Chapter 283 The clown is actually me?
The beginning of the new year brings new things.
With the end of the New Year's Day holiday, 2017 has officially begun.
With the single-day box office falling below 10 million, the failure of "The Great Wall" is basically a foregone conclusion.
The four producers, including Leshi Pictures, China Film, Legendary (Wanda), and Universal, have a conservative estimate of 700-800 million in losses in the end.
The average loss for each company is nearly 200 million.
China Film is a big company and Universal is also a Hollywood giant. Although this loss is painful, it can still be sustained.
In comparison, Leshi and Legendary are very uncomfortable.
If it was only Leshi Pictures, then the loss would be a loss, and Meng Bai would just watch the joke.
But if Legendary also loses money, then he won't be able to have fun.
After all, behind Legendary Pictures today is Wanda.
"Sister Xi, what does Wanda say?"
In the office of Ruyi Pictures, Meng Bai sat opposite Chen Zhixi and asked her.
"Not very optimistic." Chen Zhixi shook his head and said, "I asked Wanda's new CEO Jiang about the investment in the "The Wandering Earth" project, and his reply was quite ambiguous. He just said that he had recently taken over Wanda and was busy with film projects, so let's talk about it after a while."
In the second half of last year, not long after "Detective Chinatown" was released, Wanda Film and Television changed a new "leader".
The new president is Jiang Defu, who was previously the general manager of China Film Marketing Company and was mainly responsible for the distribution of China Film's film projects.
Speaking of which, this is the fourth manager that Wanda Film and Television has changed in the past five years.
The first one was Song Ge, who left in 2013 to establish the current Jingbei Culture, which was the company that previously gave Wu Jing "800 million guarantee" for "Wolf Warrior 2".
The successor was Ye Ning, who left in 2015 and went to Huayi Film and Television.
At that time, because of his departure and the scheduling problem of "I Am Not Madame Bovary", Wanda and Huayi fell out directly.
The next person in charge was Zhao Fang, who was in charge of the "Detective Chinatown" project with Meng Bai and Chen Sicheng.
The investment plan for "The Wandering Earth" was also determined when she was in office.
Meng Bai had never met Song and Ye before, so he didn't know them. But for Zhao Fang, their cooperation was quite pleasant.
Unfortunately, she jumped to Warner in the second half of last year.
As the saying goes, people leave and tea gets cold. With the new president taking over, the investment projects left behind have become "children without a mother."
If it were a year or two ago, when Wanda Film and Television was in full swing, it wouldn't be a big deal.
It's just an investment of 30 to 50 million yuan, so just give it. At
most, it doesn't matter if you lose money, just treat it as attracting business for Oriental Film Metropolis.
Unfortunately, Wanda Film and Television has gradually become a bit strong on the outside but weak on the inside because of the strategic planning of the parent group.
Now, let alone Oriental Film Metropolis, even Wanda Film and Television itself is not sure about its future.
In this situation, a domestic science fiction film with a large investment and unknown prospects naturally becomes a resource of less quality.
"Don't wait until the crew starts filming, and Wanda tells you they want to withdraw their investment, that's really..."
In front of Chen Zhixi, Meng Bai didn't say the rest of his words.
"It's hard to say." Chen Zhixi sighed, "By the way, have you heard about the recent news in the capital market?"
Meng Bai said, "You mean Sunac's investment in Leshi.com?"
If we talk about the biggest news in the capital market these days, it must be "Sunac's 17 billion to save Leshi.com."
Last year, with Leshi.com's public announcement of its tight capital chain and the huge loss of "The Great Wall" at the end of the year, everyone thought Leshi.com was going to collapse.
But unexpectedly, Boss Jia's skill as the "God of War of Painting Big Pies" has reached a higher level, and he actually pulled Sunac to help take over.
Sunac has always been mainly engaged in real estate, and in the past two years, seeing the booming film and television industry, it also wants to learn from Wanda to engage in entertainment.
It just so happened that Leshi.com was short of money and asked for help, and the two hit it off.
But...
"Does this have anything to do with us?" Meng Bai asked.
"It's hard to say. I've only heard some rumors so far." Chen Zhixi frowned and said, "Wanda seems to want to sell most of its cultural and tourism sectors, including Wanda Plaza and Oriental Movie Metropolis. One of the parties currently in talks is also Sunac."
"Huh?"
Meng Bai was surprised.
I knew Wanda was in a bad situation, but I didn't expect it to be so bad. Even the core business was sold out. It seems that it really has no money.
Chen Zhixi was also full of emotion. Ruyi Films has been looking for a big investor behind it in recent years.
At first, it cooperated with Guangguang, and later switched to Wanda. Now Wanda is also failing, and it has to continue to look for new ways out.
"The traditional industry is too risky. If you really want to find it, it is recommended to look for emerging Internet capital." Meng Bai said.
Chen Zhixi nodded. What Meng Bai said made sense.
In recent years, except for "freaks" like Arclight Films, almost every new film and television company that has emerged has the shadow of Internet capital such as BAT behind it.
Thinking of this, she smiled: "How about it, is Arclight interested in our Ruyi?"
"Don't tease me, Sister Xi." Meng Bai said: "I am interested, but we also need money."
"No way, as far as I know, your Arclight's annual revenue last year was close to 500 million, and you still need money?"
"Well, you earn a lot but spend a lot. Compared with the capital bosses, it's still far behind." Meng Bai waved his hand.
Now Chen Zhixi was surprised: "No, you really have so much revenue?"
She had only given a relatively high estimate based on experience, just to tease this "little boy".
You know, Ruyi invested in so many film projects last year, and the total revenue was only about 500 million.
But unexpectedly, they actually achieved it.
The clown is actually me?
Looking at Chen Zhixi's surprised expression, Meng Bai showed a gentle smile and said nothing.
In fact, if only the revenue of Arclight Film and Television itself is counted, it is indeed similar to the sister's estimate.
But don't forget that Arclight also has Taiyang Chuanhe and Xiaotangren Culture, including the "online drama overseas" project in cooperation with Huace.
What's more, he also has a "king bomb" Qiming Venture Partners, which has invested in Pinduoduo.
Of course, the last one is his personal investment and cannot be counted in Arclight's project.
But Meng Bai did not lie to Chen Zhixi.
Just as he commented on himself after making his first pot of gold with "Soul Ferry" .
The speed at which you spend money is definitely faster than the speed at which you make money.
This year's Spring Festival came early, and January 27th was New Year's Eve. Excluding holidays, there was only half a month between New Year's Day and New Year's Day.
Therefore, the year-end summary, New Year's plan, and annual meeting of each company were also rushed together.
Arclight is naturally no exception. Meng Bai left Chen Zhixi and returned to Arclight to hold a New Year's meeting.
"Mr. Meng, this is the list of films planned to be broadcast and established this year, please take a look."
In the conference room, Liu Zhi threw a document on the screen.
As one of the earliest veterans who grew up with the company, this young man who previously worked alone in major drama crews in northern Beijing has become the general manager of Arclight's online drama department.
Meng Bai looked at the project names on the screen. In addition to the confirmed "Day and Night Chase" and "Psychological Crime 2", there are many projects that have not yet started but have been planned.
Like the movie version of "Psychological Crime: City of Light", "Soul Ferry: Huangquan" movie, "Detective Chinatown" online drama, "Forensic Qin Ming 2"...
Arclight has almost a dozen projects, including its own and cooperative ones.
(End of this chapter)
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