1979: The child's mother is a celestial being.

Chapter 187: First Weekly Box Office Exceeds Expectations (Please Subscribe!)

"Mom, come quick, look at the aliens!"

In a run-down neighborhood in Hollywood, an eight-year-old boy pointed at the screen on the television and shouted to his mother who was washing dishes in the kitchen.

"Leonardo, where did this alien come from?" Although his mother didn't believe her son, she still patiently peeked out to take a look.

This little boy is the future Leonardo DiCaprio, but he is still living in poverty. His parents divorced when he was one year old, and he has been living with his mother since childhood. However, living in Hollywood, a place with a strong artistic atmosphere, he has shown a certain love for acting since he was a child.

He was watching a talk show, and the guest on the show was a self-proclaimed immortal who had lived for 14000 years. Mature adults would naturally be skeptical, but some children might not.

Moreover, the UFO and alien craze has been popular not only in China in recent years, but also in the United States, after all, it was created by their government.

So when Leonardo was only eight years old, he listened to the Asian man on the show speaking confidently and eloquently. Even when faced with questions from several scholars and professors, he remained calm and even provided reasoned answers to their doubts. Coupled with the shocked reaction of the audience, this planted a seed of unwavering belief in his young mind.

"Mom, it's true! Look at that person on TV, he's lived for over ten thousand years, what else could he be but an alien?"

Although Leonardo's mother still didn't believe it, she watched the TV program with a bit of curiosity.

In the program, a biologist questioned an Asian man who claimed to have lived for 14000 years.

"Mr. Li Sen, even if we accept your premise, how could a prehistoric human possibly have survived to this day? Disease, accidents, natural disasters, man-made calamities—in such a long period of time, any of these could have taken your life, wouldn't it?"

"First of all, my immune system is very strong. Secondly, I don't age, or I age very, very slowly. Time almost stopped when I was around thirty years old. As for the natural disasters, man-made calamities, and accidents you mentioned, I have encountered them, but I am very lucky. I have always managed to escape danger, as if there is a deity protecting me in the dark."

"God, this goes against science..."

Before she knew it, Leonardo's mother found herself unable to take her eyes off the television screen.

Although she kept expressing her doubts, another thought kept popping into her mind—what if it's true?

Meanwhile, countless families across the United States are also watching the show.

However, it's not that no clever person guessed the answer before it was even revealed.

Steven Spielberg, the director of "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial," which is currently dominating American cinemas, is one of the smart ones.

"The topic of immortals is a good gimmick. I didn't expect that after Warner Bros.' Blade Runner lost to my movie, they would immediately release a new sci-fi movie. It seems that they are not satisfied and are preparing to 'snipe' me."

It's no wonder Spielberg thought that way. His "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial" and Warner Bros.' "Blade Runner" had just been battling it out in theaters for a week, and the other's $30 million production was being crushed by his own $10 million film. It must have been a bit embarrassing for him.

Then Warner Bros. released a new sci-fi film during this sensitive period, making it hard not to suspect that it was an attempt to sabotage their own film.

When Spielberg saw the ending, he realized that, just as he had guessed, there were no immortals; it was just a director promoting his movie on a TV show.

To his surprise, this person turned out to be the director of this year's Golden Bear Award-winning film.

"The Man from Earth sounds like a soft science fiction film, releasing on June 15th... wait, why today?"

After confirming the release date again, Spielberg looked surprised.

His surprise stemmed from the fact that he seemed to have been completely wrong; the movie didn't appear to be intended to target him.

Otherwise, it wouldn't have been released so hastily, without even a premiere.

"That doesn't make sense!"

Spielberg was a little confused about Warner Bros.' move this time. After hesitating for a while, he decided to watch the movie himself to see if it posed any threat to him.

“Brother, why don’t we watch Blade Runner instead of this movie by an unknown director?”

In a New York movie theater, 12-year-old Nolan explained to his younger brother, "This director is not unknown. He directed this year's Golden Bear winner, The Devotion of Suspect X, and he also directed last year's The Pianist, which won the Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival."

"But this movie is so boring..."

“Because you’re still young and won’t understand, I think it’s alright.” Christopher Nolan then looked at his parents and asked, “What do you think, Mom and Dad?”

"It's not bad. Although it's mostly dialogue, it's not boring overall."

After Nolan's mother finished speaking, his father added, "It's just that there aren't many people in the audience. It's the weekend, and even including our family, there are only about twenty people. I don't think the box office will be very good." "I think it's because the promotion wasn't effective enough. For example, if we hadn't gone to the cinema today, we wouldn't have known there was a movie..."

While they were discussing, the family of four, who had already finished watching the movie, got up and left the theater.

Because Nolan's brother insisted on watching Blade Runner, his parents had no choice but to give in.

"I'll go buy the tickets!"

Nolan volunteered to take on the task of buying the tickets.

When he arrived at the ticket window, he found a long queue. He thought most of the people there were there to see "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial," but to his surprise, the most popular ticket seller was "The Man from Earth."

what happened?

Nolan was somewhat surprised, and after inquiring further, he learned that these people had all come after watching a variety show.

He couldn't help but exclaim, "So 'The Man from Earth' wasn't unpromoted after all, it was just a little late!"

Is it too late?
Perhaps it's a little late.

No, it should be said that the movie was released too early.

Warner Bros. actually hoped that Chen Fusheng's movie could be released at the end of June or the beginning of July.

That would be perfect for this promotion.

However, Chen Fusheng's trip to the United States was only scheduled until the end of June. If the movie were to be released at the end of the month, it would seriously disrupt his plans. Therefore, he insisted on setting the release date for June 15, which would be basically in sync with the promotion.

The bad news is that the movie's attendance on its opening day was rather dismal.

The good news is that the talk show he appeared on had an even better effect than he had expected.

Starting that evening, the attendance rate for his film began to rise.

The occupancy rate has increased from an average of 5% during the day to 10%.

After a night of buzz, Warner Bros. mobilized magazines, newspapers, television stations and other promotional channels to generate buzz, and the average attendance rate soared to 48.6% the next day.

It surpassed Blade Runner's 24.1% that day, second only to E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial's 87.6%.

However, occupancy rate cannot be directly equated with box office revenue.

After all, the number of cinemas showing the film and the number of screenings in theaters are different.

Moreover, Chen Fusheng's film only received B-level resources, so naturally, these two data points cannot be compared with "Blade Runner".

Because the US counts box office revenue on a weekly basis, even though Chen Fusheng's film has only been released for two days this week, the box office revenue from those two days is still considered as the film's opening week box office revenue.

A total of 101.8.

Of these, 14.5 were on the first day.

The second day saw 87.3.
Unit: US dollars!
It was much better than Chen Fusheng had expected.

At least we've broken even.

This week's box office champion is naturally "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial".

After taking the top spot at the box office last week with $11 million, "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial" also took the top spot for the second week with $13.766 million.

Meanwhile, Blade Runner, which competed with it, grossed 564.8 million this week. Unlike E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, which saw an upward trend in its weekly box office, this film's weekly box office was declining, and it dropped by 32% year-on-year.

After reading the newspaper, Chen Fusheng felt that as long as his movie's box office performance was good this week, Warner Bros. would likely increase the promotional resources for his movie starting next week.

But whether they can stabilize the situation is uncertain for Chen Fusheng...

(End of this chapter)