In 2019, the Chinese film market experienced two days of ice and fire: thousands of companies closed down, the industry suffered a capital winter, and it also harvested popular and popular movies like "Nezha: The Devil Boy" and "The Wandering Earth". On December 6, the box office of mainland China movies exceeded 60 billion in 2019, 24 days earlier than last year.
On December 12, at The Year Ahead Outlook 2020 Summit hosted by BusinessWeek/Chinese Version, Fan Rongjing, Executive Editor-in-Chief of Business Weekly/Chinese Version, and two senior filmmakers: the co-founder of Bad Monkey Pictures, CEO Wang Yibing and FIRST Youth Film Festival co-founder and CEO Li Zi conducted a dialogue on the topic of emerging Chinese directors and the development of the Chinese film market.
Li Ziwei likened the work of the film festival to "file management". She said, "Chinese movies have so few schedules each year, Spring Festival and National Day. After these two big schedules are over, shouldn't you watch movies at other times? Still have to watch. China has a box office call. There are only a few powerful directors, but apart from those few directors, will the film not be made? Still have to go. How to find young filmmakers with unique creative talents and continuous creative ability, find diverse film samples, and find Companies that have a forward-looking perspective on the film ecology? Sort them out? FIRST Film Festival has only done a small part of the work. In fact, there are still many film festivals in China, and they are all doing this sorting and summarizing." Wang Yibing said, When choosing a director, Bad Monkey Pictures will focus more on observing from the perspective of their work. He said: "I think director is a technical type of work first, and technology is a foundation. The foundation of technology is actually directly presented in his works, the control of the language of the film, the control of the actors' performance, For the control of art, photography, music, editing, etc., these are all technical issues." On the other hand, Wang Yibing said that he would also pay attention to the authorship of the director, "because we still think that the film actually has What a certain author expresses is not a very simple commercial act, but an art product and cultural product, so there still needs to be an author’s expression in it," he said.
Regarding the current ecology of the Chinese film industry, Wang Yibing believes that in the current Chinese film environment, the box office seems to be a major criterion for measuring the quality of movies. He believes that there is an urgent need to establish an artistic evaluation and professionalism beyond the box office standard. evaluation standard. Wang Yibing said, “When that standard is established, it may give creators and directors more and fairer opportunities to create freely, and then complete their own expression.”
Li Ziwei believes that there is no need to deal with business and art. Oppose. She said, “A movie is priced at 35 yuan and 45 yuan. The average audience, deep movie fans, professional creators, professional film critics, people of different identities and stances watch a movie, although they all seem to hold the same The ticket price goes to the movie theater, but the things you get are different. Movies are constantly being interpreted and discussed by different people. I think the value of discussion is the most important for the development of movies."
Wang Yibing and Li Ziwei also talked about their views on the younger generation of directors. Wang Yibing believes that, including directors, Chinese film creators are distributed across generations. The same is true for young directors. They grow up with other filmmakers of their own age, and then there will be a few leaders who will act as the "head sheep" and quickly bring up a group of creators. "Wen Muye is very typical. He now has a few very solid creative partners and teams around him." Wang Yibing said.
Li Ziwei believes that the senior director and the growing young director actually sympathize with each other. She said, “Especially at the FIRST Film Festival, I feel stronger. Because every year we invite well-known seniors in the film industry at home and abroad and even other majors to be judges, whether they are big names in photography, screenwriting, or directors. When they feel the'hormones' of the young creative group, and when they are trying their best to complete their own works, trying to explore and break through the way and style of film expression, they will also look back at whether they have forgotten anything after thirty years. I think things are very beautiful."
