directed by Luc Besson and produced by EuropaCorp. EuropaCorp and Autumn Films had a cooperation agreement, but Autumn Films didn't have high hopes for the film and refused to give Luc Besson any money. In the end, Huayi Brothers took over the domestic investment for the film.

Of the $2.1 million cost, Huayi contributed $3000 million.

Autumn Pictures was not optimistic about the project, so they let Huayi take it on, and Autumn Pictures had no objections.

The film opened in 3553 theaters in North America on the 21st of last month, a number that is typical for a blockbuster. However, its opening day gross of $652 million and its opening weekend gross of only $1702 million surprised the world.

As of now, the film has been in theaters for a month and its global box office is less than 100 million yuan. Huayi Brothers is so disappointed that they want to curse Qiu Tian for deliberately setting a trap for them.

Another highly anticipated film in August, "Once Upon a Time," suffered from box office losses due to the conflict between the two Yangs (Yang Zhengcai and Yang Yanpeng) over billing order and the infighting among the three Yangs. After more than 20 days in theaters, it only grossed a little over 300 million yuan, and its reputation was even worse. Douban users gave it a score of 3.5, with netizens expressing their disapproval of the actors' infighting.

Let's not even talk about Wolf Warrior 2; everyone, from humans to dogs, was talking about this movie all summer.

After Wu Jing finished his promotional activities, he said he was going into "seclusion," and then the audience really couldn't find him.

But it doesn't matter, people are still talking about the success of "Wolf Warrior 2" and Wu Jing himself.

After the summer movie season ends, it will be time to start building momentum for the National Day movie season.

This year, during the National Day holiday, Autumn Film Studio made a mistake in scheduling films, with "City of Rock" clashing with "Never Say Die".

Both films were primarily Investor in Autumn Pictures. However, the release date for "Sewing Machine Band" was set by Autumn Pictures, while the release date for "Never Say Die" was arranged by Mahua FunAge.

The consequences of not intervening in the production of twisted dough sticks in the fall became apparent.

If they were two films with completely different themes, it wouldn't matter, as they wouldn't affect each other. But the problem is that both of them are comedies, and their target audiences highly overlap!
Neither film wanted to give way. "Sewing Machine Band" was scheduled for the National Day holiday from the day it was first conceded, so if anyone had to give way, it would be Mahua FunAge.

With the Shen-Ma duo in "Never Say Die", it's bound to be a huge hit. Why should it be?

This kind of thing shouldn't be brought up in front of Li Qiutang.

The final decision was that both films would be released during the National Day holiday, but "Never Say Die" would be released a day later, giving Friday's release date to "City of Rock".

With the Shen-Ma duo involved, "Never Say Die" had an advantage in promotion and screenings, while the company slightly favored "City of Rock" in terms of some promotional resources.

For example, in the fall, the cinema will negotiate screening guarantees for "City of Rock" with theaters, but "Never Say Die" does not receive this treatment.

Otherwise, the arguments will never end. It's one thing for a large market to be able to accommodate it, but for a company to have such scheduling issues is indeed worth reflecting on.

Li Qiutang stared at the monitor for a long time, then picked up the walkie-talkie on the table and said to the set, "Mai Mai and Li Guangjie, come here for a moment."

Li Qiutang played the replay for the two of them. The main problem was with Zhao Jinmai. Li Qiutang didn't blame her and patiently taught her how to deal with it. She also told Li Guangjie how to act with a clueless actress like Zhao Jinmai.

“You can’t suppress her; you have to give her the emotional support and bring her out of it.” Li Qiutang has said this dozens of times in the past few months.

“MaiMai, look at you here. You can’t let your anger get out of control here. You can’t let your hatred for Wang Lei get this strong. When you said you wanted to shoot a bullet into Wang Lei’s head, that was hatred, and you could sneer because you thought he killed your grandfather. But when he actually gives you three bullets and tells you to shoot one in the head and two in the chest, you should put away your hatred. How old are you? Do you know how to shoot a gun? Do you know how to kill someone? At this point, you should be a little lost, but after that, you can’t back down. You have to be stubborn again. That’s the performance. Do you understand?”

"clear."

"Okay, go back and prepare, we'll do it again."

While we were preparing on set, Huang Bo came over for a visit.

"Why are you here again?" Ever since "Crazy Alien" started filming in the park, the two film crews have been visiting each other frequently, which has annoyed Li Qiutang.

"I didn't come here for nothing today," Huang Bo said with a smile. "I brought drinks for your crew. Have your production manager come and receive them; they're right at the door."

"Good director."

As they were talking, someone came up to greet Li Qiutang, and only then did Li Qiutang notice that Huang Bo was accompanied by a young man wearing a hat.

"Hello, Director, I'm Zhang Yixing." Zhang Yixing took the initiative to extend his hand to shake hands with Li Qiutang.

It seems Huang Bo really likes this young man; he brings him along when filming and even when he's not filming, he brings him over to get acquainted with the family.

"Ah, hello," Li Qiutang said. "I've seen your show. You were really messed up in it." Li Qiutang had only watched a few episodes of "Go Fighting!"

"It was all just a joke, and my brothers have been very kind to me," Zhang Yixing said.

"Aren't you filming today?" I asked Huang Bo.

"I don't have any scenes to film today, so I came to visit. The drinks were bought by Yixing. It's my first time visiting you, so I couldn't come empty-handed."

As they spoke, several staff members had already carried the boxes of drinks into the studio. Li Qiutang nodded, and then the assistant director called out for Zhang Yixing: "Zhang Yixing is visiting the set and is treating everyone to drinks. Thank you, Yixing."

Of course, it would be great to be able to rest and have drinks. Cheers and applause rang out on set, but the female lead, Zhao Jinmai, was unhappy and muttered, "Ugh, it's so hard to get into character."

Li Qiutang handed Zhang Yixing a message: "You're acting now, aren't you?"

"Yes, I'm just learning to act, and I'm not very good at it yet."

Then Huang Bo and Zhang Yixing took turns teasing and joking, talking about acting.

Li Qiutang is not opposed to young actors acting; in fact, she welcomes them. It doesn't matter if they don't know how, as long as they are hardworking and willing to learn. This way, they can inject fresh blood into the industry. With more people acting, even if you only select one out of a thousand or ten thousand, some talented people will eventually emerge.

Listening to Huang Bo and Zhang Yixing talking, Li Qiutang chimed in with a couple of words, then launched into her "plucking" technique:

"Then come over here and become an astronaut for me."

(End of this chapter)