It must be hard for the general public to understand why Disney said it had hit $20 million in the past, but Scarlett Johansson was still not satisfied, decided to use legal weapons, and filed a lawsuit in los Angeles Superior Court.
It's actually like if you're a painter, and the original partner promised to give you an exhibition, but it ended up being an online exhibition, resulting in a lot less of your expected income.
If you originally earned 10,000 yuan and left 5,000 yuan, you may feel nothing;
But Scarlett Johansson's salary has reached the tens of millions of dollars and is eligible for box office dividends. Movies like "Black Widow" have a global box office of more than 100 million US dollars.
According to the Wall Street Journal, a person familiar with the matter revealed that Disney sent "Black Widow" to the streaming media synchronous theater premiere, which made Scarlett Johansson lose $50 million in potential earnings.
It is not difficult to understand why she should go to great lengths to sue her old owner.
No wonder she didn't attend the premiere of Black Widow.
Scarlett Johansson has become so popular around the world with the Marvel movie series that she sued Disney in turn, is it a bit ungrateful?
Disney did have a huge help to marvel as a whole, and indirectly assisted Scarlett to become a super-first-line actress.
But Scarlett's real Bole may not be Disney.
Marvel's filmmaking Disney didn't interfere too much, which means that her chance to play Black Widow was entirely up to Marvel, and it was up to Marvel Studios mogul Kevin Feige.
Kevin Feige said at the beginning of the year that he hoped audiences would see "Black Widow" in theaters. He must have been on the same side as Scarlett.
Although Kevin Feige has an important position at Disney, he is still helpless in the face of the power of the entire Disney Group. In the end, he was unable to keep the exclusive release of "Black Widow".
Scarlett is already very famous, but her real opportunity to enjoy box office dividends should not be particularly many, like "Reunion 4", "American Team 3" and other Marvel dramas, even if she has not been particularly much, the big head must give Robert Downey Jr. this number one position to occupy;
The commercial blockbusters in which she really played the absolute protagonist were actually only "Ghost in the Shell" and "Superbody".
"Ghost in the Shell" box office loss she is definitely no dividend, so only "Superbody" enjoys a relatively considerable dividend.
Then the dividend of "Black Widow" is not dispensable for her. And this is her last Marvel movie, and she won't have that chance in the future.
"Black Widow" was able to get by at the North American first weekend box office, earning more than $80 million;
But the following weekend was clearly affected by the streaming release, and the box office shrank sharply, falling to $25 million.
The owners of north American theaters are quick to publicly attack, condemning Disney for sending "Black Widow" to streaming, causing their interests to be damaged.
Black Widow currently grossed just over $300 million worldwide. Due to piracy and word-of-mouth, even if it is released in the Chinese market, it is estimated that it will be able to get up to 400 million US dollars.
For Marvel movies, this is an extremely bad box office performance. Since 2016, Marvel's worst-grossing "Ant-Man 2" has exceeded $600 million.
The theater owners can only play a cannon, after all, they have not signed a contract with Disney, how Disney will deal with their movies, they have no right to interfere.
Unlike Scarlett Johansson, who starred, she was contracted.
Her lawsuit said that the contract signed with Marvel is said to guarantee the exclusive theatrical release of "Black Widow", and a large part of the remuneration comes from box office dividends (box office dividends are a common routine for Hollywood to cut the cost of star salaries, and Scarlett's guarantee film remuneration is obviously not high).
Also, Disney, as the publisher, deliberately induces Marvel to violate the agreement in order to prevent Johnson from cashing in on its best interests in the contract.
As for whether Disney "deliberately tempted", it seems to have become the key to the victory or defeat of this lawsuit.
Scarlett's lawyers revealed to Variety magazine that a big reason Disney sent Black Widow to stream was to help the company raise its stock price, but ignored the contracts of the artists responsible for the success of its films, violating their rights.
The disadvantage for Disney is that the North American theater line is already in a state of recovery, like the earlier release of Universal's "Fast and Furious 9" and Paramount's "A Quiet Place 2" is the exclusive release of the theater, but Disney still ignores the exclusive theatrical distribution clause in the contract, which is some deliberately going to streaming, without the suspicion of other interests.
Disney claims that Black Widow's first weekend on-demand revenue reached $60 million, and so far Scarlett has received a reward of $20 million, and the online distribution has greatly increased her dividends.
A spokesman said the lawsuit was pointless and that the lawsuit was particularly sad and sad.
Presumably, aren't you the same with the money you earn from streaming? Maybe more. It hurts to fight a lawsuit like this, and it hurts my feelings.
Whether Disney's claims are true or not, transferring theatrical movies to streaming is undoubtedly a disservice to movie creators, especially top movie creators.
Pixar has expressed dissatisfaction with Disney's streaming release, because "Psychic Journey" and "Summer Friendship Days" do not need to pay extra fees, as long as they are members can watch, which makes Pixar's internal morale low.
Simultaneous streaming has long been considered a special response to special circumstances, but discerning people can know that this will have a huge impact on the future of the film industry.
Disney and Warner have become the pioneers of streaming distribution, and both big factories have had a lot of problems.
Warner due to the forced streaming of this year's films throughout the year, caused a huge public opinion storm, including Nolan, Dennis Villeneuve and other cooperative filmmakers publicly angrily criticized, "Godzilla vs King Kong", "Dune" partners LegendAry Pictures directly launched a lawsuit, Warner can only reach a settlement through huge compensation.
Disney clearly made the same mistake as Warner, that is, it did not reach a new profit distribution plan with the relevant personnel in advance, underestimating the cooperation in safeguarding its own interests.
"Wonder Woman 1984" is a model of streaming distribution, Warner gave director Patty Jenkins and heroine Gail Gadot tens of millions of dollars in compensation in advance, so the two creators had no opinion at all afterwards. It's just that the movies that warner have been online for streaming have not done this, so it has caused an uproar.
This is actually a problem that can be solved with money.
Disney can quickly solve the problem by putting enough money into Scarlett Johansson's account.
But if the matter of streaming media distribution is still only decided by the studio, similar problems will continue to occur.