Reborn in the Hong Kong entertainment industry in the 1980s

Chapter 400 Explosive News

Guo Bin already knew that "Royal Inspector" was not only a rip-off of "Treasure Port Inspector," but also involved various forms of disparaging and belittling. He asked, "Sister Xiao, should we teach the lead actors a lesson as well?"

Hu Xiaoxiao glanced at the promotional stage. Among the main actors, four were actresses whose costumes closely resembled those in "The Inspector Wears Skirts 1." Clearly, this film was intended to imitate "The Inspector Wears Skirts 2."

"Forget about the actors." There's a reason for this.

That evening, Zhang Huai and Yan Weikang were beaten and seriously injured on their way home and were sent to the hospital.

Hu Xiaoxiao had no intention of letting Hongguang Film off so easily. The plagiarism of "Baogang Overlord Flower" and the subsequent disparaging of it were definitely related to Fang Jing.

If it were just a copycat film, Hu Xiaoxiao wouldn't care, because that's how the Hong Kong film market works: once a movie becomes a hit, a whole bunch of others immediately follow suit. Even now, there are still copycats after her original film, "The Hitman's Bodyguard," became a hit.

Whether you follow the trend or plagiarize, everyone turns a blind eye. However, if you plagiarize and then criticize the original film to elevate your own status, that's making an enemy. No matter which film company it is, they won't let it go easily.

Fang Jing wanted to use "Baogang Overlord Flower" to climb the ladder, and he also joined forces with other cinemas to create a grand event. It would be strange if Hu Xiaoxiao didn't mess with him.

After having someone check the production cost of "Royal Inspector Wears Skirts", Hu Xiaoxiao went to the cinema to watch it again.

The film boasts a truly impressive cast, with most of Hongguang Film Company's top artists participating, and two famous movie stars making cameo appearances.

Because there were so many big names, their screen time was increased to accommodate their status. As a result, the four female leads had pitifully little screen time, practically just background figures. The phrase "the guests overshadow the hosts" is perfectly apt.

The appearance, styling, and costumes of the four female leads were pitifully few, their images were monotonous, and their martial arts moves were weak and powerless, lacking any of the exhilarating feeling of an action movie.

This is a terrible movie, relying entirely on its big-name actors to attract audiences. And the production cost of such a film was a staggering ten million yuan? Hu Xiaoxiao seriously doubted the accuracy of that figure. Surely, all that money couldn't have been spent on the salaries of the big-name actors, could it?

With such poor quality, Yan Weikang and Zhang Huai must have known the box office would be terrible, so they came here to leech off "The Inspector Wears Skirts of Hong Kong"? "The Inspector Wears Skirts of Hong Kong" is a film that Hu Xiaoxiao painstakingly made, so why would they want to profit from it?

"Sister Xiao." Huang Yuliang's assistant, Tang Wenkui, had heard that Hu Xiaoxiao wanted to investigate Fang Jing and Hongguang Films, so he specially brought her some information. "Take a look at this."

Hu Xiaoxiao took it and took a look. Good heavens, Fang Jing still wanted to use the movie "Royal Inspector" to wash money!

She thought to herself, how could Fang Jing, a ruthless man who once held a gun to a star and refused to pay him a single penny, be so generous as to pay so much to hire people?

The film's budget of ten million must be an overstatement of the word count.

When outsiders can find out about certain things, it means that they've done it more than once before. Hu Xiaoxiao then had someone check the production costs and box office figures of Hongguang Films' previous films, and discovered that Fang Jing had used film money laundering to do this more than once.

Having obtained this information, Hu Xiaoxiao planned to give Hongguang Films a good thrashing, setting an example for those in the film industry who wanted to create a golden age. Otherwise, anyone could come and trample on her.

As Huang Yuliang recruited more and more people, Shengshi Entertainment Company's departments became more and more comprehensive. Among them was a newly established information department, which recruited many employees skilled in finding information. These employees used to run errands and gather information for various gangs.

Huang Yuliang recruited them into his information department, specifically tasking them with collecting various information for him. During his recent conflict with the Changxing gang, he had employees of this department bribe numerous informants and directly recruit people within the gang. This action caused the Changxing gang to suffer many unseen losses at Huang Yuliang's hands.

Hu Xiaoxiao then instructed the information department to investigate Zhang Huai and Yan Weikang.

Zhang Huai plagiarized her idea back then, which was very unethical. She was already a famous star at the time, and Zhang Huai still dared to steal it; she suspected he was a repeat offender. If even a big star like her had no way to complain, wouldn't it be even more difficult for those without fame or connections to get their ideas plagiarized?

Hu Xiaoxiao then instructed the information department to investigate whether Zhang Huai had any disputes in this regard, by checking among the former employees of the two companies Zhang Huai had previously worked for.

Yan Weikang can be described as a cancer in the film industry. He used to be backed by Ma Mianhu, and was extremely arrogant and ruthless. There were also reports of him forcing actresses to make pornographic films on more than one occasion. Hu Xiaoxiao ordered the information department to investigate Yan Weikang's heinous crimes.

Upon receiving Hu Xiaoxiao's assignment, the intelligence department immediately went to investigate the two individuals.

Yan Weikang's case is very easy to investigate because the information department has people recruited from the Sanren Society. One of them even helped Yan Weikang resolve a public opinion storm before. It can be said that there is a lot of information about Yan Weikang's bad deeds. He himself has a lot of information on him.

After another investigation, dozens of pages of information were handed over to Hu Xiaoxiao in less than three days.

After reading the information, Hu Xiaoxiao wanted nothing more than to send someone to the hospital to beat Yan Weikang up again. She had known all along that he was a scumbag, but calling him a scumbag was giving him too much credit; Yan Weikang wasn't even human.

Hu Xiaoxiao had heard rumors about forcing several actresses to make pornographic films, but there were many more he hadn't heard of. For example, he would use the name of a major film company to sign naive young girls, not only to have them make various explicit films for him to profit from, but also to act as a pimp, introducing these girls to gang leaders like Ma Mianhu, forcing them into prostitution.

Yan Weikang also created fake contracts, using elaborate fake contracts to trick people into signing contracts for pornographic films. After the matter was exposed, he instructed thugs from the Sanren Gang to burn down the victim's home and threatened the lives of the victim's family members.

There were incidents like pointing guns at celebrities during filming, extortion, and even someone who, after failing to poach a screenwriter from a film company, had the screenwriter killed.

Having committed murder and arson, Hu Xiaoxiao organized all the evidence, setting aside the evidence for now and sending it to the police when the time was right.

After some thought, Hu Xiaoxiao decided to select some of the other materials to release to gossip news outlets.

The more sensational the gossip, the more willing the magazine is to report it.

If there's one thing that easily stirs up the gossip among Hong Kong residents, it's the fact that Yan Weikang forced actresses to film erotic movies, and several of these actresses were quite well-known.

However, these female celebrities are victims in the first place. If these news stories are exposed, wouldn't that be hurting them a second time?