Jimu News Chief Reporter Rong Yu
In two weeks, the 2024 summer season will enter the "mvp settlement interface". Judging from the current box office data, this is the longest and should be the busiest period of the year. Only a few of the "rescue heroes" that the industry was looking forward to have failed one after another, and even Chen Sicheng, the "hot-selling machine", was not spared.
Why did the “box office elixir” fail this summer?
The four major players worked together to "cut" 800 million
If we turn the time back to June this year, not many theater managers would have expected that several of the upcoming summer "top players" would actually miss out.
On July 10, the costume action film " Legend " directed by Tang Jili and starring Jackie Chan , Zhang Yixing, and Nazha was released. With the "mass base" established by its companion " Myth " 19 years ago and a starring cast covering all age groups, "Legend" still has relatively optimistic market expectations for itself.
Unfortunately, after the film was released, the audience did not give Jackie Chan much face. So far, the total box office of "Legend" is only 80 million yuan. Compared with its investment scale and cast, this box office performance is a disastrous failure. Judging from the market feedback of "Legend" and Jackie Chan's previous films, Today's audience seems to "only like Jackie Chan, but not his new movies".
html On July 27, the comic-book fantasy film " Under the Stranger " directed by Wu Ershan was released. This is a super-themed movie adapted from the super-popular anime IP "Under One Man". It is young, fresh, and full of energy. It is very consistent with the temperament of the summer movie and has the potential to become a hit. It is worth mentioning that, like last summer's " Conferred Gods Part 1 ", all the actors in "Under the Stranger" also came from the "Wulshan Strict Selection", and everyone experienced harsh training in the training camp. His physical training and performance training have given him full marks in terms of creative sincerity, so theaters are also looking forward to Wuershan replicating the success of his summer release last year and contributing to the schedule as a "dark horse" with a box office of 3 billion+.But facts have proven that the love the audience gave Wu Ershan last year was taken back this year. Since the release of "Under the Stranger", the box office has stayed at 118 million, which has also made many viewers worry that the next two parts of the "Under the Stranger" trilogy will still have a chance to be released?
But the reality is cruel, Chen Sicheng finally lost this summer season. After "Decryption" was released, although it received a lot of praise for its "hardware" performance, the core of the film-storytelling did not receive high scores from the audience. As of now, the total box office of "Decryption" is only 317 million. It is a hit with the " Chinatown Detective " trilogy directed by Chen Sicheng and the producer of " The Lost She ", "Manslaughter" and " Three Brigades". Compared with this work, the journey of "Decryption" came to an end just as it started.
However, Chen Sicheng is very optimistic about the box office performance of "Decryption". He said frankly at the audience meeting a few days ago, "Some people say that I am a businessman and a product manager. Although the box office performance of "Decryption" this time did not reach the ideal. , but I will continue to try in the future until the world no longer gives me the chance to try."
html On August 9, the last "hope" of this summer's summer, " Retrograde Life " directed and starred by Xu Zheng, was released. The film casts a group of outstanding actors to bring the work and life of delivery workers to the big screen, hoping to empathize with the audience. But judging from the response after the film was released, Xu Zheng's move was not considered a success. According to big data predictions, the film's total box office is expected to reach 500 million, which is far from the level of "bailout".
Jackie Chan, Wu Ershan, Chen Sicheng, and Xu Zheng, these four most suitable movie "powerhouses" for the summer season, together only "cut" nearly 800 million in box office. No wonder some film critics commented that "'box office elixirs'" Everything failed, and the theater manager’s face turned green.”
Why are the audiences in the summer season so calm?
Manager Zheng of Wuhan Paragon Cinemas admitted that he was not too surprised by the overall performance of this summer season. He told Jimu News that in this year’s movie market, the audience’s enthusiasm for watching movies has not been high since the end of the Spring Festival period, and there has not been much improvement after entering the summer period.
"First of all, the overall supply of new films this summer is not as good as last year, and few of them are 'hits'. Although there are Wu Ershan and Chen Sicheng, the themes and types of the works they brought this year are not mainstream. It can't be compared with last year's "Fengshen Part 1" and "The Disappearance of Her". The most important thing is that this summer's film 'hit' the Paris Olympics, which diverted a lot of attention and made it more difficult for the audience to enter the cinema. "Manager Zheng observed that from the end of July to early August, the hot search lists on major social platforms were all about Olympics-related content. "In the face of this absolute 'hot hit', no matter how awesome the movie is, it is not popular,"
famous film critic , film and television producer Tan Fei continues to pay attention to the changes and trends of this summer's summer season. He believes that the high ticket prices of movies in some cities have seriously affected the audience's enthusiasm for watching movies, and the current creative methods of film and television short videos have also greatly affected the audience's viewing habits. Many people just want to "watch it in 5 minutes" A movie", but lost patience with 2 hours of normal movie watching.
In addition, Tan Fei is also very worried about the current review atmosphere in the domestic film market. Some new films have received a lot of negative reviews before they have been released. Some of the "black for the sake of being black" reviews have put the film into a reputation crisis, which has seriously affected the box office. Tan Fei suggested that relevant platforms should establish a review mechanism that can only be evaluated after watching the movie, so as to provide a more objective and fair living space for the movie, and not let the audience be blocked from the cinema by false movie reviews.
( picture source: public information from the film company)
(source: Jimu News)
