Exploiting Hollywood 1980

"It is better to be a living dog than a dead lion."

This line in "Scattered Lulu" is also a true portrayal of Jonathan Demme since his debut in the movie.

As Niceta drove away with Ronald, she told Ronald some rumors in the industry.

Jonathan Demme's debut film, "Melvin and Howard," was well shot. The reason why Universal did not release the film on a large scale is probably because the protagonist of the story, the relatives and friends of former Hollywood tycoon Howard Hughes, used a lot of force to prevent the release.

This movie is adapted from the true events after the death of Howard Hughes. There was really a poor man named Melvin who took out a will after Hughes's death and claimed to get part of Hughes' estate.

He lost the lawsuit and received no money. Hughes' relatives and friends were afraid that after the movie was released, more people would doubt whether the will was genuine, so they canceled the movie's release.

After understanding what happened to his senior brother Jonathan, Ronald had to admit that the box office of a movie is not necessarily directly proportional to the director's technique, or even the beauty of the movie.

From a purely technical perspective, the films he directed are actually far behind Jonathan. Many details, especially the turning points of the plot, are not as good as the other's.

For example, in the plot of "Scattered Lulu", at Lulu's class reunion, she meets her husband who escaped from prison. In fact, the types of movies before and after are different. The first part is more of an erotic film about an affair, while the second part is a very authentic suspense film. Jonathan Demme shot the movie very much like Hitchcock's "Psycho".

In order to hint at this change in the audience, Demi changed the lighting at the class dance, turning the original warm and colorful colors into cooler and gloomier tones.

This technique of using color to suggest to the audience that a major change is about to occur is very effective and highly skilled. Ronald's films don't have this particular sophistication.

However, Ronald's film far exceeded it at the box office.

Many unknown factors will determine the box office of a movie. Not to mention anything else, if the distribution company does not allow the copy to go to theaters, no matter how good the movie is, there will be no chance of achieving high box office.

Jonathan Demme's bad luck didn't stop there. His second movie was completely overturned by female star Goldie Hawn on the set, and he finally found a new screenwriter to rewrite the script. The original sisterly love story, which reflects the first large-scale work of American women in factories in the late World War II, was turned into a romance film with the heroine.

Jonathan was forced to reshoot all the scenes,

He was so discouraged that after the failure of two consecutive films, he went to make a concert documentary.

If it hadn't been for this loose film, Orion Pictures, adhering to the tradition of United Artists and not interfering with the artist's creation, gave him de facto final editing rights and restored his confidence. This might be a director with great potential. Say goodbye to the big screen.

With a movie like "Scattered Lulu", even if the box office is still not good, but with this kind of technique and level, no one will ask him to direct it in the future.

In a director's career, the success or failure of the first few films is still very important. If your first few films use stars, and then are interfered with and cause box office failure...

…

Early the next morning, Weintraub called Ronald. He learned from Susan that Ronald signed Cher.

"I heard that Cher won't be scheduled until the New Year? That's okay. I expect MGM/United Artists to be back up and running in October, and you can start preparing for filming by then.

Do you need to prevent Cher from acting like a big star on the set? Just go ahead and do it, Ronald, I don't think anyone can challenge you on set. "

With the promise of the future small owner and president of MGM, Ronald felt a little relieved. At least Cher can't challenge her own authority the way Goldie Hawn challenged Jonathan Demme.

The various struggles within the crew are complicated, but in the final analysis, the key to deciding who wins is who the studio executives support in the end.

"There is also good news. The theme song of the second part of The Dragon King, 'Glory of Love' sung by Peter Setra, has topped the charts."

"This is really good news." Ronald was overjoyed. The episode's top spot is very helpful for the movie's box office performance. The "Top Gun" theme song topped the charts just two months ago.

This time, "Glory of Love" hit the top spot just in the second week of the movie's release. The timing will be even greater than "Take My Breath Away" to the box office of "Top Gun."

"No, this is extremely good news. Based on my experience, this song will sit at the top position for two or three weeks, and it will stay in the top ten for a long time."

Ronald is very excited. Both movies are doing very well. It seems that the days of having two movies in the top five will continue.

Because he was going to attend the New York premiere of "Monsters in Chinatown", Ronald stayed at home in New York and began to break down the script of "Moonlight".

Combining several scenes in the dream, Ronald was still looking for any familiar actors. At the same time, he also called Coppola and stated that he wanted his nephew Cage to play the leading role.

"Peggy Sue Got Married" was still months away from being released, and Cage had many conflicts with leading actress Kathleen Turner during filming. Of course Coppola would be happy to have Cage star in such a big production. He would notify Cage and ask him to prepare the schedule to cooperate.

"There is good news about Evil Husband in the House. Cinema gave Evil Husband a score of A-", the publicity department manager of Touchstone Pictures, a subsidiary of Disney, reported the latest results to Ronald.

"I remember that the average audience rating at the premiere was B to B+. Why is the latest rating higher?" Ronald was happy but also puzzled.

"It could be that the towns that Cinema sampled were in the Midwest, and maybe audiences in small towns there liked the film more and rated it higher than audiences in big cities."

"Oh," Ronald remembered the movie "Footloose" from a few years ago, which was somewhat similar to the situation in "The Evil Husband".

They are all classic stories of bad guys and good guys, and the plots are relatively simple, so small-town teenagers who have not seen much entertainment can have no problem understanding the movie.

The phrase "Oklahoma moms and dads need to understand too" that the producers of "Top Gun", Don Simpson and Bruckheimer, often say is also aimed at a larger audience group, those hidden in Movie theater audiences in small towns across the Midwest and Deep South.

It seems that maybe they still like watching "a bad husband in the family".

Audiences in small towns may not understand those densely spoken words. But maybe this kind of slow-paced comedy that relies on plot to make things funny might just fit in with their aesthetic?

Thinking of Helen Slater's slightly dull and simple acting skills in the movie, maybe those small town youths prefer this kind of beauty with simple acting skills.

Speaking of which, the director who was "full of energy" was the director of "The Secret of Success" where Helen failed in her audition, Herbert Ross.

The movies he directed are actually quite old in terms of pace and techniques. The story of "Full of Energy" is also not in line with the aesthetics of young people in big cities, but it still received US$80 million in domestic box office.

The more Ronald thought about it, the more he was right. This might be a rule for box office success.

He took out a piece of paper and wrote down what he thought was the secret to box office success.

First, the story itself must be smooth and beautiful, without any particularly distracting parts. Advanced directing techniques and outstanding performances by actors are not necessary to be successful. Many viewers actually can't see it.

As long as the audience finds it enjoyable during those one and a half to two hours and can later recommend it to their relatives and friends, it will meet the requirements.

Second, the larger the audience you are facing, the better. If you are targeting groups such as teenagers who often go to the cinema to watch movies, you should shoot some content that they like. If you are facing a disappearing audience like The Sound of Music, you have to give them a reason to go back to the theater to watch it.

third……

Ronald thought about it and realized that there seemed to be no third party. Movies that can do these two things will generally have no big problems at the box office.

Oh, and it would be even better if the movie insert could also become a pop song. This is the third element.

Ronald took stock of the movies he had made, and it seemed that they all had a song that became the top song on the charts when it was released.

Nowadays, the cost of publicity and distribution to invite movie audiences back to the cinema is too high. Pop music is a good carrier, which can make people who listen to the songs want to go to the cinema to see how the movie is being shot.

In this era where television occupies the vast majority of adult entertainment time, if a movie wants to be a hit, letting the audience know what makes the movie good is as important as whether the movie itself is good, if not more important. Important words.

"Ring ring ring ring..."

The phone rang, and Ronald was still refining his summary, as if he hadn't heard the ringing. After four rings, the call was automatically transferred to the answering machine.

"Hello, this is Ronald's home. I'm not at home right now. If you have anything to contact me, please leave a message after the beep, or call my agent's phone number."

"Ronald, it's me, Eddie. Pick up the phone, the producer of 'Dirty Dancing' wants to talk to you about production issues."

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