Miss Cinema Understanding (topcinema original, reproduction is strictly prohibited)
Writing this article, the mood is slightly complicated.
The movie "Chinese Table Tennis Jedi Strikes Back" directed by Deng Chao and Yu Baimei has a bad fate, several times fixed, and several times rescheduled, into this year's Spring Festival file, and suddenly withdrawn, finally officially released on February 17.
This time, Deng Chao and Yu Baimei, who were always questioned before, finally proved their directing ability, and "Chinese Table Tennis" had an unexpectedly good reputation, with a Douban score of 7 points.
But good reputation did not make this movie "fly".
Now, what can affect the fate of a theatrical movie?
The word of mouth of the audience, as well as the arrangement of the cinema.
In the Internet era, the rating of the platform can have moisture, but no one can influence the real reputation of the vast audience.
However, the arrangement of films can be artificial.
Originally, "Chinese Table Tennis" entered this year's Spring Festival file, first scheduled for the first day of the New Year, and then changed to the third day of the new year, because there were almost no films after the release, and finally chose to withdraw quickly.
At that time, the film side attributed the reason to a major mistake of the publicity team.
Today, the film has made a comeback after the Spring Festival, and many audiences are still sweating for this movie, because, this time it is released again, the arrangement of "Chinese Table Tennis" is still too miserable.
On February 18, the day after the film's official release, the arrangement of "Chinese Table Tennis" was only 3.9%, which was crushed by the Marvel blockbuster "Ant-Man 3" released at the same time, and the 4 Spring Festival movies "The Wandering Earth 2", "Manjiang Red", "Bear Haunted" and "Deep Sea" that continued to be released.
"Ant-Man 3", which ranked first in the film that day, although the score was only 6.2 points, which was not as good as "Chinese Table Tennis", but it still received 30.2% of the films because of the strong commercial attributes of Marvel's superhero movies.
On February 18, the box office of "Ant-Man 3" in Chinese mainland exceeded 50 million, while the box office of "Chinese Table Tennis" with a dismal arrangement was only more than 6 million on this day. Two days after its release, "Chinese Table Tennis" plus the box office accumulated before, the current box office has only exceeded 70 million.
Even the audience couldn't stand it, and some audiences who liked this movie spoke for the movie after the second brush, lamenting that the arrangement of "Chinese Ping-Pong" was too miserable.
Many viewers even "feel sorry for Deng Chao", and have spoken out on the Internet, "shouting" for Deng Chao and his "Chinese Table Tennis". Some people pessimistically predict that the arrangement of "Chinese Table Tennis" is not optimistic, and "if you can't get it better, it won't exceed 100 million, and it's over."
"If the final box office is about 100 million. Producers can recover up to 3,000 to 40 million costs. This cost is not even enough for the publicity cost. Movie shooting equals full loss. ”
On the day of the re-release of "Chinese Table Tennis", Deng Chao's wife, Sun Li, who also starred in the film, also posted with mixed feelings-
"2.17 Chinese table tennis released
The first picture is a gift I made for Deng Chao, and I named him
A stupid sheep who loves table tennis
The second picture is a photo taken from the place I went to this morning, and with these eight words, give it to Deng Chao! ”
Sun Li felt aggrieved for Deng Chao and lamented that he was a "stupid sheep" (Deng Chao belongs to a sheep), while encouraging Deng Chao and sending eight big characters: the brave are fearless, and the wise are invincible.
Writing here, it's not that the movie "Chinese Ping-Pong" is so godly, but looking at how many times it withdrew and encountered such a dismal arrangement, I really feel aggrieved for it: this movie should not be treated like this.
In fact, the several postponements of "Chinese Table Tennis" have already shown that it is not easy for this movie to come out.
As we all know, sports-themed movies are not easy to make, especially based on true stories, and the prototype characters are all well-known sports celebrities. Who is chosen to act, and the reproduction of sports and competitions during filming, must be subject to the critical eyes of sports fans and moviegoers.
Coupled with the constraints of the subject matter and various factors, the space for movies and actors to play will not be large.
Especially sports movies based on true stories, the censorship is strict, beyond the general theme of movies.
"Chinese Table Tennis" is no exception, and from the many changes in the names of the characters in the film, you can see that this movie is not easy to come out.
Named after "National Ball" and emphasizing "based on true stories", "Chinese Table Tennis" has attracted attention from the beginning of filming, and the film tells the story of the early 90s of last century, when the national table tennis men's team was at a low point, overcame many difficulties, and finally returned to the peak.
The prototype characters of the film include Cai Zhenhua, the then head coach of men's table tennis, and the five male table tennis champions who won the men's team championship in the 1995 Tianjin World Table Tennis Championships "Jedi Strikes Back" - Ma Wenge, Wang Tao, Ding Song, Liu Guoliang, Kong Linghui.
The film is directed by Deng Chao and Yu Baimei, starring Deng Chao, Sun Li, Xu Weizhou, Duan Bowen, Cai Yida, Ding Guansen, Sun Xunlun, A Runa, etc.
Among them, the prototype of the character played by Deng Chao is Cai Guo, and the "Five Tigers" are played by Xu Weizhou (as the prototype Ma Wenge), Duan Bowen (as the prototype Wang Tao), Cai Yida (as the prototype Ding Song), Ding Guansen (as the prototype Liu Guoliang), Sun Xunlun (as the prototype Kong Linghui).
It is worth mentioning that Cai Yida, one of the leading actors, is still Cai Zhenhua's own son (the man in white in the picture below).
The male table tennis head coach played by Deng Chao, the prototype character is Cai Zhenhua, but the name of the character in the film has changed many times, and the trailer released before is called Cai Xinhua, which was found to have finally changed to Dai Minjia when it was screened before.
For Deng Chao, playing Cai's director in the film is a huge challenge.
After all, in terms of appearance alone, the two are not alike.
But after watching the film, I found that Deng Chao used his temperament, state on the field, and performance to make up for many differences in appearance with the prototype characters.
Big back, gold watch, gold necklace, handsome trench coat, on the streets of a foreign land, a man's figure appears in the camera, walking dashingly.
As soon as the opening scene, Director Dai, played by Deng Chao, firmly locked the audience's gaze with his back, and then the sudden robbery he encountered went directly to the Italian police station, leading to his state of being a foreign coach overseas at that time...
The names of the five prototypes of the male table tennis team members Ma Wenge, Wang Tao, Ding Song, Liu Guoliang, Kong Linghui have also changed many times - when the "Five Tigers" character poster was released before, the characters in the film were called Ma Wenhe, Huang Tao, Ding Feng, Liu Guoliang, Kong Shuai.
Later, when it was screened, the name of "Five Tigers" was changed to Bai Minhe, Huang Zhao, Gong Feng, Hou Zhuoxiang, and Dong Shuai.
These changes can already see the traces of repeated changes in the film.
Although the name has changed, the story and archetypal characters remain unchanged, and several archetypal characters, including Cai Zhenhua, Ma Wenge, Wang Tao, Ding Song, have previously appeared in the special feature of "Chinese Table Tennis", recalling the past, and are still excited.
Among them, Ma Wenge was also the table tennis technical director of the movie "Chinese Table Tennis", which greatly restored the tense and burning competition scene of that year.
What's more difficult is that this movie "Chinese Table Tennis" is not only about hard work, but also presents people and stories outside of winning: choosing and being chosen, trusting and distrusting, being questioned, hidden and ridiculed after failure.
In fact, as early as before the Spring Festival, "Chinese Table Tennis" has been screened in advance in many cities across the country, which is unexpectedly good-looking and has gained a good reputation, and is a family movie that is truly suitable for the whole family to watch.
A netizen who had seen the screening in advance left a message, which can represent the attention of many middle-aged and elderly audiences to this theme and the old national pingping——
"Accompanied my father to watch "Chinese Table Tennis", he was excited, and on the way back he gushed endlessly, a series of names of Chinese and foreign players were the same as tongue twisters... This film is not only the legendary experience of the athletes, but also his youth. ”
But now, finally officially released, the arrangement of films is so bleak, so that the ill-fated "Chinese Ping-Pong" once again encountered the "life and death" problem.
This is not Sun Li's mouth, Deng Chao is "stupid", this is actually the sadness of Chinese movies.
Now, look at Yu Baimei, one of the directors, and the paragraph written on the day of the release of "Chinese Table Tennis" seems to reflect his state of mind -
"At the beginning of the creation of 'Chinese Ping-Pong', I had this definition: this is not a movie about how people go to success, but a movie about how people face failure."
Look at the various inspirational slogans on the poster of "Chinese Table Tennis" now, "Xiaoqiang who can't die", "The ball does not land, never give up", or hope that this movie will stabilize and usher in the dawn of the arrangement.
Such a bleak arrangement of films is not only encountered by Deng Chao, previously, Zhang Yimou's movie "Sniper" and Andy Lau's movie "Crowd" have all encountered, Zhang Yimou was still begging for more films at that time, but then these two films achieved a counterattack with a good reputation.
I hope that Deng Chaoyu Baimei and their "Chinese Ping-Pong" can hold up, just like the name of the movie: Jedi Strikes Back.