"You really should go to the cinema yourselves and see the faces of those audience members; it's just too funny."
At the Cooper Family home, Eric, Warren, Bordeaux, and Judy sat in front of the TV, which was showing footage filmed from a cinema.
As for Billy, he hadn't returned from England yet. Michael Dobbs, the author of house of cards, wasn't just a writer; his main profession was a politician, a Conservative MP and special advisor to the government, keeping him very busy.
Billy had been trying to schedule a meeting for a long time, and Michael Dobbs only agreed to see him recently during his vacation.
In the TV footage, groups of three to five young people were seen entering the cinema, buying tickets for sharknado, chatting as they waited for the show to begin.
"Listen to me, I was browsing IMDb last night, and suddenly a lot of comments appeared under jaws, all talking about this sharknado, saying it's a groundbreaking work comparable to jaws. I absolutely have to see it."
"Comparable to jaws? Are you kidding? That's a Spielberg movie. I've never even heard of this director, Anthony Ferrante. Do you know who he is? And this AK Films, are you sure they're not an arms dealer?"
"Jeff! Before you've even seen a movie, don't plant prejudice in your mind; that's wrong. Spielberg was also a newcomer before he made jaws. Who knows if this Anthony Ferrante will be the next Spielberg?"
A young couple was eating ice cream, and the girl asked with a frown, "Charles, why do we have to watch this movie? Date A Live is clearly better."
The boy shook his head, "Laura, Howard recommended it to me. He watched it yesterday and said this movie is absolutely awesome. We have to see it."
"But I want to watch Date A Live."
"Don't worry, after we finish watching sharknado, we can continue with Date A Live. The night is still young."
Judy asked somewhat curiously, "Why are all the ticket buyers young people? Are there no audience members from other age groups?"
"Because the main promotional strategy involves online posting and commenting, and currently, young people are the majority who enjoy surfing the internet."
"Moreover, young people like to play pranks. If I'm unlucky, I can't let others off the hook. Office workers don't have that kind of free time."
Bordeaux brought over a tray of beer: "Does this kind of promotional strategy count as fraud?"
Eric laughed heartily: "Things in movies are art. Everyone has different understandings and pursuits of art. How can it be considered fraud?"
"Have you seen any movie that has 100% positive reviews? The Godfather? the shawshank redemption? Twelve Angry Men? No one can achieve that. That's art!"
The three nodded, looking as if it made a lot of sense.
On TV, the scene then changed to these people walking out of the screening room, clearly having been tricked and furious.
"This is the classic movie you said was comparable to jaws? Are you out of your mind? This is absolutely the worst movie I've ever seen!" a young man yelled at his friend.
The other person whispered, "A movie that's bad to this extent is also rare, isn't it still a groundbreaking work?"
"You—"
"Good point!"
"Laura, Laura, don't be like that, don't make that face. How about we go watch Date A Live? Didn't you want to see it? Please don't leave."
The little girl on the screen sighed, "Charles, let's just call it a day today. My head hurts; I feel like there's a shark gnawing on it."
Then a voice-over from beside them said, "Then you should stab it to death with a pool cue!"
Hahahahaha, a burst of laughter immediately erupted in the cinema.
"Poor Charles! Warren, you've ruined that young man's night; he won't be getting any rewards tonight."
Warren smirked, "Then do you think he'll be angry? And will an angry him continue to recommend sharknado to his friends?"
"Bingo! That's human nature; he definitely will!" Eric snapped his fingers.
Clink!
The two clinked glasses and drained their beers.
In this situation, with teenagers spontaneously spreading the word to seek psychological balance, coupled with the online shills fanning the flames...
sharknado's box office for the second day came out, tripling to over 4 million US dollars, already breaking even and turning a profit.
Upon receiving this data, all of AK Films cheered endlessly. Everyone knew that sharknado was going to make a fortune.
On December 18th, the lord of the rings: the two towers was released, and the Battle of Helm's Deep began. Riders from Rohan and the Orc army fought to the death on screen, creating a magnificent war effect with exaggerated momentum, like a rampage warhorse charging into the distance.
On December 19th, the iron cavalry from Middle-earth swept across the entire North American film market. All other films were affected without exception, utterly defeated.
sharknado was no exception; its box office dropped to over 2 million on the third day. This was still because many people, after watching the lord of the rings 2, chose to watch a showing of sharknado to relax.
This downward trend continued for three days until the lord of the rings 2's opening weekend ended, and the most powerful phase of this monster finally passed.
the lord of the rings 2's opening weekend box office was 62 million US dollars, still a long way from spider-man 1.
Additionally, harry potter and the chamber of secrets' opening weekend box office was 88 million US dollars, also failing to break spider-man 1's 1.3 billion record.
Until next year, spider-man 1 had completely solidified its position as the opening weekend box office champion.
And as the lord of the rings' strong period ended, coupled with Bema Hardy approving another 500,000 for shills to promote it, sharknado, whose popularity had somewhat declined, perked up again.
On the sixth day, the box office returned to 3.5 million, and on the seventh day, it was 4.4 million. The total box office for the first 7 days was 12.7 million, deducting production and distribution costs, it had already earned 4 million US dollars.
Compared to a screening scale of 435 cinemas, 12.7 million in box office was quite unremarkable. Generally, such movies would reduce their scale in the second week and then be removed from the big screen after the second week ended.
But sharknado was an exception, because while the box office of all other movies was continuously declining, its box office was continuously increasing.
This phenomenon rarely occurs, and when it does, it usually represents one situation: the movie quality is excellent, the word-of-mouth is explosive, and it has received spontaneous promotion from movie fans.
Never mind if it's good word-of-mouth or bad word-of-mouth, I just ask you, is it explosive or not?
So, after the first week's box office was released, especially after seeing the growth chart, Harry Cooper waved his hand, expanding screening halls to second-tier cities, and the number of cinemas showing sharknado also increased to 970.
The Christmas battle, that cunning fox fishing in troubled waters, was about to make its move.