Chapter 249: Acclaimed but Not Selling

An excellent movie often needs to take into account two aspects, which are the artistry and commerciality of the movie itself.

But in essence, these two factors are contradictory—for example, from the starting point, artistry is a kind of self-expression of the author, and commerciality is a performance of pleasing the audience.

And movies that can let the two cooperate and complement each other are undoubtedly masterpieces in film history, such as Kurosawa Akira's *Seven Samurai*, which is one of the representatives.

But the movie Akiwara Yuto is watching now, called *Five Stories of Survival*, is artistic but lacks commerciality.

This film tells five stories from beginning to end, respectively: *Zoo*, *Kazuko and Yoko*, *So Far*, *Seven Rooms*, and *Poem of the Xiang Yang*.

But unlike the original *Zoo* work he "plagiarized," it underwent a very large degree of "magic modification."

For example, *Zoo* tells the story of a murderer who killed his girlfriend but insisted that the murderer was someone else, thus carrying out a cycle day after day.

But in this movie version, a large number of the murderer's inner monologues and obsession with the girlfriend's body were added, and the scale was breathtakingly large.

Or for example, *Poem of the Xiang Yang*, this story that simply talks about a robot girl discovering the beauty of life.

Instead, it added a large number of memories about "apocalyptic death," highlighting the value of life through the contrast between "death" and "rebirth."

As for *Kazuko and Yoko*, *So Far*, and *Seven Rooms*, they also changed some places more or less.

After Akiwara Yuto pondered, he discovered that these adapted places also had some benefits, which was deepening the theme and depth of these stories.

But there were also disadvantages, which was that the movie had too many prohibited elements.

This is not a good thing, because of the Japanese movie rating system, so all movies need to pass the rating review of the Japan Film Ethics Committee.

And this magic-modified version of the movie will definitely be rated R-18 because of too many prohibited elements.

In this way, audiences under 18 are excluded.

But for audiences pursuing violence and h-plots, the large number of inner monologues depicted using "stream of consciousness" techniques inside were very "boring."

When seeing the ending, Akiwara Yuto could already see what the box office of this movie would be like.

After the screening of the 110-minute film ended, the lights in the screening hall lit up, the director walked onto the stage to bow and thank, and the many audiences in the audience gave applause—but in Akiwara's view, the polite and courteous components were more.

A preview screening is not a premiere, so there was no thank-you banquet after it ended.

However, Akiwara Yuto, as the author of the original work and also as the person with the highest social status in the venue, was warmly entertained by the crew members.

The director, Nishitani Yuito, walked up and said in a polite tone: "Teacher Akiwara, what do you think of this movie?"

He was a bit uneasy in his heart; after all, because of the series of changes before, he replaced the original director candidate halfway, and he didn't have much fame in the industry.

And the script of the movie itself also had very large changes from the original work.

If Akiwara Yuto expressed disapproval through public channels, he estimated that this movie would be even more "ill-fated" later.

Akiwara Yuto smiled and said: "I think this movie will be praised by many film critics."

Although he wasn't optimistic about the box office of this movie, he had to admit that this movie was very representative in terms of artistry.

For such art films, there are still many film critics who like to come and "join in the fun."

After hearing Akiwara Yuto's praise, Nishitani Yuito "breathed a sigh of relief" in his heart and then asked: "Teacher Akiwara, then on the movie poster, can your name be highlighted?"

Akiwara Yuto weighed it and agreed to this request.

No matter what, this couldn't be considered a bad film, so he didn't have to worry about it affecting his reputation.

And adding the original author to the poster is also a conventional practice for movie promotion; for example, Higashino Keigo's series of filmed works will all add his name.

Although he was dissatisfied with some old conventions, he didn't have much objection to this point.

The two chatted for a while, and then Akiwara Yuto was introduced to the actors of this movie—because it was a movie composed of five stories, there was no so-called absolute lead.

After exchanging business cards, Akiwara Yuto declined the invitation to dinner and left with Sato Maki.

On the car ride back, he couldn't help but sigh.

If the box office couldn't be a hit, his idea of participating in the box office share of other works would undoubtedly fall through.

When that time comes, what should he do?

……

Time passed very quickly; after the preview screening ended, this movie called *Five Stories of Survival* began promotion.

However, the production cost of this movie itself was very low, so the promotion budget was not much, only more than 20 million yen, not even as high as the expenses Akiwara Yuto spent on lawsuits.

But the crew was very smart; through posters and soft articles, they focused on utilizing the fame of the original author "Akiwara Yuto."

Under this strategy, many film critics and commentators also began to pay attention with great interest and spoke out through channels such as newspapers, TV, and radio.

Also because of this exposure, this movie, which could be considered "niche," took down more than 140 screens in the first week of its premiere and obtained a box office of about 80 million yen.

But good times didn't last long; as more and more audiences expressed that they "didn't understand" or "were tired of watching," a large number of related comments began to spread on the internet and affected a batch of audiences who hadn't watched it yet.

Even some loyal readers of the *Zoo* series thought that this film was not what they wanted at all.

In short, because of the decrease in attendance, theaters reduced screenings one after another, making the box office of this movie start a Waterloo-style decline in the second week.

By the time it was taken off screens in the fourth week, the cumulative box office barely reached 300 million yen.

After deducting taxes, theaters, and actor fees, it only allowed the film company to keep its capital and earn a bit of hard-earned money.

Contrary to the performance of many audiences, some film critics gave praise one after another.

Because compared to commerciality, the artistry of this movie was more prominent, and it focused on depicting "high-class" elements such as death, life, and desperate situations.

Some film critics even believed that the theme of this movie was higher than the original work.

Although the word-of-mouth was good, the fact that the movie's box office was average was indisputable, which also brought a certain negative impact, causing Akiwara Yuto to encounter some problems in the negotiation of *The Devotion of Suspect X*.

"Teacher Akiwara, this is the new condition issued by our Dong Ying Film; please take a look."

In the office conference room of Anjiu Bookstore, the person in charge from Dong Ying Film handed over the planning proposal with a smile.

And after Akiwara Yuto finished reading all the content, his brows furrowed.

Compared to the previous planning proposal, this time not only was a lower signing fee offered, but even the budget of the movie itself was intended to be reduced.

After being silent for a long time, he looked directly at the other party and responded in an icy voice.

"Sorry, regarding the copyright authorization work, I do not recognize your sincerity!"

With conditions like this, he would rather let the copyright rot in his hands than hand it over to the other party! ===== CHAPTER 250 =====