Chapter 936: Film Has Always Been a Business

On Christmas Day, Duke took no time to rest. After spending Christmas Eve with his mother and Scarlett Johansson, he boarded a plane with the rest of the crew and left North America to begin the film's overseas promotional tour, while Star Wars: The Force Awakens continued its triumphant march across the North American market.

On Christmas Day, Star Wars: The Force Awakens grossed $59.34 million at the North American box office, shattering the $24.6 million Christmas Day record set by Sherlock Holmes during its 2009 premiere.

The dazzling performance of Star Wars: The Force Awakens also drove the overall North American box office to new heights. The market raked in over $100 million on Christmas Day alone, breaking the previous $86 million record set in 2009 when Sherlock Holmes and Avatar jointly dominated theaters.

The three-day box office haul for the 2015 Christmas weekend was also on track to surpass the $260 million record set during the same period in 2009, making it the highest in North American cinematic history.

For this overseas promotional tour, Duke specifically invited George Lucas. Duke was not the Walt Disney of the past, after all, and George Lucas gladly accepted.

Having George Lucas travel with them brought a great deal of added attention to the tour.

Although the media's coverage constantly brought up the Star Wars Prequel trilogy, in Duke's mind, George Lucas's status far surpassed that of Martin Scorsese and Francis Coppola.

This had nothing to do with their personal relationship; rather, it was because George Lucas could genuinely be considered the founder of the modern film industry.

The Star Wars Series, or perhaps George Lucas himself, fundamentally pioneered the concept of the modern film franchise.

It was widely acknowledged across Hollywood and the global film industry that Steven Spielberg's Jaws had ushered in the era of summer season blockbusters in 1975, while the Star Wars Series elevated Hollywood blockbusters to entirely new heights.

In the late 1970s, franchise films were frowned upon in Hollywood. The Planet of the Apes series and the 007 series were the only surviving examples of success. However, the sudden emergence of the Star Wars Series and the brilliant success it achieved changed all that, prompting Hollywood to seriously consider and explore serialized film projects.

To a large extent, the success of the Harry Potter series, Duke's The Lord of the Rings series, and the Marvel Series were all inextricably linked to George Lucas's earth-shattering innovation in 1977.

Duke's claim that "George Lucas is the Edison of the film industry" was more than just empty talk, because Lucas had also discovered a crucial avenue for Hollywood films to profit and survive.

Beyond creating an incredibly popular film franchise, George Lucas also pioneered the commercial model for film merchandise.

Before then, movie merchandise was generally limited to small runs of T-shirts and minor souvenirs. In contrast, merchandise for the Star Wars Series was produced in massive quantities, boasted high quality, and offered a wide variety of choices.

Lucas successively partnered with toy industry giants Mattel, Hasbro, and Lego to develop countless Star Wars Series toys, ranging from action figures and playsets to spaceships.

This heralded the action figure craze of the early 1980s and cultivated a massive wave of avid collectors. For the first time, passionate youths had the chance to leave the theater, buy a "Luke Skywalker" or "Han Solo," and recreate their favorite scenes right at home.

It must be remembered that home theaters did not exist in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Through this merchandise, George Lucas cultivated future moviegoers out of a new generation that hadn't even seen the films yet.

Many people, particularly children, often fell in love with the merchandise long before they ever watched the movies.

This strategy was subsequently adopted by countless films and manufacturers, establishing a massive fan base for American "Saturday morning cartoons" in the 1980s. Franchises like Transformers, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, and G.I. Joe were prime examples of the toys being far more successful than the shows themselves.

Even now, Duke still remembered his school days in the 1980s when the popular game on American schoolyards suddenly shifted from "cops and robbers" to "Rebels and Imperial Stormtroopers." Kids waving Lightsabers and laser blasters were everywhere. With the subsequent rise of video game consoles, the Star Wars Series developed related titles, allowing street kids to immerse themselves in interactive interstellar adventures.

In fact, to this day, the entire line of Star Wars Series products—including film, television, video games, and toys—had long surpassed $30 billion in global revenue.

Getting fans to latch onto Star Wars culture and integrate it into their daily lives was a gradual process, but Lucasfilm possessed this special knack right from the very beginning. This was a major distinction between them and other companies that spent all day poring over legal statutes to tell people what they could and couldn't do.

Because of this, the Star Wars fan base had grown quietly and steadily. By the time those kids grew up, they were die-hard fans. There were now three generations of Star Wars fans; thinking about that too closely was almost terrifying.

In London, the first stop on the crew's overseas promotional tour, a reporter asked Duke for his thoughts on the massive commercial empire George Lucas had built starting with the first Star Wars film.

"My first thought is that when the original Star Wars was released, a merchandise industry didn't even exist in Hollywood."

Indeed, Hollywood in that era completely lacked the concept of an industrial chain. Duke was simply stating the facts.

"I believe that George securing the merchandising rights for this film franchise was the most critical step in the history of the entire Star Wars industry," he continued.

After thinking for a moment, he added, "Film has always been a business, but very few movies have managed to take that to the extreme like Star Wars. When the original Star Wars premiered, the billion-dollar merchandise industries of today didn't exist; there was only the Star Wars story. But it was on core concepts—that all minds and living things are bound and connected by The Force; that a struggle between good and evil exists in the universe; that a farm boy from the middle of nowhere could become the key figure in resisting an almost unstoppable evil—that this massive Star Wars commercial empire was built."

Film directors like Duke weren't the only fans whose career paths were influenced by Star Wars. Many of the kids who grew up watching the original Star Wars series eventually chose to work for NASA and the aerospace industry.

For example, NASA astronaut Kjell Lindgren had accepted the crew's invitation to attend this Star Wars promotional event in London.

"I think Star Wars is enough to spark the imagination just on the strength of its story," he said during a press interview. "Furthermore, the advanced technology and the very idea of being able to live and work in outer space were incredibly exciting. Every astronaut in my generation watched A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi as kids. Personally, Star Wars is one of the many reasons I developed an interest in space exploration."

While making an appearance on Sky Television, Duke remarked, "Star Wars has retained its charm for forty years. If I had to sum it up with the most fitting word, it would be: legendary. Like Greek mythology, Western folklore, or the works of Shakespeare, these stories have stood the test of time and continue to be appreciated by new generations of audiences today. One of the greatest draws of The Force Awakens is that parents can bring their children to the theater and introduce them to this unique universe, just as our own parents did for us many years ago..."

Of course, not everyone was showering the film with praise. No matter how powerful the combination of Duke and Star Wars was, it couldn't win over absolutely everyone in the world.

There were still plenty of people on the internet who refused to buy into the hype surrounding Duke and Star Wars.

"There are two recognized deceivers in this world: fame and fortune. On top of those, there is a third major deceiver—trends! There is no doubt that Star Wars: The Force Awakens is leading the trend at the end of this year, yet such massive blockbusters are typically complete artistic failures. This is nothing more than a commercial cash grab created for profit by the thoroughly vulgarized Duke Rosenberg!"

"The fact that a movie like this can dominate the box office and sweep the Christmas holiday window relies not on any artistic achievements we can be proud of, but purely on sensory stimulation, visual spectacle, and adrenaline."

"Our society cannot remain this vulgar forever. A day will inevitably come when people need elegant art to awaken their numbed nerves. Even if the thoroughly vulgarized Duke Rosenberg can dominate the box office right now, he will undoubtedly be abandoned by audiences in the near future!"

"Directors represented by the likes of Duke Rosenberg have forgotten the original function and mission of cinema. They are increasingly turning their backs on the very definition of film, pushing it further and further away from real life..."

Even so, the crew's overseas tour was enthusiastically welcomed in every city they visited. If nothing else, the hundreds of reporters swarming into every single event proved to be an exceptional promotional tool.

Furthermore, there were plenty of wealthy fans with time to spare who had been following the crew around ever since the premiere in Los Angeles. These fans were a welcome sight for local merchants everywhere.

Everywhere they went, the Star Wars: The Force Awakens crew was the center of attention. Every promotional event felt like a war zone, with thousands of people swarming and besieging them as the new normal. Sometimes, the cast and crew signed so many autographs that their right hands went numb, forcing them to switch to their left. Luckily, they were only writing signatures; otherwise, they definitely would have made fools of themselves.

"On December X, the Star Wars: The Force Awakens crew held an event in XX city. Once Duke Rosenberg and the cast appeared, the entire city went wild..."

At first, news reports like this easily captured the public's attention, but it soon became the accepted norm. In everyone's eyes, it was perfectly natural for Duke's crew to be greeted with such adoration. It would only be breaking news if they were suddenly given the cold shoulder.

The entire continent of Europe was sent into an uproar by the promotional tour Duke was leading.

Naturally, the artsy crowd—such as the directors in Europe who prided themselves on "pure art"—were bitterly resentful. They proclaimed that the film was nothing more than a cliché story paired with CGI visuals, stripping away the authentic charm of true cinema.

Even audiences in Europe wouldn't buy into such sour grapes, and the media in North America couldn't even be bothered to respond.

For the film itself and the everyday moviegoers, those critics had virtually no influence. Unsurprisingly, Star Wars: The Force Awakens successfully defended its throne, remaining the box office champion in both North America and globally for its second weekend.