Chapter 890 990. Cooling down

Chapter 890 990. Cooling down

It is said that "The Martian" represented China in the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film this year. It was not Huayi's initiative to apply, but it came from the intention of the higher-ups.

In previous years, the results would not be selected from many films until the end of autumn. Unexpectedly, this time, the higher-ups directly designated the movie "The Martian".

Since the higher-ups were willing to give this opportunity, Huayi would naturally not pretend to give in and readily agreed.

However, competing for the Oscar for Foreign Language Film is not such a simple matter. There will be several rounds of pre-selection, accepting competitors from various countries, and finally selecting about four films to enter the final shortlist based on the votes of the judges.

Then the award will be selected from the final four shortlisted films.

For this trophy, Nie Wei actually did not hold too much hope, thinking that as long as he could be shortlisted, it would be a sure thing.

Although the Oscars are located in the world's largest commercial film center, they prefer art films in terms of awards.

Even a super director like Cameron, who made both the "Terminator" series and the "Alien" series, which were both well-received and box-office hits, was not favored by the Oscar judges. It was not until he made the sinking ship that shocked the whole world that the Oscars had to give him the trophy that should have belonged to him a long time ago.

Moreover, Nie Wei also knew that the Oscars had always discriminated against Asian films. So far, except for director Ang Lee who broke the embarrassment of Chinese films winning zero foreign language film awards with "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon", other artistic films such as "Farewell My Concubine", "Hero", and "Raise the Red Lantern" have also failed in the Oscars.

Nie Wei did not think that "The Martian", which can be completely identified as a commercial film, could win the Oscar for Foreign Language Film.

However, although it is clear that the chances are slim, it is still necessary to strive for it, after all, there is a chance.

So after confirming that "The Martian" would be nominated for this year's Oscars, Huayi also spent about 8 million US dollars on public relations.

Part of this money will be given to media magazines, such as the authoritative magazine of the Oscars, The Hollywood Reporter, and the advertising fee for one page of this magazine is as high as 60,000 US dollars, and this is a continuous investment, it is impossible to be just one issue.

There are also authoritative magazines such as "Film Studies" and "Oscar Week". Although the price is not as high as "The Hollywood Reporter", the advertising fee is also not low, all above 10,000 US dollars.

In addition, Huayi will also set up a special advisory group.

The members of the advisory group are basically well-known film critics in the United States. They have their own columns and their own fans, and his influence is what Huayi needs.

The more members of such an advisory group, the better, and the price of hiring each consultant ranges from 10,000 US dollars to 100,000 US dollars, which depends entirely on the influence and credibility of the consultant himself.

Of course, in the end, public relations for those members of the Academy of Film who may become the new Oscar judges are indispensable.

Eight million US dollars is just the budget. If the momentum is not enough at that time, it is possible to continue to add it, and it is not impossible to reach the level of 10 million.

In fact, all film awards in the world are basically the same, except that the Oscar public relations model has become a mature business system after so many years of development.

From the point of view of public relations costs, it can be seen that the level of the Oscar film awards ceremony is indeed the best in the world.

Nie Wei did not have much hope, but just set the goal to be shortlisted. The fact that "The Martian" will represent China in the sprint for the Oscar Foreign Language Film Award immediately caused heated discussions among the media and the public once it was exposed.

In the mouths of these media and the public, they seemed to be more confident than Nie Wei.

"The Martian" will sprint for the Oscars, and there will be great hope to win the Oscar Foreign Language Film trophy for China!"

"Nie Wei will take the popular movie "The Martian" to the Oscars, and the hope of winning the trophy is as high as 80%!"

"The Oscar Foreign Language Film will usher in the highest-grossing movie, "The Martian" has a huge advantage and crushes its opponents."

The entertainment media gave great hope to this matter. In the eyes of these media, it seems that this trophy is already in the bag of "The Martian".

With the media's confident reports, many people were also influenced and felt that the trophy should be awarded to "The Martian".

Of course, some professional film magazines or filmmakers were still very rational about this, but their calm analysis was just a cold water in the eyes of those who were optimistic about "The Martian". When people make choices, they will subconsciously think about the good side, so these comments were quickly annihilated by more reports praising "The Martian".

Some people were even attacked and scolded by netizens, especially when they found that the other party did not stop talking about it when they reasoned with them, and finally gave up talking about it.

And those media that reported on the popularity of "The Martian" also tried their best to brag about "The Martian" when they saw that their articles were so popular. Some media even almost prepared to award this trophy to this movie before the Oscars started.

"If the Oscars don't give the best foreign language film to "The Martian", there must be something shady."

"That's right, such a good movie will definitely win the award. I don't believe that there will be a movie with a better reputation than "The Martian" this year. If it doesn't win, who will win."

"Support "The Martian". If The Martian doesn't win an award, I will never watch the Oscars again."

"This opinion is obviously a bit too much." Nie Wei frowned and looked at the comments of these netizens online. Although he understood that they were all fans who supported his movie and they were all kind-hearted, sometimes good intentions could also lead to bad things.

You have to know that people's words are scary. There is a term in the industry called "killing by flattery".

The higher the praise now, if "The Martian" doesn't win an award, then all the media that are promoting it now may change the direction of their guns in an instant. The higher the hope, the deeper the disappointment. Can fans bear that kind of psychological gap?

After all, sometimes fans and haters are just a matter of a thought.

"It is necessary to cool down this matter." Wang Zhonglei was happy to see this matter happen at first, but it has been so big recently that he also sensed the "danger".

"Why don't we let the company issue an announcement first and contact those newspapers privately? Suppress this news." Wang Zhonglei thought about it and made a few suggestions.

"Neither is good. Please help me contact a big newspaper and do an interview." Nie Wei thought about it and rejected Wang Zhonglei's proposal.

If the company issued a notice to pour cold water on the film, it would undoubtedly disappoint the fans who supported the film, and those newspapers would not necessarily listen to Huayi. Moreover, it was not worth it to owe those newspapers favors for such a thing, and the key effect might not be very good.

So Nie Wei decided to come out in person.

His fans might not listen to what others said, but Nie Wei was confident that most of his fans would still listen to what he said.

So at this time, using his influence to correct the fans' blindly confident views is the most effective way.

And as long as the fans calm down, those media that fan the flames will naturally retreat and look for other news when they see that there is no hot spot to report.

Of course, even if Nie Wei wants to guide the fans, Nie Wei can't use an interview to tell the fans that "The Martian" has little chance of winning an Oscar. Doing so is too straightforward and it is easy to hurt the fans' hearts.

So the theme of this interview is actually to sing praises for "The Martian", but Nie Wei will add a little bit of "private goods" in the middle.

This kind of interview naturally needs to find a media that cooperates with tacit understanding and has a huge influence, and Yanshan Wenhua Newspaper naturally became the best choice.

The interview was held in Nie Wei's office in Huayi, and the female reporter who came was called An Ge.

"Mr. Nie, this is a small gift for you." After An Ge brought the assistant reporter into the room and greeted him, she handed Nie Wei an exquisite bag in her hand.

"What is it?" Nie Wei curiously opened the bag and found that it was actually a picture album.

When he opened it, it turned out that the picture album was full of some painting manuscripts of various characters in "Nirvana in Fire", and he immediately understood it in his mind.

"Editor-in-Chief Liu asked you to give it to me? He really knows how to do business." Nie Wei smiled.

Nie Wei guessed the reason for the album that the reporter gave him. It was obvious that Yanshan Publishing House wanted to publish an illustrated version of "Nirvana in Fire", and this album was obviously to test Nie Wei and ask if he was willing.

Nie Wei easily saw through the editor-in-chief's thoughts, which was also within Ange's expectations, so he was not embarrassed, but frankly told Nie Wei what Liu Yuan had told him.

"The editor-in-chief said that if you agree, he will definitely use the best paper and invite the best painters. He said that he wanted to make this illustrated version of "Nirvana in Fire" into a work of art, and it will be sold in limited quantities..."

"Okay, go back and tell Liu Yuan that I agree." Nie Wei smiled and stopped the reporter Ange from saying that. Anyway, this matter has only benefits and no disadvantages for him, so he will go with Liu Yuan.

"I also agreed to the matter. Can we start the interview? You have wasted ten minutes." Nie Wei looked at his watch and reminded.

Hearing this, Ange's expression was flustered for the first time. While preparing a recorder and a laptop, she argued: "Mr. Nie, what happened just now doesn't count as interview time, right?"

"Why not? It counts from the time you entered the room." Seeing this beautiful reporter looking at him pitifully, Nie Wei answered coldly.

Ange pouted her lips, succumbed to Nie Wei's power, and dared not argue anymore.

After all, instead of arguing about the interview time at this time, it is better to seize the time to interview quickly and try to make everyone chat happily. Maybe the time lost before can be made up later.

"First of all, congratulations to Director Nie. The box office of your movie "The Martian" in the mainland will soon exceed 2 billion."

"Thank you."

"Did you expect the good box office results of this movie?" After the compliment, Ange officially began to ask questions.

"No, actually I don't have high expectations for the box office of this movie, especially in our country, because there is no very successful example to compare with, and I am not sure that the theme of space survival will be successful."

"Then why did you choose to make a movie on this theme?"

"Because I am very good at being the first to try something new." Nie Wei smiled and joked, then explained: "In my opinion, there is no distinction between popular and unpopular film themes, because those popular themes were once unpopular, and unpopular themes may have been popular before, so it all depends on the quality of the film itself."

"And on this point, I am very confident, I believe that the film I make will not disappoint the audience."

"Your confidence is well-founded. This film has a high score of 8.4 on IMDB, ranking 66th in the TOP250, which is also the best result achieved by Chinese directors so far."

"Here, I am very grateful to the audience for their love of this film, thank you for your support." Nie Wei smiled and thanked.

After talking about the achievements of "The Martian" for a while, Ange took the initiative to ask Nie Wei about "The Martian" participating in the Oscar foreign language film selection according to the instructions of the newspaper.

"I feel very honored that The Martian can represent China in the Oscars, especially seeing so many fans supporting The Martian online, my production team and I are very happy."

"So are you confident about participating in the Oscars this time?"

"I really hope to get this trophy, after all, this is the best result, but this is also the first time I have participated in the Oscars with my work. In my opinion, being nominated is a great affirmation for me."

"Director Nie, you are really humble."

"This is not modesty, but the fact. My idol Cameron didn't know how much "tuition" he paid, and finally won the Oscar for Best Director with Titanic. I think if I was sure to win the Oscar for the first time I was nominated, I guess someone would call me arrogant."

"No, everyone likes you very much, whether as an actor or a director." Ange gave his sincere praise. After all, Nie Wei's reputation inside and outside the circle is well known to everyone.

The interview finally lasted for 30 minutes. Just as Ange expected, Nie Wei didn't care too much about the ten minutes wasted on the previous greetings. It should be just a joke.

When they parted, Nie Wei also specially gave Ange and the assistant reporter two gifts, which were the model of the Tiangong spacecraft in the movie "The Martian".

"Thank you so much." Ange and the assistant reporter looked at the exquisite spacecraft model covered by glass in their hands, and felt a new love from the bottom of their hearts.

They deeply felt the intention of this gift, and their evaluation of Nie Wei was raised a lot. As expected, as the rumors said, talking with Nie Wei always felt like a spring breeze, which made people feel happy. It was really Nie Wei who knew how to be a person.

"Thank you, we will definitely do the report seriously and convey what you want to say to the public." When leaving, Ange promised solemnly.

"Thank you for your trouble." Nie Wei smiled and nodded.

It is currently 9:30 in the morning. Ange and his team went back to do the interview report. From sorting to publishing, Nie Wei thought that he should be able to see his interview online in the afternoon. When the fans read it, they should also be cool.

However, Nie Wei got another good news before he waited for Ange's interview report.

"Nie Wei, the Saturn Awards have announced the list, and The Martian is nominated!" Thomas, who was far away in the United States, called Nie Wei and informed him of the latest good news.

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