"Wasteland" invested more than 100 million? Box office failure, blame tens of billions of box office actor Li Chen? Niche movie innocent

On March 5, the theatrical movie "Wasteland" has been released for 3 days, with a single-day box office of 130,000 yuan, and up to now, the total box office figure obtained is only 1.546 million yuan. To say that the film's box office is a bit low is true. However, among the critics surrounding the film, there are two voices that are particularly noteworthy, and the rebuttal.

The first voice said that the total investment of this film exceeded 100 million yuan. Some unprofessional media wrote that the "Wasteland" starring Ren Suxi and Li Chen is reported to have a total investment of more than 100 million yuan. However, the media outlets that published such information did not indicate the source of their information. Is this information of investing more than 100 million yuan the income from their interviews with the film party, or is it their personal speculation?

I tend to think that this is speculation by this group of media, and even made up nonsense, deliberately fabricating a huge investment figure, contrasting with the relatively low box office, so as to achieve the purpose of attracting attention. I checked the reports of the regular news media and did not find that the "Wasteland" film team publicly stated the production cost of the film. From the perspective of common sense, the investment in this film should not be more than 100 million yuan.

Film investment, there is a clear investment concept, that is, the investment amount of various types of films cannot exceed one-third of the box office results that their own genre films have achieved. For example, in the suspense thriller genre, suddenly the theatrical box office of a movie exceeds 60 million yuan, which means that the upper limit of the investment amount of this type of film can be adjusted to 20 million yuan. This is a fundamental concept.

Back to the movie "The Wasteland", the genre of this movie is relatively niche, belonging to adventure, drama, and a niche theme played by one or two people. And this theme, in the previous theatrical genre films, the box office is very low, and there are even no works with a box office of more than 10 million yuan. If so, please correct me. Therefore, after professional film and television companies see the project "Wasteland", the highest investment standard for it will not exceed three million yuan.

That person asked, three million yuan, can you invite Li Chen and Ren Suxi? For a movie like "Wasteland", I was surprised that Li Chen and Ren Suxi could star. But in the film and television industry, there is also such a phenomenon, that is, actors are willing to reduce or even give up their salaries to star in a work for the sake of some niche, valuable, literary and artistic films. For example, Qin Hailu and "The Piano of Steel" are such a relationship, and the reason why Lao Qin is respected by filmmakers is because she not only does not receive remuneration herself, but also helps director Zhang Meng find investment together.

Therefore, I can say that the conclusion is that if the capital of "Wasteland" is professional, then the production quota of this film will not exceed three million yuan. The so-called investment of more than 100 million yuan on the Internet is obviously rumor-mongering. What film company would be unprofessional enough to invest more than 100 million in such a niche genre film? Moreover, director Zuo Zhiguo has not shot any blockbusters in the past, and has no box office results, which capital will be stupid enough to let such a young director control a film project with hundreds of millions of funds.

Then talk about the current box office results of this "Wasteland". It has achieved 1.546 million yuan, which is in line with the filmmakers' perception of the film's box office. Such a niche movie, with a box office of more than one million yuan, is already considered "not bad". If the film can operate according to the investment amount of 3 million yuan, then the subsequent broadcast of movie channels and genuine video platforms can also make the film return to the book.

For the starring roles of Li Chen and Ren Suxi, I personally prefer that they are zero pay. Because, if this film is hired by Li Chen and Ren Suxi with high salaries, it is that this movie does not know how to do it. Such a niche movie cannot be paired with a big coffee-level actor, otherwise, it will definitely be lost. There is only one exception, that is, big coffee actors are willing to reduce the price or zero pay to star. For the sake of a good movie, many actors are willing.

If the movie "Wasteland" is a normal and professional production mode, then Li Chen and Ren Suxi must have starred in zero pay or very low symbolic red envelope salary. Li Chen and Ren Suxi are for art, to dedicate their time to make quick money. And at this time, there is really no need to laugh at Li Chen. I see that on the Internet, there is a very wrong voice, and it is also the second voice to be discussed in this article - Li Chen is a tens of billions of box office actors, and the box office of the new film "Wasteland" can only swing at the million level, and he is not worthy of a high box office.

This is a very layman's phrase. Zhang Yimou is powerful, isn't it? "Manjiang Hong" has a box office of more than 4 billion, of course, it is a big director with a high box office. But he also has "One Second", which has only a box office of more than 100 million. Moreover, both films are the work of recent years. Why is that? How can the box office gap of the same director be so large? The reason lies in the type of film. Different genres have different box office expectations.

A niche type of film like "Wasteland" has genre exploration value in itself. For our theatrical films to bloom, we need to have a variety of niche movies. And this batch of niche films really needs some well-known actors to help them out. They receive very low salaries, or even no pay, to help niche films. After the release of niche movies, the box office was sluggish, and these actors who wholeheartedly helped each other in the film industry were ridiculed by some media articles for the low box office! What an ugly mockery this is.

My final conclusion is: publishing articles about film and the film industry should respect the laws of the film itself, do not grandstand, do not create something out of nothing, do not deliberately hurt the film and actors, and write film industry articles with a pat on the chest is to contribute to the film industry. (Text/Ma Qingyun)