"Monsters, Inc." was supposed to be a Pixar project. Eric sold Disney's hand-drawn animation department. After the reorganization of the new Disney Animation Studio, "Monsters, Inc." director and screenwriter Peter Docter was transferred to Disney. Animation, the project that followed, became the first post-digital transformation of Disney Animation Studios.
After Paramount bought the hand-painted animation studio, it has launched two works, "Pocahontas" and "The Lion King 2". In other words, both 2D animated films were commercially successful.
Therefore, as Disney's first work after abandoning the hand-drawn animation department, if the box office of "Monsters, Inc." does not reach a satisfactory level, Eric's move to sell Disney's hand-drawn animation department is destined to be taken again. Come out to criticize and ridicule wantonly, maybe even the Firefly Group will have criticisms about it.
However, compared to the anticipation and anxiety of Katzenberg, who is directly in charge of Disney Animation Studios, Eric is much more relaxed.
Because I really like the wonderful idea of this animated film, Eric has been paying attention to the production progress of this animated film in the past two years since the establishment of the project, and also personally added some interesting story details, so , Eric is still very confident in the box office of "Monsters, Inc." What's more, the bulk of the profits of animated films is not at the box office, and peripheral products are the bulk of the profits of this type of film.
Speaking of which, stimulated by the two hit films "Titanic" at the end of last year and "Finding Nemo" this summer, and the development rights of peripheral products of the "Lion King" series are still in the hands of the company, Firefly Group's peripheral products Product sales this year have almost doubled compared to last year. In the first three quarters alone, the sales revenue of peripheral products has reached 2.5 billion US dollars.
Due to the release of another new 3D movie "Monsters, Inc." at the end of the year, and the fact that Thanksgiving and Christmas are both peak consumption seasons, the company expects that in the last quarter, the sales revenue of the company's peripheral products is likely to exceed 1 billion US dollars.
This also means that the sales revenue of Firefly Group's peripheral products in 1997 will reach 3.5 billion US dollars.
The sales revenue of peripheral products of US$3.5 billion is almost equivalent to 10% of the annual revenue of the entire Firefly Group, while in previous years, this figure was usually only about 5%.
Moreover, compared with the average net profit margin of about 11% for all businesses under the Firefly Group, the net profit margin of peripheral products has reached 25%. Therefore, only the peripheral products will bring more than 800 million US dollars in profit to Firefly Group this year.
With a little comparison, you can see how amazing the income of the Firefly Group's peripheral products is.
According to the published data, in the first three quarters, Time Warner Group's revenue from peripheral products combined was only 370 million U.S. dollars, and the profit was even more pitiful. This is because Warner Bros. released "Batman and Robin" this year. Although the box office failed miserably, it has somewhat driven the sales of Batman peripherals.
Even for Viacom, which relies on the blockbuster chain store as a retail channel to develop peripheral business, although "The Lion King 2" brought Paramount a good box office revenue, because there is no peripheral business of the "Lion King" series. In terms of development rights, Viacom's peripheral product sales revenue in the first three quarters was less than 600 million US dollars, and even the profit figures of Firefly Group's peripheral products were not as good.
After attending the premiere of "Monsters, Inc." and showing his face at the subsequent party, Eric left early.
Back at the Horn Manor, it was past ten o'clock at night.
Entering the lobby of the villa, Eric saw lights in the reception area on the west side of the glass curtain wall.
Walking all the way, I saw Aniston wrapped in a blanket, curled up on the sofa and sleeping soundly like a kitten, a white Fireflyer player with headphones fell on the floor next to her, and there was a book in hand Opened Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.
Carefully picked up the Fireflyer player and "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" and put them on the coffee table, Eric did not disturb Aniston, and walked lightly to the kitchen.
A pot of coffee was brought over, and he sat down on the sofa next to Aniston. Eric offered himself a cup of coffee, and began to look through the thick pile of documents placed on the coffee table in the reception area.
After staying in the UK for a month, although the Firefly Group is operating as usual, the huge scale of the Firefly system is placed there. During this period of time, there are still a lot of things that need to be handled by Eric himself. The documents and materials related to the company's administrative affairs are all placed in the office, and the pile on the coffee table in front of him is basically the film project materials.
Compared with this year's series of heavyweight and big-budget films, Firefly's film release plan for next year has been reduced a lot.
Aside from Michael Bay's The Day After Tomorrow, there won't be any major blockbusters next year.
There could have been a sequel to "The Matrix", but Eric sold the production rights of "The Matrix" to Amberlin Films, which was established by Spielberg and others, and Paramount, which is currently in charge of distribution, has already sold "The Matrix" The Matrix 2 is scheduled for next summer, but there is no news about The Matrix 3 yet. I don’t know if Amberlin and Paramount will be as impatient as the original Time Warner to release the Matrix 3 by the end of next year. " is also taken out. Since Amberlin took over the back-to-back filming plan of the Wachowski brothers at the beginning, and there was no rumor of revising the script later, Eric is still not too optimistic about these two sequels.
Although with the popularity accumulated in the first part, the two sequels will definitely make Amberlin and Paramount a fortune, but Eric has no regrets. Eric invested the 300 million U.S. dollars obtained from the sale of the sequel production rights of "The Matrix" into the Clover Fund to buy technology stocks. Now the 300 million U.S. dollars has doubled, and will double or triple in the next two years Still no problem. In comparison, the two sequels of "The Matrix", even if calculated based on the global box office of 1.2 billion US dollars in the previous life, plus the video tape revenue in the later period, the revenue brought to Amberlin and Paramount will definitely not exceed 600 million Dollar.
Withdrawing his drifting thoughts, Eric glanced at the document in his hand.
This is a 3D-IMAX format movie that IMAX Corporation plans to produce, called "Return to the Cretaceous". Before Firefly acquired IMAX, the film had already been approved. The IMAX company has changed hands, and the decision on whether to start shooting the film falls to Firefly.
The film was planned to run only 45 minutes, with a budget of $15 million. Prior to this, IMAX was basically assisting some museums in the production of IMAX documentaries. Although this film was only planned to be 45 minutes long, if it was produced, it would be considered the first IMAX format film.
Eric simply flipped through the script, it was very rough, but think about it, this film is not for telling a story, but mainly for promoting and displaying 3D-IMAX technology.
After thinking about it for a while, Eric picked up the pen on the coffee table and wrote a line at the end of the document, agreeing to the filming of the film. There are still two years to go before the implementation of the '4200' plan. This film can indeed be used to show the visual effects of 3D-IMAX in advance, and at the same time allow the IMAX team to continue to accumulate technology.
Putting the folder aside, Eric read several other scripts one after another.
Due to the long production cycle of special effects blockbusters, it is inevitable that Firefly will experience a short trough in this regard. Since Firefly will only have "The Day After Tomorrow" next year's heavyweight big-budget movie, Eric intends to look for a few mid- to low-budget movies with good box office potential to fill this vacancy.
The project that has already been approved is "Teddy Bear". Although it is also a special effects movie, the production of "Teddy Bear" is much simpler than "Iron Man" and "Lord of the Rings". It is expected to be released by the end of next year.
In addition, Eric asked Katzenberg to send people to Japan to search for horror movie scripts.
Right now, two horror movie scripts, "The Ring" and "The Grudge" are placed in the pile of files in front of him. This is Eric contacted by email when he was in the UK. He has not had time to read the selected, detailed script.
Eric remembered that "Midnight Ring" was released in 1998, and originally thought that Firefly could only get the remake rights.
But unexpectedly, when the staff of Firefly was searching for the script of the horror film in Japan, although the script of this classic horror film had been completed, the filming had not yet started.
Naturally, the Japanese didn't know that "Midnight Ring" would break the box office record of Japanese horror films. Since the script was favored by Hollywood giants, they naturally offered it with both hands, so Firefly easily cut the script. The other "The Grudge" was obtained directly from the original screenwriter and director Takashi Shimizu, but it did not encounter any twists and turns.
After quietly reading the script for a while, Eric raised his head and was about to pick up his coffee, but saw Aniston woke up at some point, lying there with a pair of beautiful eyes wide open, looking at him motionless.
Eric smiled and clapped his hands, saying, "Come on, give me a hug."
Aniston pouted dissatisfiedly when he heard Eric's words teasing a kitten. However, Xiao Niu quickly kicked off the blanket on her body again, and floated over lightly.
Eric watched Aniston rushing towards him, quickly put the folder on his lap aside, and stretched out his hand to hug the little girl.
After kissing that sweet face, Eric smiled and said, "I told you to go to the premiere with me a long time ago. Isn't it deserted to stay here alone?"
Aniston's pointed chin slammed on Eric's shoulder, and he said lazily, "I'm not going, I don't want to be found out that I'm reconciled with you again."
"Heh, what you're doing is like stealing a bell by plugging your own ears. Last time there was such a big commotion, you still expect others not to know," Eric put his arms around her waist, teasing with a smile.
Aniston gnawed lightly on Eric's shoulder in dissatisfaction, but he was wearing a coat and the taste was not very good, so he quickly let go of his little white teeth and said, "Anyway, with you, even if they know, they will You have to pretend you don't know."
"Well, that's true," Eric still smiled, but the big hand on Aniston's waist lifted the hem of her close-fitting sweater dissatisfied.
"You guy." Sensing the movement of Eric's big hand, Aniston twisted her waist, not knowing whether she was resisting or pandering. After a while, feeling that Eric's movements were getting more and more excessive, she said again : "Don't be here, go to the bedroom."
"Okay," Eric said, holding Xiao Niu up, "Let's go take a shower first."
…
The next day, he was woken up by a knock on the door.
Eric had just opened his eyes, and before he got confused, the bedroom door was pushed open. Drew rushed in with a smirk, and jumped onto the big bed: "Hey, little fat girl, good morning."
Having said that, the girl really grabbed Aniston with her cold hands unceremoniously.
The little girl who was also a bit confused at first came to her senses when she saw Drew, like a cat encountering a natural enemy, she grabbed a pillow to block Drew without hesitation, and said without any sign of weakness: "Little Bichi, you Think I can't beat you?"
"Ha, let's try."
"Wait, don't run away."
With that said, the two are already entangled.
Eric put on his clothes helplessly. Seeing that Aniston and Drew didn't intend to greet important parts, he knew that they had a sense of proportion in their hearts, so he didn't dissuade them, and planned to let the cats fight.
When I walked to the door, I planned to go to another bathroom to wash up. When I saw the twins guarding the door, I ordered: "Keep an eye on them, and pull them away if you are in a hurry. If Drew wants you to help, just pretend you didn't hear it, and you are not allowed to meddle in it in the future." and things like that."
Seeing the twins nodding to express their understanding, Eric left with confidence.
After a brief wash, I went to exercise for a while before going to the kitchen to prepare breakfast for everyone.
While frying eggs, Aniston and Drew finally appeared in the restaurant outside. Although the two women were still arguing, they didn't intend to fight anymore.
"Hey, after exercising, let's get ready to eat," Eric said, lifting his chin towards the prepared bread: "Take these to the restaurant, and if you want to eat anything else, go find it in the refrigerator yourself. "
The girl came over with a smile and said, "Eric, there is a lack of a heroine in a movie that MGM is preparing. If you want a sweetheart type, it is best to be over thirty years old."
Not to be outdone, the chick said, "Hmph, then you are just right. It would be better to be like in "Scream", where you were hung on a tree within five minutes of the opening."
Eric knocked on the heads of the two women, and said: "Okay, today's confrontation is over, if you want to find someone over 30 years old, contact Meg Ryan, and if you want to act in a horror movie, find I, uh, someone go get me today's newspaper." (To be continued.)