After they finished their meal, Shao Zhongkang and Shao Yifu sat down and chatted.
Shao Yifu said gratefully," Ah Kang, your uncles and I made our fortune in movies. Back then, before the war of resistance, we established a film company in Shanghai. At that time, our company was banned in Shanghai and persecuted by the Japanese. We were forced to move to Southeast Asia. Later on, Dad went to Xiangjiang. With the help of your third uncle, we opened Shao's Film Company and dominated Xiangjiang! Father also hopes to have a successor to this huge film empire. Unfortunately…you and the others don't seem to have any interest in inheriting the film industry…and now…now that you're willing to inherit it, Father can rest assured!”
"Dad, what do you think about the TV station?" Shao Zhongkang nodded. You're only the second largest shareholder now, right? " Uncle Li still holds the largest share…" At present, the wireless television station was not owned by Shao Yifu. He was only the second shareholder. At present, wireless television was still under the control of Li Xiaohe. However, Li Xiaohe's health had not been good all these years, so he rarely cared about wireless television's matters. Basically, Shao Yifu was already in power and gave orders in wireless television.
" If it's wireless, with Old Li's health, I'm afraid he won't be able to work hard for many years. Besides, the descendants of the Li family are not interested in running a television station. If Old Li passes away one day, I'll buy the shares of wireless and make wireless our family's business..." Shao Yifu smiled.
Shao Zhongkang sighed and said to Shao Yifu,""But Dad, what do you think of Shao Enterprise's current situation?”
"What do you mean?" Shao Yifu was stunned for a moment before asking.
" Dad, you should understand the current situation at Shao Corporation..." Shao Zhongkang sighed." Let's not talk about anything else, just the rigid salary system at Shao Corporation. No matter how the box office is, the director can only get a fixed salary. This is fine for A-list directors since they get a lot of money, but it's a big killer for newcomers. In addition, since the salary itself is fixed, there is no punishment based on the quality of the film. This causes the director and screenwriter to lack enthusiasm when filming. In addition, Shao's is now a factory model that produces and sells itself. This kind of lousy film produces dozens of films a year and is screened in Shao's cinemas, but in the end, it loses money. Don't you think this is very abnormal?”
Shao Yifu let out a long sigh when he heard this.
In the future, in 1980, there were 83 cinemas in Xiangjiang City. In 1981, due to the sharp decline of the stock market and the real estate market, the number of cinemas in Xiangjiang City fell below 80, leaving only 78 cinemas. However, since 1982, the number of cinemas in Xiangjiang City had reached 89. This year, the glorious period of Hong Kong films began.
As for those small film companies, like those run by the gangsters, each company basically only had two or three employees 'bags. The low-quality films they produced were only shown in some scattered small alleys. The result was that they could only sell for a few hundred thousand at the box office, but this price was enough to cover their losses.
This was especially true for those illegal three-star and four-star movies. Basically, they could find a female prostitute (a woman who had sneaked into Xiangjiang from the mainland), a prostitute, and a prostitute. They could find a bed and shoot them. Moreover, there was no need to send them to the Film Inspection Office for inspection. Instead, they could be directly sent to the underground cinema for screening.
However, although Hong Kong was growing rapidly in prosperity, Shao was in the midst of a violent decline.
The main reason for this was that Shao's was trapped by the blockbuster system. In addition, there was an insufficient distribution of benefits within the company.
The so-called blockbuster system meant that a company would take care of all the production used for filming. The theater chain and the company would be closely integrated, and the theater chain would only screen the movies produced by the company.
It was not that the blockbuster system was not good. The blockbuster system would play an unparalleled role in the company's development when the company had sufficient funds. However, if the company had a decline, the terrifying operating costs and rigidness of the blockbuster system would be like a feudal policy of closing the country. It would drag the entire company down.
And now, Shao Industries was facing this kind of situation. Because Shao Industries implemented a fixed salary system, whether it was a big director or a small director, they all received a fixed salary. This meant that if your salary was 5,000 yuan, you would get 5,000 yuan for a blockbuster movie, and 5,000 yuan for a blockbuster movie.
Obviously, this system was to protect the interests of the elders of Shao's, such as Chu Yuan. However, this would greatly reduce the enthusiasm of the directors in the company, whether they were new or old. The worst thing was that Chu Yuan was best at making martial arts films. However, as Xiangjiang entered the 1980s, martial arts films were becoming less and less popular. At least, the martial arts films they made were outdated and the audience did not like them anymore. This resulted in Shao Brothers not accepting foreign films, and the audience didn't like the movies they made. As a result, they lost money with every film they made.
However, the problem was that Shao's cinema chain could not afford not to show the film. If they did not show it, just the maintenance of the cinema and the salaries of the employees would cost a lot.
Hence, it formed a very disgusting cycle. Shao Industries only released their own movies, but their movies did not sell well, and if they did not make any movies, they would lose money. It became a vicious cycle where they would lose money regardless of whether they did it or not.
This was a dead knot that couldn't be untied. Shao's Company and Shao's Cinemas had originally complemented each other, but now they were dragging each other down.
Shao Yifu wanted to reform, but he could not bear to cut off either side of his palm or back of his hand.
It could be said that if the Shao family reformed, they would die. If they didn't reform, they would die! However, the reform could at least drag on for a few more years. He was like the Qing government, completely rotten. The 1898 reform could not save him.
When Shao Yifu became a movie tycoon in Xiangjiang, he was already a billionaire. At that time, he was already over 50 years old, but he was still directing and supervising movies. When Shao Yifu and Li Xiaohe founded TLV together, he was already in his 60s, but he still lived and ate on the set.
Therefore, regardless of whether it was Shao's Film Company, TVB, or Shao's Cinemas, they were all Shao Yifu's blood and sweat. Shao Yifu could not bear to part with any of them.
However, in the future, Shao's films would become more and more difficult to make. The rigid system, coupled with the fact that almost all the directors in Shao's films were from the older generation, and there was no new blood, coupled with the fact that his concubine Fang Yihua would occasionally give him pillow talk, had caused Shao Yifu to have no choice but to focus his attention on TTV. In other words, he was supporting his youngest son. He had reduced his support and attention to his eldest son's Shao's film company.
This book comes from：m.funovel.com。