Chapter 558 Company

Lu Yanhe was actually prepared to be "treated casually" by Jin Zhiyan, but on the way there, he thought about it and felt that something was not quite right.

Kim Ji-yeon wouldn't ignore him—it wasn't him who wanted to see Kim Ji-yeon, it was Kim Ji-yeon who wanted to see him.

To ensure there would be something to talk about later and to prevent the conversation from going cold, Lu Yanhe searched online for some reports and interviews about Kim Ji-yeon, as well as some of his works.

Lu Yanhe has seen several of Kim Ji-yeon's films. After all, she is a rare film director in this world who can blend artistry and commercial appeal.

Directors who can do this are rare in any country.

The same applies to Hollywood.

His audiovisual style is actually quite simple, without many flashy or showy techniques. But because of this, he can shoot any subject matter. He has filmed monsters, disasters, suspense, crime, science fiction, and many other genres, making him a versatile artist.

They met at a high-end club.

Just in case, after receiving the address, Lu Yanhe specifically asked a friend he knew in South Korea to check what kind of place it was, lest he accidentally stumble into a place like the "Nth Room," where he would have no way of explaining himself—such things are not uncommon in South Korea, and have been reported in the news countless times.

Fortunately, nothing sordid happened.

Kim Ji-yeon had a friendly smile and a warm attitude. As soon as he entered, he stood up to greet him, without the arrogance that Lu Yanhe had expected.

Upon meeting him, Kim Ji-yeon expressed her liking and respect for him.

Lu Yanhe knew that Koreans had a strong sense of seniority. He wasn't surprised that Kim Ji-yeon had expressed his liking for him, but hearing the word "respect" from him was still quite unexpected.

"Thank you, Director." Since the other party was so polite, Lu Yanhe naturally returned the courtesy in kind.

To Lu Yanhe's surprise, when Jin Zhiyan asked to meet him, it wasn't to say that she wanted him to act in a movie.

Kim Ji-yeon is currently working with others to start a pan-Asian content film and television company and wants to bring Lu Yanhe on board.

"Pan-Asian?" Lu Yanhe was quite surprised when he heard this term, because he had heard it before in Maxine and HP.

This is mainly to expand the market reach.

It's like taking a show that was originally only broadcast in Thailand and promoting it throughout Asia.

Kim Ji-yeon was the first director to approach Lu Yanhe to collaborate on this so-called "pan-Asian" content.

Lu Yanhe said, "Director, what do you want me to do if you want me to join in?"

Kim Ji-yeon said, "There's so much you can do: directing, screenwriting, acting... I heard that your film 'Love Letter' will have its world premiere at the Jose Film Festival this year?"

"Yes." Lu Yanhe nodded.

"It's really enviable that your directorial debut was screened at a top film festival like the Jose Film Festival," Kim Ji-yeon laughed. "You have a great reputation and influence in Asia and are a leading figure among the younger generation. So, if we can establish a pan-Asian production company together, we're sure to be able to create some great works."

Lu Yanhe nodded and said, "I've been hearing about the Pan-Asian concept a lot lately, it seems like everyone is doing it."

“Because of the rise of streaming media,” Kim Ji-yeon said. “Streaming media has completely broken down the barriers and monopolies of traditional television stations, bringing together various markets. In the past, when we produced a show, the potential audience was just people in China, but now it’s different; it’s the whole of Asia.”

"However, TV series are still more popular on streaming platforms, right? It seems that movies still have a much smaller influence on streaming compared to theatrical releases."

Lu Yanhe was stating a fact.

Compared to the influence of streaming series, streaming movies are only slightly better than online movies, but they have not yet entered the mainstream.

Cinemas are more resilient than television stations.

Kim Ji-yeon nodded, "That's right."

"Director, does your pan-Asian production company provide content for streaming media, or..."

"Of course, it's not just streaming media; I'm just using streaming media as an example. In fact, I hope to concentrate our resources and strength to expand our power and enable our works to have better production conditions in Asia."

Upon hearing this, Lu Yanhe understood instantly.

Essentially, it's about creating a brand, making it brighter and more eye-catching, so that interested people will invest and provide funding. Why did Kim Ji-yeon want to invite him? Because he could attract investment.

Lu Yanhe: "..."

-

"Is he... trying to make a quick buck?" That was Chen Ziyan's first reaction.

On the way back, Lu Yanhe said, "Maybe they also want to get funding to make a movie."

A director will do anything to raise money to make a movie.

While a renowned director like Kim Ji-yeon likely has a stable source of funding for her films, making a film with a slightly higher budget would still be quite challenging. Everyone is concerned about recouping costs and generating profit.

No one invests purely to help the director realize their dream—you can realize your dream, but that must be a byproduct of making money.

However, what Kim Ji-yeon told him gave him a bit of inspiration.

What direction should Linghe Productions take in the future?

Pan-Asian.

Isn't Linghe's current copyright operation plan another form of pan-Asian?

-

The Mist earned $13.8 million at the North American box office on Sunday, bringing its opening weekend total to approximately $40 million. This not only secured the top spot at the weekend box office but also allowed The Mist's promoters to confidently declare it a "huge box office success."

The Mist also performed well at the overseas box office, opening in various European countries and earning around $12 million in its opening weekend.

Horror films are different from other movies—Hollywood movies generally perform well at the domestic box office and also perform well at the overseas box office, but horror films are an exception because they are a niche genre, and in other countries, the audience for horror films is not as large as that in Hollywood.

After finishing their promotional tour in South Korea, Lu Yanhe and Lu Yanhe traveled to Japan to attend the Japanese premiere of "Misty".

Next is Thailand.

They were absent from Singapore.

Because he had used up his two days of weekend time, he had to rush back to participate in the filming of "Friends".

There were promotional activities in only these four locations across Asia.

Because The Mist performed well on Monday, falling only 37%.

This gave D19 greater hopes for The Mist's box office performance.

As for overseas box office revenue, since South Korea, Japan, and Thailand are all major markets for horror films, they also hope to make a fortune there.

In particular, Lu Yanhe's influence in Asia, as well as the "Asian revenge" theme that this horror film has been promoting, have made this movie very popular in various Asian countries.

-

"It's a real pity that 'The Mist' can't be released in mainland China. Otherwise, with Lu Yanhe's appeal in mainland China, it would have grossed at least tens of millions of dollars."

D19 CEO Kaiser Murray hasn't had a smile on his face for the past few days.

The Mist grossed $40 million at the North American box office in its opening weekend. Considering its production costs, it would have broken even and started making a profit in the opening weekend alone, if it weren't for the significant additional marketing and distribution costs.

However, under the current circumstances, marketing and promotion costs will definitely continue to increase.

The performance of "The Mist" on weekdays showed them the potential for the film to generate further box office value.

It's worth noting that commercial horror films like "The Mist" typically see their box office performance plummet more on weekdays than films of other genres.

After a few days of release, Lu Yanhe's performance has become a hot topic of discussion on social media.

Lu Yanhe is not an unfamiliar name to audiences in Europe and America. Many people already knew him before the film was released, and this was especially true for film critics in Europe and America.

Lu Yanhe has produced so many remarkable works in recent years that it's hard not to know him.

Lu Yanhe's performance in "The Mist" wasn't particularly challenging or complex in terms of the role itself. The real difficulty lay in portraying the character with enough "personality."

In Lu Yanhe's understanding, these types of characters are all "specialized" characters. They have many more "inhuman" qualities than traditional characters. Once such a quality is found and amplified to its extreme, it will create a striking visual effect on the screen and leave a deep impression on the audience—because it is rare.

The Asian ghost played by Lu Yanhe stunned everyone the moment he appeared on screen.

At first, his indifference, as if he had no breath or emotion, floated around those people like a soft ribbon. In addition to the sensory stimulation presented by the combination of sound effects and editing, it also brought a chilling psychological feeling on a deeper level.

His seemingly clean and clear eyes seemed to conceal a thick black fog.

In his portrayal of this character, Lu Yanhe amplified the expressiveness of the "form," making the character's traits more distinct than in his previous roles, requiring no guessing, feeling, or pondering from the audience.

But this kind of performance style is exactly what "The Mist" needs.

His acting skills in portraying characters earned him unanimous praise from the media and audiences under these circumstances.

An organization conducted a survey of the audience of "The Mist," and Lu Yanhe ranked first on the list of the most popular actors in the film.

The media's fondness for him speaks for itself; just look at the amount of media exposure and the number of comments about him.

-

There were still some voices in China stubbornly resisting, attacking Lu Yanhe for playing a villain in a horror film and smearing the image of Chinese people.

With the release of this film, its content and themes were also spread. At this point, even though people in China hadn't seen the film, they knew what it was about.

Lu Yanhe's fans immediately stood up for themselves.

—He played a ghost who seeks revenge and kills white people, and he even won the approval of white people for such a role!

This is extremely difficult.

—Never assume that Asians are no longer discriminated against or can sit at the table on equal footing just because they seem to have more opportunities after the so-called "political correctness" storm has swept through. That's not the case at all.

The more people understand this principle, the more they realize how difficult it is for Lu Yanhe to deliver a performance in "Mist" that garnered more praise than criticism from Europe and America.

Lu Yanhe reflected on his performance and told Chen Ziyan, "It's because I played a good role and also happened to be in a movie promotion that was very beneficial to my personal image."

Chen Ziyan nodded: "Indeed, in this movie you seem to be the villain, but in the end you are the victim, especially in the version that director Mu Ken edited at the end, it's as if you are the protagonist of the movie."

"According to the script, that's not actually the case; the main focus is on the three characters, Arne and his companion."

“Yes, but the editing changed.” Chen Ziyan said, “Obviously, the controversy that occurred during filming, and the attention you received at that time, increased your weight in the post-production editing stage.”

"I also want to thank Director Mu Ken's wife, Hua Ruzhen," Chen Ziyan added. "She kept emphasizing to Director Mu Ken that since you performed the best, why not keep more of your scenes? That's why many of your scenes were kept in the second half."

Lu Yanhe nodded.

"By the way, Sister Ziyan, actually, when Director Kim Ji-yeon talked to me about the Pan-Asian project the other day, I remembered that Hua Ruzhen told me that she might also be getting more involved in film and television investment later."

Chen Ziyan nodded, "I know that. There is a foundation in the United States that is optimistic about the film and television market in Asia, so they want to find someone who understands film and television production to invest in it. Hua Ruzhen has been in charge of cultural industry investments for a group of wealthy people in her circle, so she has been listed as one of the candidates. The chances are very high."

Lu Yanhe said, "If that's really the case, then we can keep the copyrights for many of our productions and build our own teams to do them."

Chen Ziyan nodded and said, "Yes, it's fortunate that we poached Hu Siwei before. With him, the company has now assembled a team for production. With him around, we can save a lot of trouble."

Lu Yanhe: "Then should I write a few more scripts?"

“If you can write, it would be best if you could write several more. There’s no rush to film them. Just put them here first, and we’ll have many more options,” Chen Ziyan said. “Your script is our trump card. Of course, if we really want to further expand the scale of Linghe, we certainly can’t rely solely on your script. We can develop more projects like ‘Roommates’.”

Previously, when Lu Yanhe wanted to film a movie called "Love Letter", he had to borrow people from various places to assemble a good team and start filming directly.

So, Linghe still needs to cultivate its own stable team. However, cultivation takes time, and if it waits until it's ready for large-scale development to start cultivating talent, it will definitely be too late. Good production talent and a good production team cannot be created overnight.

Hu Siwei wanted to make the low-budget sitcom "Roommates," and it also served as practice material for the production team he assembled.

Lu Yanhe said to Chen Ziyan, "Sister Ziyan, I think we might need to invite some more production talents to Linghe. Our company's current funds may not be enough to risk investing hundreds of millions in projects, but if there are suitable stories, we can make more low-budget dramas like 'Roommates'."

Chen Ziyan: "I have also been considering this matter. However, the biggest shortcoming of Linghe right now is not a lack of money, but a lack of people. But we don't have enough money to recruit people by throwing money at them."

Chen Ziyan smiled as she said this, "Do you know what I'm even thinking about?"

"Hmm?" Lu Yanhe looked at Chen Ziyan with some confusion.

Chen Ziyan said, "Aren't we going to make 'The Birth of an Actor'? Each episode has a live-action segment. I was thinking, if possible, could we use this to test some new production teams?"

“This won’t do, don’t use this to test our skills.” Lu Yanhe immediately rejected it. “The short films in each episode of ‘The Birth of an Actor’ are to be high-quality and skillful, so that the audience can see that they are good. Using a new director is too unreliable.”

According to Lu Yanhe's plan, he even intended to invite established directors such as Luo Yuzhong, Chen Lingling, Fu Kai, and Liu Bige to direct this short film.

“However, Sister Ziyan, now that you mention it, I have an idea,” Lu Yanhe said. “Didn’t our previous ‘Green Onion Project’ fail? After reviewing it myself, I think a big reason why the project failed was that truly talented directors were worried about wasting their time because of the low barrier to entry. So they observed at first, and when they found that it didn’t really make a splash, they stopped participating.”

“What if we could put up real money and help them turn their scripts into movies?” Lu Yanhe said. “It’s not like a competition, but more like a film pitching festival. Do you think they would be willing to come?”

Chen Ziyan: "Isn't this a bit risky? Giving them real money to make a movie? It would cost at least several million, right?"

"But if we want to cultivate our own filming team, especially directors, is this the only way to achieve fundamental results?" Lu Yanhe asked.

"Of course, it's about cultivating new talent, especially directors directly under our own Linghe umbrella. This is something any film and television company would definitely do, but it's too unpredictable. Maybe we'll search for three or five years and still not find a director like that," Chen Ziyan said.

Lu Yanhe was suddenly stunned.

etc.

"Sister Ziyan, I suddenly thought of someone."

"Huh?" Chen Ziyan looked at him in confusion.

Lu Yanhe said, "Do you remember He Han, Liu Bige's friend? He wanted to make a movie with me before, the script for 'Miss Ning,' but it didn't work out because of funding issues."

“I remember him.” Chen Ziyan was somewhat surprised and asked, “You want to poach him from the company?”

Lu Yanhe said, "I've known him for a long time and we've talked many times. He is indeed very talented."

Chen Ziyan hesitated for a moment and said, "But it's no longer appropriate for you to act in 'Miss Ning' now. A cameo role? Another cameo role for a new director? The script for 'Miss Ning' is indeed quite good, about the awakening of female consciousness, but there have been quite a few movies with this theme in recent years, so it's no longer suitable for you to play a cameo role at this time."

Lu Yanhe said, "It doesn't necessarily have to be 'Miss Ning.' He can adapt other people's novels into screenplays like Liu Bige did, or he can buy other people's screenplays. What I mean is, if he is willing to sign with us, we can support him to make the movies he wants to make."

“I’ll talk to him,” Chen Ziyan said. “I haven’t been in touch with him for a long time.”

“I haven’t been in touch with him for a long time,” Lu Yanhe said. “I wonder what he’s doing now.”

-

In fact, since the two of them had already decided to further expand the scale of Linghe and increase the reserve of production talents, they immediately started to work on the relevant plans.

Whether it's seeking out He Han or using genuine silver to attract talented young new directors to discuss projects with them, these are just attempts.

Like Lu Yanhe, he actually had another very powerful channel, which was to ask big-name directors in the industry like Luo Yuzhong and Chen Lingling to recommend him.

In the entertainment industry, everyone knows some talented and capable people who haven't made it big for various reasons.

Just like Li Fenglei, who assisted Zhao Yuan in the movie "Love Letter".

If you can gain their approval, it means that this person must have something special.

Lu Yanhe asked many friends to recommend relevant talents for him, and then handed them over to Chen Yin, the current vice president of Linghe, and Hu Siwei, the content supervisor, to discuss.

However, although they are casting a wide net to find people and they desperately need them, given the company's financial situation this year, with "Roommates," "Chinese Paladin," and "Raise the Red Lantern" all scheduled to start filming this year, the budget that can be allocated to personnel expenses is still tight, and they cannot use all their resources to recruit.

A meeting was held, and a clear goal was established: aside from the necessary administrative staff in each department, recruitment for film and television production talent could only be based on the bare minimum required for crew positions. Once recruited, the filming projects must be kept on schedule; otherwise, having recruited people with no work to do would be a huge waste.

One by one, item by item, link by link.

After finishing his work with the "Friends" crew each day, Lu Yanhe had to hold meetings with Linghe's team every evening to sort out the company's key tasks and work plans for the year, clarifying them one by one, and then making relevant arrangements around them to coordinate the time nodes as much as possible and reduce losses.

The reason why it took so long to sort things out is not because Xu Tianming and Chen Yin hadn't made a plan, but because Lu Yanhe and Chen Ziyan had many more ideas, and if they were to be added back, everything would have to start all over again.

This is how it is for companies in a period of rapid growth.

No one knows whether tomorrow will bring another huge opportunity for development; we can only face these things as if we were fighting a war.

(End of this chapter)