Chapter 553: A Massive Gap in Weekend Box Office

"Just yesterday, the 2005 North American summer season concluded its second weekend. Due to the poor performance of the only wide-release film, Flyboys, the overall market took a downturn. Fortunately, Batman Begins maintained a steady trend entering its second weekend of screenings, preventing last weekend from becoming the lowest-grossing second summer weekend in history."

As Monday began, last weekend's box office charts—along with commentary and reports from Premiere, the New York Times, and numerous other media outlets—were delivered to countless readers.

The media ran with largely similar headlines: last weekend, Batman Begins easily retained the top spot, Flyboys suffered a disastrous opening, and Kingdom of Heaven slipped out of the box office top five.

A box office briefing was also delivered to Duke's estate. Scarlett Johansson, who had stayed the night, sipped her morning tea as she read the early paper, feeling thoroughly content.

The fact that Duke allowed her to stay here when Mrs. Leah wasn't around indicated that their relationship had taken a significant step forward.

Of course, seeing her side's film win the competition while those two obnoxious rivals failed also brought her joy.

"In the second weekend of the summer season, neither newly released nor expanded films managed to make any significant waves, and the market remained dominated by older titles. The Batman Series reboot directed by the renowned Duke Rosenberg, Batman Begins, showed an excellent trend in its second weekend, dropping only forty-three percent from its opening weekend to rake in another 39.24 million dollars, easily defending its spot as the weekend champion."

"Flyboys, financed by David Ellison, the son of the famous IT titan Larry Ellison, grossed a mere 8.86 million dollars in its opening weekend. This fell severely short of external expectations, amounting to just one-fourteenth of its massive production budget. Despite ranking second on the box office charts, it's hard to imagine the producers and investors being satisfied."

"The choice to release Flyboys during the second weekend of Batman Begins had already been viewed unfavorably by numerous industry insiders. However, having just taken control of his trust fund, David Ellison had plenty of capital on hand; at his urging, the film ultimately chose this incredibly terrible release window."

"This film about World War I aerial combat received a wide release in North America on Friday. Its midnight screenings grossed only 2.02 million dollars—a dismal performance—before it rolled out fully across nearly 3,300 theaters in North America. Its opening day revenue of 4.12 million dollars fell drastically short of Walt Disney's 12-million-dollar projection."

"By Saturday, weighed down by abysmal audience word-of-mouth, Flyboys saw a sharp decline at the box office, taking in just 2.62 million dollars. The film continued to slide on Sunday, managing a mere 2.12 million dollars. Based on current forecasts given its poor reception, its final North American box office will likely struggle to break 30 million dollars."

"The film skewed female during its opening weekend, making up fifty-five percent of the audience. After its first three days, word-of-mouth dropped precipitously across the board: its CinemaScore sat at a C, its Popcorn Index was a mere fifty-three percent, and its Rotten Tomatoes freshness rating—aggregated from 111 media outlets—plummeted to twenty-three percent, with an average score of only 4.5. On MetaCritic, 43 outlets gave it a collective score of 34."

"In addition to all this, Flyboys also suffered widespread negative reviews from the press."

"The St. Louis Post-Dispatch criticized the director for seeming completely at a loss when faced with such a script, noting that he failed to drum up any audience interest in the characters. The Oregonian felt that while the film couldn't be called entirely unentertaining—boasting rich colors and no shortage of action sequences or striking special effects, alongside James Franco's alternately brilliant and dreadful but always compelling performance—the whole movie was just bereft of anything truly exciting. Variety blasted the film, stating that none of the characters seemed interesting for a single moment, a fatal flaw for a movie."

"Compared to Flyboys, Batman Begins showed formidable strength, carrying on the consistent and steady trend typical of Duke Rosenberg's films. After taking in another 39.24 million dollars in its second weekend, the film's cumulative North American box office has reached 143.31 million dollars, with its final domestic tally poised to challenge the 250-million-dollar mark."

Reading up to this point, Scarlett Johansson folded the newspaper. Kingdom of Heaven tumbling out of the box office top five failed to rouse any interest in her whatsoever.

She picked up her fork, popped a few slices of fruit from her plate into her mouth, swallowed, and took a sip of black tea. Her eyes shifted to Duke, who sat opposite her. Ever since breakfast began, he had been answering phone calls back to back; it seemed something very important was going on.

Honestly, Scarlett really wanted to read the articles from the paper out loud to him, but she had known Duke for over a decade. She was definitely one of the people who understood him best, and she knew perfectly well that Duke utterly despised having his train of thought interrupted while he was in work mode.

Driven by curiosity as she watched Duke close his phone, Scarlett couldn't help but ask, "Is something urgent going on? You're so busy first thing in the morning."

Setting his phone aside, Duke picked up his coffee cup and said before taking a sip, "It was Tina. Just some business negotiation stuff."

"Oh..." Scarlett nodded, smartly choosing not to pry any further.

She knew that outside of shooting movies, Duke had a lot of work in other areas, and Tina Fey was undoubtedly his proxy.

Duke didn't eat much, so breakfast was over quickly. He stood up and headed out of the dining room. Scarlett Johansson followed close behind, trailing just half a step back to walk tightly by his side.

Glancing over at Scarlett, Duke asked softly, "Don't you have to work today? I recall your training just started."

Stepping out of the Eye-Shaped Villa, Scarlett naturally linked her arm through Duke's. "I don't have to go today. Jimmy Carter has to train my two stunt doubles, so he gave me the day off."

A black Bentley slowly pulled up at that moment. Scarlett looked at Duke and asked, "Are you heading to work?"

Looking down at the hand Scarlett had looped tightly around his arm, Duke ultimately decided not to say anything about it. "I'm going to the studio, and then I need to make a trip to Warner Bros. and Marvel Pictures."

Scarlett immediately grew interested. "Are you starting prep for Iron Man?"

She had been waiting for this movie—waiting for her third collaboration with Duke. Aside from two minor walk-on roles when she was a child, she had never officially starred in one of his films.

For Scarlett Johansson, who had personally watched Duke climb step by step from an ordinary director to join the ranks of the world's most outstanding filmmakers, this was her greatest regret.

Truthfully, she knew very well that if she had thrown tantrums and acted shamelessly like she did when she was little, she could have appeared in one of his films much earlier. But back then, due to her chatterbox tendencies and other factors, their relationship wasn't nearly as harmonious as it was now. Even if Duke had cast her for Mrs. Leah's sake, it would have only pushed them toward mutual indifference.

That was certainly not the result Scarlett Johansson wanted.

"Can I go with you?" she asked tentatively.

Duke turned his head and gave the blonde girl a look. Not quite twenty-one yet, Scarlett had long since shed her childhood mischief; the vast majority of the time, she was as docile as a sheep in front of him.

However, Duke was well aware that this was all a facade. Otherwise, she wouldn't have pulled those stunts on Oscar night and become the catalyst for his breakup with Ivanka Trump.

Of course, with things as they were, Duke wasn't going to pin that entirely on Scarlett's head. Just as she had said, the issues between him and Ivanka hadn't stemmed from Scarlett or any other woman in the first place. Even without that incident, the two of them would have only drifted further apart.

"I promise!" Scarlett raised one hand. "I absolutely won't cause any trouble."

As she spoke, her eyes suddenly darted around, and she adopted the same tone she'd used over a decade ago. "I'll be a quiet little egg."

Hearing that phrase, Duke thought of the Scarlett from their childhood. He couldn't help but shake his head as he walked toward the car already parked out front, and Scarlett Johansson immediately scurried after him.

The two of them first made a trip to Duke Studio, then headed over to the Warner Building. Because of his film's ongoing theatrical run and the presence of Scarlett Johansson beside him, the journey was inevitably marked by paparazzi and reporters snapping covert photos. Duke paid them no mind, keeping his focus entirely on his work.

Scarlett, however, observed everything meticulously. Especially after entering the Warner Building, the Warner employees looked at Duke as if he were an omnipotent savior. Anyone who felt they had the standing to speak up scrambled to greet him. Whenever Duke offered a slight nod in response, those people would invariably break into satisfied smiles, as if getting any reaction from him at all was something to be incredibly proud of.

Wasn't it completely normal to earn that kind of respect after dragging a failed movie franchise back from the edge of a cliff?

Scarlett understood Duke's weight at Warner. Leaving aside his status as a major shareholder, his sheer influence in the realm of film was something the other directors working with Warner couldn't catch up to even if they drove sports cars. It was no exaggeration to say that he could even influence the selection of Warner's CEO.

Having grown up around Mrs. Leah, Scarlett had a decent grasp of business. She was certain that without Duke's support, no Warner CEO would ever be able to sit securely in their chair.

Duke Studio, Warner Brothers, Marvel Pictures... Duke spent the day bouncing from one location to the next. Aside from matters regarding the upcoming formal prep for Iron Man, there were also the negotiations between Walt Disney and the other side of the Pacific, as well as the talks with Pixar Studio.

Warner Brothers had accepted Duke's suggestion, and personnel from their Far East branch had already initiated formal contact with their counterparts across the ocean.

Of course, this sort of thing wouldn't yield immediate results. After all, the investment amount involved was truly massive.

Moreover, Warner Grand World's reputation over there simply couldn't compare to that of Disneyland.

As for the negotiations with Pixar Studio, after a prolonged period of haggling, Duke's side, Steve Jobs, and Time Warner had already found plenty of common ground. Although an agreement hadn't been reached just yet, their remaining differences had been whittled down to a matter of price.

In addition, there was the matter of the overseas release of Batman Begins. Perhaps it was intentionally arranged by David Ellison, but just like Batman Begins, Flyboys would also kick off its wide release in international markets starting next weekend.