author | lolahm2
There are no Hong Kong films in the top 30 box office lists in 2023.
Ranked 31st is " Golden Finger ", which was released at the end of last year. The film cost more than 300 million. It was written and directed by Zhuang Wenqiang, with the help of Tony Leung and Andy Lau, two great actors. The box office was just 500 million, but It is already the highest-grossing Hong Kong film in 2023. It was closely followed by " sneak " produced and starring Andy Lau. The film cost 200 million and had a total box office of 360 million, which was far from recouping the money.
The loneliness of Hong Kong films has been discussed for many years, and it seemed to be particularly serious last year. . "The Detective", which sold 712 million in 2022, ranked tenth on the box office list, and in 2021 "Rage·Crime" ranked 10th on the box office list with a sales of 1.329 billion. Sixth on the list, 2020's "Bomb Disposaler 2" and "Crash" ranked fifth and ninth respectively on the box office list, with a cumulative box office exceeding 1.8 billion. Three years after the epidemic, although the Hong Kong film market is facing challenges, it will not be reduced to a situation where the box office of the top film in 2023 will be just 500 million.
Looking back at the Hong Kong films released in mainland theaters in 2023, although the box office has declined, the number is actually not large.
However, it is not difficult for us to detect a new trend in the recently released Hong Kong films, that is, is an effort to get rid of traditional Hong Kong films. In addition to the above-mentioned "Goldfinger" and "Stealth", has made innovations in theme and content. " Temporary Robbery " produced by Er Dongsheng and directed by Mak Qiguang presents a bright color based on its black humor style. . The film avoided the blockbuster schedule of popular films and was released between New Year's Day and Spring Festival. The box office on the first day was 23.566 million, and the box office exceeded 100 million in four days of release. For a medium-to-small-cost film, the results are relatively impressive.
Looking forward, "Still Think You're the Best" in 2022 and "The Vengeful Lawyer" in early 2023 have also broken through the "Hong Kong film model" in the audience's impression, refreshing the audience in terms of genre and subject matter.
Perhaps it’s not that audiences don’t like to watch Hong Kong movies anymore, but that they don’t want to watch the same “permutations” of police and criminal themes and a few familiar actors. When innovative elements are added to the classic Hong Kong flavor, Hong Kong movies can have more audiences. .
The conservatism of Hong Kong films: homogeneity, disconnection and a sense of fragmentation
The discussion about "the death of Hong Kong films" is nothing new.
The fatigue of Hong Kong films has been revealed since the mid-1990s. With the "Return of 1997", the impact of Hollywood, the loss of film talents, etc., the Hong Kong film industry, which once flourished with a hundred flowers, has become increasingly sluggish. At the turn of the century when "blockbusters" were sweeping the country, shoddy Hong Kong-produced entertainment films were surrounded and attacked by high-quality rivals from all walks of life, and the seeds of the decline of Hong Kong films were sown. Of course, Hong Kong cinema regained its glory in 2002 with "Infernal Affairs", but its peak was its peak, and Hong Kong cinema has since lingered in its own twilight.
When talking about Hong Kong films in the past ten years, what flashes through my mind are just a few familiar movie star faces. Andy Lau, Louis Koo, Aaron Kwok, , etc. with different identities walk through various scenes, either in the bustling streets, in the neon-filled nights, or in the serious courts and police stations , or on the top floor of a tall building rising from the ground, sometimes a gun battle, sometimes a drug bust, sometimes a cat-and-mouse game. In short, the impression Hong Kong movies have given us in the past ten years can be described in eight words: single content and spliced form.
In terms of content, Hong Kong movies are flooded with homogeneous themes . The various genres in the golden age of the last century tended to be monotonous. Gangster films, martial arts films, ghost films, and nonsensical and marketable comedies disappeared from the screen. In recent years, seemed to have left only police and criminal films based on a sense of satisfaction to mainland audiences. slice . Anti-narcotics, police and robbers, gun battles, car chases and other themes have appeared frequently without changing the ingredients. The stories of the golden era are constantly being retold. Hong Kong movies, like the classical Hollywood that was once in decline, have reached a bottleneck period of genres.
Of course, this has to mention the creative limitations faced by Hong Kong directors going north after the CEPA agreement.
In 2003, the CEPA agreement signed between Hong Kong and the Mainland (full name "Mainland and Hong Kong Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement") encouraged Hong Kong and mainland film companies to join forces to develop the co-production model . On the one hand, co-production films can be released in theaters as mainland films without being restricted by import quotas; but on the other hand, relying on mainland China's approval system and industrial policies, the development of Hong Kong films inevitably faces many constraints. As a result, co-productions have lost the original unconventional and unconventional "Hong Kong flavor" of local films, which is precisely an important factor that makes Hong Kong films stand out.
Formally, the ever-changing cast is one of the reasons why Hong Kong films are often criticized.. When today's audiences choose which Hong Kong films to watch, they are often unable to distinguish the differences between them. Anyway, it is just a permutation and combination of Tony Leung, Andy Lau and Aaron Kwok, which looks almost the same. The appeal of the movie kings is certainly impressive, but Hong Kong movies seem to be running on the runway with all their strength as the sun sets, completely ignoring the disadvantages of younger actors who have fallen behind and the difficulty of old movie stars getting along with young audiences.
But ultimately, not keeping pace with the times is the most fatal reason for the decline of Hong Kong films . In recent years, with the rise of mainland films, domestic audiences have developed a different aesthetic from the period when imported films were rampant. Hong Kong’s unique regional characteristics are no longer the urban imagination that people pursue. On the contrary, they have intensified the relationship with mainland cities. The sense of distance in space is also significantly separated from the life experience of the audience.
Nowadays, faces similar themes, and audiences prefer movies produced in the mainland. For example, "Rescue the Suspect", which grossed 569 million yuan at the box office, combines suspense and crime, the two major genres of Hong Kong films, and combines female revenge and court trials. Although full of flaws, he knows how to manipulate the audience's emotions and leverage social traffic. Compared with the latter's control of contemporary issues and audience emotions, Hong Kong's co-productions seem to have failed to adjust themselves in time. Under the coercion of commercial genres, awareness of social issues has been shelved, and their thinking is still focused on shaping screen spectacles and sensory stimulation. The level of . Co-productions are inherently incompatible with the local environment. If they continue to imitate the glory of the past, they will eventually fall into the dilemma of lagging content.
The transformation of Hong Kong films: freshness and familiarity coexist, innovative but limited
The awakening of Hong Kong films is late but has arrived. The films released in the past month almost take into account both freshness and familiarity at the same time.
The novelty of "Goldfinger" is that the film avoids the police and gangsters and tells a story that has nothing to do with drug trafficking, robbery, or explosions. It is simply a story about a stock god who fell from the altar. Filming financial crimes may make your eyes bright at first glance, but if you think about it carefully, you will find that this is just one aspect of Hong Kong’s urban legend. Thanks to its unique geographical location and historical development, Hong Kong is the natural soil for the financial industry. Among the skyscrapers rising from the ground, there are also many stories of people who made fortunes overnight. Zhuang Wenqiang found a new way to capture the lack of screen narrative. It is indeed fresh, but it also only increases the threshold for movie viewing. What
is familiar with is that the film continues the top two-hero lineup since "Infernal Affairs", which has become the biggest highlight of the film. Andy Lau plays Liu Qiyuan, an inspector persistently pursued by the Independent Commission Against Corruption, while Tony Leung plays Cheng Yiyan, a financial tycoon who plays with the law in his hands. He is evil and good, and continues to be brilliant. This sense of familiarity is also reflected in the intertextuality with recent popular TV series. In the first half, Tony Leung's grassroots comeback resembles Mr. Bao in "Flowers". In the second half, Andy Lau's investigation of the case is not difficult to think of Cheng Bing in "The Three Brigades".
It can be said that under the flashy and golden appearance of "Goldfinger", there are elements familiar to the audience, but behind the glamor and glamour, there is a lack of real details and solid characters . Like a revolving lantern, the film quickly replays the various highlight moments of Cheng Yiyan's rise to become a stock god, and narrates Liu Qiyuan's ruthlessness as an outlaw in his flashback memory. However, the sudden turn of events in the end creates a top-heavy look, making the film feel top-heavy. The pleasure that should have been accumulated is fleeting.
Let’s look at "Provisional Robbery" again. The main plot line is still the model of Hong Kong police and gangster movies, but movies are made with old wines and made new. They chose the path of absurd comedy, and the style of painting is novel and eye-catching.. The film tells the story of two cowards and a gangster who accidentally collide and team up to commit a robbery. Aaron Kwok broke through the orthodox screen image of the past and changed into a buck-toothed bandit. He wore short sleeves and a suit, which added to the absurdity of the film. The series of "sinister words" in the lines, such as "say thank you", "say sorry" and "repair the shot", etc., also once again contribute to the comedy background of the film. If it hadn't been for "Temporary Heist", the tradition of Hong Kong comedy would have been completely forgotten by the audience.
Compared with the innovations of the above two films, "Stealth" is slightly inadequate.. Although the film injects a strong flavor of the times and incorporates popular themes such as "dark web" and "live-streaming selling goods", problems such as plot settings that lack logical links, unconvincing character creation, character motivations, and aphasic women are frequently exposed. , it looks like it’s just a collage of many elements, bright and beautiful, but empty of gimmicks.
It is worth noting that the above-mentioned Hong Kong films lack IP blessing. As original stories or stories adapted from real events, they are a little lonely among the series of Hong Kong films. But this may be a big signal for the transformation of Hong Kong movies. Filmmakers are gradually getting tired of the commercialization trend and turning to original stories with more room for development.
After dusk, how do Hong Kong films gain momentum
After Hong Kong guides went north, Hong Kong films were divided into two categories: co-productions and local Hong Kong films.
Strictly speaking, local Hong Kong films refer to films wholly produced by Hong Kong companies. However, in view of the general trend of Hong Kong-mainland joint ventures, such films mostly refer to Hong Kong companies as the main investment, directed by new Hong Kong directors, and more local. Conscious Hong Kong movie . This type of Hong Kong film is indeed good at the box office in Hong Kong, but it has lost a larger audience. Their subject matter is completely different from traditional Hong Kong films. Most of them have humanistic care and awareness of social issues, but their size and content determine the market deadlock that makes them difficult to sell.
In 2023, "Flowing Water and Falling Flowers" only received 287,000 box office after being released in mainland theaters. However, the film has won many awards internationally. The heroine Sammi Cheng won the 41st Hong Kong Film Awards for Best Actress for her role as Tianmei. Behind the dismal box office is the limited audience of literary films. But as far as the film is concerned, it has the shadow of Kore-eda Hirokazu and the tranquility of Japanese family films, but it only lacks the "Hong Kong-ness" of Hong Kong films.
In comparison, "Vicious Lawyer" and "Still Think You're the Best" starring Huang Zihua received 187 million and 107 million box office respectively, and the results were relatively satisfactory. Both films are small-scale investments, and their genres stand out among the homogeneous Hong Kong films. The strong "Hong Kong flavor" in them is what the audience praises. In addition, the film retains the original Cantonese language at the dialogue level, which greatly increases the "locality" and "adaptability" of the film's look and feel.
It is not difficult to see that Mainland audiences' expectations and demands for Hong Kong films are largely novel and more relevant to Hong Kong films. As for co-production films, they have fallen into a situation where both audiences want to please. They are neither like mainland films nor Hong Kong films. Instead, they are in a timid and cautious situation, so they are increasingly unable to attract the favor of the audience. Only directors such as Peter Chan and Tsui Hark, after several trials and errors, have successfully lost their Hong Kong temperament, fully integrated into the mainland, got rid of the temptation of "having both," and have chosen a correct market path.
Old Hong Kong films have disappeared, and new Hong Kong films are still exploring. Between being complacent and encroaching on their own territory, future Hong Kong films urgently need to find a new content model.
