Chapter 2002 2004【Acquisition of DreamWorks】

   In March, the Academy Awards ceremony continued.

   This year's Oscars ceremony, with Crete Eastwood's "Million Dollar Baby" as the biggest hit.

Although Universal Pictures released many blockbuster works last year, such as "Spider-Man", "X-Men 2", "Pirates of the Caribbean 2" and so on, most of them are commercial films. technical awards.

  But because of face, Xiang Nan still wants to participate.

  He invited Alessandra Ambrosio to walk the red carpet with him. This made Alexandra extremely happy. Although she is a supermodel, it was the first time for her to attend such a sacred and solemn occasion.

  In order to compete with all the actresses on the red carpet, she also specially borrowed Dior's haute couture, wearing a lace dress that is semi-revealing and half-revealing, which is particularly alluring.

  …

   In the subsequent Oscar awards ceremony, Universal Pictures really got nothing.

  However, Xiang Nan is not discouraged. Next year's Oscars ceremony will definitely be dominated by Universal Pictures. He is very confident about it.

  In April, "Mission: Impossible 4" officially started filming.

  The film will be filmed in Russia, Taiwan, India and other places, and the shooting is still somewhat difficult.

  In April, May, and June, Universal Pictures successively released "Scream 4", "American Pie 2", "Red Eye Flight" and "Fast and Furious 2".

   Among them, "Red Eye Flight" is the work of DreamWorks. It tells the story of the heroine who meets a handsome man on the plane. She originally thought it was the beginning of a wonderful love. Unexpectedly, the man turned out to be a criminal, intending to hijack the plane...

  The movie cost $45 million and starred Rachel McAdams and Cillian Murphy.

   "Wedding Crashers," starring Rachel McAdams, Owen Wilson, and Vince Vaughn, just earned $280 million at the box office;

   And Cillian Murphy also has masterpieces such as "Twenty-eight Days of Surprise", "Cold Mountain", and "Girl with a Pearl Earring". In addition, "Bloody Gang" starring in him in the future was highly praised by countless drama fans, and was praised as the most fashionable gang drama.

  Director Wes Craven also has many blockbuster works such as "A Nightmare on Elm Street", "The Mountain Has Eyes", "The Devil Down the Staircase", and "Scream".

  So no matter from which point of view, this movie should be a hit. Unexpectedly, in the end, the film only grossed more than 20 million US dollars in North America, and only 58 million US dollars in the global box office.

  Compared with the cost of 45 million US dollars, DreamWorks Pictures lost about 20 million US dollars, which is really unexpected.

  …

  In comparison, "Scream 4", "American Pie 2", and "Fast and Furious 2" produced by Universal Pictures have all achieved very good results.

   Among them, "Fast and Furious 2" even got a box office of 230 million US dollars, which is quite good. You must know that Paul Walker acted in the movie himself, and the cost was only 60 million US dollars, so such a result is already quite good.

  In July, "Rage Rescue" starring Xiang Nan was released.

  The investment of this movie is only 60 million US dollars, which is Xiang Nan's smallest investment in recent years. It tells the story of a bodyguard bravely fighting a kidnapper and saving a little girl.

  The story is exciting and the plot is hot. Although the investment is small, there is no shortage of big scenes. Explosions, chases, gun battles, fighting... very lively.

   Therefore, after it was released, the box office was very hot. In the end, the North American box office was 210 million U.S. dollars, and the global box office was nearly 500 million U.S. dollars, which is really good.

   This movie also confirmed Xiang Nan's box office appeal. No matter how the times change, he is still the top superstar with the most box office appeal in Hollywood.

   At the same time, "Escape from Clone Island" produced by DreamWorks Pictures was also distributed by Paramount Pictures. As Xiang Nan expected, the North American box office only took in 36 million US dollars.

  Although the overseas box office took in 120 million, it still lost to the production cost of 120 million US dollars, which can be said to be a big defeat.

   Seeing this result, the industry was greatly puzzled.

   "Escape from Clone Island" has a good reputation, and the stars who starred in it are also big enough.

Ewan McGregor is famous for playing Jedi Knight Obi-Wan in the "Star Wars" prequel trilogy; Scarlett Johansson's "Tomb Raider" also set a female action movie box office record .

  But such a combination has achieved such a box office result, which is really too miserable. To be honest, the North American box office is 36 million US dollars, which is barely enough for the salaries of the two stars.

  Only Spielberg knows why the movie failed.

  Xiang Nan has long reminded him that even "The Sixth Day" starring the top box office superstar Arnold Schwarzenegger failed miserably at the box office, let alone Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson. No matter how famous they are, they are not as famous as Schwarzenegger, and naturally the box office cannot surpass him.

  It's a pity that he insisted on going his own way and didn't listen to Xiang Nan's words, so he incurred such a big loss. This "Escape from Clone Island" directly caused a loss of more than 80 million US dollars to DreamWorks.

   Coupled with the "Red Eye Flight" not long ago, DreamWorks lost more than 100 million US dollars. Adding up all the previous losses, DreamWorks is about $400 million in debt.

   Such a debt amount is already unbearable for a medium-sized company such as DreamWorks.

   Coupled with the loss of several consecutive films, shareholders also lost confidence in DreamWorks and sold their stocks one after another, causing DreamWorks' stock price to plummet.

   At this time, Spielberg, David Geffen, and Jeffrey Katzenberg did not want to continue to operate.

  At that time, DreamWorks Pictures had many branches, such as DreamWorks Records, DreamWorks Animation, DreamWorks Interactive Entertainment, DreamWorks TV and so on.

Among them, Spielberg is in charge of DreamWorks Pictures, and David Geffen is in charge of DreamWorks Records. Released by him; Jeffrey Katzenberg oversees DreamWorks Animation.

   Among them, DreamWorks Animation has been independently listed in 2004 because of the production of blockbuster cartoons such as "Shrek", "Chicken Run", "Madagascar", and "Shark Story". In addition to the name with the word "DreamWorks", it is actually an independent company.

  In addition, due to the rampant Internet pirates in recent years, Dreamworks Records has been weak in business, and it has not recovered from the prosperity of Geffen Records before.

   Coupled with the fact that DreamWorks Pictures is heavily in debt and its performance is not satisfactory, Spielberg, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg are naturally willing to get rid of the burden.

   Anyway, if DreamWorks Pictures is sold, they can still make money. And what a beautiful thing it would be to not have to worry about 400 million US dollars in debt.

  (end of this chapter)