Exploiting Hollywood 1980

"The score for EMA is out, it's the highest A+, which is unique among action movies. Congratulations!"

The day after the premiere, Leonard Goldberg, the president of 20th Century Fox, called personally to congratulate him. ema has always been a barometer of the film's box office. There are basically no mistakes in predicting the domestic box office of a film. Major film studios are now paying more and more attention to this evaluation method through random surveys of on-site audiences.

Many film companies also want to use this method to evaluate movies themselves, but internal researchers are always influenced by different forces within the company. In the end, everyone still feels that the most objective way can be achieved by rating by a neutral EMA.

Since the establishment of this research company, only ten movies have received an A+ rating in the past five years. No action-suspense movie has ever received such a high score before. For 20th Century Fox, this rating is like being hit by a Powerball. Same as lottery.

All marketing actions can only attract the first batch of viewers into the cinema. After that, the quality of the movie has been spread by many viewers. After the first week, the stamina of the movie depends entirely on the audience's word-of-mouth.

Because later audiences may no longer believe the propaganda in the media. They will ask their friends who have watched it how the movie was.

In essence, ema is to score the audience's reputation. And because they randomly sampled theaters in ten different regions across the country, the authenticity of the word-of-mouth is very high.

Generally speaking, a movie that gets an A- can basically satisfy the multiplication effect of the chain reaction. In other words, if ten viewers go to see a movie, their reputation can influence more than ten new viewers to also go see the movie. In comparison, for action movies, horror movies and other movies without profound connotations, the ratings received by ema will be slightly lower than the real reputation.

This may be because the audience is embarrassed to say that they like this kind of thrilling movie and tends to keep the score low. For movies adapted from famous books or Broadway plays, people will want to appear to be very cultured and will tend to overestimate the score.

"Die Hard" is an action movie that received the highest rating of A+ with an average of less than two movies a year. Now everyone knows that the movies produced by Ronald are as good at selling as those directed by him. Movie.

"Honestly, I don't understand why the audience likes you so much? You seem to have a magical power. No action movie has ever gotten an A+ score before." Goldberg was very emotional. This rare ability is so good. Wu would like to call it "talent", "Guan Gu", or "luck".

Because in addition to those indicators that can be quantified, there are always some people who have mastered something that is difficult to express in words.

They always see advantages that others can't see. They produce films that have been directed by directors, and they always break the conventions of genre films and achieve results beyond expectations.

Ronald is now the one being involved, and because of this, 20th Century Fox must step up its cooperation with him.

"This is indeed beyond some of my expectations, Mr. Goldberg. Sometimes, we don't know why some movies are so good. Bruce (Willis)'s professionalism, Aaron (Rickman) )’s drama skills, action scene design, photography director De Bont’s skills, and the screenwriter’s rather imaginative way of integrating elements of multiple genre films into one, these may all be the reasons for its success.”

In front of the president of Twentieth Century Fox, Ronald listed all the meritorious officials and gave credit to most of the creative staff. Only the blind director John McTiernan, who was often out of control during filming, was not listed by him. factors for success.

"Very good, you can give me the list of heroes, and I will invite them all to the celebration party. If you have any other requests for the movie, just ask..." Goldberg was in a happy mood. This movie He will create history and add great credit to the years he has been in charge of the film industry.

"I think there should be more theaters for Die Hard. Also, can film critics increase their public relations efforts? Some reviews are unfair to Bruce Willis."

"The copy has been sent to the technical field for urgent printing. As for the film critics, Ronald, you don't have to worry about them too much. We can't force them to say anything. We can't do anything about the protection of the First Amendment. We can influence the film reviews People, like Ebert in Chicago, will come up with some movie reviews that will satisfy you.”

After hanging up the phone, Ronald picked up the freshly released film reviews from the Los Angeles and New York media that Richard personally sent early in the morning, and slowly began to read them.

Now Richard has several assistant brokers who specialize in serving Ronald as a client. The movie review sent this time had already been cut and pasted with scissors and glue, divided into several comments, and neatly arranged for Ronald to watch, which saved a lot of time.

For example, regarding the overall look and feel of the movie, film critics from all over the world generally praised it. They say Die Hard "logically" creates a sense of scale in the film, making the experience of watching it seem more important than its story.

The scene where terrorists occupied the building was also praised as a "textbook shot", and De Bont's cinematography was highly recognized. Degovia's set design was also praised as "clever", allowing people to get into the emotions of the story at a glance.

Others praised the stunts and special effects, especially the final scene where the villain played by Alan Rickman fell from a skyscraper and Bruce Willis was entangled in a fire hose and escaped from the explosion. They were both phenomenal.

As for Bruce Willis' performance, critics' opinions are very divided. By all accounts, Willis's role was his breakout role, transforming him from a shaky TV star to a movie star.

Some people believe that John McClain's character is a changed version of the male protagonist in the TV series Blue Moonlight, with less comedy and more male hormones. Some thought it was a waste that he didn't fully express his comedic talents.

But there were also those who praised Willis's acting, although some were snarky and said that the closer Bruce Willis came to his own working-class background, his performance improved dramatically. However, some people say that he has achieved a performance that other action stars cannot do, that is, he is a flesh-and-blood detective who talks like an NYPD detective.

Before Bruce Willis, whether it was Stallone or Schwarzenegger, or anyone else, the most important thing was to have muscles that exploded on the screen and decent boxing skills.

But these people's performances all have more or less problems. Stallone's face is disabled, half of his face is expressionless, Schwarzenegger's English is not very good, and his delivery speed is very slow, which all limits the role.

After all, Bruce Willis has a background in TV dramas. When he plays a police detective, his lines and temperament are both passable, making people feel that he is really an NYPD. The so-called short version in terms of muscles and boxing skills is also cleverly alleviated by the fact that in this movie he struggles with luck, elevators, buildings, and other unfavorable factors that are not just villains. For example, he took off his socks at the beginning because he listened to the passengers on the plane, and injured his foot during the fight. The audience was also worried about him.

On the other hand, most of the fights in "Die Hard" involve the use of firearms, which can also hide Willis's weakness of not being good at shooting hand-to-hand combat scenes to the greatest extent.

In contrast to Bruce Willis, Alan Rickman's performance was generally praised. Some say he gave the film's best performance, profoundly portraying a "perfect venomous snake."

Others have compared him to Laurence Olivier's performance in the classic Shakespeare-changing film "Richard III," delivering a chillingly sneering, vicious performance.

Roger Ebert was also particularly fond of Rickman, saying he was the best villain Hollywood had seen in ten years. Abbott also defended Bonnie Bedelia, who played John McClain's wife, and felt that her performance was also very realistic and worthy of more time. The director should reduce some of the violent scenes and give the wife, who works for Japanese people and does not take her husband's surname, more room to develop.

Ebert generally agreed with the film, but he didn't like the deliberate shaping of the genre. He specifically focused on the stupidity of the police captain, who was "intentionally useless and stupid" by the screenwriter, to create unnecessary obstacles for the protagonist, wasting screen time and weakening the plot.

Ronald almost laughed out loud when he saw this. This is a damn genre movie, an action movie. Are you still evaluating it according to the requirements of a big-budget adaptation of a famous novel? I’m not filming Shakespeare, so does the villain have to be profound?

Although Ebert criticized the movie, he still recommended it to viewers overall. However, some of the few film critics rejected "Die Hard" as a whole and criticized it fiercely.

Especially for the Chicago Tribune, because Sisko was on annual leave, Cole, a film critic who was filling in for him, began to make wild remarks, attacking "Die Hard" for being too violent.

"Die Hard presents a glorification of violence, which not only exacerbates the proliferation of violence on the screen, but is also uncreative. His director wanted to perfect the action movie's fights through a humorous and sad design. type.

We can definitely see that the director borrowed from previous classic movies "Poseidon", "Alien", or "RoboCop", but in doing so he lacked his own personality and made the whole movie full of unnecessary unnecessary elements. Violence……"

"America is full of unnecessary film critics..." Ronald drew a big cross next to the substitute film critic's name to express his anger.

"This is an R-rated movie. If it doesn't make it more violent, who will watch it? It's nonsense." Ronald criticized while drawing, "And the fighting with humor, what does it have to do with RoboCop and Alien? Yes. Borrowing from it, that’s also borrowing from ja’s action comedy. This bunch of unlearned and unskilled film critics.”

Next, let’s see if Fox’s public relations can get Sisko and Albert to say something nice in next week’s TV movie review program to offset the impact. The Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times are still very influential in the Midwest and South. The audiences there still trust the film reviews in these newspapers and the film review program of the two on PBS.

In particular, these two people write their own scripts, so they can continue to broadcast film reviews on the TV station. Compared with other programs, it is no fun without writers, and the audience's ratings of their weekly film reviews are also rising.

…

"I like this movie very much. I give him a thumbs up recommendation." Albert was really well publicized. He extended a thumbs up and said to the audience, "Of course this is an R-rated movie. If you have children, , I suggest you try Cocktail instead, a movie that explores the life choices of college students while working, and is worthy of both father and child. What do you think, Gene?"

At the end of the second week, Albert finally started commenting on last week's new film on TV.

"I'm hesitating, should I recommend it to him or not?" Sisko just returned from vacation and was caught on TV. "I still decided not to recommend it. For action movie lovers, especially those like Stallone. For audiences who don't like action movies, this is a good movie that definitely meets their expectations.

But if it is a general audience, I think what I said above is all the advantages of the movie, it is a classic, 100%, action movie. Nothing else. "

"This is an action movie, what else do you want?" Ronald adjusted his coat. Sisko was very cunning and said he didn't recommend it, but he seemed to be recommending it. This not only maintains the dignity of the newspaper, but also avoids enmity with Fox.

Ronald turned off the TV and went out to get into Bud's car. Today was the premiere of "Cocktail" starring Tom Cruise. In return, Ronald also brought some people to support Cruise.

"Lisa..." Ronald saw the heroine Yin Lisabeth Su at a glance. She was wearing something similar to the rich girl in the movie today, with a light blue shirt and blond messy hair.

"Hi, Ronald." Su was still very excited when she saw Ronald. On the set, she almost got caught in the tail of a helicopter, but Ronald saved her.

"How do you feel about the movie with Tom being released?" Ronald asked her.

"It's like a dream. I'm probably the American girl's favorite girl right now." Elizabeth Su laughed. Who doesn't want to fall in love with Tom Cruise? Even if he's just a bartender.

"Tom, Mimi..." Soon Tom Cruise and his wife also saw Ronald and came over to hug him and say hello.

"Congratulations. When will your new Vietnam War movie start shooting?"

"It starts next month. There are no nasty Writers Guild pickets over there in the Philippines. Oliver (Stone) has applied for an exemption." Tom Cruise talked about the movie very enthusiastically and pulled Ronald to talk. few minutes.

He didn't listen to Ronald's seemingly ridiculous suggestion to play the fool in "Rain Man". Now that he has seen some clips, he already regrets it. At that time, if Ronald was combined with pressure, there was a complete chance of getting the role and squeezing Dustin Hoffman away.

It's a pity that Ovitz said at that time that this was an opportunity to work with the actor and learn...

"We have to take photos with the fans." Mimi Rogers came over with a crooked mouth and pulled her husband away. Through the efforts of their managers, the two finally appeared in public together. Tom Cruise smiled at Ronald, seemed to say I have to listen to my wife, turned around and left with Rogers.

"Getting back together?", Ronald asked Paula Wagner in the back.

"..." Paula Wagner curled her lips and said nothing. Mimi Rogers is not an easy celebrity wife to deal with. She is also well-informed. When she was an "audit" girl for Scientology, she worked with many popular celebrities.

Even Sonny Bono, whom Ronald worked with, was once her VIP client. She used a Scientology Dianetics meter like a multimeter to do a lot of alien exiles, leaving behind toxins "audit".

…

"The ema score of cocktail is b+? Hahaha, it seems that our Die Hard has no rival."

The second week of Die Hard and the opening weekend of Cocktail bumped into each other. Ronald and Joel Silver communicated on the phone the next day, waiting for the ratings of the biggest competitor to come out.

Generally speaking, an A+ movie is twice as long as a B+ movie and has about 20% more box office per theater than a B+ movie. It doesn't float too much up and down.

Hollywood's most accurate box office forecast is not a waste of its reputation.

With the box office guaranteed, Ronald relaxed and went to Palm Springs to enjoy himself.

"Mr. Ronald, your phone number." Ronald, who was sleeping soundly, was woken up by the waiter at the hot spring. This call had been made three times.

"Ronald, why don't you answer the phone? You have to come back soon."

Joel Silver looked anxious on the phone.

"What's wrong?"

"The box office was overtaken by Cocktail. Our box office in the second week was 8.5 million, and the box office in each venue was more than 6,000. Who knew that Cocktail had 8,000 in a single venue, and it broke our record in the first week. It ranked first."

"Huh? Didn't you say they only have B+?"

Ronald jumped up and woke up from the lazy state of vacation.

Driving hastily back to Los Angeles, Ronald ran over to Joel Silver. As soon as I walked in, I saw Silver arguing with an EMA manager.

"Your rating disrupted our marketing plan. This rating is definitely your mistake. I don't know whether you overestimated our movie or underestimated Cruise's movie. In short, it is a very serious mistake. I We will consider withdrawing our cooperation with you."

"Mr. Silver, you can't blame us. Since the establishment of our company, we have evaluated hundreds of movies every year. Except for this movie, none of them have made mistakes. The reason why this cocktail has an inaccurate box office is that it is special. caused by circumstances.”

"What special situation?" Ronald interjected, nodding to Joel Silver.

"Mr. Li, you are the director, and of course you know the status of Tom Cruise in the hearts of American girls."

"Yes, I'm asking you what the reason is..." Ronald was a little irritated. He wanted to know why the box office was overshadowed by a B+ cocktail, and what the manager said about Tom Cruise's status. Nonsense, most of this status is due to the consequences of him filming Top Gun.

"We have a guess... that is, Tom Cruise has too many fans, more than all other male stars. They go to the cinema not to watch movies, but to see him."

"Isn't it possible? Half of the audience comes to see Tom?" Ronald calculated the box office gap between normal B+ movies and this cocktail, "There were many male stars in the past? For example, Harrison Ford didn't This situation..."

"It's different, Tom Cruise is Superman, the only one among all Hollywood stars. This is what we added to the cocktail audience questionnaire, and there is an extra question in it, what if Tom Cruise didn't star? Will you still watch this movie? This is the result."

"Uh..." Ronald took the new questionnaire results, and the numbers above made him and Joel Silver look at each other. More than 40% of the audience, and more than 70% of the female audience, went to the cinema to watch Tom Cruise.