Almost everyone now believes that the movie "Crazy Rich Asians" that Ning Weimin is going to film is a story adapted from Teresa Deng's personal experience, which is equivalent to a story about the personal emotions and career growth of Asian music queen Teresa Teng.

The screen biography is a reflection and summary of half her life.

But to be honest, this is not true and is just a gimmick.

This is just a publicity method used by Ning Weimin to attract more media attention and encourage more viewers to buy tickets.

What actually happened? Why did you come up with the idea to make this movie?

Only Ning Weimin himself truly knows.

Speaking of which, in fact, it was mainly because in his previous life, Ning Weimin was deeply impressed by the story of "Asian Cinderella competing with her boyfriend's family for love".

As a result, in this life, he met Teresa Teng and became good friends with each other. Only then did he realize that the emotional experience of Teresa Teng and the eldest son of the Guo family "being beaten with a stick" was actually very similar to the plot in "Crazy Rich Asians"

Similar places.

It was only then that I came up with the idea of ​​"why not use Teresa Teng, the music queen, to film this story" and promote Chinese culture and music to the world.

The process and sequence in which this idea arises are very important and must be explained clearly first.

Because it affects the success or failure of this movie.

If he wasn't sure that he would make money, Ning Weimin, a calculator, wouldn't spend so much money on a movie that might lose money.

First of all, Ning Weimin's confidence came from the huge success of the original film at the box office in Europe and the United States.

In his last life, this movie only cost 30 million U.S. dollars and earned 170 million U.S. dollars in box office in North America. It also became the weekly champion of the North American market box office list for three consecutive weeks, and eventually became the highest box office in North America.

movie with an all-Asian cast.

Although the original film "Crazy Rich Asians" was released in 2018, such high box office results are definitely inseparable from the special era attributes.

After all, at that time, the wealth of Asians had become a general consensus among people in European and American countries, and the box office scale was also quite different from now.

But the problem is that Japan is currently experiencing an economic bubble period, and the wealth of Japanese people is also attracting the world's attention.

Therefore, as long as the story background of the movie is changed to starting from 1985, the Singaporean tycoon Yang family is shifting their investment focus to Japan, it will fit the current world situation very well.

In addition, the cost of filming movies nowadays is also low.

It doesn't even cost 30 million US dollars. Ning Weimin only spent half of the original film.

The scene can be made bigger, enough to invite real stars to play the leading roles, which is not comparable to the original film.

And at least "Crazy Rich Asians" is a hit in North America, which also shows that the story mode itself and the way some plots are presented are recognized and willing to be accepted by European and American audiences.

So to sum up, the favorable and unfavorable factors offset each other. Ning Weimin at least believes that in North America, it is not difficult to achieve the target of 20% of the box office of the original film.

In other words, from an optimistic point of view, the box office in North America alone is expected to reach US$40 million.

Then the production cost of 18 million US dollars can be recovered.

The rest of the income from the re-release of video tapes and music albums is all earned.

Secondly, in Japan, the film's main box office, and in other countries and regions in the Asian market, Teresa Teng herself is the banner with the most box office appeal.

She is different now from when she first debuted in "Miss Fan".

She has already transformed from a young newcomer to the music scene to an Asian-level music queen. Her singing can be heard not only in Asia, but everywhere where there are Chinese people.

Although in the Chinese music scene, there seem to be two people, Xu Xiaofeng and Feng Feifei, who can be compared with her. They are at the same level as her in terms of fame.

But the problem is that those two have not had any outstanding new works in recent years, and their careers have already reached their ceiling.

However, Teresa Teng's star shines brightly in Japan.

Not only have excellent new songs been released one after another, but last year he also made history by himself, winning two of Japan's highest music awards as a Chinese, becoming a double champion in the Japanese music scene.

No one can deny that she has broken the ceiling of her career and is creating a new career peak.

Looking at the entire Chinese music scene, there is really no superstar as influential as her.

In terms of popularity and career achievements, she has already surpassed others and has become a legend that has never been seen before in the Asian music scene, and is probably also a legend that will never come after her.

With her like this, even if she makes a bad movie now, it will probably be a big hit at the box office in Asian countries.

From a purely commercial perspective, even Keiko Matsumoto, Japan's number one actress, is inferior to her.

So in terms of remuneration, she is certainly the number one Asian actress.

Even if Ning Weimin paid her a salary of US$500,000 to make this movie, it would still not be a loss at all.

To be honest, at least in this movie, she is more important than anyone else and more important than the story itself.

In addition, there was also Zun Long, who had just finished filming "The Last Emperor" and was about to become famous but not yet famous, playing the leading role, and he only received Ning Weimin's salary of 600,000 US dollars.

It is estimated that when this movie is released, it will be able to catch up with the global sales of "The Last Emperor" and make Zunlong famous.

So with these two male and female protagonists, it is easy to handle the box office in Asia. So what does Ning Weimin have to worry about?

Not to mention, the factors that caused the original film to be lukewarm when it was released in mainland China no longer exist due to the different era.

You must know that in this era, Cinderella stories like this have not yet become a cliché in Asia.

Movies with similar plots, such as "Lucky Star", "Meteor Garden", "Working Girl", "Pretty Woman", "Notting Hill", "Fifty Shades of Grey"... have not been filmed yet.

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Judging from the subject matter, this kind of story is undoubtedly novel and caters to the needs of the audience, so the audience will definitely buy it.

What's more, the movie is directed by Ning Weimin, and he must also tell a purely Chinese story.

It can't be like the original film, which took away the Chinese culture and still makes American values ​​​​disgusting.

In this way, of course there will be no negative factors that will affect the film's sales in mainland China.

So even from the perspective of the planning of this movie project, this movie came into being at the right time and is destined to become popular in due time.

In particular, it is a light comedy about family reunions, suitable for all ages, and is most suitable for celebrating the New Year.

Regardless of the high investment, but from the perspective of global distribution, especially the distribution of music albums and videos, it would be a disaster if this movie didn't make any money in the end.

To put it bluntly, what is Ning Weimin doing?

In fact, he is following Michael Jackson's approach to filming "Thriller" and wants to make a movie-style MTV.

Essentially, he uses many of Teresa Teng's classic songs to interpret a romantic love story that the public can relate to and a happy reunion story that they love to hear.

Teresa Teng's music and Teresa Teng herself are the core of the movie, but the story is secondary.

So in this way, the difficulty of making this movie is actually not very high, and it is also completely controllable.

The focus of the filming is only on how to embody the conflict and romance that conforms to the emotional logic in the main line of the movie, how to use superb shooting techniques to mobilize the audience's emotions, and how to express the atmosphere in Teresa Teng's golden songs.

Of course, the best thing is to have a new song that is good enough to be used as the theme song of the movie so that it can live up to expectations.

Therefore, it is precisely because of this clear understanding that Ning Weimin has monopolized almost all personnel rights for this project since its establishment.

Even if he is a layman, he has the final say as to who can be used and whom not.

However, when it comes to matters, what Ning Weimin does does not look like an amateur, but rather like a true expert.

Although it stands to reason that the core characters of the entire crew filming the movie should be the director, and the casting should be selected by the director with his professional vision.

But "Crazy Rich Asians" is different from other movies.

Because there is no concern about box office, Ning Weimin can completely let himself go and do whatever he wants to do stunts to expand the influence of the film's early promotion.

The final result is that Ning Weimin invited many famous foreign and domestic actors to participate in the project across borders and regions.

Not only did this film become the first big-budget film to be co-produced by China, Japan and France, it would also star in at least twenty Chinese and foreign movie stars.

Even two internationally renowned clothing companies, Pierre Cardon and Yves Saint Laurent, were brought in to serve as advertising sponsors for the film.

Not to mention, he hired Akira Kurosawa's favorite photographer Nakai Koichi as the main photographer of the film at a high price that broke the industry ceiling.

At the same time, he readily hired Yutaka Osawa, a candidate recommended by Akira Kurosawa, to serve as the film's chief director.

Such an eclectic way of employing people and the courage to make decisions are even more admirable.

For no other reason than that in this movie, Ning Weimin clearly understood that the role of the photographer was obviously higher than that of the director.

The director only needs to tell the story clearly and edit it into a film.

Even though Yutaka Osawa has always been Akira Kurosawa's assistant director and has no independent directing experience before, he has filmed many large-scale productions with Akira Kurosawa, and he is indispensable in his ability to control the scene.

As the saying goes, if you haven't eaten pork, you've seen pigs running. Since Kurosawa Akira is vouching for him, Ning Weimin naturally won't worry about anything. He is very happy to let Yutaka Osawa direct the film.

In addition, even in the movie theme song, Ning Weimin did not disappoint.

He plagiarized Misora ​​Hibari's last classic "The Stream" without any mental barriers, making this Japanese classic song that has been covered by countless celebrities in the music industry come out ahead of schedule. It was transformed into Made in China and became his new song for Teresa Teng.

And this song is indeed good.

Not only did Teresa Teng fall in love with it as soon as she heard it, she couldn't wait to go into the studio to record it. She even regarded this song as a true portrayal of her own career in the music industry.

Even the other participants in the entire crew were deeply moved when they heard it.

This all adds to confidence in the success of the film.

In this way, not only could Ning Weimin sell a favor to Akira Kurosawa, but more importantly, the director, starring actors and photographers would all be grateful to him and regard him as their own.

No one will question his authority, let alone take the initiative from him.
To be continued...