Ed Warren and Rowling Warren were born in the 1920s. They have been engaged in supernatural investigation and Exorcism since the 1950s.
In the 1970s, influenced by the Exorcist fever, the supernatural events in North America began to receive frequent media attention. It was at that time that Warren and his wife became famous.
The two horror films, evocation and the haunted morgue, are adapted from the personal experience of the Warren couple. Both stories also take place in Connecticut, north of New York.
However, the copyright sources of the two projects are different.
After becoming famous, Warren and his wife accepted all kinds of interviews and authorized some writers to write books, so there were many true and false stories.
In addition, the experience of the supernatural event itself will also be interviewed by the media.
The two projects, the former from the Warren couple's own story, the latter is based on the story of the story after the snydeck family interviewed.
After lunch, Simon takes Denny Morris to his office and the two continue their discussion.
"I'll find time to draw up a thought for you about the script creation," Simon said as they sat opposite each other at their desks. "The most important issue now is copyright. Warren and his wife should have received a lot of interviews and authorizations over the years. Next, I need you to make a detailed investigation of all the external authorizations of the couple. Denny, I don't want people to jump out and sue us for infringement after the release of the film and claim $100 million or something. "
On the original time line, after the release of "evocation" and its box office success, the Warren couple once authorized an author to write the story of their supernatural investigation to claim $900 million against warner for the lion.
Hollywood has so many similar lawsuits every year that $900 million is only a joke.
However, because of his more ambitions for the series, Simon didn't want to encounter such bad things that could have avoided repeated wrangling.
Denny Morris is naturally clear about the frequent copyright disputes in Hollywood, but he affirms: "Simon, the copyright should be OK. We keep the recording of Warren and his wife and sign the license agreement for the idea of evocation. Although the morgue is also related to the Warren couple, it is a novel written by the horror novelist ray carton after interviewing the snydeckers. We have also signed an agreement with the latter
Simon nodded, then shook his head and said, "well, actually, Denny, I think the Warren couple's experience is far more valuable than just this one of evocation. The material you gave me shows that the Warren couple have been engaged in supernatural investigation for 30 years, and have kept a large number of cursed or supernatural objects. Have you ever thought about making a long-term series of their experiences? "
The story of "evocation" is just a capture of Warren and his wife's long career as a psychic investigator. Originally, Denny Morris didn't think too much about it. Hearing Simon say it, he immediately opened up: "this is really a good idea, Simon. I will immediately ask someone to investigate the possible external authorization of Warren and his wife."
"In fact, you still don't quite understand," Simon said with a smile. "I mean, since we have successfully created a DC movie universe, we may be able to create a connected horror movie universe based on the Warren couple's 30-year career as a psychic investigator."
DC movie universe is definitely one of the biggest innovations since the birth of Hollywood.
For most Hollywood filmmakers, the only thing that can compete with the DC movie universe is probably the marvel movie universe waiting to be developed by Denise entertainment.
Denny Morris didn't expect that Simon would attach so much importance to Warren and his wife that he wanted to create a special movie universe.
This is the movie universe.
Although it is clear that, limited by the market capacity of horror films, this movie universe can not be compared with DC movie universe, if it can succeed, it will definitely become a classic business case in Hollywood.
What's more, compared with DC movies, the universe is now prone to 70 million dollars of investment, horror movies, the biggest advantage is low cost, so the risk is lower.
Thinking for a moment, Denny Morris couldn't help swallowing subconsciously. Realizing his own situation, he laughed at himself, but said seriously: "it seems that I will have a lot of things to do next."
"It's just an idea for me," Simon said to Denny Morris. "The key is to see whether these two projects can succeed. If the box office performance of" evocation "and" the morgue haunted event "is too mediocre, then the idea of movie universe is out of the question. Therefore, you'd better not compete with each other before the release of at least two films Others talked about it. "
Denny Morris nodded again, even if Simon didn't remind him.
It's not just to avoid falling into a joke after failure. If the outside world learns that Daniels entertainment plans to create a new movie universe, it will definitely attract a lot of trouble like copycat who want to share the price.Denny Morris has been thinking fast about how to sign an exclusive agreement with the Warren couple.
Seeing that Denny Morris was lost in thought, Simon opened a document for a moment without interrupting him. After almost the same time, he looked up again and said, "there's something about the detective airplane head. I think the actor named Kim Carrey has his own performance characteristics. You can give each other the most space in the production process. Well, by the way, how is the contract signed? "
When Denny Morris heard Simon change the subject, he took it back for a moment.
"Evocation" and "mortuary haunted time" are the earliest events in the summer of next year, while "detective airplane head" is the scheduled movie for Easter next year.
About Kim Carey, Denny Morris doesn't quite understand why Simon is interested in the performance of this unknown little actor.
Kim Carrey, 30, has been playing minor roles in various films before. The most famous one is a supporting role in 1986's Peggy sue is getting married, directed by Coppola.
It wasn't until two years ago that Kim Kerry's popularity barely reached the second tier with a fairly good TV comedy "vivid colors".
Now that Simon has appointed the other side to play "detective plane head", Denny Morris will not be polite to the inexplicably lucky little actor, saying: "according to the original contract of Julia Roberts, there are five movies. "The pay for" detective plane head "is $200000, followed by four, capped at up to $5 million, with a contract term of 15 years."
If we can foresee the future, Simon is sure that Kim Kerry will not sign such a contract.
On the original timeline, 1994 was not only a year when Hollywood films came out in large numbers, but also the most brilliant year for Kim Carrey. The comedian released three films at one go, including detective plane, dumb and dumb and dumb and dumb and dumb and dumb and dumb and dumb It's in the top ten at the box office of the year.
Ordinary people are always talking about which star in Hollywood has joined the $20 million movie club. What many people don't know is that the first Hollywood star who can earn $20 million without a fixed share is Kim Carrey.
If the films are sold at the box office in a row, the highest salary can only get us $5 million. Although this is already the salary standard of a first-line star, Simon's understanding of Kim Carey will definitely not be reconciled.
However, there is obviously no regret medicine in this world.
Of course, there's another point. Simon will control it a little this time. He won't give Kim Carey another chance to make three big movies a year.
In my memory, the script of "detective airplane head" has already been in danielis' hands, and the comic book "disguised geek" adapted from dark horse comic company has also been won, and the last one "a fool and a melon" is in trouble.
In the original version of "a Dai and a Gua", the director and screenwriter in the main creation list are all Ferrari brothers.
In fact, this is not the case.
The script of "a Dai and a Gua" was originally written by John Hughes.
However, because the script is not complete, it is only similar to a story outline, and it is not valued by John Hughes. After new line pictures paid for the story, after negotiation, John Hughes voluntarily gave up his signature, and the film became the work of Ferrari brothers who took over the responsibility of perfecting the script.
After the great success of the "kid's home" series, John Hughes has completely given up his directing job in recent years, focusing on running his own Hughes entertainment company as a screenwriter and producer. At the same time, he has once again increased the profit share required by his creation of films. Recently, Hughes has directly offered 10% of the gross income share of the whole channel for the "kid next door", which has cooperated with Warner Brothers It's a big plus.
Gross income and net profit are two concepts.
Take the box office as an example. Gross income is equivalent to the share of the film studio's income in the box office. Without deducting the production and publicity costs, John Hughes directly takes 10% of it.
Compared with Denise Entertainment's 10% share of the local box office, John Hughes's 10% share of the local box office is only half of Denise Entertainment's share, but it includes all channels such as global box office, video sales, television revenue and even movie peripheral sales.
Under such conditions, if the box office of the film is not good enough, the studio may lose money if it doesn't pay attention to it, but Hughes makes a steady profit and doesn't take any risks.
Simon generally knows that the "kid at home" series is basically the peak of John Hughes. After the 1990s, with the rise of the blockbuster, Hughes's film style was quickly eliminated by Hollywood.
So "kid's home 2" is the last project that danielis entertainment has worked with John Hughes.
In the original space-time, the new line could spend a lot of money to buy a script idea from Hughes, who is still hot after making two series of "kid in charge of the house". In the end, it succeeded in picking up the leak, which is obviously impossible for danielis entertainment to do now.What's more, Simon is not interested in taking the risk of creative crash to make a fool and a melon come out.
No accident, this vulgar comedy, is likely to be completely fan out.
We continued to discuss with Denny Morris for half an hour, and basically decided that the two projects of "detective plane head" and "disguised geek" will be produced continuously, and the protagonist is naturally Kim Carey.
In the second half of the year, the production of "detective plane head" will be scheduled for Easter next year, and the production of "disguised geek" will start at the beginning of next year and be scheduled for the end of next year. Doing so will at least save a lot of money. "Detective plane head" has not been released, and Kim Carrey's salary for his role in "freak out of shape" can still be controlled at several hundred thousand dollars.
After Denny Morris left, the female assistant came to remind us that the following is a regular meeting of danielis entertainment on the recent annual financial audit.
The financial report of 1992 won't be released until February. This time, it's just a weekly periodic report.
In the plan, Denise entertainment will begin to prepare for the IPO at the end of this year. No accident, it will be officially listed in the summer of 1994.
Therefore, the financial data of 1992 is very important to promote the IPO process of Denise entertainment.
In 1992, the most important business of daenerys entertainment was still film.
According to the cut-off date of December 31, 1992, the number of the top ten films in North America box office ranking in 1992 is roughly as follows:
first place: Wonder Woman, US $371 million
second place: Aladdin, US $176 million
third place: Jurassic Park, US $163 million (being released)
fourth place: Lethal Weapon 3, US $143 million Yuan
fifth place: kid in charge 2, US $142 million (on screen)
sixth place: midnight bell, US $131 million (on screen)
seventh place: killing time, US $114 million
eighth place: Ninja Turtle, US $113 million
ninth place: nuns are crazy, US $108 million
tenth place: Peach trade, US $9 $3.11 million
it's not hard to find out from this list that except Aladdin, Lethal Weapon 3 and nuns are crazy, the other seven movies are all related to danelis entertainment.
This is basically the same proportion as last year.
However, compared with 1991, after danilisi entertainment merged MCA, the increase of the three film brands in 1992 and their distribution power increased sharply again, which also brought more market share to this fast-growing Hollywood giant.
In 1992, the total box office of North American film market reached 5.36 billion US dollars.
Among them, the total number of 41 films directly distributed by danilisi entertainment during the period from January 1 to December 31, 1992 (including the 1992 box office part of the films released in 1991 and excluding the 1993 box office part of the films released in 1992) reached US $2.13 billion, accounting for 39.7% of the market.
If we take into account the $294 million in the box office of the three foreign cooperation films "killing time", "the peach trade" and "the last mosikan", the proportion will further increase to 45.1%.
If the box office market share of other big studios can exceed 20% every year, it will be enough to open champagne and celebrate. In Hollywood, a highly competitive market in which there are seven major film companies and a large number of second - and third tier film companies competing for each other, a big Mac suddenly appears, which accounts for nearly 40% of the market share. This is a highly anticipated oligarchy.