After dinner, Simon took Janet and rushed back to Palisades.
In the Chevrolet SUV, Neil Bennett, the driver, drove the car very smoothly. Simon leaned against the window, thinking seriously about tonight's meeting with Mike Medowa.
Mike Medowa's reaction to Pulp Fiction was more negative than Simon expected, which worried him.
The reason why "Pulp Fiction" achieved such great fame was not only its quality, but also the Weinstein brothers' sparing no effort in public relations operations.
It can be seen from this year's 18 Oscar nominations that Orion's strength in award public relations is no less than that of Miramax later. But if Orion's executives express their disdain for "Pulp Fiction", they want them to be like Wayne. It is obviously unrealistic for the Stein brothers to try their best to win awards for this movie.
What's more, Simon's age is still the biggest variable limiting "Pulp Fiction" from receiving award recognition.
In any case, he is not yet 20 years old.
Speaking of which, Simon actually has no shortage of other options. But under his previous contract with Orion, this second movie didn't warrant some of the ideas he was bringing to the table.
In order to promote the release of "Run Lola Run", in the contract signed by Simon and Orion, his basic salary for director and screenwriter combined was only US$500,000.
Although Simon retains the power to renegotiate the sharing terms, in any case, this new film is unlikely to allow him to get too much revenue. The next best result may just be a sharing terms similar to "Death Comes".
But compared to "Death Is Here", Simon needs to invest more energy in the film he personally directed.
Since he couldn't get enough revenue, Simon decided to choose a film that he was more interested in, and at the same time, it could consolidate the popularity of his stylized director.
The specific sharing contract for "Pulp Fiction" will naturally be discussed by Jonathan and Orion, but then, the negotiation for the sale of the distribution rights of "Lola Run" is also a chore that requires a lot of time.
also.
Whether it's "The Butterfly Effect" or "Pulp Fiction" or "When Harry Met Sally," all of these projects, there's still a lot of work that needs to be done as quickly as possible.
Even taking into account the schedules of the three movies "Dead Man", "Pulp Fiction" and "When Harry Met Sally", Simon found that this year's end of the year and next year's Easter are obviously very suitable for at least inserting A movie goes in.
Time is money.
But Simon is either short of money or time.
and.
These are just things related to movies.
The U.S. stock market crashed in the second half of the year. Simon remembered the date very clearly, October 19, Black Monday. If you want to gain enough income from this financial turmoil, in addition to raising large amounts of funds in advance, you must also do a lot of other preparations, which also require time and energy.
Simon frowned in deep thought all the way, and Janet leaned beside him quietly without interrupting.
Back at the Palisades mansion, it was already nine o'clock in the evening.
Simon entered the villa and saw the phone message reminder light in the living room flashing, so he walked over and pressed play.
Janet also followed suit.
The call came from Amy Pascale.
In the message, Amy expressed her concern about the outcome of Simon's meeting with Wells Fargo executives in the afternoon, and then talked about another thing: a vice president of Mattel contacted her today, hoping to discuss "Lola Run". 》Problems in the development of toy peripherals.
Mattel is one of the world's largest toy designers, manufacturers and sellers. Its flagship product is various types of Barbie dolls.
After hearing Amy's message, Simon immediately became energetic again.
Around.
A peripheral film that is almost certain to be the annual box office champion in North America.
This is definitely another big gain.
Simon originally designed the wall clocks, rings and other small props in "Lola Run" with this idea in mind. Since most of the props and even Lola's own image are original, according to the copyright law's rule that creation is income, the copyright of these props and characters belongs to Daenerys Films.
There have been so many things going on these days, Simon simply doesn't have the energy to take care of them.
Now.
Someone else came to the door.
Naturally, you can’t miss it, and you need to plan it carefully.
After standing by the phone and doing some quick calculations, Simon turned around and was about to go to the study when he found Janet standing behind him. Because Simon suddenly turned around without warning, the woman was obviously startled and her eyes widened.
Seeing Janet's appearance, Simon smiled apologetically, reached out to hold the woman's delicate face, kissed her, and said: "Baby, you go take a shower first, I have some things to do."
Throughout the whole day today, or in all the recent days, Janet had been thinking about something as she watched Simon being so busy that he couldn't even touch the ground.
at this time.
Seeing Simon walking hurriedly upstairs, Janet followed him upstairs.
When she came to the bedroom, Janet took off her evening dress and took a bath absentmindedly. However, instead of wearing the silk bathrobe she usually liked, she put on a slightly OL-style blouse and white trousers.
After standing in front of the dressing mirror and looking at it, Janet came to Simon's study.
Different from the large study downstairs where I met with Wells Fargo Senior Vice President Paul Olson in the afternoon, this is another small study in the mansion, located next to the bedroom on the second floor, making it very private.
Janet rarely comes here on weekdays.
Because she always felt that many of Simon's secrets might be hidden in this study. Although she was very curious about everything about her boyfriend, he didn't take the initiative to tell her, and Janet never deliberately explored it.
The study door was not closed.
Janet knocked on the door panel and walked in.
Simon was standing next to the wall with a white writing board in the study, holding a water-based pen in one hand and a microphone in the other, talking to the other side.
A long list of nouns has accumulated on the writing board.
Soundtrack, poster album, video games, character dolls, butterfly wall clock, T-shirts, rings, magazines, image licensing...
These are obviously developable peripheral options for "Lola Run".
Below the slightly scattered nouns, there are several names and some contact numbers.
Seeing that Simon was busy discussing with the other side, Janet just nodded towards her and made a casual movement. Then she walked to the bookshelf on the other side and scanned the entire row of folders casually. Take down a blue folder and open it.
This is a stack of newspaper clippings.
Each page of the hand-bound 16-page draft paper has a tofu-sized piece of newspaper news attached to it.
The news on page one comes from the Los Angeles Times, with the headline 'New World Pictures acquires Marvel Entertainment'.
I read the content curiously.
"New World Pictures officially reached an acquisition agreement with Marvel Entertainment on Thursday. A spokesperson claimed that the move is aimed at expanding the company's comic publishing and TV animation businesses."
"Marvel Entertainment is one of the largest comic book production companies in North America. The company's assets include Marvel Comics in New York, Marvel Comics and Marvel Productions in the United Kingdom, and animation studios in California's San Fernando Valley. It owns Spider-Man , Hulk, X-Men and other popular superhero characters among comic fans.”
"In 1985, Marvel Entertainment's annual revenue was US$72 million and profit was US$5.1 million."
"Previously, Marvel Entertainment Group's parent company, Candace Industrial Holdings Group, officially entered bankruptcy liquidation procedures. The two parties did not disclose the detailed terms of the transaction, but industry rumors indicate that the price of Marvel Entertainment Group is roughly US$40 million to US$50 million. between."
"The transaction is expected to be fully completed by the end of the year."
In the half year they had known each other, Janet had never seen Simon read comics before, so she didn’t know why the little man would be interested in such a piece of news.
I tilted my head and read the news carefully again, but still had no clue. There is nothing else in the margin of the page except a string of handwritten dates of 'November 21, 1986'.
So I had to turn back.
Most of the following pages are still just simple news with simple dates and few annotations.
After flipping through most of it, another newspaper clipping caught Janet's attention.
This is the list of films nominated for the 59th Oscars announced in late December last year.
However, only a small piece of the clipping was retained. The three nominations for Best Animated Short Film were circled with a red oil pen on one of the short films called "Naughty Jumping Lantern". Next to it was the usual '1986'. 'December 20, 2017', along with the word: Pixar.
Pixar.
Janet remembered this time that the animation in the opening credits of "Run Lola Run" was made by this animation studio. It seemed to be a rare 3D animation studio.
Marvel comics, 3D animation.
Ah.
Is the little boy interested in cartoons
Thinking in her mind, Janet casually turned over another page of the newspaper clipping.
This time it is professional news that a software company named 'Microsoft' is conducting internal testing of a new version of its operating system. Finally, it also comes with an evaluation of Microsoft's recent stock price. Due to the continued boom in the North American stock market, Microsoft's market value has officially exceeded 1 billion. Dollar.
After reading the news carefully again, I still have no clue.
All these clippings seem to be scattered here and there, without any sense of structure or focus. Janet even thought about it in a rare moment, but still couldn't find any connection.
Earnestly had to put the folder back to its original position, Janet turned around and walked back to the man.
Another phone call from Simon was coming to an end, and he was listening to the narration on the other end and writing down a name and a string of phone numbers on the writing board.
"Well, thank you for your help, Peter. I'm sorry to disturb you so late... Haha, of course, let's have dinner together when we have time." After finishing speaking, Simon casually pressed the hang-up button on the landline next to him, and then turned to the phone next to him. Janet, who had been hanging around for a while, looked the woman up and down and said, "It's already very late, why did you suddenly change into this outfit?"
Janet spread her arms and turned around in front of Simon, saying: "How is it?"
Although Janet is not as tall as Catherine, she definitely has the kind of figure that looks very good with or without clothes.
Hearing this, Simon nodded without hesitation and said with a smile: "It tastes very good. I'll put on the high heels later. By the way, is this outfit expensive?"
Janet immediately understood some of the subtext in Simon's words, and immediately gave the man a hard look.
Reaching out to take the microphone in Simon's hand and putting it aside, Janet pushed the man to sit down on the sofa in the study room. She also sat down opposite and said seriously: "Simon, I told you before that I will help you. So. , next, I will talk to them about the follow-up release negotiations of "Lola Run". You can also leave these peripherals to me, you just need to do what you want to do."
There was still a smile on Simon's face, but after hearing Janet's words that were not joking at all, he put away the smile on his face and said: "Jenny, this is going to be very tiring."
Janet shook her head and said firmly: "I have decided."
Simon and Janet looked at each other for a moment, and finally nodded, "Okay. But if you feel you don't want to do it at any time, tell me at any time."
Janet's usual lazy appearance really left a deep impression on Simon. After all, she was a bit chauvinistic at heart. Simon didn't think there was anything wrong with this, so he didn't have any objections to Janet's plan to work for him. Too much expectation.
Perhaps his expectations were too low, but Simon was really surprised in the days that followed. At the same time, I also realized the level of Columbia University's top students that Catherine once inadvertently mentioned could make Buffett speechless.