The preparations for "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" began in 2006. It took nearly a year to write the script alone, and filming officially began in 2007.

Peter Jackson originally planned to film the story of "The Hobbit" into two parts. The upper part tells the battle between the dwarves and Smaug; the second part tells the battle between the dwarves, elves and the orcs.

However, out of profit-making considerations, Xiang Nan still suggested that he make a trilogy. In this case, he could earn hundreds of millions of dollars more from one movie.

Peter Jackson had always been in love with Xiang Nan. When he was filming the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, Xiang Nan asked for money and things. He was so happy that he was allowed to complete the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy.

, this most classic fantasy movie in film history also fulfilled his lifelong wish.

Therefore, in the end, Peter Jackson accepted Xiang Nan's suggestion and decided to film "The Hobbit" into a trilogy. In order to save costs, the trilogy started filming at the same time.

In fact, the filming of the "Hobbit" trilogy has been completed at present. The first part is being released, and the second and third parts are still undergoing post-production special effects. They will be released sequentially in the next two years.

Because of the success of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, it has conquered countless movie fans around the world. Therefore, when "The Hobbit", the predecessor of "The Lord of the Rings", was released, it was inherently welcomed by movie fans.

Upon its release, the movie performed well at the box office. It took in US$230 million in the first week of release, and the final box office reached US$1.15 billion.

Such box office results made Disney next door jealous.

After the huge success of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, Hollywood has set off a craze for fantasy films.

As a result, the last two of the three classic Western fantasy novels, "The Lord of the Rings", "The Chronicles of Narnia" and "Tales from Earthsea", have also been adapted into movies.

Among them, Disney produced "The Chronicles of Narnia", and the first "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" achieved very good results, with a cost of US$180 million and a box office of US$750 million.

Therefore, Disney launched "The Chronicles of Narnia 2: Prince Caspian" this year. The film invested US$200 million, but the final box office was only US$410 million, which cost Disney approximately US$70 million.

Loss.

Now Disney is extremely regretful, but it has not decided yet whether it will continue filming "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader".

It depends on the DVD sales of "Prince Caspian". If the DVD sells well, then the third part may still be filmed. If the DVD sales are not high, then it may terminate filming.

…

In December, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" was officially launched.

This is the fifth novel in the "Harry Potter" series and the sixth film in the "Harry Potter" series.

"Harry Potter" is now one of the most well-known IPs in the world. Even the Marvel Universe is not as popular as it. After all, the sales volume of the seven "Harry Potter" volumes reaches as high as 500 million copies, with an average sales of more than 6,000 copies per volume.

Thousands of volumes.

As for Marvel's comics, the highest sales volume of a single volume is only a few hundred thousand copies. However, it has been established for nearly 70 years, so the cumulative sales volume is high.

"Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" has such a good mass base, so it naturally did well at the box office after its release. The final box office in North America was nearly 400 million US dollars, and the global box office was as high as 930 million US dollars.

Such good results make other companies in Hollywood envious.

They are all eager to have such a profitable IP, but it is really difficult.

New Line Cinema tried to adapt "His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass" last year, hoping to replicate the success of "Harry Potter".

"His Dark Materials" is a fantasy novel created by the well-known British novelist Philip Pullman. It was written from 1996 to 2000. There are three books in total, namely "The Golden Compass", "The Magic Knife" and "The Amber Spyglass".

The novel was well received after its release, selling tens of millions of copies worldwide and winning multiple book awards. In the BBC reader survey, it ranked third among the most popular novels among British readers, second only to "Pride" and Prejudice" and "The Lord of the Rings."

Therefore, New Line Cinema invested US$180 million last year, inviting Nicole Kidman, Eva Green, Ian McKellen ("Lord of the Rings" Gandalf, "X-Men" Professor ), Daniel Craig and others co-starred in this movie.

Such an excellent novel and such a strong lineup can be said to be foolproof.

But it's a pity that there is only one in a thousand.

This star-studded, much-anticipated movie ended up taking only US$360 million at the box office, including US$70 million at the North American box office and US$290 million at the overseas box office.

It may seem like a lot, but since New Line Cinema sold the overseas distribution rights early on, it has nothing to do with the overseas box office.

New Line Cinema ultimately suffered a huge loss of US$110 million. This also made the parent company Warner very angry, so it ordered the withdrawal of New Line Cinema's independent production rights.

As a result, New Line Cinema exists in name only.

The failure of New Line Cinema has also discouraged other film companies from adapting movies from fantasy novels, fearing that they might accidentally step on a trap.

But seeing that Universal Pictures has made a lot of money with "Harry Potter", I am naturally quite envious.

…

Entering January, Xiang Nan started a new project.

"The Twilight Saga", "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince", "Tekken 3", "Spider-Man 3", "Iron Man", "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles", "Weakness", "The Hangover", "The Devil Wears Prada" and "Mission: Impossible 5."

"Iron Man" was originally supposed to be released in 2008, but Xiang Nan pushed it to 2009.

Iron Man was not originally a popular character in Marvel comics. The reason why the original Marvel universe started with him was mainly because of other popular superheroes, such as Spider-Man, X-Men, Hulk, Fantastic Four, etc. Wei had already been sold, so we had to dig deeper and take pictures of him.

However, in this world, Xiang Nan bought Marvel early, so its copyrights are the most complete. In this case, there is no rush to make "Iron Man".

Now that The Defenders, Midnight's Sons, and X-Men are all being filmed, Xiang Nan is planning to film The Avengers, The Fantastic Four, etc. in an effort to create a complete version of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Xiang Nan also chose Robert Downey Jr. as the protagonist of "Iron Man". Apart from him, Xiang Nan couldn't find anyone more suitable. The heroine has already been decided on Cobie Smulders.
Chapter completed!