Chapter 21: Preliminary Preparation

What else could be done? No matter what, they had to find a way to dissuade Xu Ke. Xiao Ran cursed under his breath, his usually relaxed expression turning stern. “Old Xu, you’re thinking wrong! I thought you knew Wu Yusen was talented—never expected…”
“He indeed is talented. He belongs to those with talent but no opportunity!” Stimulated by Xiao Ran’s words, Xu Ke seemed to loosen up a bit, especially when he remembered that it was Wu Yusen who had brought in New Art City’s first batch of profits. He hesitated, “But this kind of theme is really hard to handle. I’m worried he might mess it up!”
“Have you ever made a film on this theme?” Instead of pressing further, Xiao Ran changed the subject. “Neither have I. No one knows if you can do it well. Why not try handing it to Wu Yusen? Maybe he has a special talent for this?”
Xu Ke was frustrated. He hadn’t expected Xiao Ran not to support him in directing the film himself. Staring at Xiao Ran’s unyielding stance, he sighed and gave in. “Okay, I’ll bring him back. But I don’t know if I can convince Boss Lei!”
Boss Lei’s full name was Lei Kaitai. His Golden Princess Company was undoubtedly wealthy and powerful, and he was also the chairman of Hong Kong’s bus union—truly someone with fame and influence. New Art City was invested in by Lei Kaitai, which made Xiao Ran greatly admire Boss Lei’s vision.
“If Zhou Runfa and Wu Yusen are really going to make this film, I think we’ll need to coordinate with Huang Baiming and the others!” Xu Ke was a workaholic; once he made a decision, he would act immediately.
Xiao Ran was surprised. In his memory, Xu Ke’s film studio was part of New Art City. If they were all from the same company, why was coordination needed? He was deeply puzzled!
When he asked this question, Xu Ke looked at him strangely and replied, “Who told you the film studio belongs to New Art City? Well, if we’re going by formality, it’s true—at least on paper!”
As Xu Ke continued to explain, Xiao Ran was stunned. It turned out there were huge divisions within New Art City too. The first few years after its establishment were fine; everyone was very united. The famous “Struggle Room” back then was the best example of unity—the seven big bosses would often hold all-night meetings in a small room.
By 1984, however, Xu Ke’s creative ideas clashed with New Art City’s, so he left. But Lei Kaitai highly appreciated Xu Ke and immediately invested in helping him establish his own film studio. Although it was still officially part of New Art City, it had the right to create independently without interference.
Interestingly, when Xu Ke founded his film studio, many people guessed it was funded by Shaw Brothers or other companies, but none guessed it was still Golden Princess. When the truth came out, the eyewear store did extremely well that day.

Ultimately, the root cause of New Art City’s division was still interests. Initially, Huang Baiming, Mai Jia, and Shi Tian had differing views on how to distribute profits, sowing the seeds of division among the three giants. Later, Xu Ke, Zeng Zhiwei, Teddy Luo Bin, and Shi Nansheng each received different shares of profits, so it would have been a miracle if there hadn’t been internal strife.

Other than regret, Xiao Ran felt nothing else. New Art City had a thriving pool of talent—even big stars like Zhang Manyu, Zhou Xingchi, and Liu Hua were once turned away, showing it was no less impressive than Cathay-Keris at its peak. Without internal divisions, its future prospects would have been limitless.

New Art City’s new comedies not only performed well at the box office but also set trends for the entire era. Classics like “A Hero’s Heart” and “The Legend of the Ghostly Beauty” even influenced Hong Kong film production for over a decade, pushing the company’s reputation to new heights.

In later years, New Art City became a legend—a well-deserved one. While other film companies still focused on stars, New Art City completed the transition from star-centered to behind-the-scenes staff-centered operations. Yet in Xiao Ran’s memory, Hong Kong films later repeated the same mistakes.

Unfortunately, Xiao Ran also knew that one of the three giants, Mai Jia, had rebelled just the previous year. As a high-ranking executive at New Art City, he defected to help Hong Jinbao create successful box-office hits like the Fuxing series, directly challenging his own company. The consequences were disastrous, angering the other two giants.

In the following years, Huang Baiming also rebelled in a similar manner. This company, which valued teamwork above all, failed to stop another giant, Shi Tian, from going ahead with his own plans. He invested heavily in “Uncle Fortune Conquers All,” a film with mediocre box office results. Disheartened, Shi Tian left the film industry to pursue business.

Thinking about New Art City’s future division, Xiao Ran felt a sense of sorrow. Logically and emotionally, he deeply regretted the company’s split—many classics we know today existed because of it. Yet reason told him that if he wanted to build his own career, he had to get rid of New Art City, as it would be a formidable rival.

Back at his hideout, Xiao Ran began to plan. If nothing went wrong, “A Hero’s Heart” would still become this year’s top-grossing film and dominate the Golden Horse Awards in March or April of the following year.

Thinking of the Golden Horse Awards, Xiao Ran remembered something—he had to attend the fifth edition. Of course he had to; just to witness the grandeur of that era’s awards was worth it. Moreover, he and Situ Zhuohan were nominated for Best Screenplay for “Mr. Zombie.”

This fact left Xiao Ran extremely embarrassed—almost wishing he could die after hitting his head against a tofu block. The film originally had two screenwriters, one of whom was the highly renowned Huang Bingyao of that era. Yet neither of the original writers was nominated, while Xiao Ran was.

The other Xiao Ran couldn’t remember his name, but it didn’t matter. As for Huang Bingyao, Xiao Ran truly felt sorry for him—he had grown up watching this man’s films. For example, “Hard Boiled” was one of his works, and he even made a cameo as the chubby chief with the deadly scissors kicks in the movie!

Soon, Xiao Ran realized that Huang Bingyao had passed away from cancer in 1991 or 1992. If he could meet him at the award ceremony this time and remind him of this, it might save this truly outstanding screenwriter—consider it Xiao Ran’s way of making amends for plagiarizing the script.

Xiao Ran set aside the Golden Horse Award matters and continued to think. Although Wang Jing had extensive connections in the film industry, he had always worked for Shaw Brothers, which had almost stopped producing films that year, so Wang Jing didn’t have any new projects either. This meant he couldn’t rely on Wang Jing for much help in the short term.

He was now waiting for “Police Story” to win Best Film at the Golden Horse Awards, after which he would truly make a breakthrough. If he could also get Best Screenwriter, it would further boost his status. After all this time, Xiao Ran realized he was at best a promising new screenwriter with no special status yet.

Still, his name was somewhat known in the industry. Partly because he had deliberately made connections over time, and partly because several of his scripts had made it onto the top ten box office lists.

After some calculation, he knew the chance to take charge of a film was within reach. He needed to be thoroughly prepared. The production company wasn’t a problem, nor was filming. However, he still needed an experienced assistant director for the actual shooting.

To prepare for becoming a director, Xiao Ran had already chosen his target—“Eight Stars Bring Good Luck.” It was the safest choice. The film’s strengths lay in the actors’ performances and the excellent script, not in the director’s skills.

Of course, box office performance was crucial—so important that no one could ignore it. Xiao Ran didn’t want to end up like Wang Jiawei, with dismal box office results that angered investors. This film earned a staggering 37 million at the box office, breaking the box office records for both Chinese and foreign films of that era—a truly remarkable figure.

Moreover, the film was released in early 1988, meaning it took at most about half a year from preparation to filming. Plagiarizing this script wouldn’t pose any copyright issues; he could copy it freely.

What mattered most to Xiao Ran was that the film’s release timing was perfect. Even if it had come out a year earlier, its impact on the future would have been minimal. The only possible impact, he thought, was that it might have taken away from Cheng Long’s “Brothers in Arms” the chance to break box office records—but who cared?

When it came to the issue of plagiarism, Xiao Ran was initially afraid of running into the risk of having “twin” scripts. But soon he realized that Hong Kong movies in this era were very different from those in the declining period—everyone was eager to start shooting. Once a good script was written, it would be immediately sent to film companies for review, and if approved, production would start right away, with a cycle of no more than half a year.

It was nothing like in the declining period, when a script might sit around for years without anyone daring to invest in it. Even if a movie was finished, it might not be released right away; it would often take months to find a good release date, or even two years. A typical example was Xu Ke’s “Black Hero 2,” which, despite having its post-production completed, wasn’t released until two years later.

As for investment, Xiao Ran hoped to use his own money to invest and get the larger share of the profits with the production and distribution companies. In that case, the local box office earnings for “Eight Stars Bring Good Luck” alone would reach 37 million, and if Southeast Asian sales were added, the total would likely exceed 80 million.

After calculating his earnings precisely, Xiao Ran found that he hadn’t made much. He had received payments for “Mr. Zombie” and even for “Saving the Police Officer” released in January, as well as for “Cops and Robbers.” All three movies had box office earnings of over 20 million, and Xiao Ran received 250,000 from each.

For “Happy Ghost Meets Ghost,” “The Female Warrior,” and “True Colors of a Hero,” he only received the initial payment of 100,000. Even if he got the final payments and dividends, the amount of money he could manage would never exceed 500,000. This really troubled him—without money, he couldn’t get the larger share.

From what he understood, producing a movie of medium scale now required about 4 million, while a large-scale production needed over 7 million. According to his calculations, “Eight Stars Bring Good Luck” featured quite a few stars—just Zhou Runfa’s salary was over 300,000. Adding to that his increased value after “True Colors of a Hero,” the total cost would be at least 500,000 to 600,000.

So, just the actors’ salaries alone would require at least 1 million. Adding the salaries of behind-the-scenes creators and production costs, the total would be around 5 million! This really gave Xiao Ran a headache—where could he get 5 million from? Only heaven knew!

Investment wasn’t impossible; Xiao Ran was sure that if he gave the script of “Eight Stars Bring Good Luck” to New Art City, he would definitely get funding. The problem was that he hoped to make at least 10 million from this movie, so he needed funds to do so. It was truly a tough situation for him…

(What Xiao Ran needed to do now was build his reputation—once he became famous in the film industry, he would have everything.)