The First Thousand One Hundred and Ninety-Two Chapters Owed a Bet

"The whole of Tasmania is 15 million acres of land. It's no wonder that the Australian government is willing to sell it to you. Ted Turner only owns 2 million acres of farmland," Elizabeth said, hearing Julia shout two They were having dinner, so they sorted out the scattered information in front of them, walked to the restaurant with Eric, and changed the subject by the way: "How much box office do you think Gravity can get this time?"

Eric said: "It still depends on the market reaction, but breaking 100 million in the first week should not be a problem."

Listening to Eric's conservative tone, Elizabeth wondered, "Is it a problem not to break 100 million in the first week? It's so popular now."

Eric walked into the kitchen, helped Julia share dinner after washing his hands, and said to Elizabeth beside him, "Didn't you read the materials? Although the 3D ticket price has increased by 50%, in order to ensure the visual effect , the number of seats in our 3D screening hall is basically a medium screening hall with about 100 seats. There is no such hall with two or three hundred seats. After all, the single-day box office limit of 2,000 3D screens is only about 25 million US dollars. The one-day box office limit of the other 100 IMAX theaters is $3.64 million. Therefore, the highest single-day box office of this film is only more than $28 million, and it will definitely go a long way."

"I remember that Iron Man made more than $35 million on the first day, right?" Elizabeth walked into the restaurant with her dinner and sat down, "If you don't plan to increase the number of 3D screens during the release process, according to the normal movie decline, The box office performance will definitely not catch up with Iron Man, and it will be even more difficult to get $1 billion at the global box office."

Julia walked into the restaurant at this time, sat down directly next to Eric, and heard Elizabeth retort: ​​"Eric's movie will definitely get 1 billion."

Although she was accustomed to Julia's always leaning to Eric's side, and seeing her little daughter-in-law sitting next to the man opposite, Elizabeth still habitually eats the taste: "You have such confidence in him, ask Shall we make a bet?"

"I won't bet with you," Julia deliberately took a sip of Eric's juice, glanced proudly at Elizabeth opposite, and said, "You lost to me and Eric on Blair the Witch last time. The bet has not been fulfilled yet.”

"How can anyone bet on someone else's behalf without knowing it at all?" Elizabeth rolled her eyes, ignored Julia, turned to Eric, and said, "Speaking of which, this year's Sundance Film Festival is very exciting. It's lively. There are still more than two months, and it is said that the number of films registered for the election has doubled from last year, and many stars will also go to Park City this year.

"

Eric nodded and said: "One more movie market is prosperous, it will definitely be good for Hollywood. However, it will be difficult for a second Blair Witch to appear in the next ten years."

From the beginning of the year to the present, Blair Witch has basically been released in major ticket warehouses around the world, and the total global box office has finally reached 255 million US dollars. Compared with the production cost of 60,000 US dollars, the terrifying investment report rate is simply crazy.

Therefore, there are still more than two months before the Sundance Film Festival in January next year, and almost all Hollywood studios have already begun to gear up, trying to find a gold mine similar to Blair the Witch again.

However, Blair Witch's success is fundamentally a marketing victory, and the kind of viral marketing that is almost deceptive is difficult to replicate in the short term. Although it will also strengthen the emphasis on the Sundance Film Festival, Eric will definitely not have much expectations for this. The focus of Firefly Group's business will always be upright commercial films.

Time always flies, and it's already November 12, the world premiere of Gravity was officially held at the IMAX Theater in Santa Monica, Los Angeles.

In recent days, after the word-of-mouth frenzy caused by last week's Gravity hit has initially subsided, many media outlets have gradually discovered what Eric and Elizabeth were talking about on Tuesday night.

Although the word-of-mouth of gravity is doomed to the success of this film, due to the limitation of the scale of 3D and IMAX shows, unless Firefly Group urgently adds more 3D theaters, otherwise, this film wants to achieve a global box office of 1 billion US dollars, It's not an easy task.

However, in the media's many interviews with the executives of Firefly Group, it was revealed that Firefly Group did not consider adding 3D and IMAX theaters in the short term. As a result, many media began to be keen to predict the box office prospects of gravity.

The Iron Man in the summer season, the single-day box office of the peak period in the first week was 37.35 million US dollars. Although it broke the Hollywood single-day box office record, the overall attendance rate has just exceeded 70%. This is already a miracle. data.

Here we have to mention the concept of attendance.

In the intuitive impression of many people, the attendance rate must be the approximate number of people sitting in a theater, but this is not the case. The movie attendance rate is calculated according to the ratio between the total number of audiences and the total number of seats in the screening hall throughout the day.

For example, in a screening hall with 100 seats, assuming that there are only two screenings in the morning and evening, the number of viewers in the morning screening at 9 o'clock in the morning is only 10, and the number of viewers in the prime screening at 9 o'clock in the evening reaches 90, then this screening hall The single-day attendance rate is 50%.

The single-day attendance rate of a film is the overall average of its attendance rate in all theaters.

Under normal circumstances, even if it is a very popular movie, it is often difficult to get a ticket for the golden screenings in the evening, but due to factors such as viewing habits and working days, the screenings during the day are basically difficult to fill up, and even relatively deserted.

Therefore, for Gravity, since its single-day box office limit is only 28 million US dollars, even if it is calculated based on a 10% increase in attendance than Iron Man’s single-day peak, the film’s box office in the first week is only about 100 million US dollars. .

The starting point of the first week of 100 million US dollars, according to the word of mouth of gravity, according to the 30% box office decline curve in a single week, the total North American box office of the film will only stay within 300 million US dollars.

Gravity's planned overseas release is on a par with North America, so Eric Williams' new film is likely to gross only $600 million worldwide.

Although the production cost of Gravity has just exceeded 100 million, the total cost has already approached 200 million, including the later conversion, copying and publicity costs. The global box office of 600 million US dollars has just made the Firefly Group collect the cost.

As there are more and more similar views, when the word of mouth of gravity is completely unquestionable, the North American media who want to win attention and strive for circulation naturally turn their attention to this aspect, and begin to question the Firefly Group again. Feasibility of the '4200' plan.

After all, if even Eric Williams' films are only just getting paid, what about everyone else?

It is generally estimated that the Firefly Group has invested nearly 2 billion US dollars for the '4200' plan. According to the current situation, it is extremely difficult for the Firefly Group to receive this part of the investment.

Although many of these arguments are suspected of stealing the concept, there is no doubt that these opinions are very marketable among the media and the public, and many people have even thought of watching Firefly Group jokes.

In this atmosphere of praise for the film's reputation on the one hand, and doubts about the commercial prospects on the other, the global premiere of Gravity was successfully held under the spotlight without being affected. The essence of Hollywood. Many fans even traveled all the way from the states around Los Angeles just to watch the Gravity premiere red carpet ceremony.

Gravity's IMAX premiere and the IMAX movie screenings across North America over the following two weekends once again detonated the media and the public's admiration for the film's visual effects, but at the same time, the voices of skepticism have grown even more.

After all, the cost of all aspects of IMAX films is too high. Whether it is projection equipment or film copy, the cost is almost 10 times that of traditional films, but the ticket price is only twice that of ordinary films. Although the number of seats in the IMAX theater is more, this advantage is obviously not obvious in all aspects.

In the midst of this kind of praise, doubt, expectation, and debate, on December 19, Gravity was officially screened in 2,000 3D theaters and 100 IMAX theaters in North America.

However, in the early morning of December 19, with the release of the Gravity Midnight box office, the media in North America are boiling again.

It's not because Gravity Midnight is too high at the box office, it's too low.

$3.57 million.

That's gravity's midnight box office.

Not to mention that compared to the record-breaking $16.5 million of Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, even Eric's previous summer episode of Iron Man's $7.6 million at midnight was more than double Gravity's.

Firefly Studios.

The small dining terrace on the big boat, Eric just recently had two sets of seats added to this great view terrace.

At this moment, Jodie Foster was not interested in admiring the surrounding scenery condescendingly. She glanced at Eric, who was translating the text with a calm expression. The woman waited for a while before finally saying, "You don't seem to be worried at all?"

Eric turned a page of the manuscript in his hand, which was Judy's novel of the same name. Eric had already read the first draft last year, but Judy has been revising it repeatedly for more than a year, and the current version is obviously different from the original one.

In line with the publicity of the follow-up phase of Gravity, the novel will be officially released next month by HarperCollins Press, a subsidiary of News Corporation, in multiple countries around the world at the same time.

We talked about this topic at the premiere last week, and the two made an appointment to talk about novels this Saturday.

Hearing Judy's words, Eric looked up at the woman and smiled: "Schwarzenegger's Devil's Doomsday is only $3.96 million on the first day, what should I worry about?"

Two days before the release of gravity, that is, on November 17, Universal Pictures' action blockbuster Doomsday, starring Schwarzenegger, chose to be released on Wednesday in order to avoid the edge of gravity.

This big-budget film, which Eric has no memory of, was a box-office fiasco with almost no suspense, grossing only $3.96 million on its first day. So far, the box office in the three-day period has just reached 11.53 million US dollars. Although the box office of the two-day weekend will increase, the total box office of this huge production costing 100 million US dollars is two days before the opening plus the first weekend. Only a little over $20 million.

Judy was very dissatisfied with Eric's indifferent appearance, and Mei Mu teased: "Have you fallen to the point of being compared with Schwarzenegger?"

"It depends on what it is," Eric smiled, knowing that the woman was worried about him, his tone was a little more serious, and said: "Actually, the virtue of the media is like this, they always like to hype a person from being superior to one another. Fall hard, even if this person is actually Iron Man, he is not afraid of falling at all."

Judy listened to Eric's confident tone, leaned forward slightly, put one hand on the table to support her cheek, and said, "However, $3.57 million seems to be too little."

Eric looked at Judy, who unknowingly became a little woman, and said: "This is mainly because you have the same inertial thinking as most people and don't realize that gravity is relatively different from traditional 2D movies. A totally different show. Now, do you know what the attendance was at midnight last night?"

Judy shook her head with a curious look in her eyes.

Eric continued while flipping through the manuscript in his hand: "The 2,000 3D screening halls have an occupancy rate of over 95%. The other 100 IMAX screening halls are completely full. In order to ensure the visual effect of 3D viewing, we selected They are all small screening halls. Due to the limitation of the total number of seats, although the ticket price has been increased, the midnight box office of the film will still be relatively low.”

Speaking of which, Eric just remembers that Cameron's second Avatar, which created a box-office miracle, happened to have only $3.5 million at the midnight box office, which has to be said to be a very interesting coincidence.

Moreover, after careful calculation, due to the ten-year ticket price factor and the difference in the scale of the show, the attendance rate of the midnight show last night in Gravity should be higher than that of Avatar.

However, Avatar's reputation belongs to the cold early stage and the late stage explosion, just like the Titanic trend. Gravity's reputation has been overwhelming since the test screening stage. After the popularity explosion in the first week has largely squeezed the box office potential, the subsequent box office curve of the film is likely to show a normal decline in commercial films.

But on the other hand, there are only 2,100 theaters in total. Compared with the strong demand for 3D and IMAX movies, the audience may have some hunger marketing effects.

Combining various relatively contradictory and mutually influencing factors, Eric himself does not know what direction the box office of Gravity will develop.

Judy listened carefully to Eric's explanation, and if she understood something, she then said, "Then why don't you increase the number of 3D screens as soon as possible. According to the current situation, this should be a very simple matter?"

"Because there are not enough film sources, from now until next summer, the Firefly system only arranges the five 3DIMAX formats of Gravity, The Lord of the Rings, Underworld, Sleeping Hollow and IMAX's Return to the Cretaceous. To be precise, the return to the Cretaceous is only half of the movie. Therefore, 2,000 screens, according to the frequency of one movie a month, can just be placed in the summer of next year,” Eric explained, enjoying The beautiful blue eyes of the woman on the opposite side said, "Hey, let's not talk about that. I suddenly remembered something a few days ago. Do you still remember last year's Oscar? It seems that I still owe you a bet?"