Huayu: A Commercial Director

Chapter 164 Premiere and After-Party Celebration: Where's Your Boyfriend?
In January of the new year, the cumulative box office revenue of movies exceeded 4 billion yuan, which is a good start. The total box office revenue for the whole of last year was 44 billion yuan.

This year's box office started strong with 4 billion yuan, with "Let the Bullets Fly" leading the pack by a wide margin, but ultimately stopped at 20.33 billion yuan.

Jiang Wen applied for an extension, which was obviously not possible, but in the end, her fans still rallied and helped her break through.

Many fans who liked it after watching it once went back to the cinema to help Jiang Wen achieve its goal of 2 billion yuan, making it the first film to break 2 billion yuan in 2016.

The remaining two billion was divided among several other companies. The villain and the old scoundrel each received over six hundred million and twelve billion respectively. The remaining box office revenue was distributed among the other twenty-odd films, including some Hollywood movies.

The celebration banquet for "Let the Bullets Fly" and the premiere of "WALL-E" were held on the same day, with the celebration banquet following the premiere.

Many of those invited to the celebration banquet had attended the premiere first; the event was very well-attended.

Those who were supposed to come have come, and those who weren't supposed to come have also come.

For example, Chen Shouzhe saw that Wang Zonglei had brought Ye Ning with him and was talking to Director Tong.

After all, it's the largest domestically invested and independently produced animated feature film, so Chen Shouzhe also invited leaders to come and lend their support.

It's only right that the leadership supports domestically produced animated films, but I still came despite being persuaded by Chen Shou.

When a big leader arrives, a bunch of people will definitely surround him. Wang Zonglei was shamelessly trying to join in the fun, but Director Tong clearly wasn't going to give him the time of day.

We've given you so much support from above, but you've gone off to get involved in real estate. What are we supposed to do?
Therefore, there was considerable dissatisfaction from higher-ups, and some leaders even started to criticize.

Chen Shouzhe was busy with social engagements the whole time. He was the main character, and the film was independently produced by him. The investment and promotion cost 700 million. At the premiere, Chen Shouzhe invited several cinema chains to give the film a good look and to ensure it would be given a good number of screenings.

It's best to watch more movies at night, because they're family-friendly films, suitable for the whole family to go out and watch together. They can't be shown at midnight, right?

"President Liu, I'll need your help then," Chen Shou said.

"Definitely. With such a high investment, we'll definitely give you a good screening schedule," said the general manager of Dadi Cinemas.

"You can rest assured about the quality of my movies," Chen Shouzhe said.

Chen Shouzhe was accompanied by another person, Guo Fan. The film's director credits listed two people, meaning there were two directors: Chen Shouzhe and Guo Fan. It was time for him to be introduced as well.

Several theater chains gave it special attention, and then it could start playing.

The promotional poster has been released, featuring two robots and a cockroach.

When the movie started, many companies that had films scheduled for release during the Spring Festival didn't look too happy.

The quality of the movie is undeniable, especially with the addition of 3D, which perfectly captures the essence of science fiction.

Moreover, the film has a great message: protect the environment and cherish our planet.

We even saw a love story between two robots, one a garbage-collecting robot and the other a high-tech, beautiful robot. When WALL-E lost his memory and became an ordinary garbage-collecting robot, some of the actresses in the audience cried.

When WALL-E is finally restored, everyone can feel the joy. Even older people can't deny that this movie is perfect for the family-friendly atmosphere of the Chinese New Year.

As the movie ended, the audience erupted in applause. Big-budget productions are truly different; they were on par with Hollywood animated film production. Many began to re-evaluate Chen Shouzhe's decision back then. He was ridiculed for establishing Little Dream Company, but the two films proved them wrong.

The Martian and now WALL-E are enough to prove that Little Dream has special effects comparable to Hollywood.

Chen Shou led Guo Fan onto the stage, where they were to be interviewed and chat with the audience.

"Let me introduce you all. This is Guo Fan, a graduate of the Management Department of Beijing Film Academy. He's my senior and also the director of this film. I did the pre-production work, and then I basically handed over the rest of the production to Guo Fan," Chen Shouzhe introduced Guo Fan on stage.

Many people were watching Guo Fan. Some recognized him, while others were hearing his name for the first time. He was clearly another director promoted by Chen Shouzhe after Wuershan. Moreover, Guo Fan had joined Shouzhe Film Industry earlier and had been honing his skills for two years.

The Q&A session was very simple. There were no people present for the animated film, and there was no publicity. The only question asked was whether the investment was really that large.

“There’s a detailed breakdown of the production costs, but it doesn’t include actor expenses. We even chose our own company employees for voice acting. We’ve done everything we can to keep costs down. To be honest, this film had Hollywood special effects artists involved. In their words, even if this film were made in Hollywood, it would cost at least $1.5 million. Producing it in my own company in China has already helped us keep costs down,” Chen Shouzhe said.

There's a huge uproar right now, which means the original budget for this movie was probably around one billion yuan, but it was reduced by a domestic special effects company, based on the premise that the film had its own special effects company.

“Director Chen is right. I followed the project from start to finish. If another company had entrusted this project to our Little Dream Production, and it took two years to complete, I estimate the cost would be around $1.7 million. After all, our company also needs to make a profit; it won't be the current $1 million cost. That's just the cost,” Guo Fan said.

The quality of the film speaks for itself. After the film was released, no media attended the celebration banquet, but they all received red envelopes from Zhong Lifan. They will speak politely to her.

The rest of the people were basically invited to the celebration banquet next door. It was not appropriate for Director Tong to go, so Chen Shouzhe, along with Director La, Jiang Wen, and Yang Shoucheng, the four producers, escorted him back by car before he went back to attend the celebration banquet.

The 20.33 billion blocks of ice were broken by four people working together with hammers.

You could see the envy and jealousy in the audience. They could throw a lavish celebration banquet for their 2 billion yuan achievement, and Huayi wanted to do the same, but it was too small. They could only hold a small celebration banquet to make do with what they had.

Yang Shoucheng kept toasting Chen Shou and apologizing for what had happened before.

"Director Chen, it was an unintentional mistake. Those media reporters took it out of context. I absolutely didn't mean it that way," Yang Shoucheng said, raising his glass to Chen Shoucheng.

"Actually, it doesn't matter. If you told me in private that I was the number one director, I would definitely be happy, hahaha. It doesn't matter who's number one, who cares? Only outsiders care about the so-called rankings." Chen Shou laughed.

Those around Chen Shouzhe knew that he truly didn't care about these things.

"Come on, even if your movie has the highest box office in the world, no one will acknowledge that you are number one. How about making an award-winning movie? Trying to win a few awards?" Jiang Wen said.

"No rush, no rush, I'm still young." Chen Shou smiled and said nothing.

My master and godfather are both here; they've come to participate as well. The Deyun Society is closing its box office tomorrow, the 23rd of the twelfth lunar month, so they came today to attend the celebration banquet and premiere.

After they had eaten and drunk their fill, Chen and his companions saw the guests off one by one. The driver then took him back to his villa. His Hongqi was already well-known in the industry.

Everyone knows that Chen Shou is an oddball. While others drive various foreign luxury cars, he drives a domestic car. Of course, many people know that this car is not cheap and is more expensive than many foreign luxury cars.

I went back to the villa and took a nap, not getting up until noon the next day.

Following yesterday's premiere and today's trailer release, this $100 million film has finally come into the public eye.

At first, I thought it was a huge robot, but it turned out to be a cute, dirty robot holding a pot of flowers, with a smile on its face and a cockroach on its arm.

WALL-E is here to meet everyone in the New Year!!
The film's warm and lovely style has generated a lot of anticipation, and with media promotion, it tells a story of a future world that advocates for environmental protection and nature conservation.

Even state media outlets are emphasizing that this heartwarming film is suitable for the whole family and has educational value for children.

Protecting the environment starts from childhood.

Many parents are already planning to take their children to see it; who knows if they'll assign homework later?

Amidst the film's fervent promotion, Chen Shou changed his clothes and went downstairs.

"Why are you here?" Chen Shou asked, looking at the two people in the living room with surprise.

It was none other than Liu Yifei and Shu Can, these two best friends.

"Director Chen." Shu Can and Chen Shou didn't know each other very well, so Shu Can greeted him politely. Liu Yifei, on the other hand, stared at him and asked in a very casual manner.

Are you going to the Deyun Society's closing ceremony today?

“Yes, the annual closing performance is a grand show and can be used as a promotional platform for the movie,” Chen Shou nodded.

"We asked Sister Qian, but they're out of tickets. We're here to ask if you have any," Liu Yifei said.

"Tickets, there should be some reserved for people in the industry, right?" Chen Shou thought for a moment.

"Then hurry up and ask for us. We wanted to grab it, but we failed and it all disappeared in an instant," Liu Yifei said, while Shu Can next to her nodded like a chick pecking at rice.

Since they started performing crosstalk, the two of them have come to love this kind of performance. Although the jokes are sometimes vulgar, they still laugh very happily.

Chen Shouzhe picked up the phone and dialed Hai Ge, his godfather's agent.

"The tickets are all sold out. People started asking about them a month ago. You don't know how everyone's asking for tickets for the year-end performances. It's practically become a performance report for the entertainment industry," Hai Ge complained.

Previously, they couldn't hire that many people. As Chen Shouzhe's status rose, more and more people started to approach him through Deyun Society. After all, Chen Shouzhe came from Deyun Society, and they hoped to establish connections. Moreover, many people attributed Wu Jing's success last year to his good relationship with Yu Qian, which led to Chen Shouzhe's help.

In order to reserve tickets for audiences who truly love crosstalk, Guo Degang's side didn't have many tickets left on the ticketing website. Chen Shou asked for three tickets at once, but there were clearly not enough.

"You all heard it too, even I don't have any tickets left," Chen Shou said, spreading his hands.

"Why do you need three?" Liu Yifei asked Chen Shou curiously.

"Aren't you bringing your boyfriend?" Chen Shou asked in surprise.

Liu Yifei glared at Chen Shouzhe, snorted coldly, and got up to leave, leaving Chen Shouzhe bewildered and wondering what was wrong with her.

(End of this chapter)