Daenerys Cinema, Los Angeles.

A girl held a folder in her arms, raised her wrist and looked at her watch, facing her boss who had just finished her management meeting with Pixar.

"You have a year left, John, put out a revision plan as soon as possible, and I will see it after the New Year."

John Lasseter, who had just been scolded, followed Simon slightly and heard this, "I promise, Simon, I will do it as soon as possible."

Simon's face was still cold and said to John Lasseter, and walked straight to Girl A and asked, "Next?"

"Everyone has arrived at the movie watching "Horror Ghost"."

Simon nodded and walked out quickly, and the A girl hurriedly followed.

Returning from the East Coast, Simon has been mainly combing out Daenerys Entertainment's film projects for the next two years in recent days. He just discussed with the Pixar team that another Pixar 3D animated film "The Bugs Team" will be released at the end of next year.

Compared with films such as "Toy Story" and "Finding Nemo", "The Bugs" is a relatively low-profile film in the Pixar animation series, both in terms of reputation and box office.

As for why, there are actually many problems.

The most important one, in Simon's view, is that the main storyline tends to the love between two ants. The "male protagonist" Felix rose up to resist the Grasshopper Legion out of his love for Princess Yating, and finally the lovers finally got married. This theme seems too adult and not suitable for both young and old. In addition, this is not a real-life fairy tale between the prince and the princess, so it is difficult for people to feel substituted. Therefore, a seemingly inconspicuous problem has largely caused the trough of "The Insect Agents" in the Pixar animation series.

Let’s look at other things. “Toy Story” is the core of friendship, suitable for both young and old. “Find Nemo”, which sets the box office record, focuses on family affection, which makes it even more suitable for both young and old. There is also “The Lion King”, which has changed from 2D to 3D and still creates box office miracle after the interference of Simon, the big butterfly, which still creates box office miracles. Although the story is taken from “The Prince’s Revenge”, the core is growth, and it is still suitable for both young and old.

A very simple truth: on the premise of ensuring quality, the wider the age range of movies covering the audience, the higher the box office will definitely be.

Simon raised this question when the project started, but the Pixar team obviously did not strictly implement it. After all, with continuous success, no one could not help but be impatient. So, at the meeting just now, Simon was rarely angry and forced the Pixar team to modify it, downplay the love line between Felix and Princess Yating, focus it on friendship, and increase the more pleasing and easier selling of insect circus scenes around.

Leaving Pixar headquarters and returning to a screening room in the third floor administrative district, the director of "The Ghost of Terror" Peter Jackson, the leading actor Ben Stiller and the leading actress Mia Sarah have arrived, as well as several senior executives of New World Pictures, who are responsible for project distribution, including Danny Morris.

Everyone greeted me briefly and sat down soon.

Simon walked to the best view in the middle of the second row, and took a note from the female assistant sitting on the left. Just a few glances, he felt the faint fragrance of a strange woman on the right. He turned his head to look at it. Mia Sarah, the heroine of "The Horror Ghost", sat down beside him. Seeing Simon looking over, this beautiful woman with a very golden age Hong Kong actress temperament that was very consistent with the aesthetics of oriental people, expression was slightly nervous: "Mr. Westeros, can I sit here?"

Simon just nodded slightly, his eyes fell back to the memo to introduce the general situation of "Horror Ghost", and quickly finished reading the information.

The indoor lights quickly dimmed and the screen lighted up.

Peter Jackson's first draft of "The Horror Ghost" tells the story of Frank who accidentally gained psychic ability and colluded with his ghost friends to cheat money and ended up killing evil spirits, and finally defeating evil.

The original script was extremely bad to Simon's opinion.

Speaking of which, Western ghost movies usually have a big flaw, which is the lack of a mature model for humans to fight ghosts. This also leads to the protagonists of many horror movies who often rely on accidental or many completely inexplicable routines, and even use love to influence them, which is very far-fetched.

Just like the original script of "Horror Ghost", the protagonist defeated the evil spirit for the first time, and actually relied on two machine guns transformed by the dead sheriff.

Nonsense.

In comparison, Eastern ghost movies, especially Hong Kong movies, have a very convincing complete routine, such as glutinous rice, ink dou, spiritual talisman, dog blood, donkey hoof, etc.

In the soul-summing movie universe created by Daenerys Entertainment in recent years, Simon personally intervened and continuously improved a Westernized ghost-removing mode, which had a very good effect. As for this "Horror Ghost", Simon deliberately threw it to Jackson in a Hong Kong film "Mr. Zombie", asking the other party to watch it several times to find inspiration and re-modify the script, and perfected the original "Horror Ghost" that was neither horrible nor comedy into a qualified commercial film.

Compared with other directors with strong personalities, Peter Jackson's biggest advantage is that he is pragmatic, listens to other people's opinions and is willing to cooperate with investors' requirements to make improvements. The script that started filming finally deleted a large number of redundant story branches in the original version, and captured a lot of inspiration from "Mr. Zombies" provided by Simon, which is basically another story.

On the big screen.

The film begins with a farce, where a castle is haunted, and the owner invites the psychic Frank to catch the ghost.

It was enough for people with a little IQ to feel like a liar to be in a mess in the castle, and finally told the owner who was suspicious that he would get the job done and leave after getting the salary.

As soon as the actor Ben Stiller appeared, he gave people a completely different feeling from the original Michael Fox. This comedy star who was born in "Saturday Night Live" had a very despicable temperament that made people laugh. In comparison, Michael Fox, the male lead of the "Back to the Future" series, gave people more impressions of being a young actor than a comedian.

The perfect casting and a matching story are just an opening, which makes Simon more certain about the quality of the film.

The movie continues.

Farewell to the owner's house, Frank drove away from the castle area. In the carriage, two ghosts suddenly appeared from the back seat and under the car, first letting the audience confirm that there are really ghosts in the video.

However, when they first met, people thought they were two ghosts who were trying to attack the protagonist's evil ghost, and it was soon proved that they were just kidding the protagonist. They were friends of the protagonist with psychic abilities. The ghost hunting scene just now was also a scam that the two sides cooperated.

The wedge has been completed here and the background has been basically explained.

The male protagonist is a psychic, with two ghost friends, who make a living by deceptively catching ghosts. At the same time, from their conversation, the audience also learned that the so-called haunted castle just now was not that they took the initiative to "haunt" it, but they didn't know where the problem was.

During the driving chat, the plot suddenly changed.

On the winding and dark night road, one man and two ghosts were discussing how to spend the money they had just obtained. Suddenly another car rushed towards him. Frank hurriedly avoided him. At the last glance, he saw a black shadow sweeping up from the roof of the car and disappearing in the direction of the castle manor they had just arrived.

Immediately, Frank's car also hit a tree trunk on the side of the road.

With a thud, the title of "Horror Ghost" and the subsequent opening appeared.

The five-minute wedge, in addition to the story, is also a special effect that satisfies Simon.

The original "Horror Ghost" has very rough ghost effects, giving people a strong sense of cheap 50 cents. This time, Daenerys Special Effects Australia Branch, which has experienced many blockbusters, is responsible for the production. The ghost in the camera is drifting, and it seems that the wind may disappear at any time, giving people the appearance of this probably the soul after death.

In addition, the special effects company is just doing things after all. Peter Jackson is able to skillfully apply special effects to this level. In Simon's opinion, he can already feel at ease to hand over the Tol King series to the other party.

Just as I was thinking about these things, a close voice came from my ears: "Mr. Westeros, I always want to thank you in person for giving me this opportunity."

But it was Mia Sarah who took advantage of the opening of the movie.

Simon's thoughts were interrupted, but he just said no, and he looked up slightly toward the big screen.

So quieted down.

The main film begins with a funeral. The deceased is an employee of the town museum. Although Frank has no responsibility, he attended the funeral because of what he saw and heard that night, and met the deceased's daughter Lucy, played by Mia Sarah.

love at first sight.

In order to get close to Lucy, Frank introduced his career to Lucy and took the initiative to reveal that her father might not have died of a sudden heart attack, but was killed by evil spirits.

Lucy certainly didn't believe this nonsense, and she felt disgusted with Frank.

When he met a girl who was in true love, Frank, who had always been unemployed in his side job, decided to investigate the truth of the matter and pursued Lucy. The two ghost friends were also on the side to advise, and for a moment they were full of laughter.

Meanwhile, strange deaths similar to Lucy's father's heart attack occurred in the town one after another.

When the heroine Lucy was on the big screen and Frank, who was guarding her window on the grounds of protecting safety, struggled to hesitate whether to peek, Simon in the screening room felt that his right thigh was touched unintentionally, and Mia Sarah's voice came again with a bit of uneasy consultation and obviously a different meaning: "Mr. Westeros, how am I acting?"

Simon frowned slightly, turned his head to look at Mia Sarah next to him, raised his hand and reached out, passing through the girl's soft long hair, grabbed a piece of slender neck, and exerted a little force.

Mia Sarah just instinctively resisted slightly, and soon softened and bent down with the man's force.

The screening hall is a five by five, because the boss chose the second row, and there were two big beauties sitting on one left and one right. Of course, no one was ignorant about the two extra positions on the edge, but sat in the front and back rows.

Danny Morris and others in the front row were fine, but the New World Pictures executives who were lucky enough to participate in this film together in the back row naturally soon discovered that one person was suddenly missing by the big boss. However, the two executives who happened to be sitting in the third row did not dare to have any intention of inquiry, but were a little uncomfortable, worried that the big boss would misunderstand them and be unlucky to peek. Sitting upright for a while, still felt inappropriate, so they quietly moved their bodies and took the initiative to retreat to the back.

The story on the big screen continues.

After some accident, Lucy finally believed the existence of the ghost and suspected the truth about his father's murder, and began to launch an investigation with Frank. At the same time, because Frank was always able to appear around the deceased, the town sheriff arrested Frank as a suspect, and the evil spirit also discovered that Frank was chasing him and wanted to kill the psychic.

So another climax of the human-ghost battle in the video appeared in the police station of the town.

After the police station war, the sheriff also stood on Frank's side, and the group got closer and closer to the truth.

Frank understood that the ghost-catching styles he used to deceive people did not work for evil spirits at all. After discussing with his ghost friends, he learned that the ghost was afraid of the sanctified crosses in the church and the holy water used by the priests to baptize newborns, so he began to prepare ‘professional’ tools.

The story comes to an end soon.

The truth is actually in the castle where Frank caught ghosts at the beginning. Barbara, the hostess' daughter, had already died and was resurrected through an evil witchcraft. However, in order to maintain the state of the living dead, Barbara had to frequently transform into an evil spirit to hunt the souls of the living and sacrifice to maintain her "life".

This also echoes some of the details in the opening wedge.

Then came the wonderful final battle, with justice overcoming evil, and lovers finally getting married.

After the screening, everyone turned to the conference room next door. During this period, Girl A quietly left with Mia Sarah, and everyone present looked as if they hadn't heard of it.

Compared to "The Bugs" which had been irritated, Simon is much more satisfied with "The Ghost of Terror". He only made some modifications on the details of the soundtrack and briefly discussed the release of next Easter with the New World Pictures team, and turned his attention to Peter Jackson and Ben Stiller.

Both are filmmakers that Daenerys Entertainment focuses on cultivating.

From the initial assistant director of "Batman: The Moment of War" to now, for eight years, since Peter Jackson has been sure that he has the ability to control the "Lord of the Rings" series, the project can naturally be launched.

However, because many projects in 1997 and 1998 have been finalized, the first song of "The Lord of the Rings" will not be released until at least 1999, and Simon's initial date was the end of 1999, so Jackson had three years to produce this Middle-European epic series.

Of course, Simon's plan is still a trilogy back-to-back shooting. Considering the huge workload required, three years are actually not long.

Then there is Ben Stiller.

As one of the core members of the Rogue Gang, Stiller, under the support of Simon, participated in two projects of Daenerys Entertainment in the second half of this year, and participated in Peter Jackson's "The Ghost of the Terror" and directed Jim Carrey's "Cable TV Repairman" as the director.

Next, Simon also plans to let the other party participate in the performance in order to promote Atlantic City's "Hangover".

As long as "The Hangover" is successful next year, even if it is not as good as before, the local box office exceeds 100 million, the Ragnarok will basically take shape, enough to compete with most of the older Hollywood comedy stars.

Of course, Simon did not plan to cooperate with the Lanzi Gang for too long. After all, the more time went by, the lower the cost-effectiveness of this group of people. Although the box office of the films produced was very guaranteed, most of the income was divided by the main creators, and the studio often only made hard money, which was completely inconsistent with Simon's philosophy.

I talked to the two and it was time to get off work.

Peter Jackson and Ben Stiller are leaving now, and Simon discusses with Danny Morris about the development progress of New World Pictures' related film project in the next two years with more than an hour.
Chapter completed!