Behind the record-breaking record of "Journey to the Bell Bud", who decided the box office of the Japanese manga IP?

Author | Madman one

It was released in 12 days and the box office was 586 million.

This is the "victory" of "Journey to the Bell Buds" in the mainland as of press time, breaking another film "Your Name" by Makoto Shinkai. holds the box office record of Japanese animation in Chinese film history. According to Maoyan Pro, its predicted box office rose from 647 million to 733 million.

On March 17, the premiere of the film was held at the Centennial Lecture Hall of Peking University, and Xinhai Makoto himself also came to the scene, and the ticket of 20 yuan was speculated to 800 yuan.

Some people may think that the increase in this ticket price is slightly exaggerated, but behind this, it actually shows that the popularity of Japanese animation in China is also changing. During the Beijing Film Festival in 2022, the premiere ticket of "The Sea King: Red-Haired Singer" with the original price of 80 yuan was auctioned for 10,000 yuan on Xianyu, and when "The Sea King: Golden City" was first introduced into China, the screening ticket was only 200-300 yuan under the "shouting" of scalpers.

This change is also reflected in the box office of the released films.

After combing, Fugujun found the following two phenomena.

First, the turning point occurred in 2016. In January 2010, "Detective Conan: Dark Tracker" was released, which was also the first time in China to introduce the IP theatrical version of "Detective Conan", with a box office of only 9 million. Until 2016, Your Name. 's box office of 575 million set a new record in Chinese film history for Japanese animation, in addition, "The Golden City of the Sea King", "Naruto Theatrical Version: Boruto" and "Doraemon: New Nobita's Japan" released in the same year also exceeded 100 million at the box office.

Second, Makoto Shinkai and Hayao Miyazaki's works "divided" the top few places in the box office list, in addition to Makoto Shinkai, Miyazaki's works also occupy a lot of seats in the introduction list: "My Neighbor Totoro", "Spirited Away", "Ponyo on the Cliff", "Sky City", of which "Spirited Away" ranked third at the box office. Followed by the theatrical versions of IPs such as "Doraemon", "Detective Conan" and "One Piece", the box office is between 100 million and 300 million.

From this point of view, the box office performance of Japanese animated films after their release in the mainland is also different IPs, what is the reason behind this?

Why are Makoto Shinkai and Hayao Miyazaki selling well?

There are many factors that determine the fate of a film: schedule, subject matter, publicity strategy, etc., but for Japanese animation, the most obvious difference is the inherent audience. The inherent audience is affected by many factors, such as the influence of IP in the mainland under the influence of the length of introduction.

Taking Makoto Shinkai as an example, before "Suzubud Journey", the first time his work met Chinese audiences can be traced back to "The Garden of Words" in 2013, and it was this anime that made Makoto Shinkai popular all over Asia overnight.

In May of that year, LeTV simultaneously introduced "The Garden of Words", and the audience only needed to spend 5 yuan to watch Shinkai Makoto's new work, and also had the opportunity to win the original DVD and other peripherals, and the number of hits exceeded 100,000. Immediately afterwards, Xinhai Cheng came to Shanghai in July to sign sales, adopted a limited release strategy, and 200 sets of "Blu-ray + tickets" were snatched up within minutes.

Chinese fans want to see Xinhai Makoto, it turned out to be so difficult back then. Although "The Garden of Words" did not enter the theaters, it laid the groundwork for its subsequent works to sing all the way in China.

At the same time, this also allows the genuine distributors of the theater line to see the business opportunities and basic operation rules of introducing Japanese animated films. So, "Your Name. "Children of the Weather" naturally entered everyone's field of vision. Last month, the premiere of "Journey to the Bell Bud" was held in the Centennial Lecture Hall of Peking University, and the 20 yuan ticket was speculated to thousands of yuan, and the east gate of Peking University was crowded, mixed with the sound of scalpers shouting. Pre-sales exceeded 100 million, and the box office in the first weekend exceeded 300 million, which is inextricably linked to every timely introduction and ingenuity of the director's work.

Secondly, the marketing strategy of Shinkai Makoto's works is clear. For example, looking back at the publicity process of each film, the film side first used the combination of students and core fans to create momentum, which expanded to the audience of passers-by. "Your name. " and "Weather Child" were both held at Communication University, while "Journey to Lingya" chose Peking University.

According to insiders, the film has been widely collected from the audience to adjust the publicity strategy through multiple pre-screenings and user research, and finally positioned the actual audience at the student group. To this end, Road Painting contacted hundreds of movie-watching groups across the country in advance to watch movies in advance, and the requirement for these viewing groups was to recruit only college students and middle school students. This time, the publicity accurately found the crowd to attack accurately, which contributed to the initial round of word-of-mouth explosion.

When the previous "My Neighbor Totoro" and "Spirited Away" were released, they also carried out accurate crowd positioning during the announcement. According to the person in charge of a viewing group, the film party of "My Neighbor Totoro" found them to do real word-of-mouth, especially requested to do parent-child themed activities, and they found a series of parent-child activities in an elementary school at that time, allowing many parents to take their children into the cinema.

In addition, the subsequent brand linkage has also formed a blessing to a certain extent. "Journey to the Bell Buds" co-produced with the film collection card and movie collection card, the pre-sale score of 600 is more than ten times that of other products in this niche hobby circle. Not to be left behind in terms of physical publications, Kadokawa Pictures' joint venture in the mainland, Tianwen Kadokawa, launched the novel "Suzuya Journey", which has sold more than 100,000 copies on JD.com.

The cooperation with Nai Xue is a model of cross-border marketing, integrating the film into the milk tea that urban office workers must order every day. On the day of the event, there was a long queue at the door of Naixue in Beijing Huamao store, and the cooperative milk tea was sold out in less than two hours. Blowfish-kun also went to the scene to experience it that day, and it was a bit like queuing up to buy Heytea.

On the whole, the success of "Lingbud Journey" is the result of accurate positioning and joint efforts of multiple parties under the premise of timely introduction. And the phenomenal hot boom formed by Makoto Shinkai and Hayao Miyazaki needs the right time and place. If the time is too early, the concept of consumption is immature, if it is too late, it will usher in the proliferation of piracy, and if even the core group cannot grasp it, it will be difficult to arouse the interest of peripheral audiences.

Blood Rush Stops 200 Million: Long-term absence, difficulty in collaboration

In contrast, the theatrical versions of "Sea King" and "Naruto" performed much less.

In fact, "The Sea King" started broadcasting in Japan only three years later than "Detective Conan", but it was introduced to the mainland much later - it was introduced by Star TV in 2006, but Star Satellite TV's ratings range is very narrow, only landing in three-star hotels, foreign-related communities and some colleges and universities, until July 2010, "One Piece" officially renamed "Voyager King" was broadcast on iQiyi, this day has passed more than ten years since the broadcast in Japan, and there is no absence caused by synchronous introduction, It is equivalent to losing the opportunity to cultivate audiences for a long time in China, which will deal a great blow to the box office of the theatrical version. This is determined by the strong correlation between the plot of the Japanese manga and the theatrical version. Therefore, a big IP that swept thousands of armies in Japan and could even break Miyazaki's "Spirited Away" record has always been tepid, and the box office ceiling is only 204 million.

The second is the coordination of IP itself. In Japan, each theatrical version will be released at the same time as a new model play figure, and in the drama, advertisements for the theatrical version will also be implanted, and even joint road shows will be held. Japanese manga copyright holder Kadokawa Eiki will do activities for big IP comics, which is already commonplace in the Japanese comic industry. Most of the success of "Suzuya Journey" is also the result of Kadokawa Pictures' joint venture in China acting synchronously, which is equivalent to a direct push from the Japanese side.

But this is difficult to achieve in China, taking "The Sea King: Golden City" released in 2016 as an example, this work was introduced by Maple Pictures, which is the first time that a mainland company has tried to bring this IP to the big screen. It is understood that the copyright of the IP in the mainland was sold to three companies, Fenghai Film holds the copyright of the theatrical version, the copyright of the comic version belongs to Hangzhou Flip Animation Company, and the fan version is owned by iQiyi.

Under such circumstances, it is difficult to emulate the Japanese way of operation. According to insiders, generally speaking, coordination on this scale needs to reach agreement on big interests, that is, both sides have plans to make large investments at this point in time. But in fact, they are separated, so it is difficult to move in unison.

There is also the issue of censorship. Hangzhou Flip Animation Art Company has previously introduced that the requirements of the General Administration of Press and Publication for comics include "the tip of the knife cannot be too sharp" and "blood cannot exceed three drops", and "The Sea King: Golden City" is a theatrical version to go to the theater, which is more stringent, not only "the tip of the knife cannot be too sharp", even the shape of the knife must be changed, and the low-cut clothes of female characters must also be "pulled" up. An avid fan once said at the premiere scene, "If I were to watch the abridged version, I would rather watch the pirated version". These contradictions will affect the box office after the introduction of genuine to a certain extent.

The introduction of these teenagers' enthusiastic comics is favorable at the right time and place, resulting in their share of the Chinese mainland market far less than that of Hong Kong and Taiwan (here we only look at the share and not the total box office figures). The mainland will also introduce "EVA: The End" this year, I wonder what kind of work will be cut into with the scale of this work? Fate seems to be preordained.

To some extent, the success of "Lingbud Journey" shows the commonality of East Asian culture, and the timely introduction and multi-faceted cross-border cooperation of marketing are basically applicable in East Asian cultural circles. This year, mainland audiences will also welcome "Slam Dunk", "Sky City", "Eva: The End" and other films are also waiting in line for release, these theatrical versions of animation have achieved a lot of results in Japan and other parts of East Asia, the successful experience of "Suzuya Journey" is valuable for these films, and I hope that the introduction of Japanese comics in the future can be learned.