1982 Started from Hong Kong

Chapter 159 After you sing, I will appear on stage

"A Better Tomorrow" is in full preparation.

Zhai Yuan finally wrote the music for the Maple Forest Pavilion scene.

"Uncle Zhan, help me."

After inviting Huang Zhan to the newly renovated recording studio of Jiuyi Entertainment, Zhai Yuan directly took out the song "Avoid Losing Motivation".

"A new song?"

"A new song in the Minnan dialect. As usual, I sing it and you help me with the accompaniment."

"Sharp, handsome boy, sing it for me."

Zhai Yuan cleared his throat and sang the song in a very precise manner, following the homophones marked on the lyrics booklet that only he could understand.

"My hips are gone, I'm drunk, I'm in a state of drunkenness, curry is slurping, I'm trying not to drink as much as possible..."

The song is over.

Huang Zhan held the authentic lyrics, and his facial features were distorted.

He put his hands into his hair and scratched it, then asked, "Is this Minnan dialect?"

Zhai Yuan nodded: "Yes, is it standard?"

“Hiss~” Huang Zhan took a breath, with an expression that was hard to judge, and finally said: “It feels like someone from northern Jiangsu speaking Huangpu dialect.”

"pick!"

Zhai Yuan was too lazy to talk nonsense with him and handed him the recorded tape: "Help me get it done quickly."

"Don't worry, this melody is very simple, it will only take three days at most."

Zhai Yuan naturally trusted Wong James's efficiency, not to mention that he had a partner, Joseph Koo, who was known as the 'Father of Hong Kong Music'.

as predicted.

After only a day and a half, Huang Zhan brought two versions of accompaniment with different instrumental styles for Zhai Yuan to choose from.

The first version was played with saxophone and trombone, which was a bit more melodious. The second version was played with drums and keyboard, which was more cheerful.

The scene in Fenglin Pavilion takes place in a bar, and it is obvious that the style of the second version is more suitable.

Paid labor fees.

The next step is to find someone to sing the song.

"It's broken! No one is available again."

The only male singer in the company is Zhang Guorong, who is from Huaxing. There was also Zhou Huimin...

Zhai Yuan slapped his forehead when he thought of the name, opened the drawer of his desk and began to rummage through it.

There are a lot of miscellaneous items in the drawer.

Lighters, cigarette cards, comic books, Playboy, Deng Leling's stockings, Zhou Haimei's pure cotton... When did I bring them back?
Finally, he found a phone number that Zhou Huimin had left for him among a pile of miscellaneous items.

Zhai Yuan didn't know where this number led to, and was afraid of running into the old-fashioned old lady in her family, so he chose a time after school to call.

"Hey, where are you looking?"

Zhai Yuan heaved a sigh of relief when he heard the soft voice on the other end of the phone.

"Amin, I'm Zhai Yuan from Jiuyi Entertainment, do you remember me?"

"Boss Zhai!"

Zhou Huimin's voice was filled with surprise, and she immediately lowered her voice and asked, "Boss, what do you want from me?"

“Do you know Hokkien?”

"Yes, I learned it specially when I sang the Formosa Song."

"That's easy. My company wants to make a song and is short of a lead singer. It's the same situation as last time for "Self-Delusion". Are you interested?"

"Yeah!"

Zhou Huimin quickly responded: "Is it okay for me to go over tomorrow, Saturday, when I have a day off?"

"Okay, I'll wait for your news."

Zhai Yuan hung up the phone and repeated Zhou Huimin’s voice in his mind.

It's definitely sweet enough, but it would be difficult to sing out the charming feeling of the original singer.

Never mind, it's fine as long as it works.

Zhai Yuan didn't dwell too much on this issue.

the next morning.

Zhou Huimin arrived as promised.

The girl had obviously dressed up, wearing light-colored lipstick, a plain white sweatshirt on her upper body, and jeans on her lower body, which made her legs look even longer.

After a brief greeting, Zhai Yuan took her to the recording studio.

With the help of two composers, Zhou Huimin stayed in the recording studio until the afternoon and recorded the song "Avoid Losing Your Will" dozens of times.

After listening to her, Zhai Yuan was sure that Zhou Huimin would not make any progress in the short term, so he did not let her continue singing. Instead, he picked out a recording with the steadiest breath from several pending songs.

"Amin, this is the remuneration for the last performance of "Self-Love", plus this song, the total is 6,000 yuan."

After leaving the recording studio, Zhai Yuan called Zhou Huimin into the office and handed her a stack of Hong Kong dollars.

There is no need to use the public account to pay this amount of money, so as to avoid tax deductions.

Zhou Huimin took the money in disbelief and bowed like a student: "Thank you, boss!"

"you deserved."

Zhai Yuan smiled. He didn't have time to flirt with the girl at that moment. He casually asked a few questions about her family situation. He learned that she and her mother had a bet that "if Jiuyi didn't go bankrupt next year, she could come to work." He couldn't help but feel a little amused.

"Then you should prepare to sign the contract with the company after the New Year."

Zhai Yuan joked, reminded her to be careful on the road, and then sent Zhou Huimin out of the company.

The legs are really nice.

Looking at the girl's back, I couldn't help but sigh.

Insert the song "Avoid Losing Your Will" into the film.

The entire film "A Better Tomorrow" has finally been completed.

Zhou Huimin sang the entire song for three minutes, but actually only about forty seconds were used.

There are still ten days until the release.

The second round of trailers for "A Better Tomorrow" began to be played in theaters.

The second round of trailers contains more complete information than the first, which is basically equivalent to a two-minute movie clip.

One is the indispensable clip of Wan Ziliang counting US dollars, one is Liang Xiaolong shooting the gang leader Mr. Yao, and there is also a scene where the taxi company boss Uncle Jian is beaten up.

It is worth mentioning that, except for the familiar faces of Jiuyi Entertainment, Zhai Yuan only gave suggestions for the other supporting roles, and the rest were selected by Wu Yusen himself.

Uncle Jian still uses Huang Lao Xie and Zeng Gang.

Xiao Wang is the wild man Chen Zihui, and his powerful stunt team also takes care of the stunt scenes in the movie.

As for other actors, such as Uncle Wang from Taiwan, the head of the society Mr. Yao, and the father of the Song brothers, Zhai Yuan found them familiar but could not remember their names. Wu Yusen said that they were old friends of his who came to make a cameo appearance, so he did not ask any more questions.

In fact, a long part of the story of "A Better Tomorrow" takes place in Taiwan, but in fact it was all filmed in the streets and alleys of Hong Kong.

Fenglin Pavilion also chose a restaurant in Kowloon, casually decorated it in the style of Taiwan, and added "Avoid Losing Your Ambition" to create the atmosphere.

After all, with Zhai Yuan’s current status, if his people from Jiuyi dare to go to Taiwan to film, who knows what will happen.

In addition to the trailer, there are other promotions.

Jiuyi Entertainment is responsible for the entire promotion and distribution of the trailer.

For magazine and film review promotion, Zhai Yuan approached Huang Zhan and Shi Qiuyi of "Fortnightly".

He only placed TV trailers on TVB and ATV, the four major radio stations.

Finally, he launched another wave of offline promotion. In addition to his own dozen or so video halls, Zhai Yuan also posted display posters in several large audio-visual stores in Hong Kong.

The employees of Secret Garden were not spared and were asked to recommend the upcoming movie "A Better Tomorrow" to the guests.

All in all, all the expenses for publicity and promotion cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

"I'm going to be a pauper."

Zhai Yuan felt that his money came quickly and went away even faster.

After paying 28 million in rent to Zhao, it was like cutting a knife into his aorta. Recently, he has to bargain to the lowest price whenever he discusses publicity and promotion.

Secret Garden's revenue has been very stable during this period.

Basically, the net profit is maintained at around 2.3 million per month, which has relieved a lot of burden for Zhai Yuan.

The combined revenue from his video hall and cassette theater only reaches a few hundred thousand Hong Kong dollars a month, and there is no hope of a sharp increase in revenue for the time being.

"Damn it! If this movie loses money, I will announce my retirement from the film industry on the spot!" Zhai Yuan bit his cheek as he looked at the promotional announcements for "Project A" and "The Queen's Secret Order" on the front pages of different newspapers.

These two movies are coming out with great momentum, and Jiahe Cinemas and Jiahe Productions, Silver Princess Cinemas and New One City Productions are all companies that are deeply involved in the film industry. Once Zhao withdraws, these two companies will almost equally divide the connections and resources of the local film market.

In the original timeline, "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" was also worried about colliding with "Project A" and both sides suffering losses, so the release time was postponed for more than a month.

But now Lei Juekun and his three generals have actually moved up the release date. This overwhelming publicity offensive is not only aimed at Jiahe, but more at Zhai Yuan's Jiuyi.

"He just got some free movie theaters from you, but he still refuses to surrender to you! Lei Juekun is really petty. It's no wonder he'll die in a few years with such a big temper."

Crumpling up the newspaper in his hand, Zhai Yuan called Huang Zhan and Shi Qiuyi one after another: "Please help me put "A Better Tomorrow" together with the two new films of Jiahe and New One City in the newspaper. The other party wants to snipe me, so it's a good opportunity to use their reputation to increase the popularity of my movie."

Zhai Yuan used his ability to strike the snake while it was still under attack. Since he couldn't avoid it, he would just take advantage of your popularity.

I am a new movie produced by a new company, and it is impossible for it to be as famous as the ones produced by your two old companies. It is definitely not me who is embarrassed.

The newspaper was published quickly.

Jiahe and New One City join forces to attack, who are the people behind Jiuyi Entertainment? - Sing Tao Daily

Hong Kong's three major cinema chains are competing for the Lunar New Year box office, and "A Better Tomorrow" may be a surprise. ——"Hong Kong Business Daily"

1024 Cinema Line has taken over the baton by leasing four leading theaters of Zhao’s and continues to compete with Jiahe and Silver Princess. ——"Industry Daily"

"The Best Partner" has been rehashing old stuff for three years, "Project A" by Chen Shilong has made few innovations, and "A Better Tomorrow" is about to set off a fashion film craze. —— "Overseas Chinese Evening News"

All of a sudden.

1024, September , and A Better Tomorrow became the hottest terms in the news at that time.

…………

Jiahe Productions.

Zou Wenhuai, He Guanchang, Liang Feng and Cai Dusheng, the founders of Jiahe who left Zhao's company and set up their own company, sat together in the office, looking at each other in bewilderment after reading the news in the newspaper.

“It’s just low-level hype.”

In addition to being the managing director of Jiahe, Liang Feng also serves as the vice chairman of the Freedom Federation, responsible for the distribution of films in Taiwan.

Because of his different ideas, he naturally looked at Zhai Yuan with tinted glasses, but for the sake of Jiahe's reputation, he did not jump up and down in front of the media like Feng Cuifan did.

"We started promoting Jackie's Project A four months ago, and the release date was set for December 12. What's the point of talking about sniping?"

He Guanchang is Chen Shilong's godfather and always speaks up for his godson.

"The newspapers are just writing nonsense. I guarantee that the young boss of Jiuyi must have spent a lot of money."

Cai Dusheng smiled noncommittally and added, "But there are also sniping incidents. For Silver Princess's film, The Queen's Secret Order, I received news from the production department of New One City. They were still doing post-production editing, but suddenly the higher-ups issued an order that they must rush to finish the work day and night so that it can be released on December 12."

"Lei Juekun did a great job on this matter. He wanted to teach this ignorant handsome guy a lesson."

Liang Feng certainly supported Lei Juekun with both hands. After all, Zhai Yuan and their freedom would always have some conflicts.

However, the other three directors were obviously not interested. Everyone was out to make money, so there was no point in taking sides. The best way was to not express a position.

"By this calculation, New One City released their new film a month earlier, so they have one month less to promote it this year than we do."

He Guanchang smiled with interest: "Anyway, I've seen Jackie's new film, it's definitely good, it will definitely win the local box office championship this time, right?"

For Chen Shilon, the title of local box office champion is more important than its actual significance. The box office of his movies far surpasses all Hong Kong movies in other places, but it has not topped the list in the local market for several years. In the past two years, he has been consistently surpassed by the "Best Partner" series.

After He Guanchang finished speaking, the other two also smiled, thinking that this might be an opportunity.

Only Zou Wenhuai was holding a pen, looking a little absent-minded, as if he was thinking about something.

"Brother Wen, what's wrong?"

Cai Dusheng asked with a smile: "You are not worried about the movie "A Better Tomorrow" produced by 91 Entertainment, right?"

Zou Wenhuai came back to his senses, smiled and shook his head.

"Whether he's a hero or a punk, I know Wu Yusen's level very well. His movies won't make a splash during the Lunar New Year holiday."

Zou Wenhuai took a deep breath, rubbed his face and slowly exhaled, his tone carrying a sigh: "I was thinking, Zhao Boss rented out all four Longtou Cinemas, is he really going to retire from the underworld?"

When mentioning this old boss who has dominated the film industry for many years, the other three directors all looked a little unnatural.

Everyone had the same thought in their mind:
The film market is developing so fast. If even Zhao Yifu can't hold on and wants to leave, how many years can we old guys hold on?
…………

Compared to Zou Wenhuai, who was a journalist.

Lei Juekun, who was born with a silver spoon in his mouth and has always been successful in the business world, was obviously even more angry.

In the office of Silver Princess store.

The cups and plates were in a mess.

Lei Juekun had a dark face, and the three major shareholders of Xinyicheng, Li Xiuxian and Chen Xunqi were trembling with fear.

"You're picking that mother! You're slandering me in the newspaper? You think you're a cinema tycoon just because you rented a few theaters from Zhao Yifu?"

Lei Juekun stared at Mecca and asked in a tone like he was scolding a younger brother: "If the third episode of "Best Partner" can't be released on the 22nd, you Xinyicheng can forget about the New Year's Day schedule next year. I will praise you and bring you down!"

"Don't worry, Boss Lei. There will be absolutely no problem."

Mecca felt equally aggrieved. He was the one who got scolded every time in Xinyicheng. Was it because his bald head was too bright and conspicuous?
"Wenguang, I remember that director Wu Yusen is your old friend?"

Lei Juekun's eyes moved around and fell on Xu Ke.

Xu Laoguai, who had just been scolded for helping Jiahe make a film, shuddered, forced a smile and said, "Yes, boss."

"I don't care what his level is. I'll dig him over from Jiuyi and pay him double what Zhai Yuan offers."

With the support of KMB and KMC, Lei Juekun said in a very tough tone: "It's a failure. Independent producers still refuse to make films for me. Do you think you are a pure girl pretending to be noble? When I find that there is no one left in KMB, I don't believe that he will not bow his head and admit his mistakes with me!"

After saying this, the faces of several people in the office looked a little ugly.

The curse is a bit dirty. Zhai Yuan pretends to be a jade girl and refuses to make a movie for Princess Yin. Then aren't we all prostitutes?
Unfortunately, Boss Lei has a strong army and can only listen even if it hurts other innocent people. Princess Silver and the Lei family are the only ones in power, which is obviously different from the partnership model of Jiahe.

"Boss, calm down."

Huang Baiming poured a cup of tea and handed it to Lei Juekun with a smooth smile. Seeing the veins bulging on his forehead, he was afraid that this rich sponsor might burst a blood vessel.

"Jiuyi is a small character. You don't have to fight with him. If you quarrel now, it will only play into his hands."

"He dared to offend me with a small role. If I let him make a blockbuster movie, wouldn't that mean he would trample me into the mud?"

"No, the young man doesn't know the world. He should know his own limitations after seeing the box office flop this time."

Almost no one took Jiuyi's new film seriously. They thought Zhai Yuan was just an opportunist trying to take advantage of his own popularity.

"Boss, our "The Queen's Secret Service" is released ahead of schedule this time, a month later than Jiahe's publicity and promotion time. This is the biggest problem right now."

Huang Baiming gave some persuasion and also raised the problems facing the company at the right time.

"I know."

Lei Juekun calmed down and said, "I will contact KMB this afternoon to paste movie posters on all buses on the route. The publicity and promotion fees in other places will be appropriately increased. You can discuss the specifics among yourselves."

Finally, he looked at Xu Qi, pointed at him and said, "Remember, take care of Wu Yusen."

Xu Qi curled the corner of his mouth and nodded, but he couldn't help sighing in his heart.

It’s so difficult to make movies, there’s intrigue everywhere. Why doesn’t anyone just appreciate my talent?
I have no interest in movies like "Best Partner", "Project A" and "A Better Tomorrow", but I heard that Hollywood has released a new special effects blockbuster. I must fly to North America to watch it in a few days after Christmas!
…………

This year's film market is particularly strange.

The discussion among the audience was surprisingly high.

What movie fans look forward to most is, of course, the Lunar New Year holiday every year.

It's amazing to see that "Project A" and "Best Partner" are competing in the same time slot. Before the movie even started, fans of both sides started a war of words.

"Big Nose Dragon is dead! What era are people still making Republic of China Kung Fu movies? How did Drunken Master do well? Still bragging about movies from the 1970s? Talking about old things is just eating shit!"

"'Best Partner' plagiarized the James Bond movie from abroad, just to deceive you country bumpkins who have never seen the world. Do you know how popular Long Ge's movies are in other places? It's a failure!"

"I'm not looking down on Chen Shilong and Xu Guanjie, I'm saying that everyone here is rubbish! What era is it now? Why are we still making kung fu and comedy movies? Gunfight movies are exciting only when there are fights! Have you seen the trailer for A Better Tomorrow? I predict that this year's box office champion will be it, I say!"

The popularity of 1024 Cinema is not only reflected in its attendance, but also in the fact that it has a group of die-hard fans.

Just like the group of fans in Starbucks who are full of superiority, the die-hard fans of 1024 are also full of superiority.

Because the theater environment is good enough and the ticket prices are very high.

According to data from the Statistics Bureau, the average ticket price for more than 1983 cinemas in Hong Kong in 12.333 was HK$.

However, Zhai Yuan's 1024 Cinema has four theaters and the ticket price is uniformly 50 Hong Kong dollars.

It is equivalent to the price of a super-class seat in a large theater, or a higher-level, special-class seat with a bed.

1024 doesn’t have many die-hard fans, but their fighting power is very strong.

It actually occupied a considerable share of the audience's discussion.

This was of course due to Zhai Yuan’s contribution in hiring people behind the scenes to fan the flames.

In the midst of this movie-watching craze.

On December 1983, 12, the three films were announced at the same time that they would be officially screened in the early hours of tonight.

(End of this chapter)