Editor's Note
Online movies have achieved an industry-wide outbreak at the beginning of the epidemic. However, due to the difficulty of breaking the ceiling, the unsustainable works out of the circle, the momentum of the industry is gradually weakening, and it seems to have returned to 3 years ago.
However, after more than 8 years of growth, online films have gradually increased production costs and cycles after policy restrictions and industry self-examination, and achieved professional and high-quality development.
In Q1 2022, in the objective environment of the bad market, the platforms and companies huddled together to keep warm, still achieving a total scale of 460 million yuan in the box office, coupled with the recent issuance of the "network drama distribution license", the network movie has its own IDENTITY. I believe that there is still a bright future for online movies in the future.
In order to let the public refocus on the online movie industry, Pengxx01 planned to launch the "Online Movie · Xiancha" special topic, this article is - "Dialogue with Li Siwen, vice president of Qishu Youyu: 29 million in 4 weeks, why did "Open The Coffin" explode? | Web Movies · Freshly cha".
Recently, there are always people in the industry who lament: "The online film industry is getting more and more depressed", and the author found that this statement is not empty.
In the Q1 quarter of 2022, 85 online movies were launched, compared with 173 in the same period last year, a reduction of more than half. In April this year, iQiyi also adjusted the accounting rules for online movies, and the sub-accounting path of "effective viewing in the first 6 minutes" was completely blocked, and this move also forced online movies to improve quality and reduce quantity.
Just when online movies are collectively sung down, after the launch of Tencent Video and Youku, the box office of "Open Coffin" is about to exceed 29 million, ranking third in the list of online movie accounts in 2022, which has revitalized the long-dormant online movie market.
The online movie "Open Coffin", which focuses on the theme of criminal investigation suspense, integrates thrilling elements such as tomb robbery and folklore into it, enriches the film genre, and embarks on an innovative and differentiated route in the same genre.
"Open Coffin" is based on criminal investigation suspense, referring to a tomb robbery case cracked by the police in the early years, and when the planning team collected information, it also conducted detailed research on the relevant details, for example, if the tomb robber encountered toxic coffin liquid or gas, he was likely to die immediately. In addition, in the process of solving the case, the film reasonably integrates some folk plots and stories, taking into account the suspense of the criminal investigation theme and the horror of the folk theme.
Why did the producer pay attention to the criminal investigation suspense theme, how did it think of genre integration and innovation, and what development will this genre have in the future? In order to unlock the explosive creation methodology of "Open Coffin", Cooking Xiaoxian and the chief producer of "Open Coffin", Li Siwen, vice president of Qishu Youyu, chatted, and Li Siwen also shared his views on the online film industry.
When it comes to the current situation of online movies, Li Siwen has always held a rational attitude, "Online movies themselves have commercial entertainment attributes, although they have not developed rapidly in previous years, and they are facing some difficulties in the short term, but the online film market will still exist benignly, I believe that creators will maximize their years of experience and ability, and they can make works that audiences love." ”
As a content creator, Li Siwen feels that film and television works should not only have entertainment attributes, but also take into account social responsibility, which is also the key to the success of "Open Coffin", "When we create, we can not only consider from the perspective of business thinking, only care about economic benefits, but also have content ideals and pass on positive mainstream values." ”
Since the epidemic has changed the audience's viewing habits, online movies have ushered in a short golden period. At that time, cinema films were blocked, and a large number of talents in the film and television industry gradually tilted towards online movies, which promoted the development of online movies.
But the golden period is fleeting, and after the eleventh of 2020, Li Siwen and the team smell the breath of crisis, "There are too many online movies shot in 2020, and the cinema films are also resuming work and being released, so the competition for films in 2021 must be extremely fierce." ”
Li Siwen has always adhered to the creative concept of "only innovation can bring the audience a new entertainment experience, and only innovation can eat the so-called content dividend." Under this premise, the Qishu Youyu team made a corresponding user portrait analysis for each type of subject matter in order to accurately grasp user preferences.
In the process of research, the team targeted a major tomb robbery case cracked by the Chinese police in 2009, and the bizarre nature of the tomb robbery case largely satisfies the audience's curiosity psychology, and has the entertainment space of film and television adaptation, which is in line with the explosive theme characteristics of online movies.
After finalizing the theme, the team quickly began to carry out the development of the film, and planned to plan a work that is both commercial and industry-innovative, and "Open The Coffin" came into being on this basis.
Generally speaking, the script of the network movie can be put into production in one or two months, but "Open Coffin" belongs to the criminal investigation suspense theme, involving a lot of professional content, and this network movie is intended to take the high-quality route, and the script alone has been polished for more than eight months.
In Li Siwen's view, the difficulty in the creation of "Open Coffin" is that the advantages of various types of themes are integrated with each other but will also collide with each other, and it is necessary to sort out the primary and secondary relationships, balance the proportion of elements, and adjust the emotional atmosphere, "Taking thriller comedy as an example, it is actually very difficult to do a good job, it is necessary to balance the two kinds of genre traits that are a bit 'hedged', if the comedy effect is too appropriate, it will break the atmosphere of horror, if the horror atmosphere is too strong, it is difficult to get it easily." When we create, the first thing we consider is the proportion of the distribution between the genre and the fusion elements. ”
"Open Coffin" is positioned in the theme of criminal investigation suspense, and tells some well-known folk stories, and finally presents the effect of "1+1>2", which not only makes the audience look less abrupt, but also brings the audience a sense of hunting experience.
As Li Siwen said: "We must plan based on the main and secondary types, take into account the different types of presentation, it is impossible to focus on the criminal investigation suspense, so that the audience will only think about how to solve the case, and it is impossible to completely focus on folklore, so it is out of the story structure of the main genre of the film." ”
Li Siwen believes that works with contemporary themes can be appropriately created in dramatization, but in any case, they must be rooted in the soil of reality. "The audience is very familiar with real life, and the plot that is 100% impossible in real life will be particularly suspended."
Whether it is criminal investigation suspense or folklore thriller, it is to enrich the audience's immersive movie viewing experience, and how to use audiovisual language to maximize this immersive experience is also a challenge for producers.
Li Siwen said frankly: "Whether it is the planning level, the script level, or the image level, in fact, it is very important to promote the content, based on the sense of reality, and to design all audiovisual languages with suspense and thriller atmosphere as the core." ”
In addition to the innovation of the theme, "Open Coffin" has also made some attempts in the expression of content, and the team hopes that under the wrapping of suspense and horror atmosphere, the content experienced by the audience does not have any sense of repetition, and if the audience watches the content of the same emotion for a long time, it is easy to cause visual fatigue.
The tomb robbery begins, and dangers abound. At the beginning of the film, four tomb robbers are presented trembling and trembling to the tomb of the ghostly Sensen, intending to open the coffin to find gold, "native gold, gold raw water, Dali open the coffin", the strong atmosphere of tomb robbery adventure instantly set the tone of the film.
Folklore wrapped, visions alive. Bizarre cases are also designed around folklore, and the three cases do not have any repetitive content. The three-line parallel narrative technique can not only bring the audience the stimulation of audiovisual senses, but also bring a brain-burning experience, and the diversity of cases has also successfully captured the audience's attention.
The criminal investigation runs through and the suspense is thick. In terms of narrative structure and character design, "Open Coffin" refers to international high-quality cinema films, and slows down the narrative speed of general online movies, generally in accordance with the logic of cinema films. "We did not rely on the so-called online movie creation routine to create the script, but based on past experience, the audience's favorite points were integrated into it, thus breaking through the bottleneck of online movie creation."
Talking about the advantages of "Open Coffin" in similar online movies, Li Siwen said bluntly: "With criminal investigation suspense as the main type, tomb robbery cases as the guide + integration of folk elements", is the biggest attraction of "Open Coffin", many friends have seen this movie, feedback, "It seems that no one really tried to integrate criminal investigation, suspense, tomb robbery, folklore and other elements before." ”
"Open Coffin" combines genre films with commercial elements, and Li Siwen also hopes that this creative idea can bring inspiration to the industry at the level of content innovation.
The success of "Open Coffin" has allowed Li Siwen to glimpse a new track, focusing on "criminal investigation + suspense", integrating commercial elements such as adventure and folklore, and there may be a better market space in the future. Inference, experimenting with innovative genres and incorporating traditional hot business elements can create new content opportunities.
Li Siwen said frankly: "If "Open Coffin" can promote the diversified development of online film themes and the innovation space of genres, so that more practitioners in the film and television industry can see the possibility of new themes, this is also a small achievement of our project. ”
In Li Siwen's view, for successful criminal investigation suspense films, there are two points of great importance, "First, content innovation needs to meet the rationality of the audience's expectations of genre films, if in criminal investigation suspense films, too much emotional story is told, there is a suspicion of being noisy, naturally there is no way to meet the audience's expectations." Second, the script should have a high degree of quality completion, including the professionalism of criminal investigation, the accuracy of folk culture, the professionalism of the structure of the play, and so on. ”
Nowadays, the theme of online movies is becoming more and more diversified, and Li Siwen believes that realistic themes may become the mainstream themes of online movies in the future. However, according to Li Siwen's observation, he feels that there are not many realistic theme works released this year, on the one hand, because the creative threshold of realistic themes is relatively high, it is necessary to cut to the pain points of the audience and trigger collective resonance; on the other hand, the creators of online movies have rich experience in grasping commercial genre films, but they have relatively little experience in the creation of realistic themes, and the realistic themes are close to the audience, and the creation cycle required for an excellent realistic theme work will be very long.
Strange Tree Fish probably launches at least two realistic works every year, such as the "Donkey on the Tree" series, "China Flying Hero" and so on. In the future, it is more inclined to works with strong emotions, such as family relations, youth inspiration and other themes, and at present, the works are still in the preparatory stage.
At the same time, Qishu Youyu is also in the mainstream film commercial genre film layout, and continue to work in the folk thriller genre, Li Siwen hopes to integrate commercial genre films into some reality, "All our future works will basically start from this perspective." ”
Qishu you fish in the network movie for many years, Li Siwen also summed up some experience in shooting network movies, how to shoot online movies more cost-effective? Li Siwen said bluntly: "Content. In the early stage, we will invest heavily in the script level, and only in the future can we truly 'save time and trouble'. ”
A director once told Li Siwen, "The script is the easiest to save money, and it is also the most able to help you save money." ”
There may be fifty thousand scripts on the market, there are also millions of scripts, if you choose a cheap script, the degree of subsequent difficulty is self-evident, the screenwriter who can really create a good script is with a production mindset, this kind of thinking in the future shooting process, in fact, can save a lot of time and money investment.
"From a production point of view, a good script is more in line with the cost control of the production, in this case, the cost performance is likely to be better controlled."
Since the rise of online movies, on the one hand, the mainstream themes are very rich, from folklore, monsters to adventure, tomb robbery, from ancient costumes, fantasy to action, comedy, continuous diversification and development, and constantly have innovative themes, such as the main theme, reality, military, science fiction and so on.
On the other hand, the genres are constantly converging and the content is constantly upgraded. This year, the folklore thriller "Yin Yang Town Strange Talk" ranked first in the 2022 network movie account with a sub-account box office of more than 40 million yuan, and now, the criminal investigation suspense film "Open Coffin" is about to exceed 30 million at the box office.
How to innovate the theme, in the innovation type, integrate multiple commercial elements, and develop more high-quality explosive content, is also the goal that Qishu Youyu and Zhongle le are exploring together.
But Li Siwen believes that "creators should not blindly follow the trend of successful films, while these works are more and more, the competition in the future market is also more intense, from the logic of content creation, if you want to come up with a blockbuster, there must be innovative content." Only when practitioners work together and innovate continuously can the works bloom and the industry prosper and develop. ”
At the same time as the rapid development of the online film industry, a large number of bubbles have also poured in, and the content homogenization is serious. However, all walks of life will have ups and downs in the process of development, which is also the objective law of market development, and how to squeeze out the bubble, remove the false and the true, and truly return to the level of content creation, is also the future development direction of online movies.