When a large number of netizens flooded into the cinemas, the entire box office market suffered a huge impact.
First of all, "Those Years" had a 100% occupancy rate in all the cinemas, which was unprecedented.
Then, there was still a large number of audiences who could not be satisfied!
Therefore, in all the major cinemas, the same scene played out:
The audience sold all the tickets for "Those Years" that day, and then bought all the tickets for the next day, but there were still many audiences who could not buy tickets. Therefore, in the crowd, there was a call from the National People's Congress, "Give us more screenings! No matter how late it is, we are willing to wait! "
Almost all of these people were members of Zhao Kang's Water Army. Other than a large number of Water Army still working hard online, there was also a portion of Water Army that came offline for the first time. They flooded into the cinemas to guide the audience's enthusiasm.
The request for more screenings immediately got the other audiences to agree. Yes! Extra screenings! Even if it was extra screenings at night, no one would object.
The first thing the cinemas could think of was to temporarily reduce the number of screenings for other movies, and then make extra screenings for "Those Years".
At present, besides "Those Years", "The Hero" had the highest number of screenings. These two movies together took up 90% of the screenings in the cinemas nationwide. In other words, if they wanted to squeeze out screenings for "Those Years", they would have to start with "The Hero" first, because the other movies only took up 10% of the screenings. If they squeezed out any other movie, it would probably be taken off the cinemas. That was something they could never do. The only thing they could do was to use the box office of "The Hero" to make up for "Those Years".
"The Hero" guaranteed a minimum of 60%, but the actual occupancy rate was far less than 60%. Therefore, for the cinemas, if they were to screen "The Hero", they would sell 60% of the screenings for one screening. But now, if they were to screen "Those Years", it would be different. With the current enthusiasm of the audience, as long as one screening was done, it would definitely reach 100%!
What was even worse was that "The Hero" did not sign any written agreement with the cinemas to avoid suspicion. They only paid the cinemas in advance, and then the cinemas received the screenings. Therefore, if the cinemas breached the contract, they would just have to return the money, and they would not have to bear any other responsibility.
Comparing the two, there was a difference of 40%!
As a result, almost all the cinemas switched sides that night. Most of The Hero's showtimes were cut at the last minute to make up for Those Years! In just one night, the situation was completely overturned by Li Mu!
When the producers and investors of The Hero learned of this news, they were furious!
Never in their dreams would they have thought that Li Mu would actually play such a ruthless hand! Didn't he put in so much effort to increase the influence of "Those Years" so that he could indirectly block "The Hero"? How was he going to let them live?
Li Mu's move was indeed ruthless. After seven o 'clock in the evening, in order to cope with the craze of the audience, all the cinemas made large-scale adjustments to the schedule, and the number of screenings for The Hero plummeted.
And the media reports about the big box office success of The Hero suddenly became extremely awkward. The box office of The Hero was indeed "hot" before seven o 'clock, but after seven o' clock, it was basically as cold as liquid nitrogen.
All the media that had a good relationship with the production team of The Hero contacted them one after another, and they basically said the same thing: Today's report will be aired as usual, but tomorrow's news about The Hero breaking 20 million in the box office will not be aired no matter what.
Because of the sudden change after seven o 'clock, if The Hero still wanted to make a 20 million box office news, it was basically a pipe dream. After all, anyone with a little common sense knew that the highlight of the day's box office was after seven o' clock. The box office during this time period accounted for half of the entire day's box office, and the proportion was even higher on weekdays. Now that such a big change had happened to the cinemas, if they still reported that The Hero broke 20 million in the box office as planned tomorrow, wouldn't that be a slap in the face?
The team of The Hero could brag to the public that they had a box office of 50 million a day, and they would at most be scolded by the public for being shameless. But if the media also lied through their teeth, then they would lose all credibility. So, no matter what, they couldn't help The Hero with a half-show.
Seeing that the original plan was about to be realized, they didn't expect such a big change to happen at night, which made all their wishful thinking go down the drain. This made the entire team of The Hero extremely discouraged and angry.
Zhang Weiping said furiously in the conference room, "That Li Mu is ruthless! We have already invested 10 million today. Even if we can get some of it back later, it's still an investment of a few million! Now that he's done this, we can forget about investing a few million today. It's all f * cking gone down the drain! "
The investor representative's face was also livid, and he cursed, "F * ck. We didn't expect him to be waiting for us here! "
At this moment, Director Zhang was sitting at the conference table without saying a word. He was extremely depressed. This movie was supposed to be a blockbuster overseas, but he didn't expect that it would fail at home before it even went overseas. The poor domestic box office performance would definitely greatly reduce Hollywood's expectations for this movie. Harvey was already extremely cunning, and he was afraid that he would take this opportunity to ruthlessly suppress this movie. Being robbed of profits by Harvey was still a small matter, but if Harvey lost confidence in this movie, then it would really be over.
Right now, there wasn't a single Hua Xia company that had the ability to distribute and promote movies in Hollywood or the whole of North America. In the fiercely competitive North American market, if the distributor wasn't strong enough, it would be a fool's dream to have a high box office, and it would be wishful thinking to even think about winning awards. It was also possible that because of Li Mu's attack on The Hero, it would completely destroy their overseas dreams.
At this time, a staff member of the production company saw that the atmosphere was so awkward, and subconsciously said, "Everyone, don't be too pessimistic. After today's news is broadcast, we should still be able to attract a large number of viewers."
"It's useless." Zhang Weiping waved his hand and said, "Let's not talk about how big of a commotion Li Mu's event has caused, and how it can't wait to attract everyone's attention. Just based on the current attitude of the cinema chain, it can be seen that they are more inclined to give as many showtimes to Those Years as possible. Even if a large number of viewers really want to watch The Hero tomorrow, they will give up because there are no showtimes!"
If the words "The Hero" and "Those Years" were swapped, it would be the effect that Zhang Weiping was looking forward to. What he wanted was to reduce the showtimes of his competitors by buying the box office, so that the audience of his competitors wouldn't be able to watch it even if they wanted to. He didn't expect that one of Li Mu's events would immediately push him into such a desperate situation.
The whole conference room was filled with despair. At this time, the door of the conference room was pushed open, and a middle-aged woman said in a panic, "Director Zhang, Director Zhang, the cooperating cinema chains have come to us one after another, saying that they want to cooperate with us at least 60% …"
Zhang Weiping was so angry that he threw the pen in his hand on the wall and said angrily, "These guys are too much! They have no credibility or business ethics at all! "
Miraculously, the investor's representative also roared, "They're going too far! At most, we'll give him 100% guarantee! Even if we lose money, we'll still take Li Mu's edge! "
"It's useless." Director Zhang shook his head and said, "If you're the boss of a cinema chain, one is completely reasonable and legal, and the other is going against the industry's ethics and making money under the table, and the other is making the same amount of money, which would you choose?"
The investor's representative was stunned, and said angrily, "At most, we'll give him 120%, right?!"
Director Zhang looked at the angry investor's representative and sighed slightly. There was no other way, the investment for this movie was too big, and the risk was also high, so they had no choice but to use some special connections to bring in investors from the physical industry. However, those rich and powerful physical industries were really lacking in intelligence when it came to the cultural industry. They always had a gangster's attitude that they were rich, and they could throw whatever they wanted.
The investor's representative didn't expect Director Zhang to look at him and sigh without saying anything. Seeing that he was obviously looking down on him, the investor's representative couldn't take it anymore and questioned him, "Director Zhang, what do you mean by this? Do you have a problem with what I said just now? Could it be that the plan I mentioned just now is not feasible? "
Director Zhang said, "Director Liu, if we give the cinema chain 120%, he'll definitely be tempted, but to deliberately reduce the number of screenings of a popular movie with 100% occupancy rate, how much pressure would the cinema chain have to bear to do this? If the other party was an ordinary film company, it would be fine, but the key thing is that the other party is Makino Image, Li Mu's company! Everyone has just experienced how strong Li Mu's influence is, so I won't repeat it. "
Speaking up to this point, Director Zhang paused and said, "What we need to be thankful for now is that Li Mu hasn't exposed the fact that we bought the box office. If we don't stop in time, it will become worse. Once Li Mu exposes this matter, not only this movie, but everyone here will be disgraced in the film industry!"
At this moment, Director Zhang was feeling especially depressed. Actually, he only wanted to make a movie that could make some noise overseas. Regardless of whether it was to increase the influence overseas or to export to the domestic market, it was of great strategic importance to him. However, he didn't expect that Li Mu would appear out of nowhere. He didn't know what was wrong with him, but he actually agreed to their plan to buy the box office to go against Li Mu, completely ignoring the fact that Li Mu wasn't a kind person. So many people who tried to bully him, which one of them ended up well?
You've already exceeded your reading limit for today. If you want to read more, please log in.
Login
Select text and click 'Report' to let us know about any bad translation.
