Once Upon a Time In Hollywood

Chapter 378 The Walt-Disney Model

Roland Allen didn’t talk nonsense. Since Walt Disney’s success, he has been imitated by various capitals in Hollywood, because Walt Disney is not a pioneer in the American animation industry in essence, nor is he What a film producer, but an extremely successful businessman, the point is, his success can still be replicated.

Now, as long as people mention Walt Disney, those who have a certain understanding of him will say that Walt Disney is very obsessed with animation and painting, so he practiced hard and set up his own business. Because of an accident, he used the The little mouse was used as a blueprint to create Mickey, and eventually became famous, married Bai Fumei, and reached the pinnacle of life...

All right.

This is actually **** chicken soup.

Walt Disney started out as an apprentice in the Paceman-Rubin commercial studio, specializing in drawing commercials for theater programs. In 1920, he was fired because of the company's declining revenue.

Because of his poor skills and unable to find a job, he thought about doing it himself, so he founded a company with his friends and produced the first animation in his life "Alice in Cartoonland", but the response was not good, and the company bankruptcy.

Walt Disney, who failed to start a business in the animation field, recognized his talent in animation, so he resolutely gave up animation and went to Universal Pictures to apply for a director, but the producers of Universal thought his level was too bad, so they directly rejected him up.

The continuous blows put Walt Disney in a desperate situation, and at this time, his brother Roy Disney suggested that he go back and sell vacuum cleaners with himself, and Walt Disney felt that the profession of salesman had no future Wanting to try again, he found Margaret Winkler, willing to accept her teachings and improve the animation.

Who is Margaret Winkler?

She is the personal secretary of Warner Bros. founder Harry Warner.

If it’s just these, then there will be unspoken rules in people’s heads that rely on beauty to be superior, but the problem is that although Margaret Winkler is really beautiful, her resume is more beautiful than her person.

She discovered Max Fleischer, the cartoonist who created Koko the Clown, Betty Boop, Popeye and DC Superman.

She pushed Pat Sullivan and Otto Messmer who created Felix the Cat.

As a key pusher in the history of silent animation, when Walt Disney hugged her thigh...

The future is bright!

It doesn't matter that Walt Disney has limited painting talent, as long as he is obedient enough, Margaret Winkler will use him, and after the two parties reach an agreement, Margaret Winkler will pay $1,500 per episode. The price and he signed six "Alice" comedy contracts, and this money directly led to the birth of Disney.

After getting the money, Margaret Winkler directed Walt Disney to modify the animation.

The direction of their revision is not the painter, nor the core of the story, nor the conception of the work, but the market gap.

That's right, we are looking for the blue ocean market that others have not yet occupied!

Finally, with the help of Margaret Winkler's husband Charles Mintz, the three created Disney's first cartoon character, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.

As the beginning of Disney's success, this character was warmly welcomed by the market as soon as it was released, but it is a pity that Walt Disney, who was not deeply involved in the world, did not understand what copyright was at the time, so this was enough to support the company's operations and give the company Little Rabbit, which brought a lot of profits, was forcibly taken away by Charles Mintz with all copyrights due to contract loopholes.

Not only that, but many of Disney's animators were also taken away by them.

Eventually, they all went to Universal Pictures.

At this point, the two parties who were originally friendly and cooperative parted ways.

Although the pain of being stabbed by teammates in the end of a good cooperation is enough to make people go crazy, but Walt Disney even lost his work and money, but he found the secret to success!

Didn’t Margaret Winkler say that seizing the blue ocean market is the core of success?

And when Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was robbed, what was the blue ocean market?

Movies with sound!

In 1927, the release of "The Jazz Singer" made Walt Disney see a business opportunity.

After losing Oswald the lucky rabbit, wanting revenge, he took out the draft of the rabbit and changed it to create Mickey. In 1928, he released the world's first soundtrack Animated film, Steamboat Willie.

Then-

Mickey has been popular for nearly a hundred years!

When the world's first crab-eating Mickey became a big success, Disney, which had received high returns, expanded wildly, launching the Three Little Pigs and Donald Duck one after another, and waiting for them to eat the bonus of sound movies for nearly ten years Finally, in 1935, the world's first color movie "Flastic World" was born, and when it was discovered that there was a market for color movies—

Walt Disney once again smashed Margaret Winkler's blank market theory!

This time, he didn't just combine sound movies and color movies, but wanted to become a fat man with one bite and block the roads of all competitors, so he spent two years creating "Snow White" and the Seven Dwarfs!

In this way, according to the law of natural development, the hurdle of the world's first color animation film that should have appeared was overcome by Walt Disney, and directly created the world's first color feature-length animation!

The success of "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" made Walt Disney see the usefulness of the blue ocean theory, so in 40 years, they created the world's first stereo movie "Fantasia" !

In 2046, once again stepping on the trend, the world's first feature-length film co-starred by live-action and animation was made!

Yes!

The core of Disney's success is not the story of the painter at all, but the blue ocean strategy!

When I am the only seller in the market—

I am the only one!

Of course, if it is just a blue ocean strategy, then Walt Disney will not become the target of many Hollywood capitals vying to imitate, because this kind of business strategy already existed in the 19th century, and it was really played by him. It took him only three years to create the world's first fan circle and become the world's first fan circle fan!

After the success of "Steamboat Willie," a New York businessman named George Bergfelt bought Mickey and Minnie Mouse from the Disney director for toys, books, and clothing as Christmas gifts for his children. right to use.

This situation allowed Walt Disney to see business opportunities in derivatives.

But when he authorized the company's animation image to New York's Baibo-Lan Publishing Company to publish Mickey's derivatives, he suddenly discovered that no one seemed to have done this kind of film licensing market!

This is also a blue ocean market!

So, Margaret Winkler's blank market theory and her husband Charles Mintz's copyright approach made Walt Disney smell business opportunities again, and he prepared to make derivatives by himself.

But because he had never done this business before, he didn't dare to take risks easily, so after discussing with his brother Roy Disney, the two came up with a questionnaire survey for sales, and wanted to simply touch whether the market could bear it or not. popular.

And with this touch, a set of marketing theories has been discovered in a special way!

When they discovered that among the 50,000 questionnaires, more than 90% of the children wanted derivative products, making animation and selling products became a golden mountain in their eyes, and in order to ensure that the things they made were real Someone bought it, so Walt Disney thought of a way to build a group, first to attract fans, so—

Since the birth of the movie, the first organized and disciplined fan club has appeared!

What confuses competitors the most is that in 1931, the paid membership of the Mickey Club reached one million!

In the era when telephones were not popular, and most of them communicated only by letters, this number was terrifying!

You know, in the era of the mobile Internet, no matter which platform it is, no one dares to say that they can generate a million paid followers! And in 1931, Disney, which had never been done before, was already successful!

And when the company has a million paying fans, as long as the movie is done well, is it afraid that no one will buy it?

Therefore, pay close attention to the quality of the works, create characters that children like, and then absorb them into the Mickey Club, and then produce corresponding derivatives according to the tastes of children and sell them to them, which has become the industrial chain discovered by Walt Disney. .

From then on, Walt Disney redefined the movie.

It became an advertisement.

After the end of World War II, when the baby boom came, Walt Disney, who found that no one had set foot in the park industry, once again wielded the theory of the blue ocean market, turning all the tens of millions of paying members of the Mickey Club into Fans of Paradise, so far, the industry chain envied by all entertainment companies in the world was born.

The original product is a film, and the core meaning of its existence is advertising;

The derivative product is Paradise Resort, which has two main purposes. One is to promote the source product to complement resources, and the other is to realize the entity and earn profits;

Then comes brand licensing, everything related to IP can be sold.

Through this cycle, Walt Disney successfully turned his animation kingdom into a capital!

After seeing all this, Time Warner bought DC and wanted to replicate this success, but unfortunately—

The idea of ​​feminism is too advanced.

Of course, the failure of Time Warner does not mean that Walt Disney’s success cannot be replicated, because when Time Warner miscalculated the market, two people reached the other side of success by learning from Disney’s development path.

Those two are George Lucas and Steven Spielberg.

After Time Warner acquired DC, they pushed the production of Superman into the process, and in order to get this project, George Lucas and Steven Spielberg visited the founder of Superman, Max Fry Abandon.

That's right, the Max Fleischer who was pushed out by Margaret Winkler.

Like Oswald the Lucky Rabbit who took Walt Disney back then, Max Fleischer's Popeye and Betty Boop were taken by Margaret Winkler as a man who was still crazy at the end of his life. Fighting, the old man who wants to take back the child he created, Max Fleischer gave a suggestion to change his life to the younger generation of the same race——

Unless you have to, don't shoot Superman!

The reason is actually very simple.

Because even if they shoot well, it is still the capital that makes money in the end, not them.

If you really have the ability to make special effects, why not write a story and shoot yourself?

The special effects in the 1970s are equivalent to the animated films with sound produced by Walt Disney in the 1930s. If they really have the ability and ideas, then they can take a gamble like Walt Disney.

Anyway, I have nothing, and if I lose, I just continue to start from scratch!

So, "Star Wars" came out.

When    came out, all the copyrights were in the hands of George Lucas.

Later, when Steven Spielberg wanted to shoot "007", George Lucas, who had tasted the sweetness of the Walt-Disney model, shared the copyright with his good brother and jointly produced "Raiders of the Lost Ark".

In fact, "Star Wars", "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and even "Jurassic Park" are actually similar to the source products under the Walt-Disney model, that is, to seize the market with the first gimmick in history, and then win over fans , start selling.

Although they failed to become a big capital like Disney because of their late entry into the industry, the success brought about by replicating the successful model still allowed them to be promoted smoothly.

After Walt Disney's success, he frantically recruited painters to expand Disney's elite reserves.

After George Lucas and Steven Spielberg succeeded, they frantically recruited directors to expand their network.

When seven of the ten best-selling movies on the market are related to them, they actually monopolize the entire market.

In this case, almost all the blockbuster series are produced by their people, so it happened.

Not only that, since the two of them are the guys who copied the Walt-Disney model and succeeded, so while researching, they also have a large number of books that match the Disney project. Such things as the "Pirates of the Caribbean" script preemptive registration are very important. It's not a new thing, what's even more amazing is that Disney's successful "Frozen" in the future was also made by their people.

Chris Buck, the director of "Frozen", became Steven Spielberg's assistant in 1985. After two years with him, he was hired by Steven Spielberg in 1988. Sent to the student Robert Zemeckis, and cooperated with the other party to create "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", and after discovering that he was talented, Steven Spielberg wrote a letter of introduction and asked him to go to California The art academy taught, then, and let Steve Jobs' Pixar open up to it.

After three years of silence while teaching, he officially joined Disney and participated in "Pocahontas", and during the struggle between Jeffrey Katzenberg and Michael Eisner In the movie, he was implicated by it and has been wandering on the edge.

It wasn’t until Michael Eisner left and Pixar was acquired by Disney that he was reused. At that time, when he learned that the company wanted to vigorously develop princess films, he took out the cases that his teacher had summed up for more than 30 years...

"Frozen", was born.

So, let alone "Pirates of the Caribbean", even if Disney wants "Frozen" now, Roland can pull a full production team from the old man's network. The Legend of Nia was also made by the old man. The director Andrew Adamson is the contracted director of DreamWorks Animation, and he directed "Shrek".

If you have to pick it up, apart from Marvel, the only Disney blockbuster movie that has nothing to do with the old man is "National Treasure".

That series is what Disney has been studying for five years, and it has been polished since 1997.

Unfortunately, this series is lame.

In this way, when Dick Cook called Roland for emergency, Roland, knowing that the time had come, called the old man.

And after the time difference of eight hours, the other party received a call from Roland at the meal time of more than six o'clock in the afternoon, and the guy who knew the situation immediately showed a wave of impatience, "That's it? I thought you had something Looking for me for something important?"

"If it's not a big deal even asking you to ask for a project, what else is a big deal?" Roland said poorly.

"Okay, okay, you know what is the big deal!" The old man didn't bother to pay attention to Roland, and said, "You call me now, just to waste the time of talking with the children!

Since you want Gore Verbinski to shoot your new project, why don't you go to him directly through DreamWorks?

He has three film contracts with DreamWorks, the first filmed "Mouse Catcher" starring Nathan Lane, and the second filmed Brad Pitt's "Dangerous Lover", but the results of both films were not good. So I was going to ask him to remake "Midnight Ring" for the third part. Now that you are in a hurry, let him make your project first!

Anyway, you are a shareholder of DreamWorks, so it is no problem to stop internal projects!

As for the pirate script by Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio?

The two of them did write a pirate script and registered it, but the copyright is neither in DreamWorks nor Amblin, so you can call them directly and ask for it, and I will not send you a message.

All right, that’s it, I still have to call my son, bye…”

Roland felt extremely comfortable hearing the clean and crisp words.

No matter when, he likes this convenient and comfortable insider trading.

Have fun!

However, just as the old man was about to hang up the phone, Roland added another sentence, saying, "Wait, wait!"

"What are you doing? Anything else?"

"Have you read the script?"

"Nonsense! Of course I've seen it!"

The story of that script happened in the seventeenth century, just after the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V said: "In my territory, the sun will never set". At that time, the Caribbean Sea was a paradise for pirates, so countless story.

The fantasy curse conceived by the two of them is very interesting, but it will be very troublesome to make, because it is full of a lot of special effects, but you can leave these things to George, James, and Peter. The shelling scenes and scene close-ups, industrial lighting The magic can be flattened, the skeleton special effects directly let Weta Digital use motion capture, and the particle special effects and the sea are handed over to the digital field. They are best at this kind of thing... Actually, isn’t shooting this thing as simple as eating for you? "

This is the truth, Roland laughed.

But that's not what he said, "No, no, that's not what I meant."

"Then what do you mean? Can you just say it?" The old man was helpless. "If I don't call the children, it will be past noon and they are going to school! And when they finish school in the afternoon, I will It's early morning here, I can't survive until then!"

"I mean, I want to do this project as a series, do I need to reserve a seat?"

That's right! The quota is set by default!

As a guy who started with his arms around his legs, Roland has a deep understanding of giving back.

Although he has an impression of actors in such blockbuster movies, it doesn't mean that he can't change it!

In the whole series, Johnny Depp is the soul, otherwise, he can basically pick.

If you don’t need it, then of course it’s best, but if you have a need, you can also face it.

For example, the heroine Keira Knightley, as a guy who hates commercial films, was even late when she participated in the audition, and her parents in the British gang were the fundamental reason for her to get this role. Otherwise, she would not have been able to audition for "Pirates of the Caribbean" as a minor.

In this case, if the old man needs it, it is not impossible to replace Keira Knightley with one of his own.

After all, her performance has been criticized throughout the series.

It’s not that it can’t be done, but that British drama and Johnny Depp’s performance cannot be integrated at all.

The greater significance of her in the movie is actually beauty.

And when the old man got Roland's thoughts, laughter came from the other end of the phone, "Roland, your history is too bad, right? When was the seventeenth century? From 1601 to 1700 Years, and at that time, the United States was not yet!

Therefore, if you want to make this movie, it is best to find all the actors from the UK. As for the protagonist, the pirate, it doesn’t matter. It is normal to have been wandering at sea for a long time without the characteristics of Germanic and Celtic blood.

If I want it, I will definitely not want the protagonist, because that is the soul of the movie, you have to choose yourself, but if I don’t want the protagonist, no matter who I want for the rest, it’s meaningless! Although the core of commercial movies is to attract audiences, the real focus is to attract audiences without arousing their disgust. Handsome men and women are fine, but racial incompatibility will cause big problems.

And at any time, advertising movies can not cause such controversy.

So, even if you give me a role, I won't take it. "

"Ah... that's fine..." Roland felt that he was unprofessional again.

He even believed that if the old man was by his side, the other party would definitely laugh at him loudly.

After all, after studying for so many years, it is true that such basic questions still make mistakes—

It's a bit embarrassing.

Although it is not the era when Gal Gadot will be ridiculed by the crowd when he announces that he will play "Cleopatra", but commercials, in terms of publicity, there must be no problems, otherwise they will die suddenly like Durex .

However, just as he was about to hang up the phone, put aside the casting matter, and first push everything to Evelyn Watson, let her go to the director and screenwriter, and inform those guys to come to the house tomorrow morning to talk When Dick Cook met, the old man's voice came from the receiver of the mobile phone again, "Roland, is it because the project is too rushed and you can't find anyone?"

"Uh... no."

"Why are you being polite to me? If you really can't find anyone, I can also give advice."

"Then tell me..."

"If you really want to treat this commercial as a series or a trilogy, then you'd better choose the obedient one.

I have no idea about the male lead, but I think the elf prince in the "Lord of the Rings" series is okay as the second male lead.

is British and handsome.

As for the heroine...

In "The Phantom Menace", the British Keira Knightley, who acts as a stand-in for Nata, can.

But if you choose her, you must sign a long-term contract with her, because according to George, she has been pursuing art and doesn’t like business. If there is no long-term contract, she may run away, and this style is not suitable series production.

But if you don't pick her, there's actually someone else you can pick.

Do you remember how many projects you have started lately?

One of them also cooperated with Disney, do you remember?

It's called "Princess Diaries".

I’ve read the profile of that girl. Her parents are both European immigrants. She has all the Germanic, Irish, and Latin blood in Europe. If you really want to make a series, this girl is pretty good, at least from the current point of view...

She is obedient. "

Note: ①The success of Disney is not actually a matter of Hollywood. Its development history has been studied by people. Since 1973, "The Art of Disney", which studies Disney's strategic planning, has been published. In the latest 15 years The fifth edition has already been released (but the fifth edition is rubbish, it has concealed a lot of things and has not updated it, it is purely cheating money), and the point is, in fact, the success of LEGO is also copying the Walt-Disney model, and they are in the copyright It can still monopolize the market in the event of failure, which is a variant of the Walt Disney marketing model. ②Before preparing for "Superman", George Lucas and Steven Spielberg did approach Max Fleischer, and the reason why he gave them advice not to shoot was entirely because he was also Jewish, Those two guys are his juniors. ③The situation of "Frozen" is true. The director has been placed by Steven Spielberg at Disney, and has been suppressed for more than ten years. ④ "The Chronicles of Narnia" is also true. Do you still remember the PDI production that I wrote before and merged with DreamWorks Animation? The director of this film came from PDI, and before making "The Chronicles of Narnia", he had worked for Steven Spielberg for more than ten years. ⑤ In reality, when preparing for "Pirates of the Caribbean", director Gore Verbinski and DreamWorks still had an unfinished film contract. It was Jerry Bruckheimer who went to find Steven Spielberg's dignitaries, He can only shoot "Pirates of the Caribbean", otherwise he will be dragged to shoot "Midnight Ring" first.