Chapter 61: The Nationwide Shock of Another Bottle Free

Time flew by in a blur.

Michelle Lee, who had been parachuted into the capital, enjoyed her time there until the 23rd before returning to Hong Kong with her head full of new insights. Li Wenyu also departed for France on that same day, accompanied by Fan Bingbing.

The Cannes International Film Festival had opened as early as the 15th. Since he was at most claiming the Best Screenplay award, there was no rush; arriving closer to the closing ceremony was timely enough.

From the 16th until boarding the flight on the 23rd, Li Wenyu spent the majority of his time organizing and driving the development of Time Media and Time Weibo.

On the very day of his flight, the desktop version of Time Weibo entered internal testing.

He allowed the internal test version to be rolled out gradually, with the initial version restricted exclusively to the three generations of internet water army leaders from the Beijing Film Academy and their respective water army regiments.

By the time he returned...

Li Wenyu and Fan Bingbing spent two days leisurely touring France. On the 26th, at the closing ceremony, he collected the Best Screenplay award, while his traveling companion Leslie Cheung won Best Actor at Cannes—a predictably shared "double-egg" victory!

The other top prizes, such as the Palme d'Or for Best Film and Best Director, went to other production teams.

Could a Chinese actor sweep two Best Actor trophies across the major three film festivals within a single year?

No matter how good the script was or how much money was poured in, a shared win was the absolute limit.

Even so, this was explosive enough!

When the news was transmitted back to the mainland internet, countless fans of Brother Rong went wild in celebration. Within a single year, Leslie Cheung had successively clinched the Best Actor titles at Berlin and Cannes.

Brother Rong was willing to invest heavily in his public relations, ploughing all his profits from *The Shallows* into the campaign. Securing these two trophies successfully gilded his golden body.

Holding these two trophies basically meant that in the coming years, he could expect to serve as the jury president for Berlin, Cannes, or Venice.

On the return trip, Li Wenyu took a detour, bringing three male bodyguards to Mumbai for half a month of tourism and seeking creative inspiration.

His fitness level of 200 was rock solid!

…………

At noon on June 10th, Li Wenyu and his three bodyguards arrived back at Hong Kong Airport.

Fan Bingbing had rushed over to pick him up long ago. Once inside the car, she acted like newlyweds experiencing a brief parting, almost causing old Li to fall apart entirely.

After finally calming Fan Bingbing down, the two returned to the hotel for a passionate celebration.

After Fan Bingbing had metaphorically died and come back to life three or five times, she excitedly spoke up, "Brother Yu, that novel of yours, *Interstellar*, has exploded in Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan, selling over 500,000 copies, and more than 100,000 genuine copies have also been sold on the mainland."

"Setting aside the money for a moment, you are truly a bestselling author of a new generation!"

"*(The Tuner)* is scheduled for release at 8:00 AM on June 28th, kicking off this year's summer box office season. Wahaha's numerous newly launched beverages have already sparked massive topics and heat in the drink market."

"With a 20% winning rate, even among people around me, I've seen someone buy a bottle of mineral water and manage to drink three or four free bottles in a row. Once Wahaha beverages were shipped to Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan, they instantly whipped up a grassroots storm of 'Another Bottle'!"

"Our *Tuner* has become wildly famous, with all sorts of print media and television news pushing the gimmick of 'Another Ticket' for *Tuner*!"

Many events during this period had developed methodically according to plan. On May 13th, Chairman Zong of Wahaha had called, and by that time the printing machinery had already been secured.

Fan Bingbing and Joey Wong had wrapped up shooting the commercials in just two days.

Following that came box after box of newly printed materials bearing the beautiful faces of Fan Bingbing and Joey Wong, marked with the numbers "6-28-08," proclaiming: *The film Tuner joins forces with Wahaha to invite you to participate in the "Another Ticket" campaign.*

Backed by Wahaha Beverage Group's sales and distribution team, which had conquered the entire country, the film *Tuner* became an absolute sensation.

Consumers buying mineral water, Future Cola, and iced tea experienced it firsthand in reality, spending the exact same amount of money as before, yet getting a second or third bottle for free—real, tangible value!

When *Tuner* premiered on June 28th, could movie tickets also yield winning prizes?

Had the beverage empire and the cinemas and film groups become intertwined?

This was viral marketing covering the entire country in reality!

The power of "Another Bottle" and "Another Can" allowed Future Cola to rapidly defeat Coca-Cola and PepsiCo in the beverage market.

Naturally, Coke and Pepsi were also rushing to copy the move!

As for the movie *Tuner*, its release date truly achieved universal awareness.

In reality, promotional posters featuring the film's main cast—Tony Leung Ka-fai, Jiang Wen, Maggie Cheung, and others—were being aggressively pushed forward.

This development almost laughed Charles Heung and the boss of Huayi Brothers silly.

They had never expected Wahaha to explode with such ferocious and terrifying momentum. Summer was precisely the most frantic season for the beverage market.

Li Wenyu smiled and asked, "How is the internal testing of Time Weibo going?"

While munching on an "elephant," Fan Bingbing muttered, "Check your email yourself..."

She didn't understand internet platforms like Weibo anyway; professional CEOs and department managers would simply email their reports directly to Li Wenyu.

Li Wenyu: "..."

It was June 10th, and his free attribute points had once again accumulated to 43 points!

With his fitness rating of a staggering 200 and other powerful skills, he was now simply waiting to see how many hundreds of millions in total box office revenue the mainland would erupt with during this year's summer season.

The stage? The rocket fuel was fully prepared.

After reading over a dozen emails and preparing to handle official business, a well-fed and satisfied Fan Bingbing happily remarked, "According to what Brother Rong and the boss of Huayi said, many county seats and prefecture-level cities already have small-scale bosses expanding and opening branch cinemas."

"Some started construction as early as March, and even the slower ones began working on it the moment Wahaha's 'Another Bottle' whipped up its storm."

"Last year, *The Shallows* maintained such sustained high occupancy rates that countless people back then wished they could conjure up a branch cinema out of thin air just to make money. This time, they've caught the wave!"

"There are even quite a few places willing to offer a 100% screening share, showing only this single movie during *Tuner*'s initial release."

Li Wenyu nodded, "Then with this large-scale cycle screening, the single-week box office will surpass *The Shallows*."

Even during *The Shallows*' peak screening share and occupancy rate last year, the total number of big screens was limited, yielding a peak single-week gross of 20 million RMB, which accumulated to 121 million over seven or eight weeks.

Now, catching the right timing, the number of newly built cinemas wasn't quite that high yet.

However, a 100% screening share was terrifying; it was entirely possible to break 25 million in a single week, with a strong hope of crossing the 100-million mark within four weeks.

This was the momentum built up by laying the groundwork for over half a year—*Hero*... was having its thunder stolen for the second time by the grand momentum!

Of course, when *Hero* was eventually released, there would still be plenty of broth left for it to drink.

The "Another Bottle," "Another Can," and "Another Ticket" campaigns had a sustained longevity of one to two years.

At past 7:00 PM, while working in his office, Li Wenyu received a text message from Leslie Cheung: "Ah Yu, are you done with work? Film distributors have been raising their bids repeatedly lately, eager to buy *Tuner*."

"Offers for East and Southeast Asia have been raised to 35 million Hong Kong dollars, and the West is offering 7 million US dollars. Shall we get together and chat? Master Heung and Master Wong are a bit hesitant and are waiting for you to call the shots."

"Also, Boss Wang said Bingbing's contract can be modified to Huayi taking zero commission. Huayi won't take a single penny from her talent fees and commercials. Previously, Bingbing made 5 million per commercial, with Huayi taking a 10% cut of 500,000, but from now on they really won't take a single penny."

"For China Star's projects, Bingbing can also pick whichever female lead role she likes based on the script. If one isn't enough, she can take two, with a talent fee of 8 million Hong Kong dollars per film."

Li Wenyu was momentarily speechless. These distributors were quite anxious.

The overseas distribution rights accounted for 10%, which no longer concerned Li Wenyu; his original contract only covered box office revenue splits for Hong Kong and the mainland.

He was just a director and screenwriter earning a 10% dividend and a 3.5 million talent fee...

Was he taking a loss? After paying taxes, all his money had been used to stockpile pig farms—currently hoarding 10 million Hong Kong dollars' worth of goods—along with establishing Time Media and Time Weibo.

Talking about a total overseas sale of 90 million Hong Kong dollars? Brother Rong, the Heung family, and Huayi split it three ways.

It seemed like they could recoup their capital in just over half a year?

But NetEase was already on the rise.

Furthermore, a single Time Weibo would rapidly sprint within two years into a corporate group with a market value of tens of billions of Hong Kong dollars. His track was completely different from ordinary film and television groups.

Fan Bingbing's contract being modified once again, along with an 8 million talent fee and the freedom to choose any female lead role.

These were all good things as well.

A zero commission didn't mean terminating the contract early, but the nature of it was the same. Huayi still wanted to keep her locked in for the duration specified in the contract, no doubt wanting her to occasionally put in a good word for Skinny Bing, whispering sweet nothings in someone's ear...