Chapter 177: So-Called Freedom

"I don't think it was worth it!" Walking into the theater with his companions, Terry was still arguing with one of them. "War is about securing the greatest victory at the smallest cost. Six men dying to save one—putting everything else aside, from a purely military standpoint, it's just not worth it."

"You can't look at it like that."

As the group reached the ticketing window, another man named Bridge shot back, "Think about it. Today, you decide trading eight lives for one isn't worth it, and a mother loses her only surviving son. Tomorrow, another mother buries her child for the exact same reason. Over time, rock-solid traditional beliefs will turn into empty promises. Who would ever feel safe sending their loved ones into the military to protect this country?"

Standing a short distance from the ticket window, Huntington, an investigator from the Screen Actors Guild, smiled faintly. He had been here all afternoon and had heard countless similar debates. The topic had clearly become a cultural flashpoint. Just like these people who had already seen the movie, the arguments usually ended with them buying another ticket and heading back inside.

Clearly, the promotional campaign for Saving Private Ryan was outstanding!

Armed with actual survey data, Huntington was certain of it. However, compared to yesterday, Saving Private Ryan was also experiencing some negative shifts. Since yesterday, some media outlets had been hyping protests by Black audiences against the film, and that coverage showed no signs of slowing down today. Even though a few Black historians had stepped forward to defend the movie, his own observations at this theater showed that the proportion of Black audience members today had dropped noticeably compared to opening day.

Extrapolating from this, public opinion had clearly influenced the choices of some Black moviegoers.

However, compared to its rival in the same release window, Braveheart, the box-office performance of Saving Private Ryan over the past two days was more than just a couple of levels higher!

Take the theater he was in right now. Only a single screening room was still showing Braveheart. While corporate sabotage from rival companies might have played a role, the film's lackluster box-office performance was the key factor behind its plummeting screen share. From morning until now in the late afternoon, by his observation, Braveheart had sold fewer than forty tickets!

This wasn't some independent theater in a remote area; it was a famous multiplex in the bustling heart of Manhattan.

Huntington had also contacted colleagues scattered across other theaters in New York. From the information he gathered, it was obvious that the opening-week box office for Braveheart would fall entirely short of Paramount Pictures' expected 25 million dollars! Twenty-five million dollars was now a completely unreachable number for them!

As for why Braveheart's box office was so abysmal today, aside from the quality of the film itself and the massive gap in commercial filmmaking ability between Mel Gibson and Duke Rosenberg, it was also tied to a piece of news heavily sensationalized by the tabloids.

Numerous tabloids under the News Group umbrella had suddenly broken the story today that Mel Gibson's father was a Nazi sympathizer who had publicly denied the Holocaust, and that Mel Gibson himself was a supporter of a certain extremist political party in Australia...

Although the tabloids didn't explicitly label Mel Gibson a Nazi supporter, they heavily insinuated it between the lines.

Think about it. This year marked the fiftieth anniversary of the victory in World War II, and tomorrow was Memorial Day. The entire United States was commemorating that great war in various ways. For news to suddenly break at a time like this that Mel Gibson might be a Nazi supporter had a massive impact on his film.

Throughout his day at the theater, Huntington had heard many moviegoers discussing Mel Gibson's controversy. A significant portion of them had firmly abandoned and even spat upon Mel Gibson's movie purely because of it.

It truly was a day of fierce competition. Braveheart and Saving Private Ryan were constantly smearing each other with an endless barrage of underhanded tactics. The whole ordeal could honestly be turned into a movie of its own.

In fact, Huntington believed that if the victor, Duke Rosenberg, and the loser, Mel Gibson, crossed paths right here, they might just start throwing punches.

Would the silver-screen tough guy, Mel Gibson, come out on top? Or would Duke Rosenberg, a former quarterback, prove to be the better fighter? Huntington thought it was a subject well worth studying.

Perhaps Huntington's thoughts were a bit subjective and one-sided, but at this very moment, Mel Gibson genuinely wanted to beat the living daylights out of Duke.

His black Lexus was currently speeding toward Paramount Pictures. Sitting in the back seat, Gibson's face was darker than the night sky over Los Angeles. Even an absolute idiot could tell he was in an extraordinarily foul mood.

'These damn jewish pigs!'

This thought echoed relentlessly in Mel Gibson's mind. Those bastards were suppressing his movie, and they had actually resorted to such despicable tactics, digging up his entire history back in Australia.

"Mel..."

The publicist sitting beside him had barely opened his mouth before Mel Gibson glared at him. "I already told you, my father and I never made those remarks! It's a smear campaign—absolute slander!"

As much as he hated jewish people, Mel Gibson was no fool; he knew full well the amount of influence people of jewish descent wielded in the industry.

Seeing that Mel Gibson had calmed down slightly, the publicist said patiently, "Mel, no matter what any reporter or paparazzo asks about this, you must vehemently deny it!"

"I'm going to sue them!"

The box office for the film he'd directed was already disastrous, and now this had happened. Mel Gibson was fuming. "I'm going to sue those media outlets for slander!"

"Calm down!" the publicist raised his voice slightly. "Those tabloids would love nothing more than for you to do just that!"

Did tabloids care about being sued for libel? They absolutely loved it when celebrities took them to court. That was the best way for them to grab eyeballs and generate attention.

Mel Gibson roughly understood how the tabloids under News Group operated. He spat resentfully, "Send them a lawyer's letter! And..."

Who exactly was backing those tabloids? The face of a certain young director automatically surfaced in his mind. "Find a way. Find any way to make Duke Rosenberg suffer!"

He couldn't afford to provoke the likes of Warner and Fox, who were bound to Duke Rosenberg by mutual interests, but that young director was still inexperienced in the industry. Furthermore, the kid was a lecher who loved beautiful women. There had to be a way to deal with him.

The car pulled up to the entrance of the Paramount Pictures office building. While Mel Gibson waited for the elevator, CEO Sherry Lansing sat in her office, her face grim as she made a phone call.

"Mandino, it's me, Sherry."

After exchanging a few pleasantries over the phone, she cut straight to the chase. "Regal Entertainment can maintain the number of theaters showing Braveheart, right? We're not asking for an increase. As long as you can maintain today's screen share and screening scale, that will be enough."

She said this without any real confidence. After all, the Friday and Saturday box office for Braveheart had been far too miserable.

Sure enough, the voice of Regal Theater Chain's CEO, Mandino, echoed from the receiver, rejecting her. "Sherry, I can only apologize."

"Mandino, could you reconsider? Mr. Redstone..."

"I'm sorry, Sherry, but this isn't something I can decide on my own." The other party not only declined, but the reason he gave was completely justified. "The Friday box office for Braveheart was 2.75 million dollars, Saturday was 2.33 million dollars, and today it sits at a mere 1.56 million dollars so far. Whether you look at the per-theater average or the overall attendance rate, it is severely below the theater chain's baseline!"

Sherry Lansing wanted to say more, but Mandino had already hung up.

The two sides did have a signed contract, but the North American Theater Alliance wasn't stupid. They had signed a sliding-scale contract; if a film performed too poorly, the theaters could trigger specific clauses to slash the movie's screening scale or even force it out of theaters entirely.

Making another call to AMG, Sherry Lansing received a very similar response. Theater chains were commercial enterprises just like film studios, and their first priority would always be profits.

Sitting in her large office chair, a bitter smile tugged at the corners of Sherry Lansing's lips. Paramount Pictures had been overwhelmingly ambitious, hoping to use Braveheart to compete head-to-head with Duke Rosenberg's Saving Private Ryan. The result, however, was every bit as tragic as last year's The Shawshank Redemption.

Thinking of the first two days' box office for Saving Private Ryan, Sherry Lansing felt a profound sense of powerlessness.

20.54 million dollars on Friday, 20,000 dollars on Saturday, and even though Sunday saw a slight dip due to yesterday's protests, it still brought in 15.26 million dollars as of 7:30 PM Pacific Time. It was an absolutely phenomenal performance!

CAA, Paramount Pictures, and even Mel Gibson's public relations team had pulled so many strings behind the scenes, whipping up a fierce, white-hot competition, yet they were still powerless to halt the advance of Saving Private Ryan. It was as if Duke Rosenberg truly was the undisputed king of the summer season!

Without the impact of this vicious competition, how much higher would the box office for Saving Private Ryan have been? Sherry Lansing couldn't put an exact number on it, but she silently estimated it would have been at least fifteen percent higher, given that quite a few Black and Latino moviegoers were boycotting the film.

Even so, Paramount Pictures and Braveheart had still suffered a crushing defeat.

'Could it be that Duke Rosenberg and his work are truly invincible in the summer season?'

Despite her steadfast resolve, her vast experience, and her status as the CEO of one of Hollywood's premier studios, Sherry Lansing still found herself harboring this thought.

A knock sounded at the office door. The secretary led Mel Gibson inside, brewed a cup of coffee for him, and stepped back out.

"Sherry!" Mel Gibson was anxious, his voice noticeably loud. "I heard Paramount is pulling the resources invested in Braveheart?"

"That's correct."

This was an industry that spoke exclusively through commercial performance. The look in Sherry Lansing's eyes as she stared at Mel Gibson was icy. "Not only is the film's box office performing poorly, but its audience word-of-mouth—which reflects its market potential—has dropped to sixty-six percent. It is no longer worth Paramount investing any more funds."

Mel Gibson opened his mouth, but no words came out. He was no newcomer to Hollywood; naturally, he understood the rules of the game in this circle.

However, he wasn't going to just accept it. After only a few seconds of silence, he spoke again. "The film can still be saved, Sherry! Have you seen how The Shawshank Redemption performed in the Videotape market? As long as we can win a few Oscars, we can completely turn this loss around."

"And what if Saving Private Ryan also enters the oscar campaign?"

Would the producers of that film let the Oscars slip by? Sherry Lansing wouldn't believe that for a second. Her words carried undisguised mockery. "In a unique time period like this year, do you really think Braveheart can beat Saving Private Ryan?"

"CAA will throw their full support behind our award push!" Mel Gibson looked brimming with confidence. "What if a scandal breaks about the director of Saving Private Ryan?"