So what if I work with celebrities?

The sailor's wish was beautiful, but reality was harsh. Sales were a whopping 1.4 million on the first day, 1.5 million on the second, and 1.6 million on the third, before starting a steady decline.

The annual holiday passed quickly, and "Miss Granny" grossed more than 9.1 million yuan in its first week.

Some film magazines changed their covers to feature Xu Zan's photo, and various reports surged:

"Miss Granny is expected to surpass 20 million views!"

"Taiwan's youngest commercial film director!"

"From coffee shop waitress to multi-million dollar director, life is like a dream, and a dream is like life!"

"Miss Granny" recouped its costs in less than a week, and starting in the second week, it began to be shown in cinemas in other counties and cities across the island.

Taipei cinemas saw a precipitous drop in box office revenue, while other places experienced a steady increase.

After the Lunar New Year holiday, Shaw Brothers' cinemas in Hong Kong began showing "Miss Granny". This time, the collaboration with Shaw Brothers was not a buyout, but a combination of print money and box office revenue sharing.

The revenue split for Hong Kong cinemas is 70/30, with Panda Entertainment taking 30%, while the split for Southeast Asia is 60/40.

The increased revenue sharing in Southeast Asia is not only due to Hsu Tsan's talent, but more importantly, to Teresa Teng's influence. She has a huge fan base in Southeast Asia, and this film has already generated considerable buzz throughout the region even before its release.

The movie theme song album was first released in Southeast Asia, and it sold 110,000 copies on the first day, which is quite remarkable.

Hsu Tsan and distributors believe that the high sales volume is largely due to the fact that these songs are old songs from the Republican era.

It's not just young people who like to listen to it; people in their sixties will also buy a copy.

In mid-February, the daily box office of "Miss Granny" hovered around 500,000 yuan, and only dropped to around 200,000 yuan by the end of February.

At this time, Ryusuke Takeda, the section chief of Toei Company in Japan, approached Xu Zan, and his attitude had completely changed from the last time.

No longer with an arrogant posture, but with the same bow, this time it was clearly a 90-degree bow, whereas last time it was at most 60 degrees.

"Mr. Xu, you are a truly amazing director. Your film 'Joyful Encounter' sold very well in Japan. It was released at the same time as 'The Story of Enjiro 15,' and its sales were just as good."

Unlike in Taiwan, Japanese films are often released in pairs, with tickets sold together; this is known as joint screenings.

Toei was worried that "Joyful Encounter" wouldn't get enough audience attendance, so it was released alongside the "Enjiro Series" films.

This film was absolutely a national phenomenon, and by 1975, fifteen sequels had already been made.

The combined distribution revenue from the screenings of "Enjiro 15" and "Joyful Encounters" reached 930 million yen, roughly equivalent to 100 million New Taiwan Dollars.

It ranked sixth in the annual rankings, with the top three being "The Towering Inferno," "The Great Earthquake," and "Emmanuelle."

Xu Zan particularly liked the French film "Emmanuelle," which, after all, was a star-studded film and quite exciting for people in 1975.

Li Xiaolong's "Enter the Dragon" earned 7.72 million yen in distribution revenue, ranking ninth.

The rationed revenue accounts for about 50% of the box office, so the actual box office of "Enter the Dragon" is estimated to be 3.5 billion yen.

Brother Long is still Brother Long, you can't argue with that.

Hsu Tsan's "Joyful Encounter" benefited from the success of "Tora-san 15" and reached a box office of 4.5 billion yen. However, according to Ryusuke Takeda, the actual box office of "Joyful Encounter" was only about 30 million New Taiwan Dollars.

Without "Enjiro," the box office might have dropped even further.

Even so, Toei had high hopes for Hsu Tsan's talent, and coupled with Teresa Teng's influence in Japan, Ryusuke Takeda flew over immediately to discuss cooperation after learning about the approximate box office performance in Taiwan.

"Our company can offer NT$10 million to purchase the Japanese screening rights for 'Miss Granny'."

Xu Zan didn't immediately agree, but instead asked, "So, will it be released at the same time as 'Enjiro' this time?"

"Oh, Mr. Xu, the last time it was able to be shown was thanks to the Vice Minister's kindness towards me, but this time it's almost impossible. You may not know, but in Japan, only Japanese films use this kind of screening method, and last time was already an exception."

Ryusuke Takeda sincerely explained the situation at the time. Because he had just become the section chief and needed to achieve certain results, his superior overruled objections and arranged for the merger, stating to the board of directors that this was a one-time event.

Japanese films are divided into domestic films and foreign films, which can be seen as domestic and imported films.

Xu Zan pondered for a moment, "I want to allocate 20% of the revenue as profit sharing, and I'll also sell you the screening rights for this film for seven million. However, it can't be released at the same time as Hollywood films like 'Jaws.' The revenue allocation I'm referring to doesn't include publicity and distribution costs. Oh, and there's also the French film 'Emmanuelle 2.'"

"This..." Takeda Ryusuke calculated the income in his mind. If the distribution income of "Strange Her" was 30 million, he would need to pay an additional 6 million.

He watched this movie in the theater and thought it was fantastic. The ingenious concept and the contrast between the characters from "ancient and modern times" made it clear that the public really enjoyed the storyline.

"Alright, I'll consider this a friendship between me and Mr. Xu. I hope we can have more collaborations in the future!" Ryusuke Takeda finally agreed.

While the Taiwanese film "Miss Granny" was performing poorly, the Cultural Affairs Bureau approved the release application for the Hollywood film "Jaws".

How amazing is this movie?

A box office of $100 million in North America—in the 1970s, $100 million was no longer enough to describe it as simply amazing.

The global box office for "Jaws" is expected to reach a staggering $4.7 million, breaking the box office record in film history.

Spielberg also became one of the world's most famous commercial film directors with this film.

Xu Zan watched "Jaws" for several days. From a professional's perspective, this movie crushes the Chinese films of recent years. It's like we're still playing with Mauser rifles while the Americans are already using Gatling guns.

On the first day, he accompanied Hu Huizhong to watch the movie. The little girl was so sweet; whenever there was a scary part, she would snuggle into his arms. Old Xu, not knowing what to do with his hands, naturally warmed her frightened heart.

The next day, he accompanied Teresa Teng to watch it. Although the singer was also very scared, she was quite restrained. She frequently looked at Hsu Tsan and had to use milk tea to cover up her fear.

On the third day, he accompanied Lin Qingxia to watch. Ever since he had eaten a meal cooked by her, Lin Qingxia would often cook for Lao Xu, making different kinds of dishes.

She's a big star if you knew her, but if you didn't, you'd think she was just a cook!

By the fourth day, Xu Zan was already sick of watching movies, but there was no way around it. Zhang Aijia insisted on dragging him to watch, because she had heard that Xu Zan always accompanied beautiful women to the movies, and this time he didn't even have any of them.

That night, after drinking too much, Sylvia Chang flirted with Xu Zan and then ran away. Her main job was to start a fire, not to keep it a fire.

The box office performance of "Jaws" is absolutely phenomenal, grossing 12 million in its opening week, and there's no sign of it declining.

Film critics predict that this movie will definitely gross over 30 million New Taiwan Dollars in Taiwan.

By early March, the daily box office of "Miss Granny" had dropped to 110,000, and it was pulled from theaters across the island.

Box office data from various cinemas shows that "Miss Granny" has grossed a total of 20.37 million yuan in 29 days since its release.

It accounted for almost all the moviegoers during the Spring Festival season.

For the first time ever, a mainstream newspaper dedicated a page to introducing Xu Zan.

Hsu Tsan's significance goes beyond simply being a commercial film director. He is a director nurtured in Taiwan, unlike Li Han-hsiang, Hu Jin-quan, and Chang Che who came from Hong Kong, and unlike Li Hsing and Pai Ching-jui who have high artistic achievements but low commercial appeal.

The newspaper article concluded by saying: Perhaps starting in 1976, the Taiwanese Chinese-language film industry will enter the era of director Hsu Tsan.