Text/Magic Beet
"Chinese Table Tennis: Jedi Counterattack" (hereinafter referred to as "Chinese Table Tennis") directed by Deng Chao and Yu Baimei has experienced several twists and turns, and finally failed to usher in the "Jedi Counterattack".
"China Table Tennis" on February 17, the box office on the first day was only 8.2 million, as of now, the box office is only 77 million, and the final box office prediction has come to 110 million.
There is no doubt that for investors, it will be a film that fails miserably at the box office.
How to summarize the failure of the film, there may be many factors, missed New Year's first schedule, the benign interaction between real sports stories and movies, the synergy that content and publicity cannot form, the inherent impression of the public formed by Deng Chao and Yu Baimei's director partner...
"Chinese Table Tennis" stills
These are some of the reasons for the failure of the film "Chinese Table Tennis", but perhaps the most serious thing is that no matter how tossed and turned the film, it did not stir up much discussion in the mass market.
The industry recognizes the quality of the film, but in the more mass market, beyond the excitement of the Spring Festival file, people have long ceased to discuss this "stranded" film.
Who should carry this "pot" - is it the creative end, the publicity end, or the ambition of that genre film?
The two coordinate systems overlap
When observing the movie "Chinese Table Tennis", there are two coordinate systems that cannot be bypassed, one is the main theme movie or the new mainstream movie, and the other is the sports film, especially the sports movie adapted from the true story.
Considerations from different angles create different evaluation criteria.
Perhaps to some extent, the overlap of these two coordinate systems for this film has created the reality of the film's current displacement, the former main theme means strong support from regulators, and the real sports film represents the careful scrutiny of the archetypal characters of the past.
When reviewing the release process of the movie "Chinese Table Tennis", it can be divided into at least three parts.
The first is to be released on the National Day in 2022 and withdrawn. The second announced that it would be released in the Spring Festival in 2023, and then missed the first day of the Lunar New Year and released two days later. The third is to withdraw the file, that is, it will be finally released on February 17.
"China Table Tennis" file change statement
In this long and twisty release experience, the market is full of various rumors about the film.
But two things are certain, one is that the content of the film has been modified, and the other is that the names of the prototype characters in the film have also been adjusted.
Of course, this film was shot and produced during the epidemic, and the restricted shooting has also become the biggest difficulty in the creation of the film, and director Yu Baimei used "nine dead lives" to define the difficult creative history of "Chinese Table Tennis" when recalling this history.
Although table tennis is a national ball, it does not mean that movie audiences want to see the screen story of national ping, and the stories that occur inside and outside the movie increase the barriers between the public and the movie to a certain extent, especially the difference between the name of the movie character and the name of the real person.
To know that the biggest pleasure of movies adapted from real sports stories is to compare the stories on and off the screen, and the treatment of "Chinese Table Tennis" increases this barrier.
The creative team at the roadshow stage also responded to the reason.
"Chinese Table Tennis" roadshow
Some viewers asked the reason why the characters in the film had prototypes but did not use their original names. Yu Baimei said that there are many force majeures: "We also hope to use the name of the prototype, this movie has more twists and turns than everyone imagined, but still strives to restore the story to everyone." ”
During the film's release, a character comparison table circulated on the Internet, and even so, it was difficult for the public to compare the movie characters to specific real people when watching "Chinese Ping-Pong". And this fact greatly affects the discussion heat of the movie, creating a threshold for more ordinary people to watch movies.
On the other hand, the story told by the film is also a certain distance from the public.
"Chinese Table Tennis" is adapted from real history, aiming to present the past of the national table tennis of the Chinese table tennis men's team returning to the peak from the trough in the 90s of last century, Cai Zhenhua, who was the head coach of men's table tennis at the time, was ordered to lead Ma Wenge, Wang Tao, Ding Song, Liu Guoliang, Kong Linghui Five Tigers will regain the story of the Sweslin Cup (world championship).
Prototype of "Chinese Table Tennis"
From a creative point of view, this is the choice of the creative team, this story is more dramatic, and it is a history worth remembering and telling for the national table tennis that has dominated the international arena for many years.
But from an objective point of view, the public knows little about this history, which also creates a threshold for discussion.
A Zhihu netizen said that a problem with the film side was that the film did not see the support of Liu Guoliang, the current chairman of the Table Tennis Association and the actual helm of National Table Tennis on the eve of its release.
Perhaps it can only be said that since the main theme and sports movies overlap, how to balance the perspective and interests inside and outside the screen is a natural responsibility for this type of film, and for the film market and the moviegoers, more emotions can only be said to be regrettable.
Content and publicity disputes
In the movie "Chinese Table Tennis", when Chen Wen, a table tennis player played by Aruna, was forced to retire because of a fight, head coach Dai Minjia (prototype Cai Zhenhua) said to him, "You have to earn some money when you retire, recommend European clubs to you, pick as you like", Chen Wen finally chose to retire and return to his hometown to be the boss.
The logic of retiring to make money was used by the creative team as the dilemma encountered when "Chinese Table Tennis" was released on the third day of the Lunar New Year, when under the dual strength of "The Wandering Earth 2" and "Manjiang Hong", the late-starting "Chinese Ping-Pong" received a cold response from the market in terms of film scheduling and single-day box office.
Yu Baimei said that the cinema line has been hit hard in the past few years, and in this money-making Spring Festival file, it must give priority to films that can make money, and "Chinese Table Tennis" is not the best option for the theater line.
Source: Lighthouse Pro
One day after its release, Hengye Film, the film's main producer, issued the controversial withdrawal announcement, saying that "due to major mistakes and serious deficiencies in the decision-making, preparation and promotion of the publicity and distribution team, the film fell into a particularly passive situation during the Spring Festival... (Film) on February 17 'Jedi Strikes Back'. ”
This can be seen as the dissatisfaction of the creative team represented by Deng Chao and Yu Baimei for the publicity team, and this dissatisfaction is openly put on the table.
The creative team has become the strong party in this, and Deng Chao and Yu Baimei seem to have reasons to do so.
In the past, the plastic urban comedies created by these two director partners have been labeled as bad films, and this "Chinese Ping-Pong" is undoubtedly an "anti-killing" of the past, becoming the highest quality of this film, which made the two directors receive praise in this creation.
But from another point of view, the practice of throwing the pot to publicity is not worthy of respect, especially the main controller Hengye Film, which is both the main producer and the main publicity party, and the creative team and the main controller should be in the same boat, rather than accusing each other. The content ontology and publicity are two sides of the same body.
"Chinese Table Tennis" stills
"Chinese Table Tennis" is secretive in the content of the real story, and a lot of unspeakable content has caused the constraints of the film in the publicity, that is, the film has never been able to find a breakthrough publicity direction - is it the great historical moment of national table tennis, is it the youth and enthusiasm of sports events, is it the best historical creation of the creative team, is it all and neither.
Another point that must be pointed out is that the two bad films "Breakup Master" and "Villain Angel" were indeed box office blockbusters at that time, and the imprint of some audiences on the director combination of Deng Chao and Yu Baimei blocked their enthusiasm for theater support. This has become a negative factor affecting the publicity of "Chinese Table Tennis".
Moreover, the word-of-mouth progress of Deng Chao and Yu Baimei has only come by 7 points, and the opponents of the Spring Festival file have scored about 8 points on Douban, and the change of the past stereotype is not based on a leap forward, and the competitors are one position ahead of their own word-of-mouth advantage, in this case, Deng Chao and Yu Baimei's "word-of-mouth counter-killing" cannot form a sound.
Screenshot of Douban
The most deadly thing is that the market and the audience seem to be able to see the sound of "Chinese Table Tennis" is complicated, seemingly rich and lively, but none of the points have become the most absorbing highlights of the film itself - Deng Chao and Yu Baimei calmly face the previous bad films, Deng Chao and Sun Li couple's love, other films in the Spring Festival file wish table tennis good results, Deng Chao has its own lively properties on the short video platform to sell tickets... Ask the audience whether they will make progress for the "stereotypical bad film partner", or will they go into the cinema to pay for the star's "private life".
One of the characteristics of the 2023 Spring Festival file is that higher film discussion popularity has a better boost to the box office, and at this point, "Chinese Ping-Pong" does not seem to change the fact that the focus on the film itself is not hot enough.
Where sports movies are going
The film market seems to have a bumpy truth, that is, most of the withdrawn films do not have a better commercial ending, and this "Chinese Ping-Pong" has not escaped.
For this film, the best result is that it will be released on National Day or New Year's Day.
At the seminar reviewing the Spring Festival file, Wang Hongwei, the producer of "The Wandering Earth 2", said a point of view, he believes that the content richness of the Spring Festival file is increasing, "How can we imagine that director Cheng Er and a particularly personal film like "Deep Sea" go to the Spring Festival file before? I personally think that if they are not on the Spring Festival file, the box office is likely to be halved or one-third."
"Deep Sea" stills
In fact, if it can be followed by a normal rhythm, the movie "Chinese Table Tennis" will achieve a reasonable or better result, at least compared to "Deep Sea" and "Nameless", this is a movie more suitable for the atmosphere of the Spring Festival. Even before the festival, some industry insiders believed that the film had the possibility of a counterattack.
A cruel fact is that missing the New Year's Day makes many people not regard this film as a Spring Festival movie, just like the entire Spring Festival file, most of the whole network is talking about "Manjiang Red" and "The Wandering Earth 2", rarely talking about this movie with twists and turns in fate, and after the withdrawal, the momentum of the film has declined again, the so-called "one decline and three declines".
Putting these aside, is the Spring Festival file the best choice for "Chinese Table Tennis", which is why after seeing "The Wandering Earth 2", "Manjiang Red", "Exchange Life", "Deep Sea", "Nameless" and other films with various looks in the market finalized, many voices in the industry let "China Table Tennis" choose the opportunity to fight again, is it more suitable for the summer file or the National Day file?
At this time, even if the "release notice" arrived very late, "Chinese Table Tennis" stubbornly chose to be released on the third day of the new year, and must open its mouth on the extremely tempting cake of the Spring Festival file, but unfortunately, even with 10% of the fourth row of films, "Chinese Table Tennis" is still at the bottom of the film of the day, which led to its escape.
Box office data on the third day of the Lunar New Year Source: Lighthouse Professional Edition
Perhaps the ambition of "Chinese Table Tennis" is also the trigger for this "disaster".
Although the Spring Festival file has been staging the story of "relying on word-of-mouth counterattack" and "upgrading genre films to win the audience", "Chinese Table Tennis" also overestimated itself, overestimating that the "Deng Chaoyu Baimei" word-of-mouth step was not so big, overestimating its own uncontrollable prediction and control ability of various sports types.
Back to the content level of the "Chinese Table Tennis" movie, this is indeed a standard sports type movie, according to the three-act structure to write the story of Chinese table tennis coming out of the trough, worthy of industry recognition and encouragement.
While completing the "mission", you can also see other expressions of the film.
For example, the story of the supporting character Chen Wen, a player who played at the age of eight and entered the national team at the age of nineteen, but could only become a practice object of "secret weapons", and finally retired dimly and returned to his hometown to engage in a hard career. This writes about the cruel side of the success and defeat of competitive sports, and also shows the helplessness of many participants under the national system.
In a certain sense, it can even be said that "Chinese Table Tennis" is of positive significance to the development of Chinese sports movies in terms of content.
But this may only exist at the content level, and in the face of the reality that business promotes everything, "Chinese Ping-Pong" can be described as a fiasco, and the final box office of the film may hover around 110 million, and it is difficult to even return the publicity fee.
Source: Lighthouse Pro
Director Yu Baimei was asked in an interview with the media whether he would make another sports movie, and his answer was, "If the loss is too bad this time, there is no logic in making again commercially speaking, and it is possible if it is not lost."
Now that this problem is in front of the entire film industry, "Chinese Table Tennis" has experienced twists and turns and its commercial results have been in shambles, and whether any team will dare to make a sports movie adapted from real people and stories.
In fact, Liu Xiang's story and Yao Ming's story are all in contact with filmmakers, but the Li Na biopic "Alone" filmed by Chen Kexin has not been released so far.
Screenwriter Reed's comment on the fifth generation of Chinese directors, "I thought it was a beginning, but it was the end", seems to be able to be applied to the direction of sports movies - we think that the release of "Chinese Table Tennis" and "Winning the Championship" ("Chinese Women's Volleyball") will be a positive beginning for the prosperity of Chinese sports films, and we don't want another end.