interface news reporter | Hu Yujing
interface news editor | Zhang Youfa
Lighthouse Professional Edition data shows that as of press time on August 31, the 2024 summer box office will be 11.6 billion yuan, nearly halved compared to last year's 20.63 billion yuan, and the scale is the same as in 2014 and 2015 near.
The total number of screenings this summer was 38.26 million, 3.6 million more than last year. However, with the ticket price remaining the same, the total number of tickets issued was only 283 million, which is far from the 505 million last year. Intuitively It presents the audience’s “leaving” state.
The decline of the summer season has already appeared as early as the halfway mark. Many films that were regarded as dark horses and seed players at the box office failed one after another and were unable to ignite the movie-going mood. Before the release of " Alien: Death Ship ", the market was still struggling to support itself with two films, " Catch Baby " and " Silent Kill ", which had been released for more than a month.
"Catch Me" won the summer box office championship with a box office of 3.25 billion, while "Silent Kill" took in a box office of 1.35 billion, becoming the "only" summer movie with a box office of over 1 billion. The imported sci-fi horror film "Alien" surpassed all domestic films and became the third runner-up at the summer box office, with a score of 620 million. The box office pattern of
is not healthy. Judging from previous experience, a successful summer season often conforms to the structural rule of "one super, many strong". For example, in 2019, there was a "super hit" with a box office of 4.7 billion, "The Devil Boy of Nezha", and four "head blockbusters" with a box office of over 1 billion, including "Heroes of Fire" and "Spider-Man: Far From Home".
Last year's box office exceeded 1 billion, including "All or Nothing", ": The Disappearance of Her ", "Fengshen Part 1", "Octagonal Cage" and "Chang'an 30,000 Miles". Five films are on the 1 billion, 2 billion and 3 billion ladders. Evenly distributed. This year, there is no film to fill the "vacuum zone" between "Catch Me" and "Silver", and there is also a lack of strong support for mid-range films. There is only one film with a box office of 500 million to 1 billion. The bleak summer season of
also has certain omens. In the summer of 2023, various film companies will release their inventory intensively. The above-mentioned top films will work together to boost the box office. The top five films will collectively contribute more than 60% of the total box office for the period.
Bona Pictures founder Yu Dong told Jiemian Entertainment in June this year that because the industry's cash flow is still very tight and the film company's capital chain is tight, there will not be enough films to be put into production in 2023, and the impact will be felt in this summer.
What the industry did not expect was that this summer’s summer season would “turn back to ten years ago overnight”. The release dates of “ Under the Stranger ”, “ Decrypted ” and “ Retrograde Life ” were regarded as top blockbusters. As well as the "dark horse" screening " Safely Escapes from the 21st Century", none of the box office exceeded 500 million, which was far lower than industry expectations.
If it is simply attributed, the cyclical economic downturn, reshaping of movie viewing habits, Olympic diversion, and emotional marketing have all had a complex impact on the summer box office.
returns to the controllable variables of the industry. There is still an obvious mismatch between supply and demand in this summer's summer season. As the "main movie-watching force" and important shapers of social reputation, female audiences and young people have not met their movie-viewing needs; audio-visual blockbusters cannot get through. The market is sinking, and spectacle blockbusters are in short supply as "rigorous demand".
is based on the decisions made in the previous market stage, leading the industry forward in terms of type and aesthetics. However, in the current too cold market environment, simple and direct solutions are often more effective.
Women and young people who have not been favored
Judging from the user purchase images of summer movies in recent years, female audiences are an important driving force in the movie market. Data from the
Lighthouse Professional Edition's "2023 Summer Movie Market Insight Report" shows that among summer ticket purchases from 2021 to 2023, female audiences increased from 54% to 61%, and female users aged 25 and above are the main growth force. Especially last year, almost all top blockbuster films relied on more female audiences buying tickets.
"Decryption", "Under the Stranger" and "Retrograde Life", which have high hopes this year, and even "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century", which is regarded as a dark horse, have less than 60% of the female audience. On the other hand, the top-grossing movies such as "Catch a Baby", "Silent Kill" and " There is a Commissary in the Cloud " all had higher proportions of female viewers than last year's summer average.
Regardless of the heroic biography attribute of "Decryption", the comic book style of "Under the Stranger", the male mid-life crisis of "Retrograde Life", and the growth of middle school teenagers in "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century", from the story level See, none of these movies are relatable to female audiences.
This does not mean that female audiences are resistant to these themes. After all, last summer's box office runner-up "The Vanishing Her" was also mired in misogyny controversy, and the third runner-up "Fengshen Part 1" was almost a male heroic epic.
It’s just that this year’s summer movies overall lack a female perspective, and subsequent movies have not been explored for marketing points such as last year’s “Fengshen Proton Group CP Stew” and “Female Revenge Movie”, which cannot stimulate women’s demand for movie watching. . In the overall tired viewing mood, female audiences also lost their reason to enter the movie.
The film industry has repeatedly emphasized the importance of young audiences in the past year. Director Huang Jianxin expressed concern at the Beijing Film Academy Lecture at the end of last year that the age of global movie audiences will increase to 25 to 30 in 2022. Young audiences are attracted by other content. If not hindered, vertical screen short dramas will be the death of movies within three years. . Wanda Film President Chen Zhixi also mentioned at this year’s Shanghai International Film Festival that audiences under the age of 24 are losing from theaters, and the industry must find ways to attract young audiences.
This summer’s video supply also shows a youthful look. Animated movies mainly targeting young audiences include "Inside Out 2", "Despicable Me 4", "White Snake" and other well-known animated IP sequels at home and abroad, "Detective Conan: The Million Dollar Star", " "Doraemon: Nobita's Earth Symphony" and the re-release of "Your Name." ""Slam Dunk" and so on serve as waist and tail players to meet the needs of young audiences.
In addition, live-action films such as "Under the Stranger", "Safe Escape from the 21st Century", " negative negative is positive " and "Deadpool and Wolverine" combine the characteristics of their own genres and strive to attract young people. For example, "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" combines comic culture, Chinese dream core, time travel and other elements at the narrative and audio-visual levels. "Under the Stranger" can be called a collage product of popular culture - national comic IP, electronic Music, young people's growth, ending barrage, bar-style disco announcement, director Wu Ershan also told Jiemian Entertainment that the main audience targeted by the film is young movie-watching groups.
But these movie products still failed to capture the audience, and almost disappeared after a week of travel.
Reflected in the data, viewers under the age of 25 accounted for only 22% of ticket purchases for the top 10 movies this summer, and the main audience still falls between the ages of 25 and 34. The most popular movie among young audiences is "There's a Canteen by the Clouds", followed by "Silent Kill", "Decryption" and "Retrograde Life", with young audiences accounting for less than 15%.
The supply and demand mismatch between audio-visual blockbusters and spectacle blockbusters
Thanks to the expansion of genres and the advancement of creators' pursuit, this year's summer movies have made breakthroughs in the audio-visual level.
A major selling point of "Decryption" is the large number of dream spectacles. The film's cinematographer Cao Yu once again used the Alexa 65 imax camera with high definition and high color reproduction after "The Eight Hundred" to present the scenes in Chen Sicheng's script Surreal dream.
The photography innovation of "Under the Stranger" is more tied to its genre innovation. Wu Ershan mentioned that there are more than 1,600 visual effects shots in the film, accounting for most of the total shots. The energy transformation technique of Yuan Qi's theory , the visual expression of the Five Elements Classic of Chinese Medicine, Wu Ershan pursues superhero movies that are different from Marvel and DC in terms of cultural roots.
In addition, the aesthetic expressions of "A Negative Makes a Positive" and "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" are also novel and rare types in the domestic film sequence. The former has vague and ambiguous colors and is considered to be close to Wong Kar-Wai's style, while the latter has a strong sense of comics and presents a rich and gorgeous color gamut.
's emphasis on audiovisuals is an industry consensus formed in the context of competition between movies, dramas, and short videos. Since the Shanghai International Film Festival last year, many heads of leading film companies have suggested that the film industry is facing the squeeze of drama series and short videos and needs to go further in terms of audiovisuals.
Yu Dong expressed concerns about the video platform to Jiemian Entertainment last year. He made a calculation - the industry has evaporated 100 billion in box office in the three years of the epidemic. Where did the audience go? Yu Dong's conclusion is - "Become a member of Aiyouteng."
During this year’s Shanghai International Film Festival, he told Jiemian Entertainment that Bona will work harder to make blockbusters than before the epidemic, because “what everyone wants when entering the theater is an immersive experience and content that cannot be seen on the small screen.”
At the press conference of Alibaba Pictures during this year’s Shanghai International Film Festival, Li Jie also expressed a similar view. He said, "The adjective that many people use to evaluate the highest quality of a video work is 'movie feeling'. This is also what distinguishes movies from The unique advantages of other forms of entertainment. "
"Decryption" and "Under the Stranger" are undoubtedly in line with the "blockbuster theory" advocated by the industry, and are therefore regarded as "seed candidates" for the summer season. However, with the sluggish movie-watching sentiment during this summer's summer season, it is far more difficult for audio-visual blockbusters to activate the market than imagined. Movie-watching behavior is dominated by more direct emotions, and emotions are obviously not related to technology and audio-visual upgrades, but to the pursuit of novelty. , social issues and marketing are strongly bound, and the latter is easier to hit the sinking market.
The summer box office runner-up "Silent Kill" combines issues such as campus bullying, domestic violence, child crimes, sexual assault, secret photography, etc., and visually superimposes bloody violence, beatings, torture, imprisonment and beatings and other elements.
The discussion of the so-called "no cuts" and "scare of crying children" in the horror-thriller "Alien" has formed a kind of spectacle selling point based on the film's own "alien horror aesthetics", pushing up its box office at the end of the summer season. Finally got the third place result in the schedule.
"Caught Dolls" is not a spectacle in terms of genre, but Shen Teng and Ma Li, two national-level comedians, tried their best to pretend to be rich and poor, creating "The Truman Show" for their sons to become successful, and in the process, they made trouble. The oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooomm isyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooove miasma market.
The superposition of spectacle and emotion constitutes what Maoyan Film CEO Zheng Zhihao calls "the ultimate". In the tragic reality that audiences are generally not interested in movies, this extreme is the most effective way to drive movie-watching behavior. Although audiovisual blockbusters are in the right direction in the long run, they are still a "chronic medicine" after all.
Summer Film Revelation
Breaking away from the "box office theory", from an industrial perspective, this year's summer film also shows filmmakers' reflections and innovations on genres and creations. If the industry can get out of the current "pain period", "chronic medicine" is also expected to cure stubborn diseases.
Taking "Decryption" as an example, Chen Sicheng finally broke out of his usual narrative template of "female spectacle + Southeast Asian crime + social hot spots" in this film, and instead developed a biopic with a more "Hollywood flavor" . "Individual heroism" and the duel between geniuses, these very sophisticated genre techniques in Hollywood movies, are still new species in the domestic film industry.
Although Chen Sicheng sensed the market risks of the new genre, he may not have expected that the box office of "Decryption" would be only one-tenth of that of "The Disappearance of Her". He mentioned in an interview with Interface Entertainment, ""Decryption" is a brand new genre. There may be no risk in repetition for the time being. Once the risk comes, it cannot be changed."
But he also revealed that he is a "big money making" commercial film The director's sense of innovation - "Some people think that I am relatively successful and have made some profitable movies. If I don't even try, who will?"
Some other movies that did not perform as well as expected at the box office such as "Under the Stranger" and " "The Negative Makes the Positive" and "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century", etc., have expanded the grammar of domestic films in at least one dimension of genre, aesthetics, and style, and have become "new things" that the audience has never seen before.
The inspiration brought by box-office success movies is even more obvious. First of all, comedy movies with good narratives are still the golden rule, and the rules of spectacle movies to ignite movie-going emotions are still effective. When the industry is short of cash flow, filmmakers may continue to follow this path to ensure their creations. This is not a coincidence, but the industry's return to blood. prescribed actions.
Secondly, industry rules that were once considered outdated still work. For example, the effectiveness of IPs. New and old IPs such as "Alien", "Inside Out 2", "White Snake" and "Despicable Me" are still the backbone drivers for attracting audiences into theaters despite the bleak market situation. Although these new IP works are not hot hits, they are still in a safe zone.
Thirdly, 50% of the box office of "There is a Canteen in the Clouds" came from viewers under the age of 24, successfully verifying the movie-watching needs of young people. Literary IP based on the collective memory of the student days is less difficult to adapt than classic literature such as "Dream of Red Mansions" and is more audience-friendly. Perhaps in addition to traditional literature and online tomes, creators can also focus more on this type of text.
Fourth, the situation of realistic themes is delicate. "Retrograde Life" and "Catch a Baby", the latter has strong comedy to weaken its sense of realistic pain, while the former has slipped into the "rich man" category due to its middle-class perspective focusing on superficial dilemmas and superficial contradictions. The dangerous zone of "pretending to be poor". It reminds me of "I'm Not the God of Medicine" produced by Xu Zheng 6 years ago. Whether the audience still needs realistic themes and what kind of realistic themes are needed requires the creators to think deeply.
Finally, it was inspired by some off-site factors. "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" was not released in time after word-of-mouth quickly fermented, and the marketing of "Under the Stranger" fell into controversy over the objectification of women's bodies. These "mistakes" are not difficult to avoid, but the creators need to make preparations based on their emotions while watching the movie. consideration.
After many reflections and discussions, it seems that we can return to the old topic of whether filmmakers should guide the market or comply with the market. Make movies for the current audience, or use movies to predict the audience's predictions. The answer is naturally both.
At the moment, after a bleak period, the capital chain of film companies is getting tighter, and the industry is in urgent need of recovery. For the long term, start with quick-acting drugs, get through the current pain period, and then slowly figure out how to create a genre. and audiovisual innovation may be a more realistic approach.
