booktalesy Chapter 279 Fence-Sitter
Chapter 279 Fence-Sitter
In 2015, the Chinese entertainment industry had already split into two formidable camps due to the repeated clashes between Tencent Video and Haofeng Group on the content and artist fronts.
Artists at the bottom and small and medium-sized studios are all cautiously choosing sides, fearing that they might inadvertently become victims in the power struggles of the big shots.
However, beneath this almost suffocating iron curtain of capital, there are a very few top veterans who, with their irreplaceable status in the industry, can navigate between the two camps with ease.
Within the circle, this is known as the art of the fence-sitting school.
Zhang Guoshi is undoubtedly the most typical and successful one among them.
Although Li Feng forcefully intervened back then, buying out his production team and taking away the lead actress Ni Ni, the director always maintained extremely proper politeness and courtesy towards Hao Feng in the days that followed, and never complained in public.
Since he hadn't offended Li Feng, given Boss Li's personality, he naturally wouldn't suppress this flag bearer of the Chinese film industry without reason.
Therefore, his new project not only received a large sum of money from Tencent, but also the full support of Wanda Group, which has close ties with Haofeng.
This privilege of profiting from both ends, or even from all three, and begging from various capital giants, is something only a national advisor of his caliber could master.
If it were a director of slightly lower caliber, daring to play this kind of back-and-forth trick between several big names, they would have been blacklisted by both companies long ago during the project's inception.
In mid-October, a sci-fi blockbuster that claimed to break the record for investment in Chinese film history wrapped up filming in Beijing.
"Great Wall"!
The total investment budget for this film has been raised to an astronomical figure of one billion RMB!
And among the staggering list of investors behind it, Tencent Video poured in a whopping 500 million RMB, accounting for half of the total.
The second largest investor is Legendary Pictures, which is part of the Wanda Group.
Wanda also spared no expense in this film, investing 300 million RMB in cash.
Since Wanda Group has contributed 300 million, the lead role naturally and without a doubt falls to the wealthy and beautiful Jing Tian.
As the major investor with an investment of 500 million yuan, Tencent Video naturally wanted to place its own trusted confidants in the production team.
Li Moufeng and that man both landed significant roles in the film, and Tencent was eager to use this international blockbuster to maintain their top-tier image.
What's most amazing is Zhang Guoshi's skill in balancing the roles.
He not only secured top talent from Tencent and resources from Wanda, but also, through private communication with senior management at Haofeng, successfully secured the role of the leader of the three young stars currently being promoted by Haofeng, who will play the role of the young emperor in the film!
This is the charm of a top-tier director's skillful and versatile approach.
However, since Tencent has a large stake in it and is promoting the two defecting male stars as the core,
Haofeng Group, of course, didn't put a single penny of investment into this project.
The remaining 20% was divided up by a few companies that were already in the business.
……
Late October, Yanjing, Wanda Vista Hotel's grand ballroom.
The wrap-up press conference for "The Great Wall" was held amidst a lavish setting.
In the center of the stage, Zhang Guoshi, abandoning his usual low-key demeanor, wore a modified Chinese Tang suit and spoke confidently in front of countless Chinese and foreign media cameras, exuding high spirits!
In the eyes of this director who has been in charge of half of the Chinese film industry for decades, this billion-dollar blockbuster, which unites top Hollywood special effects teams and is a Sino-US co-production, is undoubtedly another charge he has launched against the Academy Awards!
"This is an epic of the East that showcases Chinese culture to the world!" Master Zhang's voice echoed through the banquet hall through the sound system.
"We've assembled the world's top team and actors!"
As he spoke, he pointed to the somewhat tired-looking white superstar sitting next to him.
Matt Damon!
This Hollywood superstar, who holds an Oscar and starred in "The Bourne Identity," paid a huge price to fly to China to star in "The Great Wall"!
He was originally the producer and the intended male lead of "Manchester by the Sea".
However, in order to leave his mark on director Zhang Yimou's screen, he gave up the opportunity to play the male lead in "Manchester by the Sea," giving the role to Casey Affleck, and flew all the way to East University to film the movie.
"Matt is a great actor."
During the Q&A session of the press conference, Zhang Guoshi, with his arm around Matt Damon's shoulder, faced the Chinese and foreign reporters in the audience with an absolutely confident smile and uttered a sentence that drew thunderous applause from the entire audience:
"Here, I want to say to Matt, why did you give up that lukewarm art film and choose to come to China to star in our 'The Great Wall'..."
"This is absolutely the wisest decision you've ever made in your career!"
The executives from Tencent Video and the representatives from Wanda in the audience applauded repeatedly, expressing their deep agreement.
……
The future of the film remains shrouded in mystery, but another battle sparked by this press conference ignited on the internet's traffic square that afternoon.
The incident stemmed from a heavily edited group photo that leaked from backstage at a press conference.
On the poster, the leader of the three little ones, who represent the pinnacle of Haofeng's self-made idol training series and have gained countless devoted fans, stands side by side with the man who is being promoted by Tencent Video with all its resources. This is extremely rare.
Two generations of top celebrities appear together for the first time!
The moment this photo was posted, Haofeng's fan base on Weibo erupted in a frenzy of online attacks.
EXO's fans, EXO-Ls, and TFBOYS' die-hard fans, TFBOYS' TFBOYS fans, engaged in the largest fan war in the history of the Chinese entertainment industry on this plaza!
"The contrast is too stark! That man was standing there, his face as big as a steamed bun, covered in hyaluronic acid and that overly plastic, Korean-style look—it was so ugly it made me want to vomit!"
"Exactly! Our captain is a pure, natural, and refreshing young man with a traditional Chinese style! How dare this traitor from some shady boy band stand in the same center position as our captain?!"
Most of the fans of TFBOYS are elementary and middle school students in their teens. Although they are young, they are very organized and their words are very vicious and blunt when they control the comments, belittling that man to nothing.
This has angered EXO-Ls, who are known in the Chinese entertainment industry for their extreme methods of doxxing and cyberbullying!
EXO's fervent female fans were outraged when they saw their idols being attacked and discredited by a group of elementary school students using such vocabulary. They organized dozens of super data stations and launched a full-scale counterattack online!
"What are you three brainless fans pretending to be innocent for?! These little brats who haven't even grown all their hair yet dare to compare their looks to our Emperor Wu?!"
"This is hilarious! Three guys who can't even hit the high notes on stage, just drawing circles with their left and right hands, they're worse than even the worst trainee in our group! And now they're trying to buy trending topics and piggyback on others' fame?!"
"All EXO-Ls, let's go! If we don't blow up these three Toilet Boys' supertopics today, I'll change my surname to yours!!"
Greeting ancestors' genealogy records, photoshopping unflattering images, doxxing, and bombarding online forums...
Two of the most destructive and fervent data forces in the Chinese entertainment industry have engaged in a fierce, albeit dark, battle on Haofeng's Weibo trending topics and discussion forums!
Behind this fan war that has attracted widespread attention online, the programmers at Jinling Haofeng's headquarters watched the concurrent access data in the backend refreshed hundreds of thousands of times per second, once approaching the server's red alert line.
The executives remained completely unfazed; in fact, they even felt like laughing.
After all, they understand that the more fiercely fans fight on Weibo, the more their online time and the number of fake accounts they register will increase exponentially in order to control the comments for their idols.