Happy times are always fleeting.
After spending a week at home, Zhong Lan returned to Huizhou.
She would have loved to stay a few days longer, but Zhang Jiajia's voice audition samples were already in. She had no choice but to hurry back to Huizhou and start officially handling the production matters for her first movie.
After carefully listening to the audition samples provided by each voice actor and factoring in the requirements of the script, Zhong Lan finally selected ten of them to serve as the voice cast for the entire movie.
For the next step, the voice actors simply needed to record their respective lines according to their scripts. Once everything was done, assembled, and slightly touched up with sound effects and background music, the movie would basically be considered "filmed."
Yet, simple as it sounded, Zhong Lan now faced a brand-new problem.
Lying on the living room sofa, Zhong Lan recalled her phone calls with Zhang Jiajia over the past few days.
She realized she seemed to have taken things too lightly.
At first, Zhong Lan thought she could just be a hands-off boss—wait until she got all the voice recordings, have them broadcast on the official platform, and then spend money on traffic and promotion. But after looking into it in depth, she realized how terribly wrong she was.
The film and television market in Hua Nation was indeed very standardized and unified. Whether online or offline, there was only one official entity: the online platform was Quanmin Entertainment, and the offline one was Quanmin Cinema.
According to the information she found online, once a film or television project was shot, it could be uploaded directly to the online Quanmin Entertainment platform for review. Once approved, it could be released online and start enjoying click-through sales revenue sharing.
Only, Zhong Lan hadn't expected the latest news she received.
Films and TV shows could indeed be uploaded casually, but to pass the review, the submitting production company had to hold a licensed director's certificate.
And she was currently an unlicensed director.
Even if she filmed it, it wouldn't pass the review.
Unless through a special route...
Ring, ring—
Just as Zhong Lan was lying there waiting, her phone rang.
Zhong Lan sprang to her feet, grabbed the phone for a quick glance, and hurriedly asked, "Well, Jiajia, any news?"
The voice on the other end of the receiver was even more excited.
"Xiaolan, you are so lucky."
Zhong Lan's eyes lit up. "Is there hope for the movie release?"
Zhang Jiajia replied, "I just had a friend check, and Quanmin Entertainment actually has a film submission contest running right now that hasn't ended. The final deadline is next Monday."
"I've got the submission email address, and I'll send it to you in a second."
"Jiajia, I love you to death!" Zhong Lan jumped up with excitement on the sofa and almost missed her footing.
Yet she didn't care at all, instead launching into a fierce streak of praising Zhang Jiajia.
There was naturally a reason why she was so excited.
Just like her earlier worry that the movie couldn't be released online, without a director's certificate to pass the regular online review, she had no choice but to take that special route.
Which was... a contest!
On the Quanmin Entertainment online streaming platform, film submission contests were held irregularly every year. Their purpose was for the authorities to guide the creative direction of film and television companies, supplementing the quantity of niche-themed movies and ensuring the diversity of the Hua Nation film circle.
After all, film companies all followed a capitalist route.
If certain themes had poor profit-generating effects, they were actually unwilling to shoot them.
Current mystery films, for instance, were precisely like that.
Things were different when the authorities stepped in, however. To answer the call, various film and television companies would arrange for people to shoot one or two films fitting the theme of the film submission contest, even if reluctant. Even if they didn't make money, it still counted as fulfilling an assignment.
And generally, contests organized by the authorities allowed ordinary citizens to participate as well.
Only, due to the barriers in the film industry, information about these contests didn't always reach the general public, or the threshold for filmmaking was relatively high. As a result, the number of truly ordinary citizens participating in each contest was very small. The main force remained the various professional film and television companies.
Therefore, in the absence of a director's certificate, entering an official contest was the only remaining option for the movie. As long as it could pass the preliminary review by the film procurement department, it could be normally released on the platform.
Of course, two problems came with this.
First, since it was a contest, the film procurement department still had certain requirements for the overall quality of the movie. If it failed to meet them, it might not pass the preliminary review.
Second, she would definitely make less money.
Because the submission restrictions were lifted, the official platform would take 20% of the movie's sales. Coupled with the 10% non-shareable box office tax, she would have to give up 30% of her movie sales revenue.
Naturally, Zhong Lan could only accept this.
There was no help for it—who told her she wasn't even an unlicensed director? As long as the movie could get released, it would be fine; that was still better than having the movie fall flat in her hands and losing all her money.
"Alright, alright, stop praising me."
"By the way, Xiaolan, do you want to hear what the contest prizes are?"
At this moment, Zhang Jiajia interrupted Zhong Lan's endlessly flattering little mouth.
Hearing this, Zhong Lan said dismissively, "An official contest couldn't be anything more than a small cash prize plus a certificate, right?"
"You even knew that?" Zhang Jiajia was slightly surprised.
Zhong Lan shrugged.
Expected.
That was basic operations worldwide.
"Well... but that's not entirely correct." Zhang Jiajia paused to reflect, then said, "I heard the support is actually quite substantial this time. If you place, you can directly get a director's registration certificate. The merit award gets you an unlicensed certificate, and the top three go straight to a bronze director's certificate."
"For real?"
Zhong Lan instantly calmed down.
To her, this was indeed good news. But at the same time, it also posed a potential risk.
Since the authorities even brought out rewards to upgrade director ranks, she guessed there would definitely be more contestants this time. Upgrading a director rank wasn't very attractive to film companies, after all. They had numerous directors under them anyway, and those directors wouldn't deign to get promoted this way, preferring to use box office earnings for solid advancement.
However, ordinary folks from the grassroots level would surely outnumber previous years by quite a lot.
"Hahaha, so there are things you're afraid of too."
Seeming to catch Zhong Lan's worry, Zhang Jiajia teased with a laugh, "Anyway, that's how things stand. You'd better hurry up and submit your entry. I still have to keep an eye on the voice acting for you. Sigh... what a life of toil."
"Hehe, I love you most, Jiajia."
"Once the movie is successfully released, I'll fix you up with a date."
"Tsk, keep the men for yourself. My heart is sealed; I'm done with the mortal world."
"Then date me instead. Cuddle time."
"Pervert! I'm hanging up, time to get to work."
Zhang Jiajia pouted with a blushing face and hung up the phone.
With one weight off her mind, Zhong Lan put down her phone with satisfaction and once again comfortably lay down on the sofa to rest.
Oh, right.
Why hadn't she seen the landlord lately?
Zhong Lan turned her head to look at Lu Chen's room, suddenly thinking of this question.
During this recent period, Lu Chen was almost never around during the day, only returning to the house late at night.
Yet she quickly figured it out.
He was probably busy with his new song.
Both of them were advancing their careers in different ways on two parallel tracks.
Thinking of this, Zhong Lan felt a slight sense of wonder.
The world was truly magical.
If she hadn't met the landlord, it seemed none of this would have happened, let alone the filming of a movie.
Well, if the movie made money,
she would have to properly thank Lu Chen.