After staying in Rivni for one night, Simon left the next morning and rushed to London, England.
Over in the U.S., this year’s Sundance Film Festival concluded on Sunday night.
After the premiere on January 21, the new version of "The Man from Earth" written by Simon himself has been screened three times in the past week. The venues were full, and the media discussion surrounding the film has also skyrocketed, even surpassing that on January 28 Golden Globe Awards tonight.
As the popularity of the topic increases, so does the controversy.
Audiences who like "The Man from Earth" admire it and think it is a masterpiece, a classic movie that tells a magical science fiction story without using any special effects.
Those who didn't like it also criticized the film's plot on various media platforms for being far-fetched and lacking in sincerity.
Many times, the popularity of a movie is the key to determining the movie's box office.
The new movie, written by Simon Westeros himself, has the aura of a buzz that can save tens of millions of dollars in publicity and distribution budgets. Now, the film has caused strong controversy and received mostly positive reviews. Daenerys Entertainment executives are becoming more optimistic about the film's box office prospects.
One of the most troublesome things for the Gaomen Pictures team responsible for the film's promotion and distribution is preventing spoilers.
Traditional paper media is easy to control.
Having said hello, most media will avoid leaking the plot as long as they don’t want to be shut out of the premiere of Daenerys Entertainment’s new movie in the future.
Unfortunately, the rise of the Internet has made confidentiality very difficult.
In particular, "This Man Came From Earth" is a high-concept movie that can summarize the general plot in one sentence.
Fortunately, there is the assistance of Ygrit Portal.
Even if IE browser homepage restrictions have been opened, the current Internet platforms, mainstream forum communities and social networks are basically under the influence of Igret.
Even so, the publicity team still went to great lengths to clean up or hide content that was suspected of being spoilers. In an email to Simon, Ella Deutschman joked that a quarter of the publicity budget for "The Man from Earth" would be spent on preventing online spoilers.
At the closing ceremony of the 11th Sundance Film Festival on the evening of January 29, although Simon had hinted at Robert Redford, "The Man from Earth" still won an almost expected Audience Award.
Except for "The Man from Earth," there were no surprises in the core jury award, which went to "The Brothers McMullen" produced by Daenerys Entertainment, which also received acclaim at the film festival.
"Unspeakable Love" directed by James Mangold, another new director Simon is optimistic about, won the directing award second only to the Jury Prize together with another film "The Life of a Thief".
Of Daenerys Entertainment’s three projects this year, the last of them, the fashion documentary “Zip Down,” naturally received nothing.
However, through the vigorous promotion jointly carried out by Highgate Pictures and Liz Carbone during Sundance, "Under the Zipper" became more famous than the documentary "Kluber" which won the Grand Jury Prize. Many viewers were concerned about this. I am looking forward to this documentary with many supermodels appearing.
On the other hand, Edward Burns' "The Brothers McMullen" is a self-owned project invested by Daenerys Entertainment, while James Mangold's "The Unspeakable" is not.
After Simon personally chatted with James Mangold, Mangold quickly signed a three-film package deal with Daenerys Entertainment, but Highgate Pictures originally planned to buy "Unspeakable Love" together. misfortune.
Because it was a film invested by an independent film company, everyone competed freely. After certain news came out, this ultra-low-cost independent film with a production cost of only US$250,000 was finally sold to Paramount after a lot of promotion. The Orion Pictures team bought out the local omni-channel distribution rights for a high price of US$3.5 million.
Gaomen Pictures estimated the box office prospects of "Unspeakable Love" to be around US$5 million in the local area, and accordingly made a cap budget of US$2 million. Taking into account distribution costs, this price actually depends on the follow-up video tape. and other channels to make profits. Facing the rush, Ella Deutschman had no choice but to give up.
Before the consecutive Golden Globe Awards and the closing ceremony of Sundance, on Friday, January 27, Daenerys Entertainment’s first relatively important film this year, "Red Zone", was released in North America. The film was produced by New World Pictures The brand is responsible for distribution, and the number of opening screens is 1,736.
Daenerys Entertainment has been sparing no effort in recent years to introduce excellent Hong Kong films to cultivate the market. Jack Cheng has gradually become famous in North America. After the film was released, both media reputation and audience feedback were very good. Coupled with the stronger promotion and distribution capabilities of New World Pictures than New Line, the North American box office of "Red Zone" is expected to be better than the historical US$32 million.
After that, in the face of the strong expectations of the audience, Gaomen Pictures immediately announced the filming date of "The Man from Earth" on February 24.
This arrangement is mainly to make way for "Broken Arrow" which will be released on Valentine's Day on February 10.
Two other films participating in Sundance, "The Brothers McMullen" and "Under the Zipper," have also been announced to be released on February 10 and March 3 respectively.
"The Brothers McMullen" is scheduled to be on the same schedule as "Broken Arrow" mainly to ride on the Sundance Film Festival's Grand Jury Prize, and there is not much competition between the two films.
"Under the Zipper" was even more unpopular on March 3, due to the film's positioning. The publicity and development team of Gomen Pictures plans to provide an opening screen size of about 500 yuan, which is actually not an outlier. The opening screen size of "The Brothers McMullen" is probably only of this level.
Simon arrived in London on January 30.
Because there are many matters that need to be negotiated with the Ukrainian government, Celia and her party will continue to stay in Ukraine for a few more days and will not leave together.
Coincidentally, this day is the New Year's Eve in the Chinese lunar calendar.
As a city of immigrants, London naturally has no shortage of Chinatowns. The weather was too cold, and Simon had no intention of joining in the fun. He just checked his work emails on the private plane from Kiev to London and casually gave it to Lin Su and Chen Qing, who were returning to China to spend the New Year. The two women sent a text message congratulating them on the New Year.
We drove from Rivni to Kiev and then flew to London. After getting off the plane, we rushed to Simon's villa on Kensington Garden Street where Sofia Fesi stayed. It was already past two o'clock in the local afternoon.
Today is Monday, a working day.
Negotiations to acquire Burberry were still ongoing. Sophia did not come to pick her up at the airport, nor did she wait for Simon at home. Instead, she continued to go to work.
However, there was someone else waiting at the villa in Kensington Gardens Street.
Simon picked up a ballet teacher casually last year, Yulia Shulshkina. He saw this Russian girl leading the girls to dance like an elf through a remote camera. After a little work, he directly Occupy it.
It's just that Simon has never had the opportunity to come to London in the past year, and he has not summoned this Russian girl to his side. Instead, besides teaching ballet classes to girls, he has arranged another job for her to serve as Simon's representative in the UK. Housekeeper for a range of properties.
Shulshikina's treatment was similar to that of Lin Su and the others. In addition to her residence, she was also provided with a female maid and a guard.
Shulshkina, who had been through many hardships and almost had her mother and daughter sold together by her lover, accepted her role without any resistance. Over the past year, she had been peacefully and conscientiously working on several things Simon had told her.
When she met Simon for the first time, Shulshkina was neither overjoyed nor nervous or shy. The 31-year-old woman, who still showed no signs of age, was wearing a well-tailored OL suit indoors, with her blond hair pulled up, her face delicate and perfect, and her hands clasped together. In front of her, when she calls Simon, she is different from other women around her. She does not call Simon by her name in a friendly way, nor does she call her boss with multiple meanings. Instead, she calls Simon 'Mr.' in a clear and gentle voice.
This made Simon think of the British butler in "Big Shot" for a moment.
Since she was assigned to be a housekeeper, Shulshkina did receive professional training courses. It is not surprising that she developed this British housekeeper style.
Simon has always felt that Slavic girls are the race closest to 'elves'. Yesterday's Lyudmila and this time's Shulshkina can both be called elves, but they have two completely different styles, one is flamboyant and the other is restrained. All perfect and refined.
Listening to Shulshkina greeting him, Simon stepped forward and held up the woman's delicate chin, admiring it carefully. He finally saw some nervousness in the woman's expression, smiled and said: "Go and put on yours." Practice clothes, show me how to dance later.”
Shulshkina was startled, and when Simon let go, she nodded subconsciously, but couldn't help lowering her eyes, not daring to look at the man.
After Simon finished speaking, he walked upstairs, running around continuously, planning to take a hot bath to relax first.
During this period, I called Sophia. The woman said that the matter would probably be finalized today, so she would not be back until after five o'clock. Simon mentioned that today was Chinese New Year's Eve and asked the woman if she wanted to eat Chinese food. Sophia took the initiative to introduce a few restaurants here. A good Chinese restaurant where you can invite chefs to cook your food fresh.
After taking a shower, he arranged for Girl A to arrange dinner. Simon was led by the maid of the villa to a spacious room on the first floor with an area of about a hundred square meters. This was originally a recreation room of the former owner of the villa. Simon bought this room. After the property was moved, all the old things were cleared out, except for an indoor bar in the corner, which was intended to be used as a dance floor for parties.
Shulshkina is already waiting here, wearing a pure white ballet practice suit without a tutu, which shows off the woman's perfect figure even more.
There is a circle of sofas next to the bar and a stage for the band to play, with a piano placed on the stage.
Simon did not sit down on the sofa, but came to the piano, looked at the woman standing in the middle of the room with her hands tied, and said with a smile: "I saw you dancing last year, and I had an idea. I thought you would look very good dancing solo. I happen to be here." There is a song for you to listen to. If you can dance well, I can record a MV for you in the future. Well, I will need to change my clothes then, but let’s talk about it later.”
After Simon finished speaking, he lowered his head and started to play the keys.
The piano skills inherited from those memories have never faded, and I find the feeling easily, and then, the sound of piano music fills the room.
This is a ballet solo that Simon watched in his previous life, "The Last Day of Bach."
I was not interested in ballet at all, but when I saw this dance by chance, Simon fell in love immediately. It turns out that ballet can be like this, and probably all truly beautiful things are like this. Later, I made a special inquiry and found out that the song was composed by a German singer in memory of his deceased wife. I found the complete song, but I didn’t feel much about it after listening to it. It was just a pure music version with Paulina, the principal of the Berlin State Ballet. Semionova's solo dance is stunning.
Because the original song was only created after the new century, and with the growing influence of Simon, the big butterfly, if he didn't come up with it, it might not appear again in the future, so I came up with the idea of having Shulshkina perform it. .
After playing the song once, Simon began to direct Yulia's corresponding movements and dances.
After reading the information, Yulia, who has been practicing ballet since she was a child, has no worse ballet skills than the principals of many dance companies. It’s just that in this kind of thing, personal opportunities are always more important than ability. Before meeting Simon, Shulshkina had always been The one with less luck.
Directed by Simon, women are soon dancing around the vast room.
Over and over again.
Gradually become proficient.
Then it's easy.
At some point, the sky in London had darkened. Sophia, who had returned from outside, appeared at the door of the room. She looked at the dance of the woman in the room that perfectly matched the sound of the piano. She was a little jealous, but couldn't bear to interrupt. It wasn't until it was over again that she walked over to the man. In front of him, he looked at Yulia, who seemed to be addicted and unable to extricate herself, lying on the floor with her neck curled up like a swan, and said, "It's very beautiful. Did you write the song specifically for her?"
Simon was still sitting on the stool and did not respond. Instead, he put his arms around the waist of Sophia who was standing next to him, put his face against the woman's belly, and asked with a smile: "How is the baby today?"
The man didn't answer the question just now, and Sophia was smart enough not to ask further questions, and said softly: "It's only been two months, and the little guy hasn't reached the time to be naughty yet."
Simon listened for a moment and said: "It's too cold in London. Let's leave tomorrow and go to Cannes, Rome or Athens. The temperature there is suitable for children to grow up. Don't work like this anymore in the next few months."
Feeling the concern in the man's tone, Sofia's jealousy dissipated a lot. She put her palm on the man's head and stroked it gently, and agreed: "Okay, anyway, the matter has been settled today."
The two whispered intimately, and Yulia, who was curled up on the floor, remained motionless, as if she had fallen asleep.
Of course it is impossible to fall asleep.
In just a few hours, while dancing to the man's music, Yulia felt that her heart, which had become cold and cold over the years, suddenly melted again.
Reminisced many things.
After a few hours, I took my first ballet class.
Clumsy little swan.
When I stood tall, I felt so happy that my dance was appreciated by others, and I felt that the world was so beautiful.
At that time, I was as proud as a swan.
Later, there was the thrill of joining the Bolshoi Ballet.
…
Then.
The trajectory of life seems like a derailed train.
Keep falling.
come down.
Until today, a heart that had been submerged for a long time suddenly resurfaced and felt the long-lost air.
And the man sitting next to the piano is her savior.
Know that you are just a piece of his collection.
Don’t dare to love.
However, I really want to keep dancing to his music like this.