Chapter 349: The Smoke of North American Summer Movies
When Liu Zhou came to the United States again, the covers of all the political news media in this land had been changed.

The unprecedented skin color has brought a new wave of changes to American society.

But this has nothing to do with Liu Zhou. Even if he wants to worry about it, he can't reach that level. Even if he reaches that level, he is not allowed to write about it.

Otherwise, Liu Zhou would have to go to the wedding of a real estate tycoon's daughter this year to get to know the woman who would later become the first socialite in the United States and a rare tough guy in the United States.

Berkshire, Summit Entertainment headquarters.

Liu Zhou arrived in the United States, rested for a day, adjusted to the jet lag, and then headed straight here.

Currently, Summit Entertainment has moved its headquarters from New York to Berkshire, which is not far from Hollywood and is also home to the headquarters of many film companies.

Companies like Warner, one of the seven major Hollywood companies, and New Line, the leader of Hollywood's second-tier film companies, are now neighbors of Summit Entertainment.

But now, New Line has been completely acquired by Warner.

In the 1980s, Warner only acquired part of New Line's shares. New Line Cinema still had a great deal of autonomy, and it was difficult for Warner to get involved.

However, last year, taking advantage of the financial crisis, Warner completely turned New Line into its wholly-owned subsidiary.

This acquisition and Liu Zhou's acquisition of Summit Entertainment were both major events that happened in Hollywood last year.

However, these two acquisitions pale in comparison to Disney's acquisition of Marvel Comics earlier this year.

Shortly after the beginning of 2009, Disney acquired Marvel for an extremely high price of US$42 billion, which not only caused a sensation in Hollywood, but also in the entire United States.

In the United States, there have always been two major comic giants, one is DC and the other is Marvel. Marvel is the name changed after Marvel Comics.

DC owns Superman and Batman, two of the most famous superheroes in the United States, so it was acquired by Warner Bros. Pictures early on.

So Superman and Batman were adapted into movies and TV shows very early on, and the box office has always been good.

Just as TVB used to send out Jin Yong dramas when its ratings were lower than ATV's, Warner also played the Superman or Batman cards when its box office performance was poor.

However, compared to the stability of DC Comics, Marvel has had much more ups and downs. It has been on the verge of bankruptcy several times and even sold a lot of the copyrights of its superheroes.

It wasn't until last year that Marvel made a desperate effort and mortgaged all its assets to shoot "Iron Man".

This pioneering work of the Marvel Universe did not disappoint Marvel, achieving both box office success and critical acclaim, and grossed $5.85 million worldwide.

This immediately made Marvel a hot commodity.

Coupled with the good box office performance of "The Incredible Hulk" and Marvel's subsequent ambitious Marvel Universe plan, it finally attracted the attention of Disney.

After only half a year of negotiations, Disney completely took Marvel into its possession.

Since Michael Eisner stepped down and Robert Iger took over Disney, he started a series of buying sprees.

First, in 2006, it acquired Pixar Animation for $70 billion. In the animation film market, Pixar has a huge lead, and its technological strength is also far ahead of its peers. It is known as the "jackpot" by the outside world.

Although the animations produced by DreamWorks Animation are good, their technical level is notoriously rough, only slightly better than that of Blue Sky Animation Studio, which produced "Ice Age".

Then this year, they spent $42 billion to acquire Marvel.

Two years later, Disney spent another $40 billion to acquire Lucasfilm and added the "Star Wars" series.

Finally, a few years later, it acquired 20th Century Fox, also one of the seven major Hollywood studios.

This also allowed Disney to become the world's number one media group.

Although Disney spent so much money to acquire these companies, they have already made their money back through the full copyright development of these numerous well-known IPs.

It was just a few days after Disney acquired Marvel, and the heat was exploding, with almost the entire Hollywood talking about it.

Although Liu Zhou was envious, he also knew that at the moment he could only envy.

This is a bit far from Liu Zhou. Instead of envying others, it is better to focus on doing your own thing.

So Liu Zhou quickly put aside his thoughts about Marvel and focused all his attention on his own company's movies.

"Anthony, is the premiere of Twilight all set?"

"Boss, don't worry. It has been arranged. The date is set for two days from now at the China National Theater. Many guests have been invited. The momentum will definitely not disappoint you."

"That's good. Right now the outside world isn't very optimistic about our film. We'll give them a good slap in the face this time."

In fact, "Twilight" has not been favored by the outside world since the project was launched, because many people think that this novel is a follow-up to "Harry Potter".

But compared to "Harry Potter", "Twilight" is more melodramatic.

However, it is precisely because of the melodramatic love in "Twilight" that it is the biggest selling point of this series of movies.

“Boss, since we’ve already postponed the release to April, why not put it at the end of April?

At the end of April, the strength of the movies in the same period was not very strong. "Twilight" can first take a week's box office, and then rush into the summer season in May, and then take as much as it can." "There is no need to be so radical. This is the first movie of "Twilight". The most important thing is to get off to a good start and build the reputation of the movie first.

As long as the first film is a hit, we will go for the summer season starting with the second film, so we will just rely on the box office in April, which is also safer.”

If last year's Hollywood summer season was abnormal, this year's is no less so.

"Transformers 2", "Harry Potter 6", "Up", "Wolverine", "Star Trek", "Ice Age 3", and "G.I. Joe" are either big productions or big IP series.

Ordinary movies put into the summer season can only serve as cannon fodder.

Although Liu Zhou is confident about "Twilight", this is after all the first film in the series. Without influence and without the outside world's optimism, rushing into the summer season would be no different from being cannon fodder.

But in fact, Anthony Edwards' idea is not wrong. If the movie is released at the end of April, it will earn box office revenue in a week and also help to promote the reputation of the movie.

If we rush into the summer season now, we will have a fighting chance and may even achieve very good results.

After all, although the North American summer season is highly competitive, it is also the peak season of the year, and the bonus to the box office is considerable.

But unfortunately, among the movies released in late April this year, there is one that looks harmless but is actually a dark horse.

It is the work that the American entertainment director Wen Nanzhu often uses to make himself famous, "The Hangover".

The total investment of "The Hangover" was only 35 million US dollars, but it earned nearly 400 million US dollars at the global box office, and nearly 300 million US dollars in North America.

Historically, "The Hangover" followed the path that Liu Zhou just described. It first earned box office revenue for a month at the end of April, built its reputation, and then entered the summer season.

"The Hangover" not only perfectly replicated what Liu Zhou said, but also became a mess after entering the summer season.

Not only did it defeat Fox's "Wolverine", but it also faced off against the newly released Pixar Animation's "Up".

Although "Wolverine" did not perform well at the box office in mainland China due to its poor local conditions, it is still highly regarded in North America.

Although 20th Century Fox only has the copyright to Marvel's X-Men, even after leaving the Marvel universe, it still created a worldview of its own and produced many hits.

This also became a treasure trove for 20th Century Fox and the only series of films that Fox could show off after entering the new century.

As a super popular character in the "X-Men" series, Wolverine is also highly anticipated despite being the first film.

In fact, the box office of "Wolverine" is not bad, otherwise there would not be a sequel. It's just that compared with "The Hangover", it is not good enough.

From this we can see how thoroughly dark horse "The Hangover" is.

Therefore, if "Twilight" is released at the same time as "The Hangover", there is a high possibility that it will be used as cannon fodder by "The Hangover", "Wolverine" and "Up" one after another.

This is also the fundamental reason why Liu Zhou insisted on releasing "Twilight" in early April.

But Liu Zhou couldn't explain these words to Anthony Edwards, so he could only use "stability" to deal with him.

However, Anthony Edwards was obviously not convinced by Liu Zhou's words, but because of his trust in Liu Zhou, he did not say anything more.

Liu Zhou also changed the subject:

"By the way, how many theaters did we secure for the opening of Twilight this time?"

"2150! I tried my best to negotiate this."

"That's great. It's very rare to have more than 2,000 theaters opening in April. Anthony, thank you for your hard work."

The schedules at other times are not like the summer schedule. During the summer schedule, movies released can open in three to four thousand theaters.

So if your distribution capabilities are not good enough, you are actually not qualified to compete in the summer season.

Summit Entertainment's distribution capabilities can only attract 1,700 theaters at most. Perhaps with more effort, they may be able to negotiate for another 100 or 200, which will be the limit.

But this time, Anthony Edwards was able to negotiate 2150 theaters, obviously he tried his best.

He not only relied on Summit Entertainment's distribution capabilities, but also used his own connections.

He has been engaged in distribution in Hollywood for 10 to 20 years and served as the head of the distribution department at Lionsgate, so he has some connections in the distribution industry.

Liu Zhou can only be thankful that he did not choose the wrong person at the helm, but he will also remember Anthony Edwards' dedication and diligence.

"Boss, this is what I should do." Edwards said with a smile.
“Has Lucy started filming?”

“It was already started at the end of last month.”

I originally wanted to talk to Anne Hathaway about our relationship, but since I have to go film a movie, I can only do it next time.

"Okay, after Twilight is released, spend more time on Lucy. This is also a key project of our Summit."

"Understood, Boss."

(End of this chapter)