Chapter 551: Negative Impact

The moment he woke up the next day, Billy Emerson turned on his computer and logged onto IMDB. He had a lot of pent-up anger over the terrible movie he had watched the night before—a film that had completely scammed him out of his enthusiasm. Naturally, he needed an outlet to vent, and IMDB, one of the most influential websites on the internet, was the perfect place.

His hands flew across the keyboard, typing a string of letters into the review section for Flyboys.

"Just finished Flyboys, and I'm really disappointed. The plot is uninspired, the storyline is completely idiotic, and the acting is formulaic with zero surprises. Worse yet, how could theaters actually allow such a garbage war movie to be released?"

After posting his review, Billy Emerson gave Flyboys a score of 4.

He went to the bathroom to take a shower. After changing into fresh clothes, he returned to his computer and refreshed the page. The words he had typed were already buried under countless other reviews, almost all of them negative.

"This is a completely ridiculous movie. There's absolutely no need to watch it. Aside from James Franco and the beautiful French girls, there's basically nothing to see."

"A very mediocre film. Absolutely no surprises."

"Very average, very average, really just very average!"

"I don't even want to say anything else. The movie is simply bad."

"For a movie that's pure melodrama most of the time, the survival of a favorite main character is probably the biggest reward it offers viewers who manage to stick it out. The only reason I finished Flyboys was for James Franco. He's just too handsome."

"Aviator hats, the French countryside, golden birch leaves, fine horses, blue skies, airplanes (fucking biplanes at that), girls, and war—the director tried so hard to mash all these pretentious elements together, but it fell flat at every turn. The first confrontation between the veterans and the rookies in the tavern especially showcased the director's childishness and incompetence to the extreme. Using decadent revelry and raising a pet lion to portray their attitude toward death is just too hippie and clichéd."

Briefly skimming the reviews, Billy Emerson shifted his gaze to the score. Following last night's midnight screening, many more viewers had seen Flyboys, which was evident from the number of users rating the film.

IMDB had 25,638 users participating in the ratings. And the score for Flyboys was a mere 6.1!

"How could this happen?"

Seeing the statistics, David Ellison's eyes nearly popped out of his head. He seemed unable to believe this was the audience score for Flyboys, and he turned to look at Michael Ovitz sitting next to him.

"Such a low score..."

Michael Ovitz sat on the terrace, slowly regulating his breathing. In truth, after the premiere ended last night, he had already sensed something was wrong from the live audience's reaction. Unlike the test screenings, where feedback was a mix of good and bad, the premiere had a much larger audience, and most of them had reacted with overwhelming indifference.

"David. Calm down!"

The other party was a young man, after all. When it came to composure, how could he possibly compare to an old fox like Ovitz?

"IMDB doesn't mean everything," Ovitz said. "There have been movies with low IMDB scores that still became box office hits in the past."

IMDB was merely a weather vane, just like the Golden Globe Awards and the Oscars. There was no inevitable connection between its scores and a movie's box office gross.

Moreover, many insiders knew that the ratings for numerous films on IMDB were inflated.

For example, the top three movies currently on the overall IMDB rating chart were The Lord of the Rings 3: The Return of the King, The Matrix, and The Godfather. The first two were Duke Rosenberg's films. Anyone in Hollywood's upper echelons knew that director controlled an army of paid online shills with a scale and reaction speed that ranked at the very forefront of the entire industry, if not the whole country.

Michael Ovitz believed that given Duke Rosenberg's personality, he absolutely would not sit back and let Flyboys enjoy a smooth release. He would inevitably pull some strings on the internet. Even though Ovitz and Disney's own teams of paid online shills were keeping a close eye on IMDB, they still fell far short when it came to competing head-to-head with Duke's forces.

This score would only cause some impact; it wouldn't deliver a truly fatal blow to the film. As long as market research confirmed decent audience word-of-mouth, Flyboys still had a chance to turn things around.

"Mr. Ovitz."

His assistant suddenly stepped onto the terrace and handed a brief report to Michael Ovitz.

"This is the statistical report that Disney Pictures just faxed over," the assistant said.

"Oh?"

Before Ovitz could take it, David Ellison grabbed the report first. He only skimmed it briefly, but his eyes instantly sharpened into twin blades. His furious glare carried a mix of confusion, bewilderment, and sheer disbelief.

"What's wrong?" Michael Ovitz instantly realized the situation was bad.

"The midnight screening box office is only 2.02 million dollars."

David Ellison closed his eyes, then slowly opened them again. The arrogant expression on his face chipped away bit by bit.

"It didn't reach our expected 5 million dollars," he added.

"It's just missing a little over 2 million dollars," Michael Ovitz said, feeling slightly relieved. "That can't be considered a failure."

David Ellison shot him a glance and scoffed lightly. "I know, a midnight screening box office like this isn't bad."

He was a student of the USC Film School, after all, and he had studied Hollywood extensively over the past few years. If the film's momentum continued at the midnight screening's pace, recouping costs and even turning a profit through overseas box office and merchandise wasn't impossible.

But the problem was...

"Audience word-of-mouth is far from ideal," David Ellison continued. "According to surveys by the CinemaScore Company, the positive rating among theatrical audiences for Flyboys is only sixty-five percent, with an average audience grade of 'B-'."

Such statistics meant the film would severely lack staying power, inevitably suffering a steep box office dive after its opening week.

Clenching his right hand into a fist, David Ellison slammed the statistical report heavily onto the table in front of him. Hot-blooded and young, it took a great deal of effort to keep his temper in check. The education he had received since childhood taught him that throwing a tantrum now wouldn't solve a single thing.

Would losing his temper make Duke Rosenberg back off voluntarily? Would it stop him from attacking his film across traditional and online media?

Just as he and Disney had refused to let go of Anne Hathaway's scandal, his opponent absolutely wouldn't let him off the hook either.

As the heir to a business dynasty, David Ellison understood perfectly well that this had little to do with personal grudges. Their conflicting interests had already dictated their opposing stances!

Compared to David Ellison, Michael Ovitz found himself unnaturally calm. Deep down, his subconscious seemed to treat this outcome as a matter of course—as if losing to Duke Rosenberg was the most normal thing in the world.

Why was it like this?

Michael Ovitz's mind only turned the question over briefly before he grasped the crux of the issue. He had lost too many times in his past clashes with Duke Rosenberg. So many times that losing had become a habit.

But Ovitz wasn't going to give up here. A man who could build a massive entertainment agency like CAA wouldn't admit defeat so easily.

Much like Michael Ovitz, Duke wouldn't give up either—he would never pass up an opportunity to strike at a competitor.

Starting Thursday night, the army of paid online shills controlled by Penny Kalis had fully deployed. They stirred up trouble across most film-related websites, including IMDB, Rotten Tomatoes, and Yahoo Entertainment, actively steering the direction of online public opinion.

If Flyboys had been a film of guaranteed high quality, these tactics would have only caused a limited impact without dealing a severe blow to its box office and market standing.

But out of everyone who had watched Flyboys, how many actually thought the movie was brilliant?

Perhaps the more forgiving viewers would say the film had a few saving graces, but the vast majority immediately classified it as garbage.

Even if the opposing side had also mobilized their own paid online shills, goading an audience that already considered Flyboys mediocre to attack it online wasn't a difficult task at all.

Furthermore, once a trend of negative reviews formed, changing the tide of online opinion was far beyond what Ovitz and Disney's shills could accomplish.

Meanwhile, Duke didn't spare Flyboys in traditional print media either. The more their opponent's market space was compressed, the more beneficial it would be for Batman Begins, which was just entering its second weekend in theaters.

Leaving aside the media outlets directly controlled or heavily influenced by Warner Brothers and Disney, even the relatively neutral publications had plenty of negative reviews splashed across their pages. Faced with such a terrible movie, Duke and Warner's PR departments barely had to expend any effort to make that happen.

"Whether viewed as a wartime adventure or a romance, Flyboys is less than successful. Even the special effects set against a historical backdrop are sleep-inducing and fail to salvage this overly long and tedious film."

— Washington Post

"Can this even be called a movie? Inexplicable actors following the demands of an inexplicable director while sitting in prop planes simply looks laughable. The only thing that manages to leave any impression is the aerial combat."

— New York Times

"The film uses a vast amount of CGI-generated effects, but the execution is poorly handled. It doesn't capture the feel of World War I at all; instead, it looks like a story set in a futuristic world—albeit a cheap, third-rate sci-fi tale."

— Entertainment Weekly

"This is a textbook example of an aerial combat film that spent big money but achieved nothing. The narrative completely follows a formulaic pattern of plot-battle-romance-plot-battle-plot-final battle, utterly lacking any unique traits. Its only redeeming feature is that it's somewhat boisterous, allowing it to be watched as a hilarious, trashy comedy."

— The New Yorker

In an office in Silicon Valley, Larry Ellison, having just returned to California and finished his pressing work, made a point to set aside time to read the newspaper and magazine reviews of his son's film. But the sea of bad reviews he saw made his weathered face flush bright red. If he hadn't reined in his temper over the past few years, he would have flipped his desk over long ago.