Chapter 325: You Don't Fit My Aesthetic

With a limited production budget, Warner Brothers' investment in distribution and marketing wasn't exactly high. They still put in considerable promotional work by capitalizing on opportunities like the shooting memorial, but a film like Daylight could never launch the overwhelming marketing bombardment typical of big-budget Summer Season blockbusters.

The film held two test screenings for audiences, theater executives, and the media—one in early March and another in mid-March. Duke had been busy in New Zealand with the final pre-production preparations for The Lord of the Rings and hadn't attended at all. With several lead actors present and the strong cooperation of the Los Angeles County Police Department, there was no shortage of necessary promotional gimmicks.

After the two test screenings, Warner Brothers immediately relayed the results to New Zealand.

"Eighty-four percent positive audience feedback, and an overall commercial grade of B+ from the theater chains," Tina Fey said rapidly, outlining the screening results as she stood behind Duke, who was inspecting a cave troll model. "The media screening scored an A-. The film will be released in North America across 2,200 theaters after the Oscar Awards Ceremony."

"That's a bit better than I expected."

Generally satisfied with the troll's design, Duke moved to the other side to look at a lifelike giant spider.

"I thought it would get a limited release in around 300 theaters, with the chains waiting to see how it performed before expanding the scale."

Perhaps because he always prepared for the worst, the test screening response for Daylight was better than Duke had anticipated. This was evident from the resources the theater chains were investing; theaters never yielded easily unless they saw a film's selling points and expected returns.

Duke walked over to the Spider Shelob, but Tina Fey stayed where she was. Women usually detested these kinds of things.

"There's some news from New York."

When Duke headed out of the model warehouse, Tina Fey followed.

"Director Lucas asked if you could attend the Star Wars Premiere in May," she said as they walked. "Mrs. Leah is confirmed to attend. Victoria's Secret sent over a proposal regarding their angel models and The Lord of the Rings that needs your review. Miss Lauder mailed some men's skincare products—trial samples for her brand's upcoming launch..."

"This girl..."

Stepping out of the warehouse district, Duke looked up at the bright sunlight.

He muttered, "She's using me as a guinea pig."

"What about Marvel Comics?"

Duke turned and walked toward the weapons armory.

"When can we formally sign with them?"

After more than a month of haggling with Marvel Comics, the two sides had finally reached an agreement regarding Duke's investment and equity stake. Lawyers and accountants from both camps were auditing the details; otherwise, Tina Fey wouldn't have returned to New Zealand as his representative.

"An exact date hasn't been set yet." Tina Fey flipped through her work log. "But according to the initialed draft, the formal agreement will be signed no later than the end of May. Also..."

She reminded Duke, "This is a 200 million dollar deal for a twenty-five percent stake. You don't have that much liquid capital on the books. We have to wait for David and Yahoo's management to reach a share transfer agreement."

"Keep an eye on it."

Leaving her with that instruction, Duke walked into the weapons armory and greeted several weaponsmiths. He headed toward the storage area inside, telling Tina Fey as she caught up to him, "Once the Yahoo share transfer is complete, finalize the Marvel Comics deal as soon as possible."

In Duke's judgment, investing in Marvel Comics was essentially a guaranteed profit. True, no one could guarantee that Marvel Comics would evolve into the massively successful Marvel of the future, but as a director, there was one thing he knew for certain: special effects technology was advancing at breakneck speed. This provided the foundational conditions for Marvel Comics' superheroes to appear on the big screen. Even if the Avengers never assembled, the cinematic value of Marvel Comics wouldn't be poor.

Besides, as long as he secured a stake, he would naturally remind Marvel Comics' management to sell themselves to Walt Disney or another film studio for an astronomical price in the future.

Walking through the armory, Duke inspected the weapons used by the main characters one by one. They were all handcrafted; some were made of alloy steel, some of aluminum alloy, and others were purely rubber props.

But even the rubber swords looked indistinguishable from real steel on the outside.

After finishing his inspection of the weapon props, Duke returned to the Wellington Studio office, where he reviewed several proposals sent by Victoria's Secret. The executives suggested that once The Lord of the Rings trilogy officially began filming and generated significant buzz in North America and around the world, the Victoria's Secret angels would fly to New Zealand to join the crew in the most high-profile manner possible. Ideally, they wanted a television station to broadcast the entire trip live.

Perhaps they could rent a fleet of convertible sports cars, letting the Victoria's Secret angels blow kisses all the way from their New York headquarters to Kennedy Airport before taking a luxury charter flight to Wellington. They could gather the news media on both ends and orchestrate the hottest possible promotional hype?

After briefly writing down his thoughts, Duke had Tina Fey fax them to Victoria's Secret's management.

No blockbuster film could succeed without a successful marketing campaign. With the total investment for The Lord of the Rings trilogy reaching 350 million dollars, large-scale promotional hype was absolutely essential.

Along with the Victoria's Secret proposals came a profile packet for the Victoria's Secret angels. With angels coming and going over the past few years, the roster had changed quite a bit. Victoria's Secret management faxed this information over so Duke could find the most suitable candidates.

Looking at the tall, slender models in the glossy portfolio, Duke suddenly remembered that the crew still hadn't found an actress to play Arwen. Maybe he could find an angel model with long legs, a narrow waist, and a pure appearance?

The role itself didn't require outstanding acting skills—not even a passing grade. And frankly, did the original Arwen have any acting chops anyway?

After handling the Victoria's Secret business, Duke sat and thought for a moment.

"Write back to George," he told Tina Fey. "I will attend the Premiere of The Phantom Menace."

Since his mother was going, he had no reason not to.

Finally, there were the men's skincare products mailed by Aerin Lauder. This was a cosmetics brand she had founded backed by the Estee Lauder Group, and she held absolute controlling shares. Even though Duke had told her during their regular phone calls that she could come to him if she had funding issues, Aerin had never asked. For now, it seemed she wasn't too short on money either.

Having known her for so many years, Duke could see that Aerin Lauder was an inwardly strong woman forging her own business path.

In this regard, no country or society in the world was truly fair. Some people were simply born with an advantage at the starting line.

Leaving Aerin Lauder aside and just looking at himself, if he hadn't been born into such a wealthy family, his path as a Hollywood director would probably be ten—or even a hundred—times harder than it was now.

Everyone knew that the first step toward success was the hardest, and the initial startup capital was the most difficult to raise. He was fortunate enough to have his mother's full support.

Duke opened the skincare products, glanced at them, and set them aside. Aerin Lauder knew his habits; the things she mailed were the simplest products, like men's sunscreen.

"Tina, have someone buy some local New Zealand specialties and mail them to..."

Duke paused and thought for a moment. "Buy a bit more. Mail a portion to my mom, one to Aerin, and... one to Ivanka Trump as well."

As time passed, more aspects of the pre-production work for The Lord of the Rings were declared complete, and more relevant personnel arrived in New Zealand.

Meanwhile, the number of media reporters and paparazzi swarming outside Wellington Studio was rising sharply. After all, this was The Lord of the Rings trilogy—a monumental work in Western literary history that was also renowned as the most impossible piece of literature to adapt into a film. Coupled with Duke's fame as a director, it was more than enough to attract a lot of eyeballs.

Some gossip media outlets in particular sent dedicated paparazzi just to keep an eye on him.

Everyone in Hollywood knew that Duke never tried to hide his affairs and that he changed female companions extremely quickly. However, he had quieted down since The Matrix, and this abnormal situation had actually piqued the curiosity of some gossip media.

The New York Post even reported with absolute certainty that he was tired of this chaotic lifestyle and was currently secretly dating a girl, intending to establish a long-term, stable relationship...

Whether it was scandalous gossip or positive coverage, none of it affected Duke's work. In accordance with the overall promotional plan, he had issued a gag order to the crew: everyone was strictly forbidden from giving private interviews to the media.

This included Duke himself. No matter how the reporters chased and intercepted him, he maintained his media silence for the time being. Even when he returned to Los Angeles to attend the Premiere for Daylight, he only talked about that film while walking the red carpet and answering questions in the interview area, refusing to discuss The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

The scale of a Premiere usually corresponded to a film's investment budget. The Premiere for Daylight was not large; it was held at a medium-sized theater in downtown Los Angeles. They hadn't invited any heavyweight guests, making it just an ordinary Premiere for the Spring Season.

The release date for Daylight was set for late March, right after the Oscar Awards Ceremony. There were no films released during this period that Duke had any prior impression of, meaning there were essentially no heavyweight competitors. However, there were simply too many low-budget films being released, which vastly dispersed the theater chains' resources.

This, however, was also the theater chains' distribution strategy. In a release window where big-budget productions couldn't be used to attract audiences, no one knew which film would ultimately emerge as a dark horse. As long as a particular movie showed blockbuster potential, it would immediately become the primary film promoted by the theater alliances.

The 2,200 theaters for Daylight might not seem like much, but it was actually the film with the widest release that weekend. The fact that the film managed to secure a relatively high number of theaters was not unrelated to the confidence Duke had instilled in the theater chains.

But at the end of the day, whether the film would expand its release scale or reduce its theater count moving forward would ultimately depend on its market performance.