Monday, April 20.
Just after Easter with his family, Peter Sanders received a call before eight o'clock in the morning and hurried to Fox Studios.
Ronald Goldberg's assistant was very hurried on the phone and hung up before he could elaborate. Peter Sanders knows very well that it must have something to do with the next weekend box office of "Butterfly Effect."
Walking into a conference room in the studio's administrative building, Peter Sanders found that there were already five or six people waiting here, basically all executives of the publicity department, but Ronald Goldberg had not yet appear.
Before sitting down at the conference table, Peter Sanders keenly caught a certain number in the crowd's comments.
"...11.86 million..."
11.86 million? !
Feeling strongly that he might have heard it wrong, Peter Sanders snatched the folder handed by the other party from the secretary of the meeting, and opened it directly when he stood there.
The first page is the box office data report for the latest three days of the weekend.
"Butterfly Effect", 11.86 million US dollars, -17%.
It really was 11.86 million US dollars!
Moreover, compared with the box office data of 14.31 million US dollars in the first weekend, "Butterfly Effect" fell far beyond everyone's expectations, only 17%.
Peter Sanders couldn't help but start his mental calculations quickly.
The box office dropped by 17% the following weekend. If this trend continues, it is absolutely possible that the total box office in North America will exceed $100 million.
The question now is, what happened?
Peter Sanders was standing there in a daze, Ronald Goldberg walked in with a few people hurriedly and sat directly at the top of the conference table. Seeing Peter Sanders' appearance, Goldberg said very kindly: "Peter, stand there and do something, sit down."
Peter Sanders came back to his senses, smiled and nodded to each other, walked to the conference table and sat down.
The secretary of the meeting began to distribute another document.
Ronald Goldberg and others all sat down and said directly: "Everyone should have seen that, yes, 11.86 million US dollars, the box office fell only 17% the next week. As for what happened? A temporary summary of the recent audience survey results of the company's publicity department can probably explain the reason. However, this is not the most important thing. The key now is how to maintain this box office trend and how to make the "Butterfly Effect" box office pass The $100 million threshold."
After several years in charge of Fox Pictures, the company is finally about to usher in a North American box office that is expected to exceed 100 million yuan. Ronald Goldberg's tone is with unconcealable excitement.
Peter Sanders listened to Ronald Goldberg and discussed with everyone the issue of increasing the scale of the "Butterfly Effect" screening and adjusting the film's marketing strategy as soon as possible. He opened the other document he just received and read it with one mind. Beginning with Fox's publicity department's analysis of the "Butterfly Effect" box office trend in the next week.
In the summary of the report, several sets of data from the "Butterfly Effect" audience survey in North America are specially marked.
"The proportion of the audience in the 18-26 age group: 43%."
"A 10-point audience rating: 7.7."
"The proportion of viewers who chose to watch movies influenced by "Rora Run": 81%."
"Percentage of viewers not affected by comments: 33%."
"The proportion of viewers who believe that the film has received unfair comments from the media: 76%.
"The proportion of viewers who plan to recommend to friends after watching the movie: 69%."
Conference room.
Just after reading this set of data, Peter Sanders has roughly understood why the next week's box office trend of "Butterfly Effect" will exceed everyone's expectations.
The research report also clearly pointed out that, compared with the overwhelming media negative reviews, the reputation of "Butterfly Effect" in the audience group is much higher, and the audience rating of 7.7 basically belongs to the category of an excellent movie.
At the same time, because the audience of "Butterfly Effect" tends to be younger, this group of people rarely read newspapers on weekdays, and are more inclined to recommend friends to choose the movie target. Therefore, the media's one-sided bad reviews have far less impact on the film's box office than Fox predicted.
The report also speculates that the popularity of "Lola Run" has brought a very large potential audience base for "Butterfly Effect". Although some audiences temporarily gave up watching the movie due to the negative media reviews in the first week, they still chose to enter the theater again after word of mouth spread. This also contributed to the slight decline of only 17% in the next weekend of the movie. .
Basically, the major films released by major Hollywood studios will conduct similar audience research. These data existed before the box office of "Butterfly Effect" was released next weekend.
It's just that the media's bombing of bad reviews on "Butterfly Effect" is too violent, and everyone on Fox has not been able to feel safe because of these data.
Now that the box office results of the film have been released, it is easy to reverse the reason through the data.
After all.
Movies are after all a high-risk business as unpredictable as the weather.
After reading the report, Peter Sanders looked up. An executive in the publicity department was expressing his opinion.
"Ronald, in addition to these, I think we can use public opinion control to render the strong contrast between bad media reviews and the box office of the film as much as possible, making people believe that "Butterfly Effect" has been treated very unfairly, even, We can imply that someone is deliberately discrediting the film, which can stimulate the audience's sympathy and rebellion to the greatest extent and guide more people into the theater."
Ronald Goldberg finished listening, nodded in approval, and said, "Nick, you will come up with a detailed implementation plan as soon as possible, and I will let the New York side cooperate. So, for the time being, everyone will go to work. Right. Remember, I will see the "Butterfly Effect" screen increase to over 1,700 yuan this Friday."
This was a publicity strategy adjustment meeting. Peter Sanders was called out only because he was directly responsible for the role of the vice president of production for "Butterfly Effect."
When Ronald announced that the meeting was adjourned, Peter Sanders also got up and was about to leave with everyone, but was stopped by Ronald Goldberg.
"Peter, the next promotion of "Butterfly Effect" still needs the cooperation of Simon Westero. You are responsible for contacting this matter. In addition, I remember that Daenerys Pictures is still preparing a romance film. Someone makes an evaluation report to me."
Peter Sanders nodded and agreed. When Ronald Goldberg left, he raised his wrist and looked at his watch. It was just nine o'clock in the morning.
at the same time.
With the start of the new working week, the box office data for the next weekend of "Butterfly Effect" spread quickly throughout Hollywood.
Compared with the original box office curve of "Run Lola Run", the box office of "Butterfly Effect" surprised too many people the next weekend. Until the report inside Fox gradually spread, many people finally believed it. This fact.
The first week was 21.69 million US dollars and the next weekend was 11.85 million US dollars.
In just ten days, the total box office of "Butterfly Effect" has reached 33.55 million US dollars. There is no doubt that even if it cannot break 100 million in the end, this movie will definitely be able to squeeze into the top ten of the annual box office rankings.
Thinking of this, many people suddenly feel surprised.
Counting "Running Laura", which is still in theaters, a young man who has been in Hollywood for less than a year, unknowingly, has created two movies that are enough to squeeze into the top ten North American annual box office charts.
Even Steven Spielberg has never created such a miracle.
Realizing this, Daenerys Pictures, located in an office building in Santa Monica, suddenly attracted the attention of Hollywood.
In Hollywood, one success can be regarded as accidental, but two successes are enough to prove too much. Now, since there have been two miracles, Simon Westero's good luck may not stop there.
Daenerys Pictures headquarters.
It is already afternoon.
In Simon's office, a heavyweight visitor, the president of C+, Michael Ovitz is welcoming.
Due to the internal turmoil of WMA last year, C+ took the opportunity to poach a large number of top stars. With this company and its mature packaging operation mechanism, Michael Ovitz is definitely one of the most powerful people in Hollywood at this time.
However, on the other hand, Michael Ovitz is an extremely low-key person.
In my memory, it wasn't until the end of the 1980s that as the power of C+ became stronger and stronger, the media spared no effort to dig out, Michael Ovitz, the'giant crocodile' that lurked in Hollywood finally surfaced, and continued for many times At the top of the "Premier" magazine Hollywood power list.
On the sofa in the reception area, Simon and Ovitz sat opposite.
Michael Ovitz has a kind of easy-going temperament that makes people naturally feel close, but he is straightforward in his words, saying: "Simon, these days, you have turned to John Travolta and Robert Many customers such as Radford and Meg Ryan have issued cooperation invitations. So, in order to facilitate our cooperation, how about joining C+?"
As soon as he spoke, Simon felt the strong desire to control the C+ boss.
However, he just shook his head slightly and smiled: "Sorry, Michael, I already have an agent. Also, even if I join C+, I won't sign a sharing contract with you."
"Of course, our company is actually very flexible in this regard. Spielberg is also our customer. We also signed a fixed salary contract with him." Michael Ovitz also gave a smile, and finally did something Pointingly added: "The same as you were at WMA."
"In this case," Simon shrugged and said: "Michael, you should know that I would never terminate the contract with Joe easily. If it weren't for him, I might still be a cashier in a supermarket. So, we still Let's talk about Bob's pay."
Michael Ovitz nodded. He didn't go after him like the rumors, or he just didn't show it for the time being. He changed the subject altogether and said: "Bob called me, he wants to be in your new A cameo in the movie. I've seen the script. Seriously, I don't think it's a good choice. But you know, we always try our best to meet all the requirements of our customers. So, Simon, $1 million, Bob is absolutely worth the price."
PS: It's still 4000 words. I will definitely not finish writing before 12 o'clock, but I will definitely finish writing today before going to bed, and then I will not set a small goal.