Chapter 404 Chen Kaige Is About to Avenge His Shame

The screening of "Along with the Gods" in Venice was very good.

Although this film was not shortlisted for the main competition unit, it was successfully listed in the film review section of some program books the next day after the screening ended.

Perhaps it was because of Zhang Guorong's fame in Europe that most film critics gave this film a decent evaluation.

Of course, the score was given from the perspective of commercial films, not compared with the art films in the main competition unit.

Considering that he was an actor who turned director, even if he turned to commercial film director, as a non-professional contestant, it was already very good to hand in such an answer sheet.

Also because of the good reviews given by some program books, "Along with the Gods", which was continuously screened in small batches in various cinemas on Lido Island in the next week, was also quite popular, with more than half of the seats occupied in each show.

The head of the sales department of the Light and Shadow Times group has also received invitations from some Asian and European film companies to negotiate the buyout of the distribution rights of this film.

Just like China Film Group purchases a batch of films from the three major European countries every year, film producers from other Asian countries also come to buy a lot of Chinese films every year.

This year, "Along with the Gods" is obviously a popular model.

This kind of commercial film, which is based on the cultural foundation familiar to all Asian countries, combines fashionable and popular packaging and creativity, gorgeous special effects and the tear-jerking plot of family affection that Korea is good at, and fully integrates traditional culture with young tastes, is still quite popular in Asian countries at least.

South Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Brunei, Thailand and other small East Asian countries have reached a distribution rights purchase contract with Light and Shadow Times the fastest.

European countries also quickly followed suit.

The unit price of each country is not expensive. On average, a country only spent tens of thousands of dollars to get the domestic distribution rights of this film.

After three days of screening, the sales added up to almost 2 million US dollars.

When Wu Yuan heard this number, he couldn't help but sigh that the era of making a lot of money by selling copyrights is really gone forever.

It's not that the copyright is hard to sell, but this price is really worthless for the current mainland movies.

In the past, if an art film could earn two million US dollars in copyright fees overseas, it would have made a lot of money.

After all, the cost of shooting may not even be 2 million RMB, so rounding it up is ten times the profit.

When Wu Yuan's "The Night the Comet Came" sold for 2.55 million US dollars, he felt that he had made a lot of money. He had never seen so much money in his two lives.

But now "Along with the Gods" has sold for 2 million US dollars, which is less than one-tenth of the cost of the film, let alone making money.

There is no way. Now that a large amount of hot money has poured into the mainland film industry, the cost of making movies has increased significantly. Even the most ordinary art films, which used to cost tens of millions to make, now generally cost two or three million.

It is basically impossible to make a movie with 300,000 yuan like Wu Yuan did back then.

Times have changed!

Although "Along with the Gods" is known as a fantasy and magic blockbuster, in fact, the special effects shots of this movie are not many, only one-tenth of "Gravity", and the main focus is still an emotional drama.

Even so, the budget of this movie is as high as 100 million, and it cost 84 million to complete the actual production. If the subsequent publicity and distribution costs are added, the cost is definitely over 100 million.

In the face of this 100 million cost, the overseas copyright sales of 2 million US dollars can really only be regarded as a drop in the bucket.

Even if there is more than a week of screening, the film is estimated to only sell for 4 to 5 million US dollars in the end, barely recovering one-third of the production cost.

Unless it wins the heavyweight Golden Lion Award like "Li Wen" and "Still Life", it is impossible to sell tens of millions of dollars.

Not only "Along with the Gods", "Painted Skin 2" was also screened in Venice on the second day of the Venice screening of "Along with the Gods".

Chen Kaige's fame in Europe is no less than that of Zhang Guorong, and the IP pioneer of "Painted Skin" was shot by Wu Yuan.

The copyright of Painted Skin 1 was sold in Europe, and it was shown in all major European countries.

European audiences are quite interested in this magical film from the mysterious East.

Just as Chinese people are full of mystery about Greek mythology and Nordic mythology, Europeans are also quite curious about Chinese mythology.

After all, for European audiences, the legends of Chinese gods and fairies are too fresh.

Most of the film companies that bought the overseas distribution rights of Painted Skin 1 have recovered their investment, and even made a small profit.

According to statistics, the total box office of Painted Skin 1 in Europe is about 10 million US dollars, and the distribution rights buyout only received 3 to 4 million US dollars.

With the previous profitable work, the European film companies that came to watch Painted Skin 2 in Venice naturally became eager to move.

Wu Yuan and Liu Yifei also attended the premiere that day.

Unlike Along with the Gods, Wu Yuan had seen the finished film of Painted Skin 2 in advance.

There was no way. Chen Kaige had a criminal record. No matter how confident Wu Yuan was in him, he still felt a little nervous.

When the film was just finished and before any post-production, Wu Yuan had already watched the footage shot by Chen Kaige.

Then, after the post-production was completed and Chen Kaige personally edited it, he watched it again.

Fortunately, although the whole film still inevitably carries a strong "Chen Kaige-style film aesthetics", at least this time Director Kaige restrained himself and did not over-express his desire to express himself.

The overall tone of the whole film is still the tone of a commercial film, and the plot story also follows the script.

It is even blunt to say that the finished film shot by Chen Kaige is more advanced than "Painted Skin 1" shot by Wu Yuan in terms of picture aesthetics.

The beautiful scenery of the desert with solitary smoke, the long river with the setting sun, the picturesque scenery of the Gobi and the Jiangnan water town, under Chen Kaige's lens, is so beautiful!

Zeng Li, the school beauty of the Central Academy of Drama, and Zhou Xun, the unique vixen, are even more beautiful under Chen Kaige's lens.

Chen Kaige, who can shoot Zhang Rongrong's Yang Guifei so stunningly, comes to shoot real beauties, which is so strong!

The script has a good story, beautiful natural scenery, excellent actors, and high-quality special effects. The finished film of "Painted Skin 2" is undoubtedly excellent and has the potential to be a big hit!

Facts have proved that as long as there is a good script and Chen Kaige does not change the script himself, he can indeed make a very good movie.

The premise is that someone has to suppress him and prevent him from letting himself go.

Wu Yuan has a hunch that this time "Painted Skin 2" will definitely allow Director Kaige to redeem himself in China! (End of this chapter)