In the new box office week that started on July 15, there are two main new movies released in North American theaters, namely "Bloody Romeo" produced by Daenerys Entertainment's High Gate Pictures and the children's baseball theme produced by Paramount. The movie "Big League".
Last year, the Working Title Films team, which has produced famous films such as "Four Weddings and a Funeral", "The Big Lebowski", "Fargo", and "Notting Hill", was directly hired by Dani Under Lisi Entertainment, Simon selected the first three projects from the scripts reserved by the other party, namely "Four Weddings and a Funeral", "Love in My Heart" and "Bloody Romeo".
The first two films have been released. "Four Weddings and a Funeral" was a box office hit after it was released on Valentine's Day at the beginning of the year, and subsequently caused a movie-watching craze around the world.
"Love in My Heart", which was abandoned in early March due to poor quality, was a complete failure.
The last "Bloody Romeo" was originally given by Simon to Quentin Tarantino, who completely changed his career because of his big butterfly, as the other party's second project after "Reservoir Dogs".
"Bloody Romeo" tells the story of an FBI agent who relies on selling information about the hiding of tainted witnesses in exchange for black money, and becomes involved in a series of conspiracies after committing another betrayal.
After Quentin took over this script, which was already very suitable for his personal style, he made significant modifications according to his own preferences.
Although the budget is only US$15 million, relying on the extensive contacts Daenerys Entertainment has accumulated over the years, the film has also attracted a series of well-known Hollywood movie stars to join in cameos at low wages or even for free, including in recent years, in addition to the leading actor Gary Oldman. Robert De Niro, who has been working closely with Daenerys Entertainment for many years, Famke Janssen who plays Wonder Woman, Madonna who really likes Quentin’s “Reservoir Dogs”, should have made a comeback this year with “Pulp Fiction” John Travolta and other big names all showed up more or less in this movie.
Compared with the original version, "Bloody Romeo", which is completely "renewed", received a comprehensive media score of 8.7 points from major North American media on the first day of its official opening.
In fact, Gaomen Pictures would not have put this film on the summer schedule if it had not been a good success during the internal trial screening.
Although it is a non-mainstream crime thriller that requires word-of-mouth, "Romeo Bloody" still opened on 2,031 screens.
At the same time, Paramount's "Big League" is still at its core a children's film type like "Home Alone", which tells the story of a little boy who accidentally inherits the baseball team left by his grandfather and uses his unique youth skills to The story of his cleverness and wisdom leading the team to the championship.
The script is clearly trying to capture the success of films like "Future," "Pink" and "Home Alone," but it fails to do so.
The comprehensive media score of 3.3 points means that another summer cannon fodder is born.
Paramount probably doesn't have high expectations for "Big Brother" either. It only gave 1,532 opening screens. It has obviously shifted its expectations to Harrison Ford's new film "The Pursuit", which will be released next week.
Simon returned to Los Angeles on July 16. In Hollywood, the enthusiasm for Daenerys Entertainment's listing gradually faded away, and many people's attention turned back to DreamWorks Pictures and French Vision, which Spielberg and others are currently preparing. Wangdi's acquisition of Disney Pictures.
The biggest news about DreamWorks recently is undoubtedly the news that software tycoon Bill Gates invested US$500 million in his own name to join the company.
Since the initial dissatisfaction over the IE browser pre-installation cooperation, Damen classmates have increased Microsoft's layout in the Internet industry, and have continued to use various means to eliminate the impact of the Westeros system on Microsoft, and even deliberately held some important board meetings. Forget about the representatives of the Westeros system.
Simon just looked on with cold eyes.
If Microsoft completely goes against the Westeros system, it would actually not be a bad thing. Of course, the premise is that Damen must first buy back nearly 20% of the Microsoft stock held by the Westeros system.
With the early arrival of the new technology wave, Microsoft's stock price has exceeded 50 billion U.S. dollars. Although it is still far from the highest point, if Damen is willing to spend 10 billion U.S. dollars in cash to buy back Microsoft shares, Simon will not refuse. .
Unfortunately, not just anyone can get $10 billion in cash.
Even if Microsoft wants to join other companies in doing this, considering that Wall Street generally believes that technology stocks are overheated at this stage, there is probably not much capital willing to invest in buying Microsoft's obviously "high" value stocks.
In this world, Simon is the only one who can predict how crazy technology stocks will be in the next few years.
However, US$500 million is not a lot of money for Damen, whose current personal net worth has exceeded US$20 billion.
The software tycoon obviously gave birth to the desire of many wealthy people to pursue fame after becoming rich.
As for the results.
Simon had already proven it once in his memory.
Returned in vain.
As for Disney, after the news that Vivendi was in contact with Disney executives about acquisition matters came to light, Michael Eisner immediately denied it.
However, many subsequent news proved this.
After Jeffrey Katzenberg resigned, Michael Ovitz, who was originally interested in joining Disney to take over Frank Wells's position as president, also started to wait and see again, considering that once Disney was acquired, there would definitely be management adjustments in the future.
At this stage, Disney is basically a publicly held company.
However, Disney's two major shareholders, the Bass family of Texas and the founder Disney family, still hold 25% and 11% of Disney's shares respectively, for a total of 36% of the shares. It is basically certain that Disney will be affected by the acquisition invitation. belonging.
Simon received the news that the Disney family expressed strong opposition to the acquisition of the company, but the Bass family was not determined.
Disney's decline in recent years, the continued turmoil in management, and the fact that Disneyland Paris in Europe is like a mess that could explode at any time, made the Bass family feel that while the company is still valuable, it would be a good idea to cash out. choose.
Now, Vivendi Group, which is trying to acquire one party, and Disney management and the Disney family, which are resisting the acquisition, are trying their best to win the support of the Bass family.
After Simon and Joseph Schlapp reworked their lobbying strategy for the media consolidation ban, they returned to Los Angeles and were also considering how to help the Bass family make up their minds.
Daenerys Studios.
The time is Monday, July 18th.
The group's weekly high-level meeting was taking place in a conference room in the administrative district office building. Simon was in Los Angeles, so he naturally attended.
"The investment plan for the group's cash reserves is roughly the same. In order to avoid risks and consider the next stage of expansion, the funds we obtained from the IPO and the company's original cash reserves will only be invested with very low risk and can be cashed out in the short term. Fixed income products. On Wednesday, Mr. Lawrence Fink, CEO of Black Rock Asset Management, will come to Los Angeles to explain to the board of directors in person. So, the next topic is about Universal Studios Osaka. Bruce Peck, President of Theme Park Business A bill was submitted last week, arguing that Osaka Universal Studios should add attractions with local Japanese cultural characteristics, and also made some suggestions. The information is in everyone's hands, so you can take a look first."
After Amy Pascal finished speaking, the core senior executives who could participate in the meeting lowered their heads and flipped through the information.
Although they each manage different businesses, Simon firmly believes in the management method of teamwork. In order to prevent the company from falling into misunderstandings due to the wrong ideas of a certain senior management, many more important issues will be discussed together at regular senior meetings.
The final closing matters of the IPO have been completed recently. Excluding various commissions and handling fees, Daenerys Entertainment Group still received more than US$5.4 billion in cash. In addition, before going public, Daenerys Entertainment Group's own cash reserves reached US$2.7 billion. However, this part of the total capital of US$8.1 billion has exceeded the market value of several other major Hollywood studios.
Simon did not intend to use the money to repay Daenerys Entertainment's liabilities, and there were no big projects to invest in in the short term, so he planned to put the funds into Black Rock Asset Management Company and invest in treasury bonds, agreement deposits, and AAA corporate bonds. and other low-risk fixed-income financial products to gain certain value-added.
The fundamental goal is actually to resist inflation, and profits are dispensable.
Of course, there are more lucrative investment channels, but now that it has been listed, the capital flow of Daenerys Entertainment must be supervised by the board of directors, shareholders, SEC, etc., and cannot be used at will. Moreover, if a huge amount of more than 8 billion US dollars is invested in certain fields, the movement will be very large, and public disclosure and reporting will be required. Failure to protect it will become a target for those who are interested, so it is best to seek stability.
While sorting out this matter, Simon looked through the motions of Bruce Peck, President of Theme Park Business.
Universal Studios Osaka began planning in 1991 and broke ground in mid-1992. It is expected to be completed by the end of this year and open during Easter next year.
There was already a complete plan before the movie theater was built, and it was originally impossible to add additional projects temporarily. However, one of the 'Space Fantasy Train' projects some time ago was proven to have safety risks. For the theme park, even if it allows Tourists don't think it's exciting, and they must ensure safety first, not to mention that this is not a core project such as 'Jurassic Park' or 'Jaws Water Park'. Simon personally approved the cancellation of this attraction, and then appeared There is a vacancy.
Looking through the information in his hand, at a certain moment, an idea flashed in Simon's mind, and he thought of another thing.
In the conference room, Nancy Brill was the first to speak: "I don't think this is feasible. In terms of theme park management, we need to adapt to the cultural and living habits of the Japanese, so that we can achieve better localization, just like Tokyo Disney. . However, as for the setting of attractions, I believe that when Japanese tourists buy tickets to enter the park, what they want to see is American culture, not the things at home."
"I think we can give it a try," said Danny Morris, president of New World Pictures: "What Nancy said actually makes sense, but we can also Americanize Japanese elements. Hollywood has never excluded elements from all over the world. culture."
"The more important question now is," said Ella Deutschman, president of Highgate Pictures: "Universal Studios Osaka will open for Easter next year. It is already mid-July. There is still time to plan an attraction with Japanese elements again. Is it enough? I don't mean simply building, but planning from scratch, which will be very troublesome. Therefore, it is best to transplant mature projects from our existing theme parks to ensure that the opening of Easter next year will not Procrastination. The Disney Paris disaster was largely due to procrastination, and we should learn from this lesson.”
Mark Belford, the group's vice president of global operations, also said at this time: "I agree with Ella. It is very important for our first theme park overseas to ensure that it is completed and opened as planned."
Everyone was talking about it, but Simon never expressed his opinion.
After more than ten minutes of discussion, everyone finally decided to reject Bruce Peck's suggestion and transplant mature attractions from the existing Universal Studios in Los Angeles and Universal Studios in Orlando.
When Amy finally looked at Simon, Simon nodded.
Decision made, Amy turned to other topics.
The regular meeting lasted until half past eleven. When the meeting ended and others left to eat in the restaurant, Simon called out to Amy.
From the beginning of the topic of Universal Studios Osaka, Amy noticed that Simon was a little absent-minded. When only the two of them were left in the conference room, Amy spoke first: "Simon, Panasonic invited you during the IPO at the beginning of the month. Going to Japan as a guest, and the Universal Studios thing, maybe you should go to Japan during this time."
During this IPO process, in accordance with the agreement signed with Daenerys Entertainment when Panasonic gave up the acquisition of MCA three years ago, all the US$1 billion that Panasonic originally invested in Daenerys Entertainment in the form of loans was exchanged for Daenerys Entertainment at the issue price. The stock of Liz Entertainment Group is also considered one of the small shareholders of Daenerys Entertainment at this time, holding 45 million shares, which is equivalent to taking one-fifth of the 250 million new shares at one time, occupying Daenerys 1.9% of total entertainment capital.
The stock price of Daenerys Entertainment continued to rise after the IPO. In fact, a large part of the newly issued shares were taken away by Daenerys Entertainment stakeholders. In addition to Panasonic, Black Rock Asset Management also subscribed for 20 million shares. . In addition, a large number of stocks granted to Daenerys Entertainment employees in advance generally have a sales restriction period of 3 to 6 months, resulting in not many stocks ultimately flowing to the secondary market for trading.
Market demand far exceeds stock supply, and stock prices naturally rise.
Simon had been entangled with the Hearst family for most of the first half of the year, and Simon had never left the United States. Hearing what Amy said, Simon nodded and smiled: "The Japanese may just be polite, but they may not necessarily welcome it in their hearts." I’m a guest.”
Amy laughed.
She has not forgotten the original 'Westeros Effect'.
After the joke, Amy said: "You were a little distracted just now, Simon, what happened?"
Girl A brought coffee in at this time. Simon took the coffee, took a sip, and said to Amy: "You know, I have been thinking about how to get Disney shareholders to make the decision to sell this company in the past few days, and it just happened that inspiration."