When I was visiting a certain group a few days ago, I suddenly saw a netizen's real question:
Is Xu Zheng already exhausted by Jiang Lang?
In recent years, the box office has not been strong.
Exaggerate? Slander? Creating anxiety?
But on second thought, she seemed to be right.
Opening Xu Zheng's data sheet, since 2019's "囧Mom", Xu Zheng seems to have disappeared from the film circle, and he who used to set off a comedy boom every year has not made a big move for a long time.
But is Xu Zheng really not on the movie?
Nor is it.
In April 2021, Xu Zheng's "Memory Cutting" ended at a dismal box office of 3.93 million, and in February of the following year, Xu Zheng's producer + producer's "My Heart Is Flying" also quietly ended with 6.32 million.
In addition to a few big IPs for cameos and platters, the only thing Xu Zheng can take in recent years is "Love Myth".
However, even in the case of a super explosion of word-of-mouth, this movie only gained 260 million and then stepped down in a hurry.
You know, these 260 million yuan were put into a few years ago, and even a fraction of Xu Zheng's "Hong Kong 囧" could not be hung up.
Once the head of a comedy troika, now abandoned by the market?
At the same time as Xu Zheng's data declined, an old news surfaced, accompanied by the collapse of Zhang Ting's business empire, and he dragged Xu Zheng fiercely.
Zhang T T's "Zheng Wine"
On the one hand, the ability of the box office is questioned, and on the other hand, it is a word-of-mouth crisis that is plagued by anecdotes.
At this time, Xu Zheng is at the fork in his life, and the lead behind it is just the decision of Mingzhe to protect himself in 2020.
The epidemic has changed the network ecology and changed the trajectory of Xu Zheng's life
The Spring Festival of 2020 has two keywords of national concern.
One is the epidemic and the other is Xu Zheng.
And these two things are also inextricably linked to cause and effect.
Turn the clock back two years ago, a year known as the "strongest Spring Festival stall."
Chen Sicheng's "Tang Detective Universe Part III" "Tang Detective 3", Lin Chaoxian's "Rescue Trilogy" "Emergency Rescue", "Nezha" Universe's new work "Jiang Ziya", Chen Kexin's "Chinese Women's Volleyball Team" ready to go....
Of course, there is also the third "囧Mom" of Xu Zheng's "囧 series".
It is not the final chapter of the trilogy or the sequel to the big IP, and it is not too much to say that the 2020 Spring Festival file is praised as the strongest.
But no one can predict which tomorrow or accident will come first.
Just when everyone was throwing away all the publicity costs and emptying their pockets to prepare for a duel, the epidemic came.
The theater line is closed and isolated at home.
The arrival of this Nian beast has disrupted the lives of all people in the country, and it has completely cast a layer of loneliness and twilight on the Spring Festival, which should have been noisy.
In the face of a slashed lifeline, this group of filmmakers scratched their hearts, some of them closed and digested alone, and some spit bitter water in front of the media.
Tough guy Lin Chaoxian even choked up in front of the camera several times, and his heart hurt the real money and silver that was poured into vain.
However, although fate gave him a blow to the head, fortunately, there were also people to accompany him, and his heart was slightly relieved.
But before Lin Chaoxian could comfort himself, a "defector" appeared.
Xu Zheng.
Chinese New Year's Eve, Xu Zheng announced that his Spring Festival movie "囧Mom" was announced to be screened online and did not charge a dime.
The reason behind the free "囧Mom" is already familiar to everyone, Xu Zheng, who signed the VAM agreement, doubled the pressure, and the arrival of the epidemic directly killed his hopes, which chose to package and sell.
In the face of the sudden visit of "囧Mom", the audience who was idle at home was of course smiling and praising Xu Zheng's kindness.
But on the other hand, Xu Zheng was a traitor to the others.
Cinema line.
Shortly after "囧Mom" was announced to be broadcast for free, the crusade set off layers of noise, from grassroots workers to capitalists, and even a boycott of 23 companies + 20,000 practitioners when it reached its peak.
For a time, the name of "banning" was very popular.
"Heavy profit and light righteousness, despised by gentlemen"
To say why did the theater react so much that it took the public relations procedure to sanction Xu Zheng?
On the one hand, because the cinema line, as a partner, has participated in a lot of human investment, and before announcing the withdrawal of the file, the difference between the opening day and the door is one foot, and the cinema has already carried out a series of publicity work such as standing, digital, and peripheral products.
Not to mention that because of the unfavorable pre-sale of "囧Mom", Xu Zheng also played a temporary promotion before that, and at that time, many theater workers were insulted, but they still completed their duty.
By now you have defected, like an arrogant problem student, and finally you are about to graduate from the church, and as a result, you have transferred.
Can this not be hated?
On the other hand, since 2015 with the small and broad "Taoist Out of the Mountain", the big online movies have mushroomed and grown wildly.
The industry's territory has suddenly changed, capital investment has soared, the volume of stars has soared, and with the continuous rise of production, lineup, quality and other data, online movies have the potential to compete with theaters.
Right now, it's the end of the game where one move is sure to win or lose.
As a quasi-cinema level, the cinema is the finale, and has invested a lot of manpower, "囧Mom", suddenly turned against the enemy, which is undoubtedly an epic betrayal of the cinema.
Just like a pair of restaurants that have been secretly competing for many years, at the end of the year, when the key point of performance, the boss lady has an affair with each other and moves her own inventory materials to the lover's warehouse overnight.
This, the theater can not be angry?
Cutting off people's financial paths is like killing people's parents, not to mention that you were once my pillow person.
At this point, the theater line and Xu Zheng completely cut off, which helped Xu Zheng create countless box office myths, and became a hotbed of his countless nightmares.
At the same time that Xu Zheng was boycotted by 23 companies and 20,000 workers, another practitioner broke the news:
Xu Zheng's "囧 series" was stolen.
In his exposé, we learned that Xu Zheng's original "囧 series" was "People on the Road" produced by Huaqi Pictures.
After winning 37 million at the box office with an ultra-low investment of 7 million, the producers quickly concocted the second part and quickly sent the script to Xu Zheng.
Unexpectedly, when Huaqi applied to the Film Bureau for approval, he was told that the project had been successfully declared by another Beijing film company.
And the movie is called "People in 囧城", and the screenplay name is Xu Zheng.
Later, Huaqi sued Xu Zheng's ZhenleDao Film Company on the grounds of unfair competition, and won the lawsuit and received 5 million yuan in compensation, but this compensation was a dime a dozen for the 1.27 billion box office of "Tai Chi", and the subsequent "Hong Kong 囧" and "囧Mom" made Hua Qi hate it to the teeth.
So far, Huaqi has not cooperated with Xu Zheng anymore, nor has he touched the "囧 series" again.
And the whistleblower is Bi Zhifei, a well-known bad film director in the industry.
As a peer, Bi Zhifei not only did not give Xu Zheng face at all, but instead fired wildly at the other side.
After exposing a series of Xu Zheng scandals, he even ended with a sentence of "get out of the entertainment circle", and the disgust was overflowing.
At the same time, former comrade-in-arms Chen Sicheng also ridiculed Xu Zheng's defection to the enemy on many occasions.
Theater boycotts, peer ridicule.
Xu Zheng, who had just put 630 million yuan in his pocket, was set up on the stove and roasted, and the blessings and misfortunes were all self-inflicted, and the cost was also measured by himself.
A long road to pay off debts
I believe that readers who pay a little attention to film information will notice that what is the news about Xu Zheng in recent years?
Positive energy.
For example, he will amway a lot of movies that have nothing to do with him, and use his own resources to support, influence, and help.
"Wuhan Day and Night", "My Sister", "One Second", "Balloon", "Endless Climbing".... In any case, you might see him in any movie.
From the movie group to the recording of the VCR, from the social media to the front of the stage, Xu Zheng is like a humanoid loudspeaker, helping others to publicize everywhere he goes, sparing no effort to do everything himself.
After helping people finish advertising, he rushed into the film festival to cheer for the organizers.
Film festivals, exchange meetings, venture capital fairs
Xu Zheng was so busy that he almost participated in all the film activities that he could participate in in China.
When it comes to action, Xu Zheng is even more bold.
He first set up the "Tinder Project", which gathered top talents from all walks of life into a team to liberate children's nature through drama, realize new educational methods, and let children know drama and learn drama.
This is for the performance "Seedlings".
Then, he joined hands with Wen Muye, Han Han, Zhang Yibai, Guo Fan, Wu Jing and other industry leaders to establish the "Golden Key Venture Capital Plan".
Recruit young creators throughout Asia, participate in investment as long as the script passes, and achieve a breakthrough of 0 to 1, just like a new version of the "Bad Monkey 72 Change Plan".
This is to "sow seeds" for creation.
In the end, Xu Zheng even played live broadcasting.
Shortly after the theater line was unsealed, the 10 billion box office male god actually took the initiative to contact the theater side and set up a special ticket sales team and APP research and development with the six princesses, just to cooperate with Xu Zheng's ticket sales interaction in the live broadcast.
Amway, philanthropy, venture capital, and even live ticket sales.
It can be seen that in the past few years, Xu Zheng has almost devoted everything to help domestic films, always hanging on the "film industry", and then thinking of the premise of being boycotted, it is not difficult to understand that This is Xu Zheng's loyalty to the theater with a series of actions:
I'm still on your side.
With such a push and the flushing of time, people quickly forgot Xu Zheng's past, and the theater line was not blocked as said at the time, and all of Xu Zheng's movies were released in turn.
The road to repayment of debts is long and its repair is far away, Xu Zheng searched up and down, which can be regarded as ice release.
But just when everything was about to turn over, Xu Zheng had an accident again.
Zhang Ting and Lin Ruiyang's East Window Incident, 96 properties were sealed, and they were fined 21 million yuan.
The tree fell and scattered, and for a time the wind was loud, and Tao Hong and Ming Dao, who had a close personal relationship with Zhang Ting, also immediately broke their tails to survive and began emergency public relations, afraid of being caught by the media.
Unexpectedly, the media searched for it, but Xu Zheng collapsed.
After Zhang Ting's accident, netizens followed the clues and found that Xu Zheng had once endorsed a kind of red wine for Zhang Ting's brand, and named it after himself, Zheng Wine.
At the same time, Xu Zheng was also pulled out and had an inextricable relationship with Zhang Ting Company.
Not only was he advertised by the company as a "shareholder", he also personally filmed VCR to consumers many times, adding bricks and tiles to Zhang Ting's illegal empire.
So far, although Xu Zheng has not pulled out the equity relationship with Zhang Ting's company, it is still chaotic at the moment.
Coupled with the fermentation of the previous negative news, some voices that Xu Zheng did not want to hear appeared again-
At the same time, the public welfare undertakings that lasted for more than two years also suddenly encountered a reaction, and Xu Zheng's Sima Zhao's heart finally surfaced.
Everything seems to be back to the starting point of 2020....
epilogue
Xu Zheng has never hidden his profit-seeking nature, but he will not despise the value of art.
In the face of real art, he will be inferior, he will wander, and even because he is too commercial, he does not dare to extend his hand to Lou Ye, for fear that others will look down on him.
Seeking advantage and avoiding harm is the nature of a businessman.
"囧Mom" incident, we say Xu Zheng is wrong?
Too arbitrary, after all, he is only for his own wisdom to protect himself, and he will not sin to death.
But objectively speaking, Xu Zheng's influence on the theater line cannot be ignored, and what he did is also acquiescence to his own harm and compensation to the theater.
The whole incident, as Xu Zheng himself said, was nothing more than "a special decision was made in a special period."
to err is human
Even Sage Kong once sighed: "Take people by words, and destroy them if they are lost; Take people by their appearance, and lose their sons and feathers", not to mention Xu Zheng.
Now, there may be only one road in front of Xu Zheng -
Make another high-grossing movie, stunning four, cut through thorns.
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