Made in Hollywood

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Without any accident, Duke walked out of the Warner Building in a hopeless and full of fighting spirit. Although he hit a wall one after another throughout the day, he could not stop him from pursuing that tiny opportunity.

This is a circle that pays attention to connections, qualifications and successful experience. Duke's resume in this area is almost zero. If there is a movie with a box office of millions or even 100,000 dollars, he will enjoy it in the film company. Treatment will certainly be very different.

Unfortunately, the hardest part of entering this circle is the first step. For Hollywood, opportunity is often more important than talent.

Opportunities are created and fought hard. If you don't fight, chances will never come.

For the next ten days, Duke was like an inexhaustible Spartan, going in and out of various studios in the Greater Los Angeles area, Paramount, Disney, MGM, Universal, Sony These first-tier companies in Colombia have left his footprints; second-tier companies such as New Line, Carlock, and the newly emerging Miramax office in Los Angeles have also witnessed his busy figure.

During this short and long period of time, Duke sent out a copy of the script, and received numerous rejections. He hit his head in Hollywood with blood, but he did not flinch!

After he went to all the larger film companies, he temporarily suspended his search for opportunities with film companies, and the remaining small and small film studios did not need to go. They themselves did not have the strength to invest in this level of film, and they did not have financing. A channel of tens of millions of dollars will not make such a relatively high-investment film at all.

Just when everyone marveled at James Cameron's "Terminator 2" in July, Duke began to find ways to get to those famous producers, including Jerry Bruckheimer, Katherine Kennedy, Jon Landau, Annie Spielberg and others have all been harassed by him, and the answer is still refusal.

Not all companies and producers are not optimistic about the script. Paramount and Jerry Bruckheimer thought it was interesting and interested, but shook their heads at Duke's director request.

Even if Duke offered to sell them the script for a token dollar in exchange for the chance to direct, the answer would still be no.

They are neither friends nor relatives with Duke. The investment of tens of millions of dollars and their too young qualifications are unsolvable flaws. Even if Duke speaks out, these people will not put such a huge amount of money down. On a director who had no successful directing experience.

In addition to producers and production companies, Duke still has a way to seek investment from banks or foundations. Although there are not as many film investment funds in Hollywood in this era, there are still a few.

In Malibu, Duke finally met a film fund manager.

"Have made two experimental films, and graduated from CalArts' film and video major with all A grades, which can't explain any problems..."

This is one of Duke's few qualifications that he can get his hands on, and obviously he can't play the AUG film fund.

Although big Hollywood companies often resort to falsifying accounts and concealing box office reports to defraud these investors of their funds, because they have such strength, Duke obviously does not have the conditions to extract large sums of money from these vampires.

When nearly ten days passed in July, Duke, who was running into a wall, had to prepare to take the road that was reserved at the earliest, and the road that was slightly more likely, to find his mother's best friend, who was famous in Hollywood and even the world. The eminent George Lucas.

Duke really wants to use his ability to win opportunities, but he is not someone who does not know how to work around, using all favorable conditions to create opportunities for success, which is not a shameful thing.

Of course, he took this as a final filing.

The previous company or producer will not give him too long. Even if Duke makes some preparations, he has no room to perform. It is different to see George Lucas. Duke is not ready to go to Lucasfilm, but It's straight to Lucas' estate in the suburbs of San Francisco.

Before going, in addition to the script, Duke also planned to shoot a video.

This is a movie where the main plot will be in the car, and Duke's shooting is naturally related to the car.

He retrieved his 16mm camera from the storage room, swiped his credit card to buy film, and used the weekly mowing lawn workers to drive the empty Santa Monica Ocean Drive a few times. , he himself shot several times in the co-pilot and outside the car, and it took half a day to basically get it.

Just as Duke edited the video, silenced it, added a heavy metal soundtrack, and turned it into a videotape, an informal meeting about his script was quietly unfolding in Warner Bros. CEO's office.

"Kevin, I think the script of "Life and Death" has a certain operability."

The speaker was Jeff Robinoff, whom Duke had met, and he suggested to CEO Kevin Tesuhara, who was sitting in a large office chair, "If you can shoot the thrills reflected in the script, And the quality of life racing against time..."

"Jeff..." Kevin Tesuhara raised his hand to stop Jeff Robinoff's words, and looked at his assistant next to him, "Robert, what's your opinion?"

Robert Solomon, who has the right to speak with a heavyweight, rested his arm on the armrest of the chair and rested his chin in his palm. After thinking for a while, he slowly said, "There is a situation, you can refer to it, Duke Rosenberg used to He is a signed artist of CAA, and he was just given up by CAA this year. You know the way of doing things from CAA, but if he has potential, they will never give up on him."

"And..." He moved his hand away and nodded at the script on the desk, "It's never a wise idea to invest tens of millions of dollars in the work of someone who has no qualifications!"

Speaking of this, he specially emphasized, "Don't forget, he also asked for the director's position! A 21-year-old who has never made any official films, hehe..."

As executive vice president, Robert Solomon's meaning is very clear, and his words are heavier than Jeff Robinoff, and Jeff Robinoff does not mean to insist strongly. After all, considering the actual operation, The risk is indeed a bit big.

"That's it."

CEO Kevin Tesuhara considered for a few minutes, "This script is temporarily put on hold and is included in the script library."

Duke, who had just entered the Lucas Manor, did not know that an opportunity passed him by during the discussions among several senior executives of Warner Bros.

Parking the car, Duke greeted the people at Lucas Manor familiarly. Although the number of visits here has decreased in recent years, he was a frequent visitor here before entering college.

Perhaps it was because of Lucas's sons and daughters going on a trip. The manor seemed unusually quiet. Duke walked around the fountain and walked into the spacious living room. There was no one here, only George Lucas, sitting on a low-backed chair, was there. waiting for him.

"Uncle George..."

After greeting him politely, Duke put the bag on the small table in front of him, and when he sat in the chair, George Lucas looked at him with interest, "Why not call George."

He smiled slightly, but Duke didn't answer. In the past, it was possible to sell a small one, but of course it can't be done now.

"Just like before, just call me George."

The two families have been friends for more than 20 years. After the servant brought the black tea, George Lucas was not polite and directly extended his hand, "What about the script you said on the phone?"

"here."

Opening the bag, Duke handed over the script with less than 200 pages. When he called yesterday, he mentioned the script, "In the past month or so, I have been to many Hollywood companies."

"I've heard from the CAA folks,"

Turning over the script, George Lucas said while watching, "The incompetent son of Leah Rosenberg of the Santa Fia ad agency, naively wants to be a director."

Duke frowned and quickly returned to normal.

After the two of them said a few words, George Lucas kept his mouth shut and devoted his energy to the script. Duke has met a lot of people this month, and it was the first time someone read it so seriously in front of him. The script, and this person is a person close to his family, this has to be said to be a kind of irony.

At the same time, Duke, who has been lingering on the edge of this circle, has seen the incomparably realistic side of Hollywood. Without qualifications, contacts and achievements, it is a weed that no one pays attention to.

Hollywood would rather invest heavily in bad movies of well-known figures than take a second look at newcomers.

After nearly an hour, George Lucas put down the script. He took a sip of the black tea that had long been cold, and asked Duke, "Is there anything else?"

"Have!"

Taking the elaborate videotape out of his handbag, Duke walked over to the TV cabinet, turned on the TV and the VCR, and tucked the videotape in. After a brief snowflake, a clip without much post-processing, accompanied by a drum beat The soundtrack appeared on the TV screen.

This video is not complicated, it always switches between the front wheel of a car and the speedometer, but the spinning wheel and the pointer hovering above 50 are obviously carefully edited, and the length of each short shot is absolutely no more than In one second, frequent and smooth switching can easily trigger a sense of tension in people's minds.

Although the picture is a bit monotonous, George Lucas watched it very seriously. He naturally thought of the setting in the film that the bomb would explode below 50 miles, and connected these with the image...

"Duke, come and sit."

George Lucas motioned Duke to turn off the TV, and then pointed to the chair opposite, "Dazzling motion shots, sharp editing style, well done."

"Uncle George..."

"George." Lucas corrected.

"Okay, George."

When Duke sat down, George Lucas completely changed his business attitude, "The script is not very good, at best it is a middle-level commercial script. In Hollywood, a good idea can be made into a bad movie, and a bad movie. An idea can also be made into a good movie, and the role of the director is extremely important. If the script is handed over to an experienced director, there is a half chance that it will be profitable.”

Hearing these words, Duke showed a helpless smile, and the meaning of George Lucas was very obvious.

"I have seen your estimated production cost. Even if the special effects of the film are all handed over to Industrial Light and Magic, the cost cannot be reduced to less than ten million US dollars."

In an instant, Lucas turned from a businessman to an elder again, "Involving such a large amount of investment, even Lucasfilm has to be cautious. Duke, you are still young, exercise for a few more years, in the future There's definitely a chance."

Afterwards, George Lucas stopped talking about the movie-related content, turned the topic to Duke's mother, and talked about some of the things the two started when they were young, and did not let Duke leave until after dinner.

Not long after the black Chevrolet van disappeared at the entrance of the manor, the phone in the living room suddenly rang.

"George, it's me."

The voice in the receiver was clearly Leah Rosenberg, "Have you seen Duke?"

"Yes."

"I have something about Duke I want to talk to you about. Are you coming to Los Angeles or am I going to San Francisco?"

"I'll go."