Chapter 806 Is This Really Necessary?

Because Charlie's Angels trio was busy with the global promotion of "Charlie's Angels 2", they ultimately failed to catch up with the "Casino Royale" filming in Italy.

As a result, the originally planned one-month Italian filming cycle also ended two days before the opening of the Venice Film Festival. The crew began to move to the last stop of the filming, the United Kingdom. Eric was invited by the Venice film organizer to stay. Attend the opening ceremony of the 53rd Venice Film Festival and the premiere of "Titanic" that night.

Cameron returned to Los Angeles at the beginning of the month and rushed to work with the support of the Firefly Records department. He successfully completed the recording of "My Heart Will Go On" in three weeks. The singer of choice was still Celine Dion. With the intervention, the song is almost the same as the original, and a new film copy of the revised ending song was also delivered to Los Angeles the day before the opening ceremony on September 28.

These days, because the "Casino Royale" crew is filming in Venice, "Titanic", the most expensive film in history, will premiere at the Venice Film Festival, and the Venice Film Festival itself, the city of Venice is extremely lively, and a large number of people who were originally interested in Venice The film festival is not too interested in the media also because of the above reasons, have come from all over the world.

At the same time, when he came back again, Cameron was not alone. Because Katzenberg happened to be in France in the past few days to deal with some affairs of Disneyland Paris, he also followed.

However, the relationship between Katzenberg and Cameron is not very good. They are both hot-tempered and stubborn guys. Eric has no intention of bringing the two together for the time being, as long as they don't fight. Just do it. After all, there is no personal conflict between the two. One is for the company and the other is for the movie. Therefore, as long as the future box office performance of "Titanic" can meet expectations, then Eric will come forward to mediate, the two Greediness is eliminated naturally.

September 28.

As the opening film, the premiere of "Titanic" is scheduled for 7 pm local time.

After attending the opening ceremony of the film festival during the day, Eric showed his face a little at the subsequent reception, and left in a hurry to join the preparations for the premiere of "Titanic".

Just after 6:00 pm, outside the Lido Island Film Palace, on both sides of the long red carpet, a large number of media reporters and movie fans have gathered nearby, which seems to be more lively than the opening ceremony during the day.

Although most of the internal management of Firefly Group are not optimistic about "Titanic", but with the strong support of Eric, the company still invested a large amount of publicity budget for "Titanic", in order to make this premiere The show seemed more popular, and everyone, including Eric, tried their best to contact the star guests who could attend the premiere.

In addition to most of the judges of the Venice Film Festival jury and all the creators of "Titanic", Liam Neeson, Dustin Hoffman, Pierce Brosnan, Nicolas Cage, Brigitte Fonda, Holly Hunter, Sophie Marceau, Juliette Binoche and other heavyweight Hollywood and European stars, even though many people are watching "Titanic", but when these guests appear on the red carpet , or frequently caused the screams of the fans at the scene and the crazy photos of the media reporters.

As the host, Eric appeared with Katzenberg and Cameron at the beginning of the red carpet. The three of them walked across the red carpet, answered a few questions after taking pictures in the media area, and then entered the film palace and began to greet them. Guests who came to cheer.

"Hey Liam, nice to have you here, I heard the judges liked your Michael Collins a lot this time, good luck."

"Oh,

Bridget, you're still so beautiful... Of course, I'll definitely work with you in the next movie if I get a chance. "

"Cage, I thought you might not have time."

After a series of greetings, Eric had just sent Nicolas Cage to the film palace, and Sophie Marceau, who was wearing a long black dress, came over. Sophie had hardly changed from a few years ago. , with smooth black hair, eyes like water, delicate face, and a very comfortable smile.

"Hi, Sophie, long time no see," Eric stepped forward and stretched out his hands to the girl. After the filming of "Braveheart", although Sophie took on several roles in Hollywood, the two never met again. Second, this time Eric just made a tentative call. He thought that if there was no contact for a long time, the other party would refuse, but Sophie agreed.

After gently hugging Eric, Sophie let go of him, but there was a slight dissatisfaction on her face: "Eric, I almost don't want to pay attention to you."

"Oh, may I know why?" Eric pretended to be frightened.

Sophie rolled her eyes at him and said, "Do you remember what you promised me back then?"

Eric deliberately showed a puzzled expression, saw the girl wrinkling her nose angrily, and quickly said: "Okay, of course I remember, Bond girl, but I'm really sorry, Sophie, the production strategy of the 007 series has been very good. Big adjustment, this sequel doesn't have the villain Bond Girl character, so you'll have to wait until the next one."

"Well, for the sake of you finally remembering this, I forgive you," Sophie waved at him, then smiled sweetly: "I thought you were all for coaxing women. What a nonsense you forget."

"Oh, it's really sad for you to think so," Eric pretended to be hurt and said, "But, well, this matter is actually my fault, I forgot to inform you in advance, so give it to me How about a chance to apologize?"

"I'm just curious how you're going to apologize," Sophie glanced at him with a style, and added, "Mr. the richest man in the world, you can't be sincere."

"No problem," Eric said cheerfully, "I'll buy the Eiffel Tower tomorrow and have it delivered to your house."

Sophie looked disgusted: "I don't want second-hand goods."

"Okay, then build a new one in your yard."

"Haha," Sophie laughed happily. Seeing that there were several more guests at the entrance, she stopped joking and waved to Eric: "Go ahead and greet the guests, I'll go first."

Eric nodded and said, "Have a meal together when you have time."

Sophie nodded and said, "Well, as long as you have time, I know that you are a busy person."

"For a beauty like you, I can spare time no matter how busy I am."

"Heh, rhetoric," Sophie lightly tapped Eric with a smile, turned around and walked in without saying anything.

Eric looked back and greeted the guests again, but this time it was two fat men, brothers Harvey Weinstein and Bob Weinstein.

"Shakespeare in Love" starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Julia has been completed, and post-production work is underway at this time. This film focuses on the Oscars and has nothing to do with the Venice Film Festival.

However, as an award-winning professional, Miramax will definitely not miss the Venice Film Festival. The participating film this time is called "Flirty Years", which is a biopic of an American street artist. The cast is very strong. Including a large number of powerful Hollywood stars such as David Bowie, Dennis Cooper, Willem Dafoe, and Gary Oldman.

Although "Titanic" is an opening film, it is purely a screening film and does not compete for any awards at the Venice Film Festival. Therefore, many big names who came to participate have also thrown their scruples and came to join in. The Weinstein brothers are in this way.

After a few chats with Harvey Weinstein and a few more guests, the time has come to seven o'clock fast.

Eric entered the screening room. After Cameron brought Leonardo and several other main creators to the stage to give a brief speech, the screening of the film officially began.

The lights in the projection hall dimmed, Eric turned his attention to the big screen, and Cameron quickly came out of the backstage and sat beside him.

After all, this is the first public appearance of "Titanic", and although it has been quite relaxed on the surface, Eric still noticed the details of Cameron's grip on the armrest.

"Hey Jim, relax, I guess everyone will love this movie."

"Hopefully," Cameron muttered in a low voice, then turned to look at Eric, raised his voice, and said, "Anyway, Eric, thank you."

Eric nodded slightly, didn't say anything, just patted Cameron on the shoulder.

In the screening hall, as the picture on the big screen lit up, the three hundred invited guests, reporters and fans all focused their attention on the big screen, and everyone wanted to see it. What does a $215 million blockbuster look like?

However, the opening scene of deep-sea treasure exploration disappointed most people.

It seems that there is nothing special about it.

This slightly disappointed mood persisted until the elderly Rose appeared, and the memory picture unfolded. When the Titanic giant-like figure appeared at the British harbour terminal, and the young Rose played by Rachel Weisz made a stunning appearance. The disappointment of the audience was slightly relieved, and the insiders who were familiar with the filming process even sighed in their hearts. Such a highly restored picture is really a money-burning weapon. However, they also inevitably underestimate: is it really necessary to create such extravagant scenes for a movie?

With the progress of the plot, the long and small foreshadowing, even the scene where Jack and Rose are standing on the bow in the film will feel like a dream to anyone who sees it, it is difficult to stop many media and filmmakers. The position I secretly made for this film in my heart is a cliché love story between a princess and a groom.

Therefore, although the film began to turn on the tear-jerking mode frequently in the second half of the film, for many media reporters and filmmakers in the industry, this film did not have many highlights except for some of the special effects. Thinking of the heavenly singing of "Heart Forever", some people suddenly felt that this song was the most attractive in the whole movie.

In fact, Eric has been paying attention to the reaction of the audience in the screening hall, mainly the small group of lucky ordinary audience. When he noticed that the two girls on the left and back were hugging each other at the last parting moment of Jack and Rose, they hugged each other unabashedly. When sobbing, Eric was probably relieved. The main audience for this film was young people, and Firefly's marketing plan for "Titanic" was mainly aimed at this group of people. Eric is not too worried about the opinions of film critics. As long as the media is not one-sided, "Titanic" will have the opportunity to create miracles that happened in the original time and space.

When the ending song ended, the lights in the projection hall came on, and applause broke out in the venue. It was not cold, but it was not too warm. Many people even whispered something to their companions while applauding.

The audience began to leave, and Eric beckoned his assistant, Peter Rich, who was sitting nearby, to come over and said, "I forgot one thing in advance. Does this movie have a questionnaire for ordinary movie fans?"

Peter Ritchie shook his head and said: "No, Mr. Williams, including tonight and tomorrow's three screenings, tickets are mainly for media reporters and film critics, and only 50 tickets are given to ordinary fans through the event. "

There are only fifty ordinary viewers, and it is understandable that the distribution department did not arrange a questionnaire.

Only four screenings of "Titanic" were arranged at the Venice Film Festival. Because of the large number of media people from all over the world, tickets for these four screenings can be said to be in short supply, and tickets for ordinary audiences are also poor.

Only four screenings were arranged, mainly to screen and compress the viewing objects as much as possible, so as to facilitate Firefly’s later publicity operations. After all, it is a super huge investment of more than 200 million US dollars. Be careful, even if Eric is more confident , and there is no idea of ​​expanding the number of screenings of the film.

"50 will be 50." After thinking about it, Eric said: "Forget it tonight, you can arrange it. No matter how many ordinary movie fans are left for tomorrow's screenings, I will see these people the day after tomorrow. questionnaire form."

Peter Ritchie didn't ask any more questions, nodded, and hurriedly turned to leave.

Katzenberg, Cameron, and a few others stood not far away. After seeing Eric and his assistant talking about things, they came over together. Katzenberg said: "Eric, let's go to the banquet hall, Everyone's been waiting there."

Eric nodded and left with everyone, rushing to the location of the reception specially organized by the crew for the guests.

In the banquet hall of the Lido Island Hotel, Eric shuttled through the crowd, greeted the guests one by one, chatted casually, and socialized for half an hour before he escaped and escaped to the terrace outside the banquet hall. Ventilation on.

This is the second floor of the hotel, facing the sea, and looking further into the distance is the brightly lit main city of Venice.

There was already someone on the terrace, wearing a long black dress, holding a glass of red wine, leaning on the railing and quietly looking at the sky in the distance.

Eric walked over, leaned on the railing and looked at Sophie's side face, and said with a smile, "The beautiful woman is alone, and no one is talking to her, it's really reckless."

Sophie smiled, her expression a little reluctant, and said softly: "Eric, you are the fifth one, and, I am hesitant, whether you want to be the fifth one I drive away."

In the faint light, Eric noticed that Sophie's expression was obviously a bit lonely, and asked, "Why are you suddenly unhappy?"