Exploiting Hollywood 1980

Without waiting for the official results the next day, that night, Weintraub pressed the company manager's neck and asked him to give him an answer overnight.

Rating sheets one after another were faxed back from theaters in various states across the country. They were then summarized and filled in a form, and a staff member pressed a calculator to calculate the average score.

After reviewing twice, the average scores were added up and then converted into a scoring system from A+ to F, which was finally filled in by the staff in the large space at the bottom of the form.

This final score summary was faxed from the headquarters in Las Vegas to Weintraub's hotel in New York.

"a+, a+, uh, uh..."

Weintraub took the fax and kissed it passionately, regardless of the unique smell of the fax machine still remaining on it.

"Ronald, it's an A+. It's the first movie in four years to get an A+ rating from the company! We are about to succeed, hahaha..."

Ronald, who was forced to stay by Weintraub, was actually not very happy. He wanted to go home with Aunt Karen to bake some cookies and talk about family life and Donna's MIT studies. .

However, Weintraub was very good at making women happy. He told Ronald's aunt that the next score was related to whether Ronald could make another breakthrough. Her aunt heard that it was related to Ronald's career future and persuaded him to stay.

The company's ratings are based on a completely random selection of cities in several states, and then staff travel to do the sampling. Therefore, the ratings can completely represent the audience's perception of the movie.

"Is this rating important?" Ronald was actually not very clear about the company's rating system. He only remembered that "ET Alien" also received an A+ rating back then. This time, the second part of Long Wei Boy was able to get good reviews from the audience. It seems that I have done a good job.

"You are not a company executive, Ronald. Now you are highly valued in Hollywood. Because their ratings can be seen as predictions of box office to a large extent. Anyone who gets an A or above has achieved great success at the box office. .

Therefore, the current ratings have been bought out by the seven major Hollywood studios, and they cannot immediately release the ratings publicly in the media. The real rating numbers can only be released to the studio first and then given to the news media after approval. Some key data will not be released. "

"Well, is your evaluation accurate?" Ronald asked the staff member.

The staff explained it. It looks like he does this job a lot.

Surveys will be conducted in five randomly selected cities for each movie. For opening day audiences only. The survey cards asked about age, gender, their rating of the movie ("a", "b", "c", "d" or "f"), whether they would rent or buy a video, and more.

There were also questions directed at the announcement, such as why they chose the film and whether they thought the film lived up to its marketing.

"For a movie we get an A rating, the first weekend multiplier of the total box office is more than 5 times. If we get an A+, it may exceed 8 or even 10.

The total revenue of a film with a C rating is about three times its opening weekend.

So generally speaking, a is good, b is average, and c is terrible. D and F ratings indicate that they should not have made the movie, or that they advertised it to the wrong crowd and found the wrong group of people to watch the movie. "

"I remember I got an A+ from et."

"In fact, when ET was released in 1982, there were two other movies, 'Gandhi' and 'Rocky 3' that got A+. But because ET was so successful, the total box office was more than 30 times that of the first weekend, so we revised grading criteria.

More than three years later, no movie has met the new A+ rating standard. Your "The Mighty Kid Part 2" was the first movie in four years to get an A+ rating, and even your "Top Gun" only got an A.

So, congratulations, Director Ronald, Mr. Weintraub, based on our experience, your movie will definitely do well at the box office. "

"Thank you, so we can use a+ for publicity, right?"

Weintraub asked the staff.

"Of course we have no objection to that."

Although the ratings are generally not announced to the public, some movies will receive A-level ratings and be included in their own publicity packages.

Some posters, newspaper ads, and TV ads will be marked with a rating of A.

"Dragon Boy Part 2" received an A+ that had not been seen for a long time. Of course Weintraub would not let it go. He hurriedly called Columbia's publicity department and urged them to immediately revise the publicity materials and propose Additional budget.

Although Weintraub has joined MGM/United Arts, Columbia will not be troubled by money.

In addition to this "The Dragon King Part 2", which will bring them huge returns, Columbia also has the distribution rights for the sequels in the series of movies.

Moreover, in two consecutive movies, product advertisements of Colombian parent company Coca-Cola were embedded. For such commercial movies, the director was very cooperative in including advertisements, instead of refusing commercial implants for the sake of art like some directors.

Columbia's distribution arm moved quickly. By the evening of that day, new scoring publicity materials had been distributed in New York City.

It was made into a patch style; the advertisement with an A+ rating was pasted on the Long Wei Boy posters in major movie theaters.

A big a+ with words on the background. There was also a person next to me who gave a thumbs up, indicating that it was very good.

"This seems to be the gesture of the two film critics in Chicago." Ronald, wearing sunglasses, came to a cinema in Manhattan to see the new posters.

"They didn't apply for a patent anyway." Weintraub was not wearing sunglasses. In the world of movies, audiences rarely care about the appearance of the producer. Although he is the big boss, he still enjoys being on the front line, pointing out the mistakes of the staff and correcting them.

"That's right." Ronald saw the crowd queuing up to buy tickets at the box office.

In addition to Ronald's "Top Gun" and "The Dragon King Part 2", some people are buying "Spring Is Not a Day to Read", while the rest are buying tickets for another new movie.

"Legal eagles?" Ronald looked at the celebrity faces on the poster, one man and two women, three big stars that were very pleasing to the eye.

The position of stars on movie posters is also a symbol of their status in the industry.

In the middle is Robert Redford, reclining on the ground, taking up the most space by himself. He was Hollywood's golden boy as an actor, and as a director, he won the Oscar for Best Director for his directorial debut in 1980's "Ordinary People." In that movie, there was also actor Timothy Hutton, whom Ronald hated.

Therefore, he had the best card and was placed in the best middle position.

On the left is Deborah Winger. She starred in "An Officer and a Gentleman" and "Mother and Daughter", and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress. However, she lost to Shirley MacLean who played her mother in the same movie.

The dark-haired beauty wore a white sweater and exposed one right hand.

She had the second best card, so she leaned half of her body out from Redford's side. Redford's body is also slightly tilted towards her, and the audience's eyes will be guided by Redford and see her second.

On the right is Daryl Hannah, who starred with Tom Hanks in the hit film "Mermaids." However, she has no blockbuster films since then, and she has not been recognized by awards.

So she only showed her face and blond hair on the poster, and her body was blocked by Redford.

"I want to see it, will you come with me?" Ronald thought about watching this main competitor's movie, and he asked Weintraub if he wanted to watch it.

"I'm not interested. We have an A+ rating and we will definitely win."

"Okay then, I'll see for myself."

Ronald's eyes stayed on the face of Deborah Winger. Although America traditionally considered her a dark-haired beauty with a bigger brain than her body, Ronald preferred this kind of beauty with temperament and intellectuality. He is more attractive to himself than Daryl Hannah, who only has blond hair and a tall figure.

"Are you attracted to her? But you're too late. Deborah is already having a shotgun wedding." Weintraub made a round gesture with his hand on his stomach.

"What?" Ronald didn't understand at first.

"She is pregnant. She belongs to Timothy Hutton. Hutton is a famous playboy in Hollywood. If he can agree to get married, he must have a child.

Rumors are spreading in Hollywood circles that her agent is yelling at Hutton. All of Hutton's movies after "Everyone" failed at the box office. No one is asking him to submit scripts anymore. He is with Wenger to deliberately gain popularity with her. .

Now Deborah Winger is taking at least a year off. It is very bad for the career of an actress who was originally on the rise to become pregnant and have a baby. "

"Hey, it's really difficult for a female star."

Ronald shrugged, bought a ticket, and a large can of popcorn and Coca-Cola combo, and carried it into the screening room.

"The French Open Condor" is surprisingly pretty good-looking. Redford plays a prosecutor and Debra Winger plays his rival lawyer. The two defend Daryl Hannah and accidentally get involved in a deliberate arson case involving more than 20 years of money.

The movie has romance, unexpected explosions, and conspiracy revelations. In the end, the character played by Redford did not choose Daryl Hannah, who inherited his father's huge fortune of world-famous paintings, but chose DeBo, a like-minded man who opened a law firm. La Wenger.

The whole movie is quite satisfactory, and the script can be seen to be very well written in line with the specifications of a commercial blockbuster film.

Ronald noticed that the screenwriters on the credits were Jim Cash, and Jack Epps, Jr. This screenwriting duo is also credited as the screenwriter of "Top Gun". Of course, the script of that movie was very thin, and it mainly relied on the director's performance.

Among other things, they wrote the script for "Secret of Success."

However, the plot of the movie is too conventional, and the stars also perform well. As a Hollywood person, Ronald had all the twists and turns that he expected, and the actor gave an unexpected performance without any scenes.

After watching the entire movie, Ronald couldn't even recall a single scene that was most impressive.

"How exciting! Deborah Winger is so beautiful."

"Daryl Hannah isn't bad either, she's got a really nice body."

Ronald came to the bathroom and found that the audience did not talk about the plot, but talked about the performance of the beautiful actors.

"It seems that he is also a strong enemy and should not be underestimated."

Although the plot was not discussed, Ronald believed that the reputation would not be bad if the appearance and temperament of the heroine were discussed in this way.

Maybe Robert Redford is also being discussed in the ladies' room.

"Audiences love stars, and producers rely on stars." Ronald understood this sentence deeply.

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