After "Qiu Ju's Lawsuit" won the award at Cannes, subsequent distribution became much easier.

The Cannes International Film Festival is essentially a film exhibition. Not only film producers from all over the world come to participate in the exhibition, but also distributors from all over the world select films.

"Qiu Ju's Lawsuit" has been recognized by the Cannes Palme d'Or, so it can naturally sell for a high price. In the end, distributors in more than 20 countries and regions introduced the film, allowing Kirin Pictures to earn nearly 10 million US dollars.

Even excluding the mainland box office, this US$10 million is enough for Kirin Pictures to recoup its capital. After all, its production cost is only 8 million yuan.

"Qiu Ju's Lawsuit" was subsequently released in mainland China. Because of the Cannes Palme d'Or gimmick, the attendance rate was pretty good.

But in the end, the box office amount allocated to Xiang Nan was less than 3 million. The rest of the money was probably squandered by theaters and distributors.

Although Xiang Nan is angry, he is also helpless. If he relies on his connections, he will definitely be able to recover the money if he wants to. However, the general environment is still difficult to change.

When Chen Peisi was filming "The Queen Mother" and "Two and a Half Men", every theater was full, but the theater company insisted that the movie was not a hit, and they were telling lies.

As a result, the movie that was originally very profitable turned out to be a loss in the end. Chen Peisi was so angry that he quit the film industry and never made movies again. Later, he switched to acting in dramas, and one ticket was a penny. Although the scale was far less than that of movies, it was good Lai has seen the money.

Xiang Nan is not as grand as Chen Peisi and will not quit the film industry. However, he suffered a loss this time and learned a lesson. If he invests in making movies in the future, he must either find a reliable distributor or Directly sell the issuance rights at a fixed price.

If it were still based on box office sharing, he would definitely have to make one film and lose the other. Not only would he not make a penny, he would still have to lose money on it.

…

In 1994, Xiang Nan began to fill the hole and released "Ghost Blowing the Lantern: Longling Labyrinth Cave".

In 1987, he published "The Ghost Blowing the Lantern: The Ancient City", which really made many readers hooked.

However, it also attracted criticism from some literary critics at the time. They believed that Xiang Nan's writing was too commercial, entertainment-oriented, lacked innovation and depth, and was just a series of spiritual fast food and literary garbage.

But times have changed. Today, Xiang Nan, who produces fast food literature, is making a lot of money. On the contrary, those avant-garde writers who were once very popular are dying of poverty, starvation, and changing careers.

A large number of such writers gather in the countryside outside the Third Ring Road of Beijing. They eat steamed buns and drink cold water every day, and they are bent on creating works comparable to Calvino (The Baron in the Trees), Marquez (One Hundred Years of Solitude), and Milan Kundera (The Baron in the Trees). The unbearable lightness of life).

But in 1994, the literary creation environment was completely different from that of ten years ago.

On the one hand, people prefer popular literature to serious literature and avant-garde literature, such as martial arts novels by Jin Yong and Gu Long, ruffian novels by Wang Jie, romance novels by Qiong Yao and Xi Juan, etc.

On the one hand, piracy is rampant. Jin Yong’s martial arts novels have sold less than 300,000 copies of the Sanlian version. However, the number of Jin Yong’s martial arts novels in existence across the country is probably in the hundreds of millions.

Xiang Nan's "The Mystery of Longling" has sold less than 500,000 copies since it was released. Compared with the previous sales of millions, it is really far behind.

…

In August, "Jade Guanyin" was officially completed.

While working on post-production, I was also discussing cooperation with TV stations.

Since the 1980s, mainland television stations have begun to outsource programs.

For example, ATV's "Fearless Heroes", TVB's "Shanghai Beach", China Central Television's "Last Night's Star", Taiwan Television's "The Legend of White Snake" and so on.

Xiang Nan is now preparing to sell this TV series to a TV station for broadcast.

And how much each episode will be sold for, the ownership of the copyright after broadcast, the ownership of distribution rights, etc., all need to be carefully discussed.

The main reason for this is that in the 1980s and 1990s, television stations did not have a strong sense of copyright.

In 1990, China introduced the Copyright Law; in 1992, China joined the Universal Copyright Convention.

In the past, there has always been extensive management. Therefore, the lack of awareness of copyright protection is deeply ingrained. Even in 2020, TV programs have been repeatedly exposed for infringement, let alone the 1990s.

At that time, after a TV station bought a copy, it could exchange programs with other TV stations at will, regardless of whether it owned the copyright. It was commonplace for county and city-level TV stations to even openly broadcast pirated DVDs.

Therefore, if there are no restrictions, I am afraid that "Jade Guanyin" will only be sold once. By then, other TV stations will broadcast it for free, and the loss will be huge. Therefore, strict restrictions must be imposed.

In the end, Kirin Pictures and CCTV reached an agreement, and "Jade Guanyin" was sold to CCTV for 80,000 yuan per episode. CCTV had to pay another 20,000 yuan per episode for every rebroadcast. Moreover, the contract stipulated that CCTV was not allowed to resell it. Give and exchange broadcast rights.

…

In October, "Jade Guanyin" officially landed in CCTV's Feitian Theater.

This is also the first time that Xiang Nan's TV series premiered on CCTV. Before, it was all broadcast on Yanjing TV.

After "Jade Guanyin" was released, the ratings immediately exploded.

The thrilling story, the lingering love, the vivid and complex characters, and the combination of handsome men and beautiful women made the audience fascinated and unable to stop watching.

From this, Yu Feihong, Li Anpeng, Liu Yijun, etc. all began to become popular quickly and became well-known TV stars. Especially Yu Feihong, because of his good looks and good temperament, he has gained the love of a large number of viewers.

Among the top ten favorite TV actors selected by "Popular TV", she and Zhu Lin are among the best, second only to Zhao Yazhi who starred in "Shanghai Beach", "Joke about Qianlong", and "The Legend of White Snake". Popularity Sheng, it can be seen.

After "Jade Guanyin" was broadcast on CCTV, it was immediately bought by provincial and municipal TV stations for second and third rounds of rebroadcasts. Although the price was much lower than the first broadcast, because more TV stations were purchased, it was Kirin Pictures still made a lot of money.

The entire investment for this drama was RMB 7 million. In the end, it earned RMB 30 million just from the broadcast rights sold to the TV station.

Coupled with the distribution rights of audio and video products, in the end, Kirin Pictures earned more than 30 million from such a TV series alone. In the 1990s, this was already very good, at least more than the profit from movies.

Feng Xiaogang also received a million-cent bonus, and he was so happy that his teeth leaked out.

"Master Cheng, you are so interesting." He said happily.

After working at the Yanjing Television Art Center for ten years, the total income of the company did not exceed 30,000 yuan. Within one year of joining Qilin Pictures, he earned more than 1.2 million yuan in salary plus dividends, which made him really I feel like I made the right decision to change jobs.

"I've told you before that this is how I am. I will be nice to anyone who is nice to me." Xiang Nan smiled and said, "Gangzi, you can continue to hang out with me. I won't favor you."
Chapter completed!