Chapter 441 Zhang Yimou and Xu Ke's Second Battle
Compared to the sensational news that Zhang Yimou joined Golden Harvest Group, the news announced by Golden Harvest afterwards was relatively less shocking.

Despite this, it also attracted the attention of people in the industry.

First of all, the film "The Flowers of War", directed by Zhang Yimou and starring Hollywood superstar Christian Bale, has been officially approved.

One is the most famous director in the country, and the other is a Hollywood superstar. Even if Zhang Yimou is not in the whirlpool of public opinion at this time, the collaboration between the two will still cause a sensation.

Christian Bale is a new superstar in Hollywood. Through his independent films with Liu Zhou and Christopher Nolan, he has proved his ability to bring in box office success alone.

However, what really made him a world-class superstar was his collaboration with Christopher Nolan in the Batman series.

The second film, "The Dark Knight," grossed over $1 billion worldwide, making it the third film in the world to gross over $1 billion.

It is also the third highest-grossing film in history, second only to James Cameron's "Titanic" and "Avatar".

Christian Bale also became famous worldwide with the "Batman" series, and domestic audiences also got to know him through this series.

Although Christian Bale is not as famous as Nicolas Cage in mainland China, he still leaves a deep impression on mainland audiences because "The Dark Knight" was released not long ago.

Before the filming of "Moon" started, Zhang Yimou was also quite indignant because Lu Chuan's "Jinling Jinling" caused a public outcry.

So he also wanted to make a movie that reflected the Jinling incident, and finally he set his sights on Yan Geling's novel "The Flowers of War".

Later, while filming "Moon", he was also taking into account the preparations for "The Flowers of War".

There is no need to worry about the script of "The Flowers of War", as Golden Harvest has a strong screenwriting department and Yan Geling is in charge. The most important thing is the role of the male lead, the priest.

It is definitely not a small-scale project when Zhang Yimou comes to shoot this film. "The Flowers of War" is built on the scale of a blockbuster.

So it is impossible to just invite a foreign actor to make up the numbers. If we have to invite someone, we must invite a Hollywood superstar.

Liu Zhou was also very interested in Zhang Yimou's movie and personally helped him find the male lead.

In fact, Liu Zhou prefers Nicolas Cage, who can be said to be the most famous Hollywood star in the mainland.

But now he's in some trouble. Although the income from "Edge of Tomorrow" has given him some relief, he still can't escape bankruptcy.

Zhang Yimou was worried that this would affect his condition, so he did not choose him, but chose the popular star Christian Bale.

Liu Zhou also respected Zhang Yimou's opinion on this, and Bale is also famous enough now, and he also performed very well in the original version.

Liu Zhou collaborated with Bale on his first Hollywood film, Source Code, and they established a good personal relationship.

Although his fame grew rapidly afterwards, Liu Zhou did not stand still. He has even become the owner of a well-known film company in Hollywood, so the relationship between the two has always been pretty good.

In response to Liu Zhou's invitation and the fact that Zhang Yimou was no unknown figure, Bale also took on the project of "The Flowers of War".

So when the project was officially announced to the public, Bale's joining was also announced.

As Zhang Yimou's first film after joining Golden Harvest was not in the entertainment industry, the outside world was also very concerned about it.

But apparently it did not disappoint everyone, as they invited a Hollywood superstar to play the leading male role, and it was obvious that the film was going to be a big one.

Some people with ulterior motives also clearly noticed that Golden Harvest and Zhang Yimou must have been secretly colluding for a long time, otherwise it would be impossible for the new movie to be launched the next second after the announcement of joining, and the male lead had already been confirmed.

Ordinary audiences don’t care much about this. They are still paying attention to Zhang Yimou’s movies, so they are also looking forward to "The Flowers of War".

The movie "The Flowers of War" stars Zhang Yimou, so it is definitely a highly anticipated blockbuster.

Therefore, Golden Harvest also took the lead in promoting the film. When announcing the film project, it also announced the release date, which will be during the Spring Festival next year.

With the announcement of this news, next year's Spring Festival period immediately becomes a highly competitive period.

In addition to the project launch of Zhang Yimou's "The Flowers of War", another piece of news is also the launch of a film project.

The film "Flying Daggers of Dragon Gate", directed by Xu Ke and starring Jet Li, has also been approved. However, what attracts most attention is that this film is also scheduled to be released during the Spring Festival next year.

This immediately piqued everyone's interest.

This is the second fight between the two!

This year, Zhang Yimou and Xu Ke competed in the Spring Festival, and Zhang Yimou had a slight advantage. Now the second battle has begun, and it is still unknown who will win.

But everyone likes this kind of drama, and what they like most is the head-on confrontation between big directors.

Zhang Yimou and Christian Bale versus Xu Ke and Jet Li, a big director and big stars, there is no duel more worth looking forward to than this.

If we compare the influence of directors, Zhang Yimou may be stronger, but to a limited extent. Xu Ke is also a veteran domestic director.

He was previously known as the king of the Spring Festival period. Although he lost to Zhang Yimou this time, many people also know that a large part of the reason why Xu Ke lost this time was due to the subject matter of "Sword Rain".

Now "Flying Daggers of Dragon Gate" is still a martial arts movie, but it is a 3D martial arts special effects blockbuster.

Xu Ke is also a well-known director who is good at applying special effects. 3D is also very popular in China at that time, so everyone is also looking forward to "Flying Daggers of Dragon Gate".

What's more, there is still a big gap between Christian Bale's appeal in China and Jet Li's.

Although Bale is more famous than Jet Li worldwide, in China, Jet Li is far better than him.

Moreover, Bale's box office appeal is not necessarily stronger than Jet Li's. The former is mainly a big gimmick. The real box office success of "The Flowers of War" is still Zhang Yimou.

"Flying Daggers of Dragon Gate" was supported by Xu Ke and Jet Li together at the box office. Relatively speaking, Jet Li's ability to support the box office was even stronger.

It may be hard to say in China, but if it is put overseas, especially in Asia, "Flying Daggers of Dragon Gate" will definitely achieve better box office results than "The Flowers of War".

The subject matter is one aspect, and the other aspect is also because of the presence of Jet Li. Bale's box office appeal in Asia is definitely not as good as Jet Li's.

But no one can predict the final result before the fight even starts, after all, the strength of the two sides is equal.

However, this did not affect the enthusiasm of netizens at all. A large number of netizens argued endlessly online about who would win the second fight between Xu Ke and Zhang Yimou, and this even ranked among the top ten hot searches on Weibo. This shows that everyone is full of expectations for next year's Spring Festival.

If the audience is looking forward to it, then the bosses of the film and television companies in the circle will feel like cursing.

Seeing that the Spring Festival market was getting bigger and bigger, they were just about to increase their investment in the period, but unexpectedly, Golden Harvest directly threw two trump cards into the period.

With "The Flowers of War" and "Flying Swords of Dragon Gate" scheduled for the Spring Festival, the Spring Festival period has become a dead period.

The market potential of the Spring Festival period has indeed grown, but it is not yet so big that there will be much left after being swallowed up by these two blockbusters.

Therefore, next year's Spring Festival period is destined to still be dominated by Golden Harvest.

No matter how angry they are, no one would be so stubborn as to let their blockbuster compete with Zhang Yimou and Xu Ke's blockbusters, otherwise they would be destined to become cannon fodder.

In fact, this was also Zhang Zhao's deliberate arrangement.

They could see that the Spring Festival market had grown, and Zhang Zhao could certainly see it too, and because of Golden Harvest's powerful market analysis department, he could see it even more clearly.

So for the growing cake of the Spring Festival, he simply put out two big knives to cut off the biggest and richest part.

As for other people who want to have a piece of this cake, it depends on how strong their knives are and whether they can withstand the joint attack of Jiahe’s two big knives.

Of course, Zhang Zhao put two highly anticipated blockbusters, "The Flowers of War" and "Flying Swords of Dragon Gate", in the same schedule. In addition to taking in as much box office as possible, it was also to complement each other.

Through the promotion of "Moon" and "Sword Rain", Golden Harvest's publicity department also found that the effect seems to be better if they promote them together.

So this time, the two of them happened to start new projects at the same time, and Zhang Zhao decided to bundle the two films together and promote them from the beginning of the project until the release.

Liu Zhou also agreed to this plan.

Although the two films in the original time and space did not do this, after they were released, they hyped themselves up together very tacitly.

The effect was also very good. Both films broke the 600 million box office, and "The Flowers of War" even reached 700 million.

The only concern Liu Zhou has is that the two films will be released nearly a year in advance, and during the Spring Festival, so he wonders whether they can still achieve the same good results as the original films.

However, considering that the domestic single movie box office in the original time and space began to explode in 2010, Feng Kuzi's "If You Are the One 2", "Aftershock" and Jiang Wen's "Let the Bullets Fly" and other movies have successively raked in box office of million, million and million.

In addition, the current film market is much larger than the original time and space period. Even if it is moved forward from the 2011 Lunar New Year period to the Spring Festival period, it will not have much impact on "The Flowers of War" and "Flying Swords of Dragon Gate".

As for the market size of the Spring Festival period, there is no need to worry. Past experience has proven that this period has the greatest potential. It just depends on whether there are any movies that can stimulate this potential.

These two blockbusters by Zhang Yimou and Xu Ke undoubtedly have this strength.

On the contrary, Liu Zhou was more worried that Zhang Yimou's film "The Flowers of War" was rather heavy and might not be suitable for the Spring Festival period, after all, this is the time when everyone is celebrating the New Year.

However, considering that this movie also has a strong warning and educational significance, and Zhang Yimou's appeal is strong enough, I think the impact of this should not be too great.

The audience is looking forward to the release dates of these two films, the bosses of the film and television companies are ready to curse, and most of the artists in the circle are excited.

Because Zhang Yimou and Xu Ke both announced that the actors would have open auditions.

Zhang Yimou, in particular, said that there will be an open audition for the heroine, and even unknown amateurs or college students from art schools can participate.

If other people said this, they would just think it was a show, just like when Li Shaohong was planning to shoot Dream of Red Mansions, he said it was an open casting, a nationwide audition, but the cast had already been decided.

There have also been many scandals, and some gossip media have reported that this was a way to select a concubine for the financial sponsor. As to whether this news is true or false, that depends on one's own opinion.

However, after Li Xin became famous, many media outlets still used this incident to gossip about her.

Others would deliberately put on a show for publicity, but Zhang Yimou obviously wouldn't do that.

Because this is not the first time he has publicly auditioned for a female lead. People like Zhang Ziyi and Dong Jie were both chosen by Zhang Yimou in this way.

So when the female artists in the circle saw Zhang Yimou once again auditioning for the female lead, they immediately saw three big golden words in their eyes: "Mou Girl"!

Zhang Yimou is the best at promoting actresses. The value of "Mou Girls" is even higher than that of "Star Girls".

Once she is chosen by Zhang Yimou to become a "Mou Girl", it means that she can immediately become a hot female star in the circle, starting from the second line in the circle.

Although Zhang Yimou doesn't like to look for those who are already famous, actresses in the circle are still interested in him. What if they are chosen?

Not only actresses, but actors also took action. After all, this time two major directors were casting at the same time, so there were more opportunities.

This time, Liu Zhou and Golden Harvest fully respected the opinions of the two directors, and the roles were decided by themselves. There was no requirement to use artists from Golden Harvest.

Liu Zhou set up Golden Harvest's brokerage department as a separate company in order to enhance their competitiveness.

From now on, Jiahe will not feed food to them. They have to fight for food themselves.

Of course, those who should be taken care of will be taken care of, and if all conditions are the same, they will definitely be given priority, but all resources will not be given to them first as before.

Zhang Yimou and Xu Ke are not people who are completely ignorant of the ways of the world. They will choose the people they think are most suitable for the main roles, but for other supporting roles, they will try their best to use Golden Harvest artists.

But no matter what, with Zhang Yimou's official announcement of joining Golden Harvest, and Zhang Yimou and Xu Ke starting new projects, it not only caused a huge sensation in the outside world, but also mobilized the entire entertainment industry.

Compared with the first two pieces of news, the third piece of news announced by Golden Harvest may not be so eye-catching, but it also caused quite a stir.

Golden Harvest Group announced that the television epic "The Legend of Zhen Huan", directed by the famous director Hu Mei, with Qin Hao and Fan Xiaopang as the male and female protagonists, and an investment of 100 million yuan, has officially started.

This news also caused a lot of heated discussion. Not to mention the 100 million yuan investment, this may be the TV series with the largest investment since the new century.

However, what surprised everyone the most was that Qin Hao and Fan Xiaopang actually came to act in a TV series.

The rumors that had been circulating in the outside world turned out to be true. These two most popular mainland male and female actors really came to act in a TV series.

(End of this chapter)