Millennium director

The movie Wu Yuan showed Li Yang was a quite classic youth romance film.

It can even be said that it was the appearance of this movie that led to the explosion of the Chinese-language youth film market and triggered the youth film craze that lasted for seven or eight years.

Yes, it's the one from Nine Knives, "The Girl We Chased Together in Those Years".

There was no way, Wu Yuan thought about it a lot, and among so many youth romance films that had relatively good results, this one was the most suitable for Liu Yifei to film.

Yes, Director Wu is praising his little girlfriend again, and this time he is really praising her out of selfishness.

After all, his little girlfriend even gave it to him for the first time without reservation. As a man, Wu Yuan should treat his girlfriend better.

After much deliberation, he realized that the heroine in "My Girlhood" was an ordinary girl, which was obviously not compatible with Liu Yifei.

The early stage of the movie "A Little Thing About First Love" is not even ordinary. The heroine is completely an ugly duckling, and she will not turn into a white swan until the middle stage.

But Liu Yifei is so naturally beautiful that no matter how ugly she tries, she can never look ugly.

Wu Yuan can stand tall and say that his girlfriend may have been too vulgar and had some problems with her early dress aesthetics, but she was definitely not ugly and she really couldn't play "A Little Thing About First Love".

The remaining youth films such as "To Youth", "Left Ear", "Whose Youth Is Not Confused" and "My Deskmate", as well as the one she actually filmed, "So You're Still Here", and "Those Years" 》It’s far from it.

After much deliberation, Shen Jiayi, who is the crush of many boys in the class and has stunned the boys throughout their youth, is the most suitable person for Liu Yifei to play.

The original work of "Those Years", Nine Knives, was released online in 2005, and a physical book was released in Taiwan this year.

Immediately, Wu Yuan instructed Li Xiaoping to buy the film and television adaptation rights of this novel.

Not only "Those Years", Wu Yuan also asked Li Xiaoping to buy the film and television adaptation rights of Liu Cixin's novel and "Zhu Xian".

This is just the beginning.

The next two to three years will be the real peak period for copyright purchasing.

"Ghost Blows Out the Lamp", "Tomb Robbers Notes", "Step by Step", "To Youth", "The Wind", "A Thousand Bones of Flowers", "The Legend of Zhen Huan", "Nirvana in Fire" and other novels that will be adapted into TV series in the next few years, Wu Yuan They all plan to try their best to get the copyright first.

It’s not that he wants to adapt these novels into movies and TV series and make them himself.

The era of light and shadow has not yet made such great strides.

Mainly because as a person with memories of later generations, for Wu Yuan, the easiest thing to do to make money in the film and television industry is to buy the film and television adaptation rights of novels.

Let’s put it this way, it’s as easy as those who rushed to sign up for catchy websites in the 1990s.

Nowadays, the film and television adaptation rights of various novels are very cheap. You can buy the adaptation rights for as little as tens of thousands or as much as hundreds of thousands.

And once you buy it, you get ten years of copyright.

This is more expensive than a cabbage price, and since someone is buying it, the author is basically willing to sell it, and there is no such thing as waiting for a price.

Wu Yuan doesn't even need to film them himself. He just needs to be the first to buy the film and television adaptation rights of these novels. When a film and television company wants to film them, he can resell them at a higher price and make a fortune.

Although the profit may not be much, judging from the current market expansion rate, once the adaptation rights are resold, one or two million can be earned.

But there are too many. Later TV series are almost all adapted from novels, and original scripts only account for about two-tenths of the TV series broadcast every year.

Before the entry of Internet companies, Wu Yuan could buy at least the film and television adaptation rights of his thirty-fifty excellent online novels, and he could buy seven or eight novels every year.

In the age of light and shadow, you only need to pick out about ten of the best ones and shoot them yourself, and the rest can be resold at a higher price. How easy is it to make money?

Therefore, starting in 2006, Wu Yuan consciously paid attention to online literature platforms, mainly female channels. As soon as he discovered the original TV series that would impress future generations, he would immediately ask Li Xiaoping to buy the film and television adaptation rights.

Not just at home.

Over in Hollywood, the first part of "The Twilight Saga" was finally published, and became a sensation among teenage girls in North America and became a popular read.

The popularity is roughly equivalent to the popularity of "Dragon Clan" among Chinese boys.

But no one can imagine now that all five volumes of "The Twilight Saga" could actually sell 250 million copies worldwide.

That's a crazy score.

Taking advantage of the fact that the phenomenon of "Twilight" has just begun, Wu Yuan immediately asked John to discuss the purchase of film and television adaptation rights with the original author of "Twilight".

Authors in North America attach greater importance to film and television adaptation rights. After all, there are works such as "Harry Potter" and "Lord of the Rings" that are in front of them.

However, "Twilight" has become popular again, but the six Hollywood majors don't look at it at all. They think it is just a youth idol novel. If it is adapted into a movie, it is also a youth idol movie, and there is no market in Hollywood.

This idea is normal. Before the "Tiny Times" movie appeared, no production company in the Mainland had ever imagined that such a book for teenage girls could be adapted into a movie and sell hundreds of millions.

Some things are just fucking outrageous.

No company in Hollywood believes that "The Twilight Saga" has the significance and value to be adapted into a movie.

Therefore, Light Times is the only film and television company to find "Twilight" author Stephenie Meyer.

When only one company was willing to bid, Stephenie Meyer and John sold the film and television adaptation rights of the first film for US$2 million after grinding for a period of time.

And the second part, which will be released soon this year, John also packaged and bought it.

However, Stephenie Meyer is still very shrewd. Although she agreed to sign the clause that Light Times would have priority to purchase the sequel film and television adaptation rights, she also proposed supplementary clauses.

If the adaptation of "Twilight" is successful and the movie box office exceeds $100 million, she will receive 8% of the global box office as royalties.

Maybe she has seen J.K. Rowling suffer.

Rowling's agent sold the movie rights to "Harry Potter 1" very early, for only US$1 million. As for the income from theme parks and peripherals, it was all owned by Warner. Rowling barely made much money from the movie. .

Stephenie Meyer is of course confident in her work, so she doesn’t want to repeat Rowling’s mistake of asking for a share of the global box office.

Of course, John couldn't agree easily. The two negotiated many times and argued for a long time. Finally, after asking Wu Yuan for instructions, they reached an agreement of 5% of the box office split.

In John's opinion, Stephenie Meyer may not be able to get this money.

Anyway, as a professional Hollywood producer, he is also not optimistic about movies adapted from novels about youth idols.

However, Wu Yuan knew what he was doing and knew that he would definitely give the money.

But who said the "Twilight" series is really too profitable?

If you find a few young and beautiful idol actors and spend 30 to 40 million U.S. dollars to make a movie, you can win a global box office of 390 million U.S. dollars, and it doesn't matter if you give points to the original author.

In this regard, Wu Yuan is more generous than the capitalists in Hollywood. After all, he is a director first, and then the boss of a film company.

After John won the copyright of "Twilight", Wu Yuan was not in a hurry to film it.

"Fake Marriage" has been released in North America, with a box office of 168 million US dollars. It is indeed much less than the "Hangover" series, but it is still a huge profit.

Wu Yuan is now known as the "Golden Touch" in the circle of Hollywood production companies.

Many gold medal producers are impressed by his investment vision. From its establishment to the present, Light Times has made three movies, all of which were box office dark horses with small costs in exchange for high box office. They made a lot of dollars with a small profit.

Wu Yuan also has to pay attention to his eating habits. He will finish the movie "Weakness" for the time being, and then think about "Twilight".

After all, The Chosen Actress Kristen Stewart is only 16 years old this year

Let’s get back to the point.

After getting the script of "Those Years", Li Yang read it on the spot.

Movie scripts still seem to be much faster than TV drama scripts, plus the director himself has the ability to read scripts quickly.

After a while, Li Yang roughly finished reading the script of "Those Years".

"Great script!" He said with excitement: "The script really shows the youth of high school, and the story is in line with the high school era that most people have experienced."

"The boys in the class all admire the school goddess. In order to pursue the goddess, they work hard, use their own unique tricks and thrilling talents, and they also behave in ugly ways."

"The lines are also well written."

"This sentence: The cruelest part of growing up is that girls are always more mature than boys of the same age. It's so right!"

"Director Wu, did you write this script?"

"Those Years" has not yet been published in the Mainland, so of course it has no reputation.

Wu Yuan shook his head and explained: "This script is adapted from a youth novel written by a novelist in Taiwan. Most of the lines are original sentences from the novel."

"Director Li, if this movie is handed over to you, are you confident that it will be a success?"

In Wu Yuan's view, Li Yang's "Prosperity" is still okay. This kind of youth romance film is about knowing everything. If he can make one, then it will not be difficult to make another one.

The prerequisite is that the parties involved must have confidence.

Now that the opportunity has been placed in front of him, it depends on whether he can be brave enough to seize it.

Li Yang tightened his grip on the script and took a deep breath.

"I can shoot!"

"Okay!" Wu Yuan smiled brightly and stuffed the script into his arms.

"The project can be started immediately, and we strive to start production around November and complete it before March."

"It may be difficult to shoot summer scenes in winter. The filming location can be in the south, and you can find a seaside city in Guangdong or Fujian Province to shoot."

"I think Xiamen is good."

This kind of low-cost youth film really doesn't cost a lot of money. Judging from the current industry prices, this film can be made for less than 10 million. Any more would be money laundering.

In 2011, when Nine Knives took the photo, it only cost NT$50 million, equivalent to 12 million RMB.

"By the way, there is no need to choose the heroine of this movie."

Wu Yuan looked at Li Yang with a smile on his lips, and said in a calm but unquestionable tone: "I prefer Liu Yifei to play the role of Shen Jiayi."

"For other roles, you just have to decide on the actors."

As the producer + producer, Wu Yuan has the right to directly decide who will play the heroine, and Li Yang will not even think of refuting the rejection.

"Okay, Director Wu."

"I understand, Director Wu!"