~： Two hundred and sixty-seven - missing person notice

The shooting footage of the film is full of shaking, but it gives people a strange sense of reality. The edited picture is not long, and it ends after five or six minutes.

On the sofa in the lounge area of ​​the office, Harvey Weinstein nodded with satisfaction, but he was not in a hurry, and what was to be broadcast later was the top priority.

"Hello, viewers, I'm Rebecca Leslie, and I'm glad you're watching this episode of "Late Night Quest"..."

After just a few minutes of the film, a beautiful blond host appeared on the periphery of a forest, holding a microphone and giving a non-stop introduction.

"The video tape just now was picked up from here by a farmer." Rebecca Leslie pointed to the forest behind him, turned and walked to a stone tablet on the path. "Attention here, this is an ancient stone tablet, estimated to have existed for at least a hundred years, with some warning words carved on it."

As soon as her voice fell, the camera's lens suddenly zoomed in, and the carvings on the ancient stone tablet were faintly visible. "Stay away from the forest! Watch out for witches!"

Rebecca Leslie reached out and patted the stone tablet, turned her head and said to the camera: "No one knows when this stone tablet was erected and who erected it. But in local legends, these things first appeared. The time can be traced back to the period of great immigration to North America.

Legend has it that the witches who were hunted down by the church in Europe followed the early settlers to this continent and hid in the large forests of eastern North America. Even now, legends about witches are still circulating in Talawa, Maryland, Massachusetts and other places!

The information and historical stories of many witches are still one of the most terrifying local legends, and the Blair mentioned in the video tape is one of the most widely circulated witches in our place in recent decades..."

The prevalence of witches in North America has always been widespread, and the stories that accompany these groups are always accompanied by horror legends.

Especially on the east coast of North America, there are many witch legends with a long history, and there are also a lot of interested people. Otherwise, everything about witches will not always have such stories.

Moreover, in many traditional American horror films, there are shadows of witches. The witch falls in love with a young man, and then her identity is revealed. Before being burned to death, she passed a curse and killed an entire town at once. Endless performances.

"The local legend about the witch Blair has also appeared along with the disappearance of the townspeople."

On the TV, host Rebecca Leslie was still making introductions. "The video tape that was just played at the beginning of the show was given to us by a farmer after seeing it. In addition to this destroyed video tape, there are also the personal belongings and some relics of the three college students who disappeared.

According to the interview with the townspeople before we came, we learned that the three young people have been looking for traces of witches and want to find out the secret of witch Blair. However, due to the serious damage to the videotape, it is still in the process of emergency repair..."

With a "pop", Harvey Weinstein reached out and turned off the TV, and did not continue watching.

Through the program report just now, he believes that there will be no less people interested in this matter. After all, these kinds of exploration programs usually broadcast documentaries about the Bermuda Triangle and the pyramids of ancient Egypt.

Today's pseudo-documentary should create an illusion for many viewers, making the audience in front of the TV believe that all this is really happening.

"We invested more than $2 million to make Blair the Witch appear on this late-night show, and hope to achieve better results."

Bob Weinstein squinted, looked at his brother and said softly: "But this is the only program for the United States. The other two dozen late-night TV stations are all local, and the audience is definitely not as large as abc. ."

"That's enough!"

The big fat man has a smile on his face. If this wave of propaganda continues, there will definitely be a lot of interested people. Coupled with the follow-up propaganda and guidance, people who are curious about witches will be like a virus. more contagious.

"There is still half a month before the film is released. Every step of the publicity plan is very important. Bob, you have to watch it yourself, and there must be no mistakes!"

"I understand." Bob Weinstein nodded, he knew the importance of this.

For the promotion of this film, the two brothers invested all their working capital. They are not like Wayne Greenberg, who have a terrible fortune.

Miramax is not their brother's either. The majority shareholder is Walt Disney, and they don't have much of a stake in it.

The net worth of Harvey Weinstein is very inconsistent with his status in the circle. Miramax started out by careful calculation and operating low-cost movies, and the profit he made was not much.

That's why this fat man is envious of those high-box-office films. It's almost impossible for a movie with a North American box office of 100 million or 200 million to appear in Miramax, and it is impossible for this company to invest in such a big production.

Early the next morning, when all the media and the public were talking about "Batman: War Hour" at the beginning of the summer season, a large number of people were also discussing the Blair Witch incident on the Discovery Show yesterday. After all, there are three living stories. Human life disappeared in that forest.

Not only abc's late-night program reported this incident, but more local small TV stations also reported this incident in detail, and they all played videotapes as documentaries.

For a day or two, it was just a matter of gossip, discussing this matter with friends and family on a small scale, but the subsequent development gradually changed the taste.

When many people didn't know what was going on, various secondary media, whether it was newspapers, magazines or radio stations, and even Blockbuster video rental stores all over the United States, appeared together with a missing person notice.

"In March 1994, three college students studying film and television came to Bull Town with photographic equipment, wanting to find and understand the secrets of witches, investigate and shoot local legends about witch Blair, but soon after they found some clues, these three A young man disappeared.

Their family searched for them everywhere, but there was no clue at all until a broken videotape was picked up. Through the videotape and the relic notes picked up at the same time, it was only confirmed until now that the three young people met the legendary witch.

From the notes they left behind, they learned that the three young people not only encountered witches, but also a series of terrifying things happened. "

When the propaganda reached the second stage, the discussion about Blair the witch has gradually formed a trend. With the help of various media, the mystery of the matter has increased little by little, and it has made the North American public a lot of curiosity.

There are also many kind-hearted people who spontaneously started to publicize the missing person notice, hoping to find the three young people.

Although this trend is getting bigger and bigger, and more and more people gradually believe in this incident, they have not found out that the media reporting this incident are all second- and third-rate tabloids and magazine radio stations, and there is no authoritative one. big media.

To put it bluntly, this plan customized by Wayne is not complicated at all. It just uses various wide-ranging but cheap publicity channels to spread things in the form of news in a short period of time, creating an illusion for ordinary people that it is real and agitating. These people spread the word to family and friends around them.

This kind of thing is actually not uncommon. The commercial method of viral marketing usually appears in other commercial fields. It is definitely the first time that this kind of thing can be used in movies, and it is also distributed on a large scale in the form of deception. Appear.

"The effect is even better than we imagined!"

The Weinstein brothers have been watching the development of this matter, especially Bob Weinstein, who is the executor of the entire plan.

Harvey Weinstein nodded. "Ok, we will increase our investment later, and put all the funds on the Witch Studio's books into it. We must ensure that before the film is released, more people will look forward to the specific content of the videotape.

Now we must pay attention to confidentiality. We will increase the investment of various TV stations, let them continue to broadcast the short film, and then buy more advertising spaces and post missing people notices. These are all chips for us to win more theaters. "

"Leave it to me," said Bob Weinstein.

The mystery of this matter still needs to be maintained, but as long as it is more than a week, it will not matter in the later stage of the propaganda work. This kind of trick will deceive the ordinary people, and it is impossible to hide from the elites in the society.

This is especially true for people in Hollywood circles. It has only been publicized for a few days now, and many people have already smelled the familiar smell. I have almost played "Joker's Soul" before, although it is not so extreme, but the execution method is very similar.

Except for those who are very sober, even if ordinary people have doubts about this matter, but through the lies fabricated by the witch Blair, coupled with the propaganda of TV stations and the spontaneous spread of the people around them, they will still do the same. Be piqued by curiosity and a desire to explore.

Time was advancing slowly. Outside the Warner Bros. studio, Wayne and his group, who had been busy with post-production for a day, were about to get into the car when they suddenly noticed a volunteer and walked towards them.

The girl walked up to them, holding a large pile of documents. "Sir, ma'am, if you see the three people above, please call the number above, their families are going crazy, thank you!"

Handing a missing person notice to them, the girl turned around and walked to other passers-by, continuing to distribute materials.

"Boss, it seems that Harvey Weinstein's progress is very fast." When the car started, Nina looked at the missing person curiously and said to him.

"Don't worry about this, this matter has nothing to do with us." Wayne didn't lift his eyelids, the plan was almost made by him, and no one knew these things better than him. "Let's just wait and collect the money, don't worry about what the fat man does."

The Oscars were coming soon, and the post-production of the film had reached a critical moment. He didn't have the heart to worry about these bad things. After all, it was just a wave of quick money.