Chapter 598: Big Melee
Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" has sold more than 40 million copies worldwide. It can be said that the movie has a broad fan base of the original book.
As long as the movie adaptation is reasonable, there will still be a large audience.
However, the film does not have the amazing big scenes like "Transformers", nor the gorgeous special effects. It looks as bland as water.
"USA Today" commented: "The Da Vinci Code" is a movie that is loyal to the original work, but unfortunately, the film did not bring any surprises to the audience."
"The New Yorker" also commented: "Without a code to decipher, "The Da Vinci Code" is a useless, boring, monotonous, stupid movie adaptation of Dan Brown's suspense story."
During his free time, little Gilbert also interacted with movie fans on his social account and answered many questions from fans about movies and new works.
When talking about new works, he said bluntly on his social account: "I won the copyright of the Cyberpunk tabletop game very early.
But I hope to enrich the entire cyberpunk world and tell legendary experiences through a large number of original stories.
There are many fans around the world who are obsessed with cyberpunk culture, and I also like it very much. If you study my films carefully, you will find that they usually have symbols and labels from cyberpunk culture. ”
A fan asked him to give an evaluation of two movies currently in theaters. Little Gilbert said this: "I have been to the premieres of both movies.
Ron Howard's "The Da Vinci Code" is the holy grail of summer blockbusters, a powerful, action-packed thriller.
Tom Hanks' performance is great, and I think he is the best person to play Professor Langdon.
As for Transformers, Andrew Garfield is good and Megan Fox is sexy. ”
Little Gilbert didn't mention the robot transformation scene in "Transformers". In fact, in his opinion, "Transformers" is very different from its previous life, and even has Michael Bay's usual problems.
But we are currently in an era of innovation in the special effects industry. Starting with "Transformers", it heralds that the Hollywood special effects industry has entered a new stage.
The special effects at this stage are something that the audience has never been exposed to before. There is no longer the feeling that the special effects looked a bit distorted before, and people are beginning to be unable to distinguish between illusion and reality.
After the release of "Avatar", the concept of special effects plus 3D brought Hollywood to a climax.
In terms of fans and audiences, "The Da Vinci Code" cannot be compared to "Transformers". In terms of screen performance, "The Da Vinci Code" also cannot surpass "Transformers".
In addition, Sky Studios has made so many announcements and created a lot of momentum, so it is natural for "Transformers" to defeat "The Da Vinci Code" in the first week.
On May 19, the two films opened on a large scale in North America. "Transformers" grossed US$28.925 million on its first day, beating "The Da Vinci Code"'s US$20.676 million to become the single-day box office champion.
In third place is "The Last of Us" in its third week of release, with the film earning $6.629 million in a single day.
Caught between two commercial blockbusters, all the films that have been released are trembling. It is already rare that "The Last of Us" can maintain a good box office curve.
North American theaters ushered in a wave of movie-watching frenzy on Saturday. Although "Transformers" has some small shortcomings, its advantages are equally outstanding, enough to attract many, many viewers.
It is worth mentioning that this movie brings back many people’s childhood memories. The 1980s happened to be the time when the “Transformers” animation became popular in North America.
This animation has even been introduced to mainland China, where there are fans of "Transformers".
Although the difference between the movie version and the animated version is quite large, this does not prevent the post-70s and 80s generation, who have become the backbone of society and the main consumer group, from experiencing the "Transformers" in the new era and new technologies with a nostalgic mentality.
The film grossed US$36.446 million on Saturday, once again winning the single-day box office championship. "The Da Vinci Code" took in $27.339 million, and "The Last of Us" continued to take in $7.73 million.
The popularity dropped slightly on Sunday, but "Transformers" still earned US$28.816 million in theaters, and the North American box office reached US$95.187 million in its first week. The first week's box office almost exceeded 100 million. Such a high first week box office was due to a series of factors.
First, Sky Studios developed a targeted strategy. Through childhood memories and other nostalgic means, it has attracted many fans of the "Transformers" series.
Secondly, unconventional publicity methods.
Although the trick of leaking the source of the film was spurned by peers, it has to be said that it attracted many passerby viewers who did not originally pay attention to "Transformers".
Before the film was released, it had accumulated countless fans and viewers who wanted to see it because of various publicity methods.
There is a want-to-see list on the IMDB list, which labels movies that have not yet been released as ones that you want to see.
Before the release of "Transformers", a total of 2.8 million IMDB users marked "Transformers" as wanting to see it, which is enough to prove the audience's expectations for the film.
If it weren't for the fact that the film itself didn't appeal to some female viewers, as well as the messy editing and camera shake that made people dizzy, there would have been no problem with the box office exceeding 100 million in the first week.
Even so, the box office is enough to make Sky Studios and distributor MGM United Artists smile. And don't forget that the biggest profit point of movies like "Transformers" has never been the box office, but the peripherals.
Although "The Da Vinci Code" is not as good as "Transformers", it is not too bad. It took in a box office of US$19.307 million in a single day on Sunday, and the box office in its first week reached US$6,732.2.
For a plot-oriented movie, this first-week box office performance is actually quite good.
It's just that Sony Columbia Pictures is not very happy if "Transformers" has to be produced despite clearly dominating the schedule. Although we had a happy cooperation with Sky Studios before, now we are rivals.
During the first week of the release of the two films, both sides mobilized trolls to set the pace on the Internet, and the massive melee between trolls created a chaotic atmosphere on the Internet.
This is especially obvious on IMDB, where trolls from both sides give each other low scores. Later, "The Da Vinci Code" couldn't hold on any longer, so they pretended to be fans of "Transformers" and gave the movie low scores.
"Transformers" also followed suit, pretending to be fans of "The Da Vinci Code" and going around criticizing other movies.
"The Last of Us" was accidentally affected, and its original rating of 8.6 quickly dropped to 8.4, which made Little Gilbert's fans very angry.
Movies such as "The Godfather" and "Lord of the Rings" at the top of the list were all affected, so fans of these movies joined the battlefield one after another.
For a time, IMDB started a world war, and it was so chaotic that IMDB had to close the comment function and rating function before moving the war to other places.
Although the quarrel was fierce, the two new films released performed well, which also led to the rise of the overall market. From a macro perspective, they contributed to the film market.
"The Last of Us" took in $7.25 million on Sunday, and made a huge fortune in its third weekend with $23.309 million.
Including the four-day box office, it took in US$35.108 million this week, and the North American box office reached US$176.82 million, which is quite a good result.
The film's overseas box office also began to decline. Although it continued to add more than a dozen markets, the box office contribution from these markets was limited.
In overseas markets this week, "The Last of Us" took in a box office of US$53.58 million, bringing the global box office to US$429.92 million.
The most eye-catching movie at the overseas box office this week is undoubtedly "Transformers".
(End of chapter)