Chapter 605
Wang Yifei: My God, Brother Big Fish, you have too many secrets! The Story of the Foolis
Bang!
In Burbank, at the Disney headquarters, on the top floor of his office, President Michael Eisner, his face contorted with rage, threw a newspaper away and slammed his hand on the table.
Because their Disney-produced and distributed film, "The Chronicles of Narnia," only grossed $450 million in North America after nearly half a month in theaters.
Logically speaking, this box office performance would have been incredibly impressive ten years ago.
But that won't work in today's world.
The total box office of The Chronicles of Narnia in the United States was only equivalent to the box office of Avengers: Age of Ultron in one day.
Last Saturday, Avengers: Age of Ultron grossed $2 million in a single day.
This unprecedented box office record sent shockwaves through the entire Hollywood.
In just three days, the film has already grossed $1.3 billion, becoming the fastest film in history to break $1 billion at the box office.
It's fair to say that Avengers: Age of Ultron was created to break all kinds of movie box office records.
Other people's movies are so amazing, but Disney's movies are so terrible, no wonder Michael Eisner was furious.
"Change is necessary! Disney must change!!!"
While Eisner was making pronouncements, MGM was launching a new film project: Pirates of the Caribbean.
In the original timeline, "Pirates of the Caribbean" was filmed and released in 2002.
However, in this timeline, it had already been registered but not released because MGM had too many good scripts and wasn't in a hurry to choose one.
On the other hand, the production cost of "Pirates of the Caribbean" was very high, requiring various technical aspects. In order to achieve the best results, the filming had to be postponed.
Now that the technology has improved, there is naturally no problem with shooting at this time.
Wang Yifei stared at the audition invitation for the film "Pirates of the Caribbean" and fell silent.
"My God, Big Fish Bro actually had MGM hidden away?"
Yes, she didn't sign up for the Pirates of the Caribbean audition, but she did receive an interview invitation.
That's strange!
The three major Hollywood studios: Paramount, MGM, and Marvel Studios.
While "Avengers: Age of Ultron" was dominating the scene, MGM announced the development of "Pirates of the Caribbean," creating what seemed like a fierce competition.
But Wang Yifei found it a bit strange. Could MGM be a subsidiary of Want Want Group?
Although her father didn't say it directly, she felt that her guess was correct.
But the more this happened, the more worried she became.
Could it be that the three major Hollywood giants are all subsidiaries of the Want Want Group?
If Wang Duoyu knew her guess, he would definitely be very happy.
Although he didn't say it explicitly before, Wang Yifei was able to guess, which shows that she is very thoughtful.
“Crystal, can you teach me Chinese again? What does the sentence ‘One and a half hours is three and a half hours’ mean?”
At this moment, Jordana Brewster came over and took the initiative to ask for advice.
Since Wang Yifei joined the crew, she has quickly become the crew's Chinese teacher.
The recent filming has consisted mainly of dialogue scenes; the outdoor scenes will not begin filming until next week.
Many actors, when they have free time, will ask Wang Yifei to teach them a few Chinese phrases.
However, the more they learned Chinese, the more they broke down.
For example, the sentence Jordana Brewster is currently learning is one she simply cannot understand.
Upon hearing this, Wang Yifei smiled and explained to the other party.
One and a half hours is three and a half hours, which is easy to understand in Chinese, but not so easy for foreigners to understand when they learn it.
Sometimes, even Wang Yifei doesn't find it easy to explain the meaning of these words.
For example, wear as many layers as you can in winter and in summer.
What do you mean?
Foreigners would look completely bewildered.
"Ah, Chinese is so hard to learn!"
Half an hour later, Jordana looked completely devastated. She decided to memorize her lines instead of cramming for Chinese at the last minute.
The very next day, a know-it-all in the crew started reporting on the box office of "Avengers: Age of Ultron".
The opening weekend has passed, and the film's opening weekend box office results are in.
Saturday's box office grossed $467 million, while yesterday, Sunday, it grossed $454 million.
Although box office revenue dropped slightly compared to Saturday, this result is still very impressive.
The total box office for Avengers: Age of Ultron in its opening weekend was $2 billion.
In the United States alone, a super box office market, a single movie raked in $1.8 billion in just four days. That's absolutely terrifying!
Kill crazy!
The entire Fast & Furious 3 crew was discussing this.
Wang Yifei, on the other hand, remained quite calm; she had even begun preparing for her audition for "Pirates of the Caribbean."
Now that she has guessed that her father's Want Want Group is likely to control the three major Hollywood giants, it would be a real shame if she didn't take this opportunity to develop it.
Before long, the film crew went to another location to shoot, and Wang Yifei had to go along.
The indoor dialogue scenes have been filmed, and the next step is to shoot outdoor scenes, which will require traveling all over the world.
The Fast and Furious series is a blockbuster film shot in various locations around the world. Wherever it goes, it is ruthless and leaves nothing but desolation.
Either the local gang leader is killed, or the local super agent is tortured to death; in short, there must be conflict, and in the end, the protagonist group wins a great victory.
That's just the characteristic of Hollywood blockbusters.
Dude, that makes sense!
By the time Wang Yifei returned from overseas, Avengers: Age of Ultron had been released for more than half a month, and the film's box office had already surged ahead, rapidly heading towards the all-time box office record.
The box office in the United States, a major box office market, has reached $3.25 billion, while the global box office outside the United States has reached $2.44 billion.
In other words, the current global box office has reached $5.69 billion.
The overseas market hasn't really picked up yet, and the film hasn't been released in many major markets, so the overseas box office is naturally lagging far behind.
The American market has been largely plundered, leaving only a few die-hard movie fans who watch the film multiple times a day without fail.
Yes, these fans are already super fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. They know the movie heroes like the back of their hand and are very familiar with the movie plots.
These people have nothing better to do than watch Marvel movies, and they're even urging other films in the series to be released quickly.
I'm urging for an update online!
In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there are four superhero movies that can be released independently: Captain America, Iron Man, Spider-Man, and Thor.
Now, seeing the booming film market, Marvel Studios is planning to release more standalone superhero movies to enrich the storyline of "The Avengers." Looking at the box office success of "Avengers: Age of Ultron," it would be a lie to say Wang Yifei isn't envious.
If she were of mixed race, she would want to star in one of the hero roles.
pity!
In the blink of an eye, it's early August, and "Jason Bourne" has been released.
At this point, the global box office of "Avengers: Age of Ultron" had reached $2 billion.
After breaking the six billion dollar box office mark, Avengers: Age of Ultron inevitably faced the situation of lacking momentum.
Following this trend, it seems unlikely that breaking the record of $6.82 billion set by "Kung Fu Panda" as the highest-grossing film in history will be possible.
Of course, surpassing the $6.2 billion box office record of "Captain America 2" as the second highest-grossing film in history is still no problem.
"Jason Bourne" was released on Thursday and grossed $5 million on its opening day.
The news report shocked the world.
It seems that no one expected the movie to have such an outrageous box office performance.
The first four days of the weekend passed quickly, and "Jason Bourne" actually grossed $5 billion at the box office.
It seems possible to catch up with Avengers: Age of Ultron.
Only time will tell.
In its second week, "Jason Bourne" hit overseas markets and grossed $5 million in a single day in many countries.
Many media outlets, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the San Francisco Chronicle, reported on it as a front-page headline.
This box office performance is still very impressive, especially considering it was on a Monday, a weekday.
That's terrifying.
Soon after the second week, "Jason Bourne" successfully surpassed five billion US dollars in total box office revenue. At this point, everyone was speculating that it had a high probability of catching up with "Avengers: Age of Ultron".
However, when the third week arrived, the daily box office in the United States plummeted by 2%, indicating that the US market is far less successful than that of "Avengers: Age of Ultron".
The overseas global box office market did not plummet, but instead continued to increase in a very healthy manner.
Five days later, before the third week was even over, the global box office of "Jason Bourne" had reached $5 billion.
Therefore, even if "Jason Bourne 5" doesn't catch up with "Avengers: Age of Ultron," it can still become the third highest-grossing film in history.
As for "Captain America 2", it can only be ranked fourth.
All of Hollywood is talking about the box office, after all, Avengers: Age of Ultron and The Bourne Identity were big winners this summer.
However, Wang Yifei did not continue to focus on the Hollywood film market, but instead returned to the mainland.
Ice City, Harbin Institute of Technology, the island in the middle of the lake.
"The Foolish Old Man Who Moved Mountains," by Lie Yukou during the Warring States period, refers to the Taihang and Wangwu Mountains.
Inside the villa's living room, Liu Xiaoli stared at Wang Junxian with a stern face while glancing at the book in her hand.
The little guy is reciting his textbook, which is the textbook for "The Foolish Old Man Who Moved Mountains". Although he is still young, he has already begun to recite this text.
In Lao Wang's family, starting to study early is a given.
Skipping grades in elementary school is common practice; conversely, those who follow the established curriculum are considered the exception.
Wang Junxian was very angry. It wasn't that he couldn't memorize it, but that he didn't want to. He always felt that he shouldn't be memorizing such a book.
"Hurry up and memorize it!"
Liu Xiaoli is a very good supervisor, overseeing the little one's homework.
"Mom, I don't want to carry it. I don't understand why Yu Gong insisted on moving this mountain. Couldn't he just move house?"
The little guy's question left Liu Xiaoli somewhat at a loss for words.
"The spirit of Yu Gong moving mountains is something we should all learn from. It is a hope that we can conquer nature with perseverance, fearlessness in the face of difficulties, and the fighting spirit of human determination to overcome nature."
Her words were actually a summary of knowledge from the textbook; after all, if she were asked to explain it herself, she certainly wouldn't know how.
"Why be so foolish as to move mountains? Moving house is so simple! It's incredibly stupid."
Wang Junxian's rebuttal greatly upset Liu Xiaoli:
"Why do you care so much? Just memorize it when you're told to. The point is, we should learn from this spirit. This is the inheritance of our Chinese culture, you know?"
do not know!
The little guy wanted to argue, but at this point he had no choice but to give in.
Otherwise, his mother would definitely have given him a beating.
During dinner that evening, the family gathered together, and Wang Junxian, who was getting angrier the more he thought about it, couldn't help but ask his father another question.
The same two questions remain: Why move the mountain? Can't we just move house?
"Yes, yes, Brother Big Fish, I also want to ask this question. Yu Gong lived in the Taihang and Wangwu Mountains for so many years, why did he only think of moving the mountains now? What was he doing when he was young? Now he's old and can't finish the work himself, and he wants his children and grandchildren to move them too. Isn't that selfish?"
The two sisters, Bai Doufu and Wang Yifei, also had similar doubts.
I've memorized stories like "The Foolish Old Man Who Moved Mountains" since I was a child, but I didn't understand their meaning then, and I still don't quite understand them now.
But Wang Duoyu understood.
He said with a smile:
"These questions you raised are very good. It shows that you all have your own thoughts and have realized that blindly believing everything in books is worse than having no books at all!"
"I will answer your questions one by one. First, moving is indeed a smarter choice."
"Have you ever thought about this question? The story of Yu Gong moving the mountain has been passed down for more than two thousand years. Has no one raised the same question as you?"
Wang Junxian and the others were deep in thought. It was clear that someone had brought it up, but the story of Yu Gong moving the mountain has been passed down to this day.
"So this story isn't about moving, but about why we absolutely have to move the mountain!"
"First of all, why did Yu Gong only think of moving the mountain when he was old? Because some mountains cannot be seen until you are a certain age."
“When he was young, climbing mountains was a form of exercise and a scenic experience. He probably thought that walking a little more was nothing. But when he got old and saw his sons and grandsons still having to take this wrong path, and watched generation after generation trapped by the same mountain, he suddenly realized that this was not a scenic view, but a mountain that had to be moved.”
"For example, some difficulties are not visible until a certain age."
"Youthful years don't reveal the responsibilities of caring for aging parents and raising young children that come with middle age, far more mentally and physically demanding than any work project. Middle age doesn't reveal how approaching old age becomes; once health is lost, the game of life instantly becomes incredibly precarious and passive."
"You can go to the entrance of the ICU in a hospital and see how helpless and desperate people are just trying to survive."
After hearing what they said, Wang Yifei and the others all fell silent.
Although Wang Yifei and the other children had very limited life experience and had not suffered much hardship.
But these children are very smart. They have experienced the lives of ordinary people. Although they cannot fully empathize with each other, they know a little about the current state of society.
Especially Wang Junxian, who is now a parent, will have a deeper understanding. (End of Chapter)