Chapter 528 MGM
Holding her hand, Xu Liang smiled and said: "I didn't expect that I found a good wife."
"I am not your wife."< br>
Besides happiness, there is also a bit of resentment.
“Hey, I said yes.”
Xu Liang exerted his strength and had already hugged Jiang Xiaoyang into his arms before he could react.
“Oh, let me go.”
Xu Liang not only did not let go, but instead carried her towards the second floor.
"Stop screaming, my mother is on the second floor."
Jiang Xiaoyang became quiet instantly.
Xu Liang came to his room with his feet up, locked the door, threw Jiang Xiaoyang on the bed, and threw himself on him.
"Come down quickly, if my aunt finds out, I will be thrown to death!"
"Don't worry, you will scream quieter later."
"I, Wuwu..."
Although he said this, it turned out that Jiang Xiaoyang was really worried and he didn't force it.
After being bored for a while, Xu Liang sent her home after dinner at home.
The next day, I came to the company.
"Mr. Xu, this is MGM's information."
Took the document from Lu Hui's hand.
“Is there anything else?”
“Mr. It’s time to be happy. By the way, did Mr. Xie tell me where it will be held?”
“Okay, I know. Remember to inform me when the time comes.”
“Okay.”
Lu Hui turned and left.
Picked up the MGM information collected by the CEO's office on the table and looked at it carefully.
MGM was founded in 1924 through the merger of Metro, Goldwyn, and Louis Meyer.
In the heyday of Hollywood in the 1930s, MGM was the largest film company, producing 40-50 films every year. During this period, MGM had the most popular movie stars and directors in the United States.
Greta Garbo, Clark Gable, Jean Harlow, Spencer Tracy, Robert Taylor, Joan Crawford, Norma Shearer, etc., directors such as Eric ·Famous characters such as Von Strauchen, King Vidor, Fritz Lang, George Cukor, and Victor Fleming are all owned by MGM.
The 1930s and 1940s were a period of great success for MGM.
Paramount, Warner Bros., etc. are under pressure.
But the good times did not last long, and MGM could not escape the law of prosperity and decline.
In the 1950s, MGM gradually declined.
In 1948, the U.S. Supreme Court made the final ruling on Paramount's years-long bill, stipulating that the studio must sell its theaters.
The passage of the Paramount Act directly led to the disintegration of the studio system and the beginning of the ruin of classic Hollywood.
Large companies have had to reduce the number of films they shoot each year, increase the cost of a single film and carry out large-scale layoffs.
In 1950, U.S. film revenue accounted for only 12.3% of the entertainment industry. In the past, this number was as high as about 25%.
MGM was also forced to give up its own exhibition business, thereby cutting off its main source of financial resources, and was no longer able to maintain its previous high output and stable quality.
In addition to the Paramount Act, television began to enter ordinary households in large numbers at this time.
The rise of new entertainment methods has divided a large number of audiences.
By the 1950s, the number of movie audiences was half that of the 1940s, and independent producers and agents began to emerge.
Finally, Meyer, who led MGM to glory, was forced to leave MGM in 1951.
His film idea is to entertain the public, but the company board's suspicion of him is growing day by day.
By the early 1950s, the conflict between him and his assistant Doyle Sharry became more and more serious. In the end, the board of directors decided to keep Sharry and let Meyer go.
Amid internal and external troubles, in the 1950s MGM produced hit musicals such as "A Parisian in New York" and "Singin' in the Rain" with excellent reputations.
But in 1957, the company suffered a loss for the first time.
In 1960, MGM was forced to terminate the contracts of all contracted actors.
During this period, MGM's most successful film was the musical "Kiki". This film was MGM's last musical to win the Academy Award for Best Picture.
In 1959, MGM remade the epic film "Ben-Hur". This four-hour blockbuster starring Charles Heston was a huge success and cost $15 million. He won 11 Oscars, a record that has never been broken.
But "Ben-Hur" also brought disastrous consequences, that is, MGM can only shoot one super-large production every year, including "The King of Kings", "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" and "Mutiny", and any The failure of one part will be an unbearable loss.
Big productions can only be done occasionally, in the next 10 years.
Although Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer has excellent films such as "North by Northwest", "Butterfield", "Lolita", and "Doctor Zhivago", it still suffers losses year after year. MGM, which continues to decline, is no longer for sale.
So in 1967, Edgar Bronfman, an investor from Canada, bought MGM, but he was not good at running the entertainment business. Two years later, in 1969 Then he sold MGM to Kirk Kerkorian, a millionaire Las Vegas gambling tycoon.
In Bronfman's hands, MGM was still the top film company in Hollywood, but in Cork's hands, MGM was just a money-making tool.
And the reason why this gambling tycoon acquired MGM was not to enter the entertainment industry, but because he took a fancy to MGM's land.
As soon as he took over the company, he auctioned off all MGM's props and costumes, and invested the funds in real estate and hotels in Las Vegas, Reno and other casino cities.
He even closed down the distribution department of MGM in 1973 and handed over the distribution affairs to United Artists.
In 1979, Kirk Kerkorian even announced that MGM had become a hotel company.
In Cork's hands, MGM, which only had its production department, was one of the top eight in Hollywood and was actually on its last legs.
Perhaps he got a taste of the sweetness from the acquisition of MGM. In 1981, he repeated his old tricks and bought United Artists, one of the eight giants in Hollywood that was in decline.
After the merger of the two companies, a new company was born - MGM United Artists.
Hollywood has also changed from the top eight to the top seven.
Here we need to introduce United Art.
United Artists was co-founded in 1919 by Chaplin, Fairbanks, Pickford, and Griffith.
The purpose is to get rid of the constraints and exploitation of big film companies and strive for more creative freedom and greater profits.
The films produced and distributed by the company include Chaplin's "The Gold Rush", "Modern Times", "The Great Dictator", "Stage Life", Griffith's "The Broken Flower", " "Go East" and "Scarface", "Peach Blossom", "West Side Story", "007", "Rocky" and other very famous films that even left their names in the history of world cinema.
Unfortunately, even the brilliant United Artists cannot escape the pattern of prosperity and decline.
In the 1950s, the American film industry entered a period of depression and recession. Chaplin and Pickford successively sold their stocks to financial capitalists.
After that, United Artists changed hands several times, and was finally merged into MGM in 1981.
Originally, the acquisition of United Artists was a turning point for MGM, but the house leaked and it suffered from continuous rain, and the ship broke and faced another storm.
The big-budget film "Heaven's Gate," which cost almost all of United Artists' money, turned out to be a big flop.
The level of badness is comparable to Chen Mantou's "The Promise".
The difference is that "The Promise" successfully fooled everyone into the cinema, with a box office of hundreds of millions; old and American movies have been watched a lot, and information is developed, so it is not easy to fool people. "Heaven's Gate" has a terrible box office and directly brought it down. United Arts.
This case is still the most famous case of a luxury blockbuster causing the bankruptcy of a movie company, and it is often used as a "whip" by movie company bosses.
Coker, who acquired United Artists, did not have the good luck he had when acquiring MGM this time.
No money was made.
This guy just decided not to play anymore.
In 1986, MGM was sold to CNN's Turner for US$1.45 billion.
Later, when CNN was short of funds, he bought back most of its assets from Turner.
But Turner's CNN retained 300 movies, including "Gone with the Wind."
After CNN was acquired by Time Warner, these 300 movies became the assets of Time Warner. Warner made a lot of money by releasing the DVDs of these movies (MGM Classic Series).
This is also the reason why the film is obviously produced by MGM but is distributed by Warner.
It should be noted that MGM's more than 4,000 movies and more than 17,000 TV programs have not been sold.
Only 300 films in Turner's hands were sold.
MGM’s copyrights can still bring the company at least $500 million in net income every year.
This is also the reason why so many companies are interested in MGM after it collapsed.
However, although Cork bought back MGM, he did not bring him back to life.
After seeing that I couldn’t make any money, I simply sold it.
In 1990, it was sold to an Italian consortium headed by Giancado Paretti for US$1.3 billion.
Two years later, MGM was auctioned off by a French bank as Paretti was accused of fraudulently obtaining control of MGM.
In 1993, Frank Macasso took over MGM, and his team subsequently released blockbuster films such as "Get Shorty" and "GoldenEye".
In 1994, MGM's "True Lies" starring Arnold and Schwarzenegger had a global box office of 365 million U.S. dollars, and "Speed" starring Keanu Reeves also created 2.83 billion in global box office.
Although MGM made money, after repeated ownership transfers and several blind acquisitions and expansions, MGM was saddled with heavy debts.
Frank Macasso had no choice but to withdraw, so he decided to quit.
But MGM is a mess, and not many people want to take over.
Boss Joe bought two rotten apples and bet Cork on three to buy MGM.
That’s right.
Here he comes again.
In 1996, Cork once again gained control of MGM for $1.3 billion.
Sold for 1.3 billion and bought for 1.3 billion. If inflation is taken into account, Cork will undoubtedly make a profit.
For the next few years, MGM struggled to operate.
(End of this chapter)