What Cheng Yu'an really wants is the preferential investment in the sequel of "Kung Fu Panda" and 30% of the copyright of the entire series.

It is no exaggeration to say that Cheng Yuan can rely on this for a lifetime.

Making millions of dollars in income every year is not a problem.

"Kung Fu Panda" has been in production for more than 4 months now, and the more I work on DreamWorks Animation, the more unsure I feel.

Coupled with the widespread news of DreamWorks selling out, the independent animation department has also been affected to some extent.

What they want most at this time is to quickly find money to complete "Daydreamer" and stabilize the company.

Other copyrights and sequels are not within their scope of consideration.

It's unclear whether there will be a sequel.

If Cheng Yuan wants it, just give it to him.

In fact, DreamWorks' plight has been foreshadowed since its founding.

The three founders were ambitious. From the beginning, DreamWorks was positioned to develop across the board, including movies, TV shows, animations, records, books, etc.

But taking too big a step will always lead to problems. In 2004, due to strategic issues, the animation department had to be split off independently, and in 2005, it sold to Viacom.

After the animation department became independent, it was led by Katzenberg, one of the three founders.

Katzenberg is more ambitious and wants to invest heavily in original animation.

This kind of project often has a very long preparation and production cycle, and the risks of original animation are also high.

So the plight of DreamWorks embodies a truth: no matter what if you are Steven Spielberg or Jeffrey Katzenberg, you will still hit the street without the support of big investors.

You can't develop into a consortium just by making movies.

By the time Cheng Yu'an returned to China and landed, it was already the 16th.

It has been 2 days since "The Promise" was screened on the 14th.

The status is explosive!

The box office on the 14th was 8 million, breaking the record of "Hero"'s highest box office of 2.1 million.

The first-day box office on the 15th was 21.15 million, breaking the highest first-day box office records of "Titanic" with 18 million and "Kung Fu" with 17 million.

Brother Kaizi is so happy!

With high spirits and enthusiasm, he led the creators to work tirelessly to launch nationwide publicity.

Cheng Lingfeng blocked Cheng Yuan and shouted: "Crazy, crazy! This is already 30 million! It is estimated that it will reach 50 million today!"

"Have you gone to see it?" Cheng Yu'an asked.

"I watched it last night and the cinema was full of people!" Cheng Lingfeng said.

"What do you think?" Cheng Yu'an asked with a smile.

"I didn't understand what he was going to say." Cheng Lingfeng thought for a while and said truthfully, "His narrative lines are too scattered, the several lines are not well integrated, and the relationship between the characters is also very thin.

."

"One more thing. Before the release, a glamorous rookie reporter interviewed the director of Kaige and asked him if his self-esteem would be hurt if the box office did not meet expectations. He directly scolded the girl." Cheng Lingfeng shook her head, "This is really true.

This is not what a great director like him should do."

"So you know how much director Chen Kaige attaches great importance to "The Promise". From now on, don't talk about "The Promise" outside the country." Cheng Yu'an didn't want to recruit him.

More than ten years later, Li Chengru said that he had not watched "The Promise" because of the comments at the time, but after watching "Farewell My Concubine" seven or eight times, he was scolded by Chen Kaige, saying that he was an old-school person who only knew how to listen to operas and sing songs.

Fighting crickets cannot keep pace with the times.

"The Promise" continues to dominate the Lunar New Year season. On the 17th, it broke "Kung Fu"'s single-day box office record of 22 million with a single-day box office of over 25 million.

On the 18th, it broke the first weekend box office record with over 70 million.

The box office of "The Promise" is expected to exceed 300 million.

Then something happened.

Lu Wei's evaluation of "The Promise" was published verbatim by the Chinese Business News:

"The theme of "The Promise" is very false and nihilistic, and the plot is scattered. It is a very failed movie."

Lu Wei is the screenwriter of "Farewell My Concubine" and one of the few great screenwriters in China who can write epics.

His comments instantly sparked public opinion.

But Director Chen was busy promoting it all over the world and had no time to respond to Lu Wei.

But Cheng Yu'an knew that because of this sentence, Chen Kaige did not have any contact with Lu Wei for more than ten years.

But Lu Wei's remarks did not affect the popularity of "The Promise".

The entire Lunar New Year festival was made to make way for "The Promise". Jinan New Century, the best theater in Shandong, gave all 11 halls to "The Promise", but even so, movie tickets continued to be sold out.

This is why Cheng Yuan is unwilling to put "Clues of Time and Space" in December.

He knows the quality of "The Promise", but he also knows how fierce the offensive of "The Promise" is this year, and there is no need for "Clues of Time" to touch it.

But as the end of December came, negative comments about "The Promise" began to appear.

Han Shao posted on his blog: "Director Chen obviously didn't understand the difference between computer stunts and netizen FLASH. In one of the scenes, Zhang Dongjian walking among the flowers and grass, it feels like it was filmed with a calendar pulled from behind. I don't understand why recent directors are so fond of it.

Use computer effects. Could it be that what you want to express can no longer be expressed using real lenses?"

The blog queen Xu Cairen published a blog that seemed positive but was actually yin and yang: "It's better than expected, except that the actress was photographed too ugly, the martial arts was a bit dizzy, some scenes were a bit too cartoon-like, and the ending

At that time, some people’s heartfelt dialogue was a bit like that.”

On the 20th, the Berlin Film Festival released its nomination announcement, and "The Promise" was shortlisted.

"The Promise" did not take the initiative to apply for Berlin. This shortlisting is Berlin's proactive show of goodwill.

Director Chen and Berlin have rarely crossed paths, and this shortlisting has added fuel to the fire of "The Promise".

On the 22nd, "The Promise" broke the record for the fastest to break 100 million with a box office of 103 million in 8 days of release.

Coupled with the news of being nominated for a Golden Globe Award, "The Promise" was in the limelight for a while.

No. 28.

"What was supposed to come has come." Cheng Yu'an sat in front of the computer, looked at the video on the screen, and smiled.

Yes, "A Murder Case Caused by a Steamed Bun" has been released.

"Hahaha, Yu An, look at this, it's so fun." Cheng Lingfeng found him holding a notebook.

She also watched "A Murder Case Caused by a Steamed Bun".

According to the eyes of Cheng Yu'an's later generations, this 20-minute video was actually very rough. If Cheng Yu'an had to do it, he could have done a more spoofy and funnier job.

But now it's the end of 2005, and this spoof video has gone viral.

Cheng Yu'an couldn't help but laugh: "This author named Hu Ge is going to suffer. Director Chen will not let him go."

"No way." Cheng Lingfeng knew that Director Chen was a petty person, but he wouldn't have a conflict with an unknown netizen.

After all, I have just been nominated for the Golden Globe Award and the Berlin Film Festival. I am really excited. Who would do anything with such a small role?

In fact, if you look closely at "A Murderous Case Caused by a Steamed Bun", Hu Ge's spoof also exposed the shortcomings of "The Promise".

The relationships between the characters are messy and the logic is inconsistent. At least it cannot convince the audience to believe the story.

Sure enough, after the New Year, "Steamed Buns" became a viral hit on the Internet, and the number of downloads actually exceeded the "The Promise" movie itself.
Chapter completed!