"A $20 million remuneration and 15% of the North American box office share, heh, Firefly can't make such an offer," Eric smiled and shook his head, saying to Roland Emmerich who was sitting on the other side.
The time was July 7th, and the two were having breakfast at a breakfast restaurant in Beverly Hills. Roland Emmerich told Sony unreservedly the conditions offered by Sony to let him direct "Godzilla" Eric. Howard Stringer is also a smart person. He wanted to poach Roland Emmerich to Sony Pictures to direct "Godzilla". He didn't directly choose to contact Firefly, but offered Roland Emmerich made an offer he was hard to refuse, and gave him the job of getting Firefly's understanding.
If the future box office level of "Godzilla" can be equal to that of "Independence Day" which is currently being released, reaching about 300 million US dollars in North America, then Roland Emmerich will be able to get 65 million US dollars from this project. Even if the box office fails miserably, Roland Emmerich's income can still be maintained at more than 20 million US dollars, no matter what the drought or flood. Under such conditions, fireflies will definitely not bloom.
Of course, Firefly is not stingy either. "Independence Day" is a big hit at the box office. In addition to the original fixed salary of 8 million US dollars, according to the corresponding sharing agreement, Roland Emmerich can also get from the follow-up income of "Independence Day" More than 20 million U.S. dollars, after all, a "Independence Day" can also bring him 30 million U.S. dollars. The directors who can earn 30 million US dollars in a film can be counted on one hand in the whole of Hollywood.
This is also the cooperation method that Eric has always advocated, suppressing fixed remuneration, bundling the main creator's interests with box office revenue through appropriate sharing methods, and sharing risks. Like Sony, the film has a sky-high price of 20 million U.S. dollars before it even has a clue. With the addition of a high box office share, it is simply a reckless act relying on wealth and wealth.
Roland Emmerich saw that Eric was not angry after hearing that he would be filming for Sony, and still had a faint smile on his face. Also relax a little bit.
Although he had never seen this young man angry, he would not naively think that Eric was a bad tempered person. On "Clash of Heaven and Earth" and "Independence Day". Roland Emmerich worked very happily with Firefly, and he knew that it was these two films that pushed him to where he is now. He is not the kind of ungrateful person. Normally, even if there is no contractual restraint, He is also very willing to continue working with Firefly, but this time. The offer from Sony was indeed too difficult for him to refuse.
"Anyway, I'm sorry, Eric, I'm afraid I won't be able to direct "The Day After Tomorrow"," Roland Emmerich felt relieved, but on the surface he still had a regretful expression. Hollywood's influence is still increasing, and Roland Emmerich definitely doesn't want to anger Eric unless it is absolutely necessary. After thinking about it, Roland Emmerich said, "Eric, everyone is looking forward to your new work. Perhaps it would be a good choice for you to direct "The Day After Tomorrow" yourself."
"Let's talk about the situation," Eric said with a smile, noncommittal.
Sony is ambitious to make "Godzilla" into at least a trilogy. In theory, it is impossible for Roland Emmerich to return to direct Firefly in the next few years.
Eric still felt a little uncomfortable about this matter. Roland Emmerich gave up directing "The Day After Tomorrow", and Firefly's filming plan had to be adjusted accordingly.
But when Roland Emmerich was invited to direct "Clash of Heaven and Earth", Roland Emmerich only signed two film contracts with Firefly. Completed Independence Day. The contract between the two parties has been fulfilled, although Firefly has the priority to renew the contract. But it is absolutely impossible to offer a sky-high salary even close to Sony's. Blocking people's money is like killing their parents. In this case, it would be very difficult for Firefly to forcefully keep Roland Emmerich.
Of course, the main reason why Eric let Roland Emmerich leave so easily was to plan in advance for a few years later.
Right now, the representative of CLSA has arrived in Los Angeles and is negotiating with Amy Pascal, who is in charge of Blossom Pictures, that Blossom Pictures will expand rapidly once the distribution platform of MGM is won.
On the other hand, although it has Sony's strong financial support, it is absolutely impossible for Sony to continue to operate Columbia-Samsung with losses due to the huge losses caused by Peter Guber's management. Once Sony's ambitious "Godzilla" series fails again, it will be a devastating blow to Sony's confidence in continuing to maintain its film business. At that time, Flower Pictures can take advantage of the trend to eat Columbia and complete Eric's further expansion of Hollywood. layout plan.
Roland Emmerich didn't know what Eric was thinking, and seeing him let him go so easily, he felt a little ashamed.
Therefore, the atmosphere at breakfast inevitably became awkward. The two chatted indifferently, and hurriedly finished their breakfast. Roland Emmerich settled the bill on his own initiative, took his leave and left the restaurant.
Although Howard Stringer still hopes that he can communicate with Eric about entrusting the digital field to be responsible for the special effects of "Godzilla", Roland Emmerich is already quite ashamed in his heart, and it is even more difficult to say such things , I made up my mind to leave this headache to Sony to handle it by myself.
After Roland Emmerich left, Eric was not in a hurry to go to the company. He ordered the waiter to remove the tableware, ordered a cup of coffee, and leisurely read today's newspaper.
In the weekly box office bulletin of the entertainment section of the "Los Angeles Times", the first place was "Independence Day" with an unbeatable $85 million, followed by Universal Pictures' new film, the famous "Apollo 13", although the actor It is no longer Tom Hanks, but with the excellent quality and reputation of the film, it still got more than 43 million US dollars in the box office in the first week, ranking second.
All in all, despite the acquisition turmoil at the beginning of the year, Universal Pictures’ summer film still maintained good box office results. At the end of May, "Ghost Horse Elf" and this "Apollo 13" cost less than two films. It is too high, although the results are far from being comparable to Firefly, but it is enough to make Universal's summer box office results very good. Although Michael Eisner's strong and fickle character is not pleasing, but after entering Universal and restarting, it seems to be inspired by the spirit of running Disney in the 1980s. Eric remembers that in the next ten years, Universal Pictures will The turmoil continued during the process of repeated owner changes, but he didn't know how many major changes he would be able to withstand Universal.
After "Apollo 13", "Batman Forever" in its second week of release ranked third with $42 million at the box office. Next, "Forrest Gump" is still very stable at the box office of more than 28 million US dollars, with a slight 20% box office drop, ranking fourth, with a total box office of 150 million US dollars in four weeks. The box office of "Toy Story 2" has just reached 28.02 million U.S. dollars, ranking fifth, with a total box office of 130 million U.S. dollars. Around $200 million.
In addition, after the cumulative box office of "Jurassic Park 2" reached 280 million US dollars in four weeks, the box office in the fifth week was only more than 14 million. It is expected that the cumulative box office will exceed 300 million US dollars next week, but at the same time, the weekly box office will also fall to the million level. , enter the finishing stage.
In just one month, the weekly box office fell from 140 million to 14 million US dollars. It is inevitable that there will be comments in the newspapers that Firefly’s distribution strategy was wrong. It is believed that Firefly released 3,500 screens in the first week of its opening, which is an excessive consumption of "Jurassic Park 2" "'s box office potential, if Firefly's film scheduling strategy can be more conservative, the box office curve will definitely be even better.
For this kind of comment, Eric just laughed it off. Anyone with a discerning eye can find that in recent years, Firefly has almost occupied the entire June schedule. The postponed release strategy, if it weren’t for Firefly’s need to make “Independence Day” cater to the American Independence Day on July 4th, this film would definitely be a week earlier, and it is precisely because of this that Warner dared to release “Batman Forever” On June 23, which was supposed to be the last "box office bomb" of Firefly's summer vacation.
It is precisely because of Firefly's behavior of occupying the June schedule that other film companies have put their main films in July. Starting from Universal's "Apollo 13" and "Independence Day" on June 30, the entire July , there are two major new films released almost every week, such as "Liar Liar" starring Fox Kim Carrey and Time Warner's "Water World" on July 7, "Night at the Museum" and "Water World" on July 14. Evaporation Order", "007's Golden Eye" and "The Wire" on July 21. Under the bombardment of this intensive new film, if Firefly does not dig out the box office of "Jurassic Park 2" as much as possible in June, it will still be quickly crowded out by a large number of new films in July.
Eric quickly scanned several major newspapers today, and noticed that Kevin Costner's "Future Water World" will be released today, so he picked up his mobile phone and called Amy Pascal to remind him The other party pays close attention to the trend of "Future Water World" and chooses the right time to start the salary negotiation for "Mission: Impossible 2" with Kevin Costner.
Although the finished film has not been seen, Warner's $175 million Water Wasteland movie ticket is destined to end dismal. Counting last summer's even more blockbuster western film "Law Enforcement", Kevin Costner has already failed two big-budget films. The salary negotiation will have a very large initiative.
Although there is Eric's strong support, in the process of acquiring MGM, Huahua Pictures will definitely have to solve part of the financing by itself. The global box office of the first "Mission: Impossible" broke through 500 million US dollars, and the results are very impressive. Finalizing the contract for the sequel of "Mission: Impossible" will undoubtedly add more financing chips for Huahua Pictures.
(To be continued.)