Millennium director

He said that he would celebrate the New Year first, but in fact, after taking a few days off with Liu Yifei who had returned to China, Wu Yuan continued to be busy preparing for "Ready Player One".

The original "Ready Player One" took three years from the beginning of preparation to the filming and release.

Although part of the reason was that it was not urgent, considering that the current technology was not as good as later, Wu Yuan actually had to go through a long preparation period for "Ready Player One" this time.

Not to mention anything else, the special effects alone would definitely require a three-year production cycle.

Of course, most of this would be continued after the filming was completed, so Wu Yuan could still control the actual completion of the filming before October 2014.

In this way, he would have another year to shoot "Ride the Wind" and produce the post-production of "Ride the Wind".

"Ride the Wind" is a movie that does not require any computer special effects. It can be completed from the start of filming to the post-production and then to the release within one year, but the time is still very tight.

So Wu Yuan became busy for the first time in a long time, and he had to sort out all the complicated things about "Ready Player One" in a very short time.

Almost every day he held various meetings with the creative team and organized the crew to set up scenes in Shanghai and Chongqing.

For example, in addition to the selected outdoor locations in Chongqing, the scenery of the stacked building area must be built, using a large amount of steel as the supporting structure, and stacking more than 20 RVs in a completely random way to form 5-6 "semi-finished products" about four or five stories high.

Such "semi-finished products" are actually the appearance of the slums where the protagonists live in the movie.

Cyberpunk-style slums must be stacked high and compact, similar to the "pig cage city" that appeared in early Hong Kong movies, but a technological version.

Of course, the reason why it is called a semi-finished product is that these "semi-finished products" provide enough real elements for the shooting of close-up scenes and real-life interactions. Digital Domain has expanded the scope of the stacked building area to hundreds and thousands, and through further optimization, it looks shaky.

At that time, what will be shown in the movie is hundreds and thousands of such "pig cage buildings", and even repeated floors will be virtualized on them to create a cyberpunk flavor.

This kind of special effects has to be produced in the preparation period before the filming starts, and all of this needs to be confirmed by Wu Yuan.

This time, the special effects production of "Ready Player One" will not only involve the special effects company of Light and Shadow Times, but also Industrial Light and Magic and Digital Domain in the United States, and the manpower required is very large.

The budget for special effects alone exceeds 250 million yuan.

The total budget of this movie is as high as 420 million yuan. It can be said that it will not make money unless the box office reaches 1.2 billion.

Of course, although the domestic box office market has reached the level of 1.2 billion per film, Wu Yuan is targeting the entire Asian market this time, not just thinking about making a profit.

But I have to admit that from this point, it can also be seen how great the pressure of making a return on investment is for making science fiction films.

Other mainland films that have no Asian market to speak of, how can they attract so much investment to make such a science fiction blockbuster?

Even if they pay for it themselves, I am afraid that few companies dare to gamble.

With so much money, wouldn't it be better to make seven or eight comedies?

As long as one of them is a hit, the investment will be recovered. Isn't this much less pressure?

In his previous life, Wu Yuan was very "pretentious", thinking that the domestic film market was ruined by those producers who loved to make low-cost comedies and romances. He had no high-level pursuits and, like most netizens, thought that movies like "The Wandering Earth" should appear more often.

But in this life, he has reached a high level and can understand why the Chinese-language film market has been dominated by comedies and romances for nearly a decade.

Before 2016, the mainland film market could not support science fiction blockbusters. This is an objective fact and there is nothing we can do about it.

When the market matures, science fiction blockbusters like "The Wandering Earth" will naturally appear.

What kind of market will naturally produce what kind of movies.

Just like the European film market will never have science fiction blockbusters.

Do they not want to shoot?

There is no such condition!

Fortunately, China has a huge population base of 1.4 billion, and generations of excellent commercial film directors have emerged, which has cultivated the Chinese film market.

Without these excellent comedies and romances to bring audiences into the cinema, the fruit of "The Wandering Earth" would not have been produced.

There is no need to criticize and blame those directors who make comedies and romances just because "The Wandering Earth" is excellent. Their contributions are equally important.

Just because science fiction blockbusters are the pinnacle of commercial films, we cannot despise and look down on other commercial films.

Of course, there is nothing to say about directors who make bad films. Good scolding, scold more!

And Wu Yuan chose to make this "Ready Player One" in order to keep his original intention and to promote the maturity of the Chinese film market.

This is what he has been doing all along.

The Light and Shadow Times Cinema Line has added more than 200 cinemas to China.

The movies he invested in accelerated the development of the Chinese film industry by three to five years.

The science fiction movies he shot also let the world see the pinnacle of Chinese commercial films.

To date, "Gravity" is still the Chinese-language movie with the highest cumulative playback volume on major video platforms!

Now, he is going to climb a higher mountain.

"We made this "Ready Player One" not only for Chinese audiences, but for audiences across Asia, mainly for audiences in Japan, South Korea, Southeast Asia and Greater China."

"So in the movie, we need to be more international. Although the story takes place in the future Chinese world, there are no borders in the virtual world of "Oasis."

"So in the construction of the "Oasis" world, we have to add some Japanese and Korean buildings, and the virtual characters we meet on the road should also have Japanese and Korean styles."

"For example, users who dress like ninjas, users with exaggerated Korean styles, and buildings with Southeast Asian styles, etc."

"As for the European Don’t worry too much about the American-style characters and buildings, because our movie won’t be shown in Europe and America anyway. ”

“Just assume that only Asian countries exist in the future world of the story.”

“Have you seen Hollywood’s future science fiction movies and various Japanese comics?”

“The worldviews of their works are either completely European and American, or completely Japanese, as if the whole universe speaks English or Chinese.”

“And this time, our “Ready Player One” is a pure Asian world where everyone speaks Chinese!”

“As the birthplace of Asian culture and the de facto suzerain, this is reasonable, right?”

At an internal meeting, Wu Yuan said confidently. (End of this chapter)