Before the Shanghai Film Festival ended, Duke took his own business plane to Los Angeles. In addition to using several promotional activities to expand the signature of Rosenberg-style movies, other gains can only be said to be average, especially the actual income that can be brought by "Hurricane Rescue" simultaneously released by China and the United States can only be said to be better than nothing.

Due to the market size and the number of theaters, when Duke left, "Hurricane Rescue" was released in China for a whole week and won 42.28 million rmb box office. Although it was quite good box office results compared to most movies of this era, only 13% of the box office share ratio did not bring much actual benefits at all.

Fortunately, the future is bright. As long as its brand is famous enough, there will naturally be a bumper harvest in a few years.

Compared with China, North America is the foundation of Duke's career. "Hurricane Rescue" maintained a stable performance in the four working days this week, earning a total of US$41.17 million. Together with US$51.25 million in the first weekend, the box office in North America failed to exceed 100 million in a week, but it also reached US$92.42 million. Compared with the theme type and investment scale of the film, this is already a very good result.

Moreover, the audience reputation of the film has always been good, and the audience praise rate of the inemasore theaters has always remained above 85%. When the navy basically did not start, the imdb score was temporarily as high as 85 points.

However, on the second weekend, "Hurricane Rescue" encountered Spielberg's "Happy Terminal".

In Hollywood, the theme type and investment scale of commercial films are equally important to the impact of market performance, and they can even compare with the role of directors and superstars. For example, in the past few years, Duke directed not the Lord of the Rings series, but replaced it with the type "Shawshank Redemption". Even he could not make the film super popular, and many Hollywood films would not take a detour.

By the same token. During this summer, many films no longer hide from "Hurricane Rescue" like last year because there is no need.

This schedule was actually carefully selected by Duke. He had a rough impression of many popular videos, and of course he also picked the persimmons.

Most of the time, Spielberg is a persimmon that is difficult to pinch, but "The End of Happiness" is definitely an exception, which is a rare floppy work by an old Jewish man.

In recent years, DreamWorks' situation has become increasingly difficult. Whenever DreamWorks encounter difficulties, Spielberg will release a work. Hollywood also has a unique landscape. DreamWorks is in trouble, and Spielberg takes action to save it.

But no matter how great a director is, he cannot support a company as huge as DreamWorks alone. Duke cannot, James Cameron cannot, and Spielberg cannot.

What's more, no matter how good the director is, there are times when he fails.

"The End of Happiness" is undoubtedly Spielberg's mishap. Although it has collected three box office guarantees from Spielberg, Tom Hanks and Catherine Zeta Jones, the response is far lower than DreamWorks and the outside world's expectations.

During the three days of this weekend, "The End of Happiness" only earned $19.05 million in North America. Apart from the classic line "I have been waiting for this life, but I don't know who I am waiting for" it can't be said to be successful.

Although the box office of "Hurricane Rescue" fell by 40% the next weekend, the record was US$30.75 million, which is enough to ensure that the film won the North American box office list again and pushes the North American box office to the 100 million yuan mark. The cumulative amount reached US$1170 million!

After returning to Los Angeles and taking a weekend off, Duke re-entered his work. "Hurricane Rescue" did not consume much of his energy. The film has reached this level and achieving high profits is not a problem at all. With Warner Bros.'s publicity and distribution department watching, he doesn't need to pay too much attention.

The first thing to do is to let Tinafe and agent investor David jointly form a negotiation team to negotiate with Warner Bros.

The Duke Studio has many copyrights for the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, the Harry Potter series, and the Matrix Trilogy. It seems to be small in scale, but its actual profit is very high. If Warner Bros. wants to eat it, he must have to pay a lot of real money. Moreover, Duke does not lack cash. He wants shares equivalent to Warner Bros. or Time Warner.

Negotiations have never been an easy thing. The negotiations have just begun, and Duke has participated in another negotiation between Pixar Studio and Warner Bros.

After increasing its holdings in recent years, Duke's shares in Warner Bros. has reached nearly 9% of his shares. Warner Bros.'s revenue is closely related to him, and once the acquisition of the Duke Studio is completed, the Warner shares in his hands will continue to increase.

Besides, he had other ideas.

With the current scale of Pixar Studios, if Warner wants to complete the merger and acquisition, he must use stock exchange and cash payment. Compared with large film companies that must maintain huge liquidity, Duke has sufficient cash in his hands, and most of the benefits obtained by the Lord of the Rings trilogy are not used.

This can be said to be a serial negotiation. The negotiation between Tinafe and Warner Bros. will have the most basic conditions, which are closely related to Pixar Studio.

Duke then went to San Francisco specifically to have an interview with Steve Jobs, who was recuperating.

Of course, he would not be stupid enough to persuade a person with a stubborn personality to receive Western medicine treatment. If even his family can't persuade him, he will obey an outsider's words. Is that possible?

This is just a conversation about interests.

"Duke, you don't have to go around in circles."

Sitting under the vines in the corridor, Jobs poured a cup of tea for Duke, "Hollywood has six major companies. Even if we exclude Sony Columbia, there are five more companies. Why should I choose Warner Bros?"

"Five companies?" Duke picked up the teacup, took a sip, and shook his head gently, "Steve, are there really five choices?"

Without waiting for Jobs to answer, Duke continued, "Your negotiations with Disney have not made any progress. The cooperation condition you proposed is that Michael Eisner must step down. With Eisner's control over Disney, it may be difficult to achieve it?"

Perhaps it was the chain reaction caused by his appearance that Michael Eisner's position at Disney has been extremely stable until now.

"Twentieth Century Fox has Blue Sky Studio, and the two sides have worked together for many years. They are not short of animation production departments. Even if they want to cooperate, are you sure Pixar Studios will maintain its position in the Disney system?"

“Universal Pictures is negotiating with Lighting Entertainment, which is a very promising animation company, and their sincerity is the problem.”

"Paramount Pictures is indeed looking for a suitable animation partner, but have you noticed Steve? DreamWorks are not performing well. The Big Three want to separate DreamWorks Animation Studios. It is said that Paramount Pictures will become the new publisher of DreamWorks Animation."

Steve Jobs looked at Duke quietly without any expression.

There is no doubt that even if all the situations Duke said are true, he still takes the absolute initiative in the negotiations.

"Warner is different. Warner has a wide distribution channel around the world and is the media company with the largest market value." Duke would not be stupid enough to think that a few words could impress people like Jobs. He just told some basic situations and reminded him of Warner's advantages over other companies. "Although Warner also has an animation department, it is so small that it can be basically negligible. We will give Pixar Studio the greatest creative freedom, which is even greater than Disney."

The price issue is a matter of specific negotiations, and Duke doesn't need to mention it. If you want to get Pixar, you must offer a price that satisfies Jobs.

"This is the tea I brought from India," Jobs suddenly turned to the tea. "How does it taste? Is it fresher and more natural than the black tea we are used to drinking?"

"Very good." Duke gently turned the teacup, "It's just not to my taste, I'm more used to drinking Chinese tea."

He suddenly changed the subject, "Steve, your life can only be described as legendary. I really want to make a video of your biography in the future."

Jobs' eyes lit up, but he said nothing.

When a person enters the business circle, he pursues nothing more than fame and fortune. Duke is very clear. For Jobs, money is just a number game, but what about the temptation of keeping his name in history?

Just like "Schindler's List" to Oscar Schindler, successful films will create a misfortune for someone to come.

It was not easy to impress Jobs, and it was impossible for Duke to say a few words, which moved the famous Steve Jobs so much. Until he said goodbye, Jobs did not make any special statement.

But Duke believed that his words could still have some impact. As long as Jobs could be slightly biased towards Warner, that would be enough.

Duke returned to Los Angeles by helicopter, but before he arrived at his destination, the news of his meeting with Jobs was heard by Disney executives.

“It is not likely that other companies can really work with Pixar Studios.”

In the spacious office, Cook Dick sat in a swivel chair and looked at Michael Eisner behind the desk. "Warner and Duke Rosenberg are our biggest competitors."

Michael Eisner crossed his hands and placed them on his desk, "What about Marvel Studios?"

"Duke Rosenberg has promised Marvel to be the director of "Iron Man"," Cook Dick quickly replied, "Marvel Studios tend to work with Warner."

He reminded, "Michael, we cannot lose Pixar, we must make appropriate concessions in the negotiations."

"Without Pixar, we have Disney animation studios."

Since "Tarzan of the Apes", Disney Animation Studio has been committed to developing 3D computer animation. The countless glory of the past has also made Michael Eisner believe that Disney animation will inevitably rise again. "You can make appropriate concessions, but you can't let Jobs open your mouth!"

A hint of anger flashed in his eyes, Eisner said, "Don't determine the release date of the new film Orwitz and David Ellison collaborated on. Let's wait until the release date of the new Batman is announced. I want to save Batman..."
Chapter completed!