Chapter 369: The Wind Becomes a Blockbuster, the First Billion-Yuan Box Office Queen

The next day, Yan Li learned the first-day box office figures for The Wind.

16.21 million!

This figure is acceptable, especially since The Dawn 1949 barely reached ten million, while The Wind, with 15% more showings, earned 30% more at the box office.

If this figure holds steady today, it will be crucial for National Day holiday screenings.

China Film can offer The Wind some support early on, but ultimately, box office numbers speak for themselves.

If The Wind fails to deliver, China Film won’t ignore its own interests by forcing it forward.

Not even China Film, but even Yi’an’s own theater chain wouldn’t leave theaters empty just to avoid profit—when the film loses money, the theater loses too; that’s double loss.

Yu Fatty, who was just watching the spectacle, was delighted—he was a veteran distributor with a keen sense of trends and scheduling, and he called Yan Li to congratulate him.

“Looks like The Wind will be the top-scheduled film for the National Day holiday; The Dawn 1949 probably can’t even beat The Founding of a Republic.”

“If it doesn’t hit thirty million in the first three days, even with a strong National Day push, it’ll barely break a hundred million—haha, Hua Yi has really messed up this time.”

The Wind, being a spy thriller, has limited action scenes and isn’t especially high-budget among blockbusters; most of the money went to actors, sets, and promotion—the official figure was 85 million, but actual total cost was under 70 million.

The Dawn 1949 was different—it involved assassination and anti-spy plots, with plenty of fight scenes, gunfights, and explosions, and its shooting schedule was longer than The Wind’s.

Hua Yi claimed an investment of 120 million; some insiders said it exceeded 100 million.

The actual inflation is unclear, but it was likely higher than The Wind’s.

Wang Zhonglei, the producer of The Dawn 1949, stated in an interview that the box office target was to guarantee 200 million and aim for 300 million.

With the current momentum, if it doesn’t perform well during National Day, hitting 200 million will be difficult.

When things go badly for oneself, one hopes others fare worse—Yu Fatty was thoroughly delighted.

“Has The Wheat Field broken ten million yet?”

Seeing Yu Fatty cackling, Yan Li said one sentence that shattered him.

The Dawn 1949 is being crushed by The Wind, but breaking a hundred million isn’t hard—it can still climb higher; even if it loses money, Hua Yi won’t lose much.

In contrast, The Wheat Field hasn’t even reached ten million yet—it’s completely dead; BoNan has no room to complain.

“...”

Yu Fatty fell silent for a moment, then hung up; Yan Li sneered—let you bastard try to watch the show.

After answering a few more congratulatory calls, Yan Li finished each conversation and then listened to The Wind’s detailed promotional plan.

Overall, the strategy centers on Weibo, with ground promotions, word-of-mouth support, and precise targeting of elements like dual soldiers, main melody, emotion, and suspense.

“...We combined efforts with Weibo, building momentum through celebrity influence and word-of-mouth... We held VIP screenings, leveraging the influence of Weibo influencers to promote the film, while inviting multiple cast and crew members to participate in online interviews on Weibo, directly interacting with netizens and encouraging them to rate and review the film.”

“...So far, related topics for The Wind have approached fifty million views, consistently trending on Weibo’s hot search list; with the National Day holiday approaching, we expect another surge.”

“...For offline promotions, considering National Day travel, we placed ads at train stations, highways, and taxis, specifically targeting students and white-collar workers for holiday promotion.”

“...Cinema displays, touring roadshows, print media, TV variety shows, and cross-promotions are all fully underway, with comprehensive contingency plans prepared.”

“Our goal is to reach 200 million in box office before the National Day holiday ends.”

Yan Li calculated silently—this goal wasn’t unrealistic; the probability was quite high.

If this goal is achieved, The Wind still has at least a month left in theaters—hitting 300 million isn’t out of reach.

Earlier this year, Crazy Stone already hit 300 million; if Yi’an delivers another 300 million film, who can stop Yi’an from winning?

By the way, City of Life and Death is a Lunar New Year film, likely to release in December, and must be counted toward 2009.

Strictly speaking, Yi’an was also one of the producers and distributors of The Founding of a Republic.

If handled well, Yi’an could occupy the top ten—or even top five—spots on this year’s mainland box office chart.

Wow, given the plan to go public next year, achieving such major results this year means Yi’an’s financial statements will look spectacular.

Yan Li was in good spirits and made promises.

He would coordinate Weibo and other hard-to-access resources for the crew; if The Wind’s team pushes hard for 300 million, he and the company would not hesitate to award bonuses, and promotions and raises were highly likely.

Next year, when Yi’an goes public, funding will be even more abundant, and they’ll hire aggressively.

If The Wind becomes a hit, those key staff who’ve delivered for the company and have the ability will naturally rise in rank.

Under Yan Li’s direct supervision, The Wind’s crew, along with Yi’an and Weibo, fully mobilized, waiting only for National Day.

On September 30, The Wind earned 17.8 million, ranking first among all films released that period.

Fan Xiaopang, Li Bingbing, and Sun Honglei split into three teams to launch the largest possible roadshow tour during the National Day holiday; even Yan Li himself, as producer and supervisor, gave interviews to media outlets, discussing The Wind’s production.

In just two days, tens of millions in box office were enough to let The Wind’s word-of-mouth begin to spread.

Weibo ratings had opened, with The Wind holding an 8.2 score—the third-highest among domestic films released this year, behind only The Founding of a Republic and Crazy Stone.

Hmm, The Founding of a Republic’s 8.9 score seemed questionable.

According to some Weibo users’ leaks on other platforms, negative reviews were being censored and deleted, and the number of raters appeared abnormal—suspected of being manipulated by Weibo’s backend.

Without manipulation, there was no choice: internet culture had become severely toxic; if some people started stirring up controversy and generating negative impact, Weibo would suffer the consequences.

So it wasn’t unreasonable for some internet platforms to cold-handle related works or even censor comment sections.

Some idiots didn’t understand the stakes and liked to self-destruct; worse, they dragged others down with them—platforms didn’t want to die with these fools, so they had to protect themselves.

This time, Weibo simply lacked experience.

Next time a similar situation arises, just don’t open ratings at all—wait until the storm passes, then open them; by then, most raters will be ordinary viewers, avoiding idiots seeking attention.

The Wind’s subject matter also attracted some idiots trying to gain visibility.

But with The Founding of a Republic absorbing the heat, and The Wind itself being more commercial and better handled, most people gave fair reviews.

As long as no one recklessly stirs up controversy, whether praising or criticizing the film itself, Weibo’s ratings remain objectively presented—even for Yi’an’s films.

For a film rating platform, the most important thing is fairness and objectivity; special circumstances are unavoidable, but for normal films, there’s no need to tilt the scales.

Weibo and Yi’an share one boss and hold minor stakes in each other—they’re strategic partners, not one company.

Even if they were one company, each department and division still centers on its own business development.

Weibo’s film ratings have other development plans; it wouldn’t deliberately favor Yi’an’s projects and undermine its own foundation.

Even if lawsuits reached Yan Li’s desk, he wouldn’t back down—so Yi’an’s projects received no special treatment on Weibo ratings.

Thus, The Wind’s Weibo rating was largely objective and fair.

Even on Douban, which had declined but was still considered more “professional,” The Wind scored 7.9.

Considering Douban’s tendency to downgrade domestic films and especially main melody films, this score wasn’t low at all.

【Yan Li is truly talented—his last film, Painted Skin, had dual soldiers fighting over a man; this one, The Wind, has dual soldiers in a lesbian romance. Looking forward to his next film: will the dual soldiers team up to kill men?】

【Holy shit, I always thought the dual soldiers were rivals, but now I think they’re actually perfect together】

【Haha, finally someone understands our Bingbing fans—the dual soldiers are enemies and yet each other’s best match, made for each other】

【Bingbing is awesome, awesome Bingbing—right now, I just want to kill all Yan Li fans】

【Early childhood friends, then drifted apart, then fought over a man, then reunited for profit and various reasons, delivering one great film after another—loving and killing each other, endlessly entangled—has anyone thought of making a drama about them?】

【Go to the dual soldiers fandom—there are already tons of fanfics; now that The Wind’s a hit, more big writers will start writing】

【Just praising the dual soldiers? No one praising the plot? The suspense atmosphere is excellent, production is top-notch—it’s a major breakthrough in domestic genre filmmaking】

【I watched The Dawn 1949 first and thought it wasn’t as bad as online said; then I watched The Wind—it’s truly brilliant】

【Too bad the Japanese officer wasn’t played by Yan Li—I really wanted to see him torment the dual soldiers】

【Sun Honglei was even more villainous than the villain—he almost convinced me he was the bad guy until the end】

The final climax felt awkward, but otherwise it was decent.

【Awkward your mom*****—you **** don’t even know what faith means, I*****】

【...】

Yan Li also carefully read the related comments and reviews—overall, they were quite positive.

Some disliked the subject matter or style, pointed out flaws, or thought it wasn’t perfect—this was normal; no film pleases everyone, and Yan Li had seen this many times.

As long as the general public’s overall evaluation was good, that was enough—this would fuel further word-of-mouth and draw in new audiences.

October 1, National Day

Yan Li received an invitation to attend the military parade in person and later joined the National Day Gala evening.

When he returned home from the gala, he received The Wind’s first-day box office for the National Day holiday.

39.51 million!

Total box office had already approached 75 million; barring any surprises, tomorrow it would likely break 100 million.

Four days to break 100 million—faster than Crazy Stone by a day, mainly thanks to the National Day holiday.

Yan Li checked The Founding of a Republic and The Dawn 1949’s box office again.

The former’s total had already surpassed 300 million; after two weeks in release, it achieved a box office rebound on National Day, even surpassing The Dawn 1949.

The latter’s total was still under 50 million—remember, it had released one day earlier than The Wind and had effectively withdrawn from the National Day battle.

Yan Li hadn’t expected Hua Yi to be this weak.

He had confidence in The Wind, but also thought Hua Yi wouldn’t do too badly; originally, he’d planned the National Day showdown hoping for mutual hype.

Now he even felt disdain for Hua Yi—if it weren’t for the awkwardness of directly targeting The Founding of a Republic, he’d have switched sides already.

The Wind’s promotion had already begun abandoning National Day showdown promotional materials.

Since no real competition existed, talking about a showdown would just let Hua Yi benefit—better to declare victory outright and put them down.

Hua Yi had also abandoned its showdown promotion; after being crushed so badly, further publicity would be self-humiliation and could harm its upcoming IPO.

October 2, The Wind broke 100 million; the crew had already begun small-scale celebrations.

Fan Xiaopang and Li Bingbing even, unusually, interacted friendly on Weibo outside of work, chatting about their respective roadshows.

Remember, they’d co-starred in two films together—Painted Skin and The Wind—and their Weibo mentions of each other were almost always official promotional content.

Fan Xiaopang sometimes posted selfies or group photos, but had never posted a private photo of himself alone with Li Bingbing on Weibo.

The two of them were either in promotional photos or stills from dramas, at most behind-the-scenes footage shot by the production team.

Li Bingbing was even more so—she rarely posted pictures, perhaps due to her blog habits, favoring textual expression instead.

Under these circumstances, the fact that the two could interact publicly and amicably revealed how they truly felt.

Their previous film, *Painted Skin*, had been a massive hit, and they had already delivered an excellent performance, yet criticism persisted—accusations of bitter rivalry and malicious hype, claims that their success was merely luck, and so on.

For this film, *The Message*, Yan Li did not appear; the two of them carried the film together, and their public gossip and hype were restrained, focusing instead on performance and the film itself.

Under these conditions, *The Message* became a huge success, propelling the two to become the highest-grossing female duo in mainland China, and even in the entire Chinese-language film industry.

They were over the moon!

The sky cleared, the ground brightened, and even the other party no longer looked as repulsive as before.

Not only the two stars themselves, but even their fans—who had previously fought bitterly—put aside past grudges and joined forces to mock the Four Dan.

After calling them “Double Bing, Four Dan” for so many years, it was time to flip the name: “Double Bing, Four Dan” should become “Double Bing, Four Dan.”

Among these figures, the first targets were Little Swallow and Prince Zhou.

On one hand, both had long-standing feuds with Double Bing.

Little Swallow had old grudges with Fan Xiaopang over *My Fair Princess*, and earlier this year they clashed fiercely over the Weibo Goddess title.

Prince Zhou and Li Bingbing had been in constant conflict for years over the title of Hua Yi’s top actress.

On the other hand, both had also entered the National Day box office race—one as the female lead in *The Wheat Field*, the other as the female lead in *Dawn 1949*—utterly defeated, crushed beneath Double Bing’s feet; it was no surprise their fans launched scathing mockery.

The Four Dan’s fans weren’t just passive victims—they fought back when necessary.

But Double Bing’s concrete achievements stood firm; no matter what tactics the Four Dan’s fans used, Double Bing had indeed delivered the best film performances among actresses over the past two years.

Fan Xiaopang’s team even made the unprecedented claim of a “Billion-Yuan Box Office Queen” title.

*Red Cliff* Parts I and II grossed over 500 million yuan; *Painted Skin* earned 240 million yuan; plus films like *The Message*, *Love in the Time of Peaches*, and *The Tokyo Trial*, along with *The Message*, expected to surpass 300 million yuan.

Fan Xiaopang’s total box office as lead actress was about to reach 1 billion yuan, making her the first actress in Chinese-language film history to achieve this milestone.

This title sparked uproar everywhere.

Li Bingbing quickly followed suit: with *Painted Skin* and *The Message* alone totaling over 500 million yuan, she had also starred in *Cell Phone*, *Kung Fu Hustle*, and *Theft of the Century*.

Though she hadn’t reached one billion, she was close—and confident she’d soon break through; she’d start marketing first.

After all, Fan Xiaopang hadn’t won any prestigious best-actress awards either, yet still called herself a Billion-Yuan Queen.

At least she had two genuine Hundred Flowers Best Actress awards to her name!

Zhang Shengyi wasn’t afraid of this comparison—the global box office of *Hero* and *Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon* alone, converted, already exceeded one billion yuan.

But Double Bing’s fans quickly replied: Sorry, we’re counting only mainland China.