Abstract Art Award Winner

Given this public opinion, there must be someone pulling the strings behind the scenes.

The most common method in the industry is to use the popularity of one topic to reduce the popularity of another.

Therefore, it is estimated that both sides will make moves.

However, this label doesn't have any negative impact on Zhou Le at the moment, since his works can guarantee box office success and he has the ability to do so.

For celebrities, the title of "poisonous milk" is actually more beneficial than harmful.

As for the real reason for the film's withdrawal from release, everyone knows it; it's more of a joke than a slander.

Everyone has been under a lot of pressure lately and needs some lighthearted topics to help them get through it.

So Zhou Le simply posted a lukewarm statement online and then ignored it.

Filming is progressing very smoothly.

Everything is going according to plan.

Meanwhile, "Caught in Time" was originally planned to be released after the Lunar New Year to compete in the Spring Festival season, but given the current situation, it is estimated that it will be postponed again.

Zhou Le was somewhat relieved that nothing much happened last year, otherwise both "Ne Zha" and "The Wandering Earth" would have been canceled.

After all, some movies were held back for a whole year last year, just waiting for the Spring Festival. If they were released this year, how fierce would the competition be?
"It's all about timing and fate, Brother Le. I feel like you're just incredibly lucky. You caught the best few years to develop your career, and then this happened during this year's period of stability. Otherwise, if it were two or three years ago, you would have had movies scheduled for release during the Spring Festival. If even a few movies had been delayed, the impact would have been far more significant."

Guo Qiling remarked with emotion.

"Yes, it seems that God still favors people who love to play with abstract concepts."

But just as the two were talking, Deng Jiajia also came over.

"I think I'm pretty abstract in general. All my friends say I'm a very interesting person, so why doesn't God seem to favor me?"

Zhou Le smiled and said, "Of course you have! You're full now, aren't you?"

"Where is the fullness? If it's just about not being hungry, then of course we won't be hungry, but it still means we can't develop at all."

"Why aren't you full? You've suffered quite a bit, haven't you?"

Deng Jiajia: "You're just making me suffer. I'm almost sick of this stuff. Eating like this will get cloying. Can't you give me something else to change things up?"

"We gave you everything else too, so didn't we give you a good outcome?"

Deng Jiajia: "???"

"My life is so hard. I either suffer or I reap the rewards," Deng Jiajia cried, looking at Zhou Le with resentment. "Brother Le, you must never lick your lips again."

Guo Qiling: "What do you mean?"

"Brother Le's mouth is too sharp."

Zhou Le laughed: "I thought you meant that my little mouth is so sweet it's like it's been coated with honey, and that licking it too much could give me diabetes."

"No, this is just sweet talk? If you really put poison on your lips, how poisonous would it be?"

Zhou Le waved his hand: "You wouldn't want to know, it's been a very, very long time since I've really been sarcastic with anyone."

Guo Qiling, on the contrary, became interested: "When was the last time you were truly sarcastic? Do you remember?"

"The last time we played games."

Guo Qiling: "."

"Last night I asked you what you were doing, and you said you were playing games."

"Haha, more or less, but I usually speak with my mic off, and I only say a couple of lines when I'm playing alone. Otherwise, I'm pretty humble and gentle."

But regardless, this is Zhou Le's first time directing.

He felt it was much more tiring than being an actor, as he had to worry about everything.

No wonder when I used to chat with those directors, they all said that if one out of ten people who study directing actually becomes a film director, that would be considered good; the rest would be better off making online movies.

Those who are less successful might try making short videos, but among those who do short videos, having their own account is already quite an achievement; most people work for various companies.

Some who didn't do well either changed careers or went on to make those kinds of films.

Now, based on his own experience, Zhou Le says that being a director is indeed quite difficult. First, you need a good script, and second, you need resources, which naturally include money.

I am one of those people with resources, so all kinds of investments were already in place before filming even started.

With the funds in hand, Zhou Le decided to go all out.

Use the best costumes, props, and sets; if the scenes can be filmed on location, don't use green screens; if the clothes can be handmade and tailored, don't go to wholesalers.

Zhou Le had seen the previous scene before. Although the style and tone were in line with that era, it still looked cheap. So Zhou Le simply spent a lot of money to redecorate and added many decorations.

In other words, everyone's pay is not high, because when the actors learned that they could work with Zhou Le, they had to consider whether to insist on taking the original pay or to lower their prices in order to have a better chance of getting these roles.

Later in the conversation, everyone said they could offer a discount, and it wouldn't hurt to go for a cheaper price.

So even if all the extras needed later were included, Zhou Le's final expenditure on film salaries was less than 15 million.

Even if we take that number out now, it would only be enough to hire Zhou Le to play the male lead.

But for his own film, Zhou Le simply refused to accept any payment.

Although the investment received at the time had basically covered the budget, Zhou Le naturally had a way. Although the purpose of making a movie was not to make money, he couldn't really not make any money.

After all, when he was talking to those people about investing, although he agreed to invest, Zhou Le also made it clear to them when signing the contract that no matter how much the total investment was, he would ultimately receive 10% of the profits.

After chatting for a few minutes, Zhou Le went to the side to continue working on the storyboard design.

As for Deng Jiajia, she went to the other side to rehearse with Yu Entai.

Yu Entai was also looking at the script at this moment, and like Deng Jiajia, he had already memorized all the lines.

After rehearsing their lines for a while, the two looked up and saw Zhou Le still drawing stick figure storyboards in the small room. They asked with even more curiosity, "Brother Tai, I've always been a little curious. Now that our movie has attracted so much investment from outside, but Director Zhou is directly asking for 10% of the profits, will those people be willing to accept that?"

Yu Entai looked up and smiled: "Why wouldn't we want to? Director Zhou is already very famous, and now he's making a movie, which means he's helping them make money."

Whether it's Wang Sicong, Tencent, or He Youjun, their purpose in participating in this film is essentially to make investments. In other words, Zhou Le orchestrated this whole scheme.

Director Zhou also has a role in this movie, although it's not as important as ours. But his fame speaks for itself. After the movie was released, at least 90% of the audience came because of Zhou Le's name.

First, his name is responsible for driving up the box office. Second, even if he acted in this movie for free, if his salary and the director's share of the profits are included, the price wouldn't be low.

The main point is that Zhou Le makes his own movies and doesn't really need the money, but he wants to share the project with everyone so that they can make money together. With Tencent's publicity and subsequent promotion, it's like having a powerful backer. But getting involved with Wang Sicong is like getting in touch with the cinemas.

In short, it seems like Zhou Le could cover everything, but in the end he only gets 10%, which is a loss. The investors also lose 10% of their box office revenue for no reason, which is also a loss. But if you really calculate it, no one loses.

Putting aside the high figures, as long as the box office reaches 1 billion, everyone will make a killing. But as far as I know, Zhou Le has never made a movie with less than 1 billion since his debut. The kind of movie we're making now isn't particularly big, but I estimate it will definitely reach 1 billion. Of the 300 million that goes to the box office, Zhou Le will get around 100 million, which is only a few tens of millions short.

For those investors, exchanging tens of millions for Zhou Le's friendship is a very worthwhile deal.

Deng Jiajia nodded in sudden realization.

"I see. No wonder I'm not suited for this line of work. My brain just doesn't quite work."

Yu Entai glanced at the script again: "It's okay, I can't do these things either. Professional matters are complicated, and there are personal relationships involved everywhere."

"That's still much better than me. Brother Tai is a PhD."

"Hey, it's not that much better. A doctorate doesn't mean anything. If I had really become famous, things wouldn't have turned out the way they did after filming 'My Own Swordsman'."

I think we're actually in pretty similar situations. We both have hit classic anthology series, but we're still stuck in the second or third tier of the industry.

"Then I hope that after we finish filming this movie, we can get more good scripts and good roles."

"Haha, let's encourage each other."

Days passed by, but Zhou Le was busy filming all day and had less exposure on the internet. One day, his agent called and asked Zhou Le to create some trending topics.

Whether it's trending on Weibo or Douyin, at least let people not forget that there is such a person as Zhou Le.

"What can we do? We can't go anywhere now, and the one million we donated has already been spent. It would be best to wait a while before donating supplies. It's only been a short time since the New Year, and everyone has already stocked up on what they needed to."

The agent thought for a moment on the other end of the phone: "If all else fails, we can do a couple of live streams, chat and play games."

"Chatting and playing games, that's fine. I'll check my schedule tonight and make some arrangements."

Zhou Le now has fixed teammates when playing games.

Or they could invite Wang Sicong, Lin Gengxin, and Chen He, and then randomly pair them with a professional player.

Or they could find Wang Junkai and invite a few other streamers to join them.

After all, even though everyone works in the entertainment industry, there are still differences in closeness and distance between them.

Zhou Le wasn't sure who would be free in the evening, so he asked around. Both sides said they were available and could play games together for an hour or two.

Zhou Le: "."

I should have asked first.

So he asked both sides separately if they were willing to play together. Wang Junkai said no problem, and Wang Sicong and Chen He also said they were fine with it, since they just wanted to play games and have some fun together.

"Xiao Kai, are you sure everything's alright on your end?"

Zhou Le asked another question.

"It's okay, but does Principal Wang tend to get easily carried away when playing games?"

"Yeah, he does get easily carried away, but as long as he plays well, it's fine."

"Then my skills should be considered pretty good."

After agreeing on this, Zhou Le finished work at 7 p.m., had dinner, went back to the hotel, turned on his computer, logged in to recruit people, and started a live stream.

He discovered that live streaming was the simplest way to gain exposure, especially since he had brought along a bunch of celebrities and Wang Sicong, so the exposure would definitely be enough. Although it might not make it to the trending topics, it would definitely generate buzz.

"Zhou Le has amazing connections! He managed to get so many celebrities to play games?"

"Wang Sicong is also involved."

"Play well, or Wang Sicong will start yelling at you later."

"Why would Brother Le worry about this? Back in the day, Brother Le was able to go to the LOL All-Star tournament and go toe-to-toe with Captain Uzi and Faker. Wouldn't he just be smurfing in a game like this?"

"May Xiao Kai perform well today, and please don't let him get scolded."

The live chat was filled with shock, but after Zhou Le greeted the group and had Wang Junkai introduce himself to them, they began discussing which positions to play.

Wang Junkai played top lane as always, Lin Gengxin took on mid lane and jungle, and Zhou Le chose support.

Although the purpose is to generate buzz, the most important thing is to have fun playing games together. Losing in front of so many people would be embarrassing for anyone.

The game started quickly, and Zhou Le chose Thresh.

Wang Sicong is also quite good at games. Although he can't compare to streamers, he has a teammate like Zhou Le who can go toe-to-toe with world-class players, so he has a very comfortable game from the start.

However, during the mid-lane laning phase, Wang Sicong's ADC was suddenly hit by the enemy Lee Sin's Sonic Wave. He was already low on health. Just as Lee Sin was about to use his second Q to fly to Wang Sicong, Wang Sicong was stunned: "Holy crap! I'm going to die!"

But as soon as he finished speaking, Zhou Le's calm voice came: "He won't die."

Zhou Le interrupted Lee Sin's second Q flight with a single E skill.

Immediately afterwards, another Frostbite ultimate skill flew over from the top lane. As soon as the oversized magic crystal sword appeared, Wang Sicong felt a chill in his heart again.

"Holy crap, I'm really going to die this time!"

"You can't die!"

As they were talking, Zhou Le appeared as if a god had descended to earth, instantly blocking the attack, and the explosion's range just barely reached Wang Sicong.

But just then, a bloodthirsty and cruel figure pounced out from the bushes in the middle lane like a ghost, its eyes gleaming with cold light, aiming straight at Wang Sicong's bloodied head.

"It's over!"

Wang Sicong was now in complete despair. He hadn't died the entire game, but he never expected his opponent to be so cunning and target him like this!
"It's not over."

As Zhou Le's voice rang out once more, Thresh had already thrown out his hook without anyone noticing.

Just as the poodle's claws were about to slash at Wang Sicong, the hook seemed to have eyes, securing the poodle to the chain at the last second, just 0.05 seconds from the last strike.

However, Thresh, controlled by Zhou Le, was naturally ganged up on and killed.

"Awesome, Zhou Le!"

"God-tier support".

Various exclamations of praise rang out from the microphone.

The comments section was filled with question marks, exclamation marks, and "Holy crap!"

But just as they were returning to base, Wang Sicong suddenly asked, "If I hadn't praised you just now, and had instead said 'Don't feed, support,' what would you have thought?"

Zhou Le: "???"

"Is that something a human being should say? If you really say that, I'll end the broadcast right now and come to your house to beat you up!" (End of Chapter)