After the nominations for best original song were announced, the nominees for best soundtrack were announced next.
"Titanic" has lost the best original song nomination. Eric realized that if the Golden Globe jury really wants to follow the wishes of some people and deliberately suppress this movie, it will probably only be nominated for the best movie. For the soundtrack, a nomination is given symbolically.
However, after Mira Sorvino read out the five nominated films one after another, Eric still did not hear the name of "Titanic".
Tapping a few times with his fingers on the glass table, the corners of Eric's mouth curled up, and he murmured with an angry smile, "There's no need to be so extreme."
All of a sudden, he lost interest. Eric handed Kevin in his arms to Virginia, reached out for a blank New Year's card, and lowered his head to fill in the card.
In the living room, the sound from the TV was still going on, and the women all realized that Eric was a little irritable at this time, and kept quiet carefully so as not to disturb him.
On the TV, the host of NBC and two guests continued to announce the long list of nominations, and made some witty words from time to time to enliven the atmosphere.
The two nominations that should have been the easiest to get failed unexpectedly. Eric felt that the Golden Globe jury probably didn't plan to give "Titanic" a nomination this time. He didn't have any expectations and held his pencil patiently. I wrote cursive English on the New Year's card, trying to calm down my irritated mood recently.
After the nominations for the best foreign language film were announced, the host joked about the nominated films. Mira Sorvino once again took out a list and read into the microphone: "Next, the winner of the Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay nominees include Tom Stoppard, Mark Norman, Shakespeare in Love; Terrence Malick, Red Alert; Ethan Coen, Joel Coen, Fargo ’; Jim Sadie, ‘Shining Presence’ and… James Cameron, ‘Titanic’.”
Feeling the deliberate pause made by Mira Sorvino on the TV, Eric raised his head.
Hearing the name of "Titanic", the little girl not far away immediately excitedly said: "Eric, we have been nominated."
Eric nodded slightly, but his expression was full of doubts. He didn't quite understand the intention of the Golden Globe Awards. Could it be that the two nominations just now were just accidents, and the Golden Globe Awards jury was not affected. "Titanic" will continue to Hope to be nominated for core awards such as best picture
With a little expectation in his heart, Eric listened quietly to the entire nomination conference, but the quietly raised expectations quickly fell through.
Next, he didn't hear a single word about "Titanic". "Titanic" ended up with only a slightly embarrassing nomination for best screenplay, and nothing else.
Under normal circumstances, Oscars and Golden Globes, which at least superficially try to maintain their own credibility, are relatively fair in the nomination stage. If it is in previous years, the quality of "Titanic" itself is there, even if the Golden Globes are in Under the influence of some people, if you want to deliberately suppress, you also need to weigh the risk of loss of credibility.
However, after watching the nomination press conference, Eric generally understood that this year's situation is very different from the past.
According to the usual saying, this year will definitely be an Oscar year, and it can be regarded as a super year.
It can be seen from the list of nominations for the Golden Globe Awards that the four films "Shakespeare in Love", "Red Alert", "Fargo" and "Shining Presence" received an average of more than five nominations, showing exceptionally strong performances , Other films such as "Mr. Sweetheart", "The Master of Sex Books", "Mrs. Peron" are also quite eye-catching.
Under such circumstances, the Golden Globe jury can be said to be "confident", with so many excellent films ranked first, even if "Titanic" is nominated, the Golden Globe judges don't feel that such a purely commercial blockbuster You can win the award under the eyes of the heroes. Since "Titanic" has no hope of winning the award at all, then if you don't nominate it at this time, there will be no risk of losing credibility in the future.
Even Eric is aware of the trickiness of this best screenwriter. If "Titanic" gets nominated for best original song and best film soundtrack, with the strength of the film's soundtrack, it can still compete with other films. Competitive. These two nominations fell through, and only one nomination for best screenplay was given, which was clearly someone who wanted to let "Titanic" go away 100% empty-handed, without giving the film the slightest hope of breaking through.
"Eric..."
Noticing that Eric's silence seemed a little long, Virginia beside him called softly.
"I'm fine," Eric came back to his senses, looked at the woman's concerned eyes, smiled, paused for a while, and suddenly whispered to himself: "I'm just reflecting, Hollywood movies There are too many companies."
Virginia didn't notice the determination flashing in Eric's eyes, and asked, "Then how appropriate do you think it is?"
"Big Four, or Big Three," Eric shrugged slightly: "If there are fewer, or they are all from our own family, we won't always think about breaking other people's bowls so that we can eat more."
Virginia also felt some strong emotions in Eric's tone at this time, smiled, and said: "Then, how is it possible."
Just as he was about to say something, the phone on the glass table vibrated. Eric looked at the number, and it was Katzenberg from Los Angeles.
Eric picked up the phone, gestured to the women, got up and said, "I'll answer the call."
While Eric and Katzenberg were discussing the possible impact of the Golden Globe nomination on the phone, in a mansion in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, Michael Eisner, who had just watched the live TV broadcast, was in a very happy mood .
Hollywood is also a commercial business. Shopping malls are like battlefields. Although the competition between several major film companies will not lead to a life-and-death fierce confrontation, the parties are also natural enemies. Push each other from time to time, and no one will relent.
Michael Eisner also participated in the operation of the "Titanic" Golden Globe nomination this time, but he will not make the mistake of a few years ago, no longer believe in any loose temporary alliance, but hide Pushing secretly behind the scenes. It was tacitly understood that other people were involved, and Michael Eisner didn't care if no one participated.
Although the relationship with Eric has eased on the surface in recent years, he will never forget the past when he was expelled from Disney. With the gradual growth of Firefly in recent years, Michael Eisner is even more He felt that if he hadn't been forced to leave Disney back then, all the status and glory of Firefly in the Hollywood industry might belong to him.
After all, in the past two years, the development of Universal in the film business can be said to be second only to Firefly. This summer, Universal's total box office has even surpassed. He feels that this is enough to prove his strength.
However, Michael Eisner also realized that the development of Universal Pictures has entered a bottleneck stage.
In recent years, with the rapid expansion of the global film market, Hollywood has gradually realized the strong advantages and huge profits of large-scale special effects films in global distribution. In addition to the background, the other six, without the support of Firefly's digital field special effects technology, unless the requirements for the quality of film special effects are greatly reduced, it would be impossible to complete these.
Regardless of whether it is Warner, Universal, or Paramount, with all their resources, they can probably only produce one or two "blockbuster" films with special effects each year. The restrictions have little to do with funding, and the main thing is CG. special effects technology.
With the development of the digital field today, in addition to the headquarters in Los Angeles, two subsidiaries have been established in Florida and Australia. The total number of employees has exceeded 2,300, and the talent is second. able to dig over.
However, compared with other special effects studios in Hollywood, the biggest advantage of the digital field is the technical accumulation of CG special effects. Eric Williams was several years ahead of other peers in the past, and invested heavily in the research and development of computer CG special effects technology. At this time, the scale of large-scale rendering farms in the digital field in terms of special effects software, rendering technology, and even hardware is two to three years ahead of other peers.
Even though they were very resistant to cooperating with Firefly, when Universal produced "The Mummy 2", they still had to hand over a large number of difficult special effects shots to the digital field. Several other major film companies also rely more or less on the digital field. It is this dependence that, on the contrary, provides more opportunities for technology research and development and accumulation in the digital field, prompting it to leave its peers in the industry farther away.
At this time, several other big film companies have actually discovered a cruel fact: if Firefly cuts off foreign cooperation in the digital field, then, undoubtedly, in the next few years, it will be difficult for them to produce special effects that are comparable to Firefly rivals the cinematography.
For the Firefly Group, which has an annual turnover of more than 20 billion US dollars, even if the "Titanic" loses completely, it will not have any substantial impact on the company in terms of economics. But many things cannot be measured by simple money.
The total investment in the production and distribution of "Titanic" reached 265 million U.S. dollars, which is unprecedented in the history of Hollywood movies. Once such a large-scale movie project fails, the blow to the confidence of Firefly Group in movie production is immeasurable .
This is what Michael Eisner expected.
Although Eric has absolute control over Firefly, he cannot completely ignore the wishes of the management and other shareholders and go his own way after all, which will only cause the Firefly Group to fall into turmoil. When a super-big project like "Titanic" fails, Firefly shareholders and executives will inevitably reflect on the film production and distribution strategies in recent years, and the result of this reflection will definitely be a long time to come. , Firefly will tend to be conservative when it comes to filmmaking.
The 2,300 employees in Firefly’s digital field are enough to support the production of four to six special effects films at the same time. Once the scale of Firefly’s film production becomes conservative due to the box office failure of "Titanic", the digital field must rely on accepting external orders. It can guarantee that its more than 2,000 employees will not have nothing to do. Then, at least in the next few years, the possibility of Firefly cutting off external cooperation in the digital field does not exist. The slowdown in the development of Firefly's film business also gives Other film companies have enough time to catch up with Firefly in terms of film production and special effects technology accumulation. When Firefly Group recovers from the failure of "Titanic", perhaps, everyone's starting line will not be so far apart.
At the Golden Globe Awards, Michael Eisner secretly pushed Firefly. Michael Eisner does not intend to continue to do superfluous things. Now almost the entire industry is bad-mouthing "Titanic", even within the Firefly Group. If the film does not report too much expectation, the failure of "Titanic" is almost inevitable. At this time, he has already begun to think about Universal's development plan for next year.
The production of "The Mummy 3" is a bit difficult. The continuous success of the first two films has led to a sharp increase in the salaries from the producers to the protagonists of the film. The production will start immediately, whether it is changing the role to reduce the budget, or increasing the budget to invite the original crew. Universal will take very big risks, so Michael Eisner decided to start the Scorpion King movie derived from the "Mummy" series, which was inspired when he saw this project a long time ago.
Sorting out the various thoughts in my mind, it was almost ten o'clock before I knew it. Michael Eisner's wife, Jane Breckenridge, began to urge her husband to rest. Michael Eisner had a near-miss two years ago After the quadruple heart bypass operation, although the recovery is good, people with a bad heart are also most taboo to stay up late. In this regard, Jane is very strict with her husband.
Hearing his wife's urging, Michael Eisner got up from the sofa in the living room and walked towards the bedroom, thinking in his mind that he would have dinner with George Lucas tomorrow and talk about the cooperation between Universal Pictures and Industrial Light & Magic.
Although there is strong support from Microsoft, Michael Eisner is not optimistic about Amberlin Films, a collaboration between Spielberg and the others. Therefore, Universal is not too active in competing for the film distribution rights of Amberlin Films. However, Michael Eisner, however, attaches great importance to the development prospects of Industrial Light and Magic. Although this special effects company is a bit far behind the digital field, as a veteran special effects giant, Industrial Light and Magic is also the last company in the same industry that may catch up with the digital field. Michael · Eisner knew very well that only when Industrial Light and Magic develops and keeps pace with the digital field can everyone avoid being suddenly stuck by fireflies. (To be continued.)