The Chinese film market in 2023 has shown a trend of recovery and growth, with the box office exceeding 50 billion yuan in just 317 days, which is the first time in recent years that the Chinese film box office has returned to a high of 50 billion yuan. Among them, there are heavy industry head films and small and medium-sized costs as a "waist power" to work together, especially "Space Exploration Editorial Department", "In the Octagonal Cage", "All or Nothing", "Disappearing Her", "Mistakes by the River" and other diversified and innovative small and medium-cost films with unique styles have frequently broken the circle, successfully attracting audiences into the theater, and repeatedly setting off a movie-watching boom, "spending the least amount of money and making high-quality movies" has also become the consensus of filmmakers.
Small- and medium-budget films frequently hit high box offices
"A small and medium-budget movie, whether it is the form, the subject matter, the narrative method or the performance, must have the extreme, so that people will be willing to spend money to travel so far to the cinema to watch your movie. When it comes to film creation, Yin Hong, vice chairman of the China Film Association, professor of Tsinghua University, and chairman of the Theoretical Review Committee of the China Film Association, believes that small and medium-cost films must create a reason for the audience to watch movies and provide "cinematics".
In 2023, a gratifying phenomenon is that small and medium-budget films attract audiences to theaters. Taking the summer file as an example, the summer file in 2023 has become the "strongest in history" summer file with a box office score of 20.6 billion, and films such as "All or Nothing", "Disappearing Her", and "In the Octagon Cage", "Warm", "Tea Ah No. 2 Middle School" and other films with a box office of 3.847 billion and 3.523 billion respectively, are all small and medium-cost films. With these works blooming, 52.7% of the audience in the summer season walked into the cinema for the first time this year, a significant increase from 44.6% in 2019. Due to the frequent explosion of summer files, low-frequency audiences have been pulled back into the cinema, and the proportion of new movies is more than 10%, which is of far-reaching significance for the sustainable and healthy development of the Chinese film market.
Small and medium-cost films can also give birth to "phenomenal" works, for example, released in April this year, known as the god film "Cosmic Exploration Editorial Department", this work directed by Kong Dashan has a pseudo-documentary + soft science fiction style, as if "the romance of the universe is woven into an absurd dream", and the image of a seemingly whimsical but self-made and self-conscious editor-in-chief who is extremely keen on exploring aliens is presented to the audience, so that the audience and editor-in-chief Tang and other eccentrics excitedly embark on a brain journey of "looking for aliens". Thigh bones, aluminum pots, sparrows, donkeys, stone lions...... Various down-to-earth elements are endowed with a unique sci-fi temperament, creating this unique and curious sci-fi comedy, and the film has also received high word-of-mouth reviews among fans.
also detonated the "brainstorming" of the whole network, as well as "Mistakes by the River" directed by Wei Shujun, who successfully adapted the original work "Mistakes by the River" by writer Yu Hua to the screen. The film is not a crime investigation film in the traditional sense, but a pioneering, stream-of-consciousness, leading the audience from the riverside murder case to the unsolvable and forever solving the ultimate mystery. The box office of the film exceeded 300 million yuan, and the unpopular literary film became a hot hit.
Present the edge of young directors
"A talented director must have a way to surprise you in the plan. Director Xu Zheng's "Thai Embarrassment" once won a box office of 1.27 billion yuan at a cost of 14 million yuan, and he believes that the thinking of the creators of small and medium-cost films is very important, after all, "small and big" is not a hard hit, but to highlight their own edge, so that the film can successfully attract the audience.
In 2023, many newcomers to film stand out with new works, adding vitality to the film market, such as "Disappearing Her", "All or Nothing", "Second-hand Masterpiece", "Parrot Killing" and other films are all from young directors, and fortunately, these young directors are supported by mature and intelligent "weird filmmakers".
If you want to say that there are filmmakers with ideas in the film industry, Chen Sicheng is one. He served as the producer and screenwriter, and "Disappearing Her" directed by Cui Rui and Liu Xiang has a strong viewing value, which has made this year's summer file a "good start". In terms of form, the film makes many viewers have a desire to get a glimpse of the truth through the puzzle settings of reversal, reversal, and reverse, and the setting of marital emotional and social issues makes the work not shallow, and the participation and resonance make the box office continue to increase. Although there are some flaws, "She Who Disappeared" is innovative in both audio-visual and genre narratives, opening up the facets of life and presenting the complexity of human nature and marriage, thus opening up the topicality and discussable space of the film, and achieving the resonance of social psychology and reality.
Ning Hao, another talented director in the film industry, once "turned stones into gold" with "Crazy Stone" in 2006, illuminating the low-cost film market in China at that time. Today, Ning Hao continues to rely on his smart mind to lead his Bad Monkey Pictures to create miracles repeatedly. As a producer, he joined hands with young directors to bid for the Olympics and Wang Zizhao to create "All or Nothing" and "Second-hand Masterpiece" respectively, which have injected considerable heat into the 2023 film market.
"All or Nothing" is based on tens of thousands of real fraud cases across the country, and many characters in the film have real character prototypes, revealing the truth of overseas fraud in a panoramic way, so that the audience can intuitively feel the darkness and cruelty of fraud behind the news report. In the stylized "Second-hand Masterpiece", director Wang Zizhao's humorous talent has been vividly brought into play, and the golden sentences in the film appear frequently, laughing all the way, showing the madness of middle-aged people who have reached the top in fame and fortune, and there is a sharpness that pierces the heart.
Director Wei Shujun has two works released this year, in addition to "The Mistake by the River", and "Yong'an Town Story Collection" was released in September this year, the film with the director's usual witty humor and ridicule, condensed all the essence in the small Yong'an Town, just like a pebble thrown into the bottom of the lake will set off ripples, but finally return to the bland, everyone keeps struggling in life, but compromises again and again. "Nothing will happen in Yong'an Town" is what the film has been emphasizing, but that is only a superficial calm, and everyone's hearts are gradually accumulating. As director Jia Zhangke commented: "The contemporary feelings that are difficult to describe in one word, Wei Shujun used three stories to tell it clearly, and it is particularly humorous." ”
Civilian stories and realistic themes have attracted attention
At that time, "Crazy Stone" created a box office of 23.5 million yuan with a production cost of 3.5 million yuan, and the biggest inspiration of the "stone effect" it showed to domestic films is to abandon luxury packaging, and use images to honestly tell civilian stories to the audience, presenting a vivid sense of life. And this experience was implemented by Wang Baoqiang into his new film "In the Octagonal Cage", which achieved a box office success of 2.207 billion.
"In the Octagon Cage" has no gimmick publicity, no big production, no gorgeous special effects, and no big stars, but it still has received a response from the market and word-of-mouth. This is Wang Baoqiang's second directorial work, the film shows the little people in a realistic context, tells the story of the children of Dashan who play a way out by practicing Xi boxing, and perfectly combines realistic care with action elements. In the film, elements such as the rolling mountains, twists and turns of the mountain roads, and the simple sand fields that are difficult to get out of bring the audience a rough texture of life. Wang Baoqiang said that this film was shot for ordinary people, and he hoped to show the appearance of real ordinary people, and the audience also felt the sincerity in the creation of the film and established an emotional connection with the film.
Realistic movies that also pursue profundity and a sense of the times include "All or Nothing", "Dad" and so on. The director said that the real massive information in "All or Nothing" was obtained through interviews with relevant victims, survivors who successfully escaped and returned to China after being kidnapped, and public security officers who fought on the front line of anti-fraud, in addition to a large number of news reports written by investigative journalists. The director of "Learning Dad" Su Liang takes the father-son contradiction of "young to young" as the starting point, focusing on the most popular practical issues such as "involution and lying flat" and "anxiety and reconciliation", and shows a typical Chinese family appearance through several groups of families represented by Lei Dali and Lei Xiaomi's father and son, while discussing the family relationship and individual growth in modern society, it also wraps the core of healing and reconciliation under the shell of reality, trying to find answers in the predicament. Due to its deep understanding of the daily mentality of Chinese parents, the film has gained a high level of attention, and the box office has gradually climbed, reaching 617 million yuan.
Small- and medium-budget films are promising testing grounds
The "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of Chinese Films" released in 2021 mentions in the goals to be achieved in film development that about 50 domestic films with an annual box office of more than 100 million yuan should be reached. To achieve this goal, it is not enough to rely on large-scale super-head films, but a considerable number of high-quality, diversified and small-budget films.
In recent years, the Chinese film market has evolved from a pyramid structure supported by one or two films to a more stable structure. Simple, large-scale productions that rely on film special effects can no longer fully meet the aesthetic and emotional needs of the public, and small and medium-budget films that can provide more emotional value have become a force to be reckoned with.
In 2023, many excellent small and medium-budget films are demonstrating the creativity of creators in all aspects and have gained a good reputation. For example, "The Light of the White Tower" directed by Zhang Lu, "I Love Dunhuang" directed by Miao Yue, "One and Four" directed by Jiumei Chenglie, "A Thousand Miles to Send Cranes" directed by Lahuajia, "Keep You Safe" directed by Dapeng, "Moonlight Samurai" directed by Hong Ying, and the animated film "Tea Ah No. 2 Middle School" and other works all show more possibilities for movies.
Although many small and medium-budget films are still at a disadvantage in terms of publicity, they have left a deep impression on the audience. Just like Du Qingchun, an associate professor of the Department of Literature at Beijing Film Academy, said, it is unlikely to expect small and medium-cost films to create box office miracles, but there is still a chance to create surprises.
The creators of small and medium-budget films are relying on their love for movies and doing their best to explore the way to survive, trying to reverse the "two-eight division" phenomenon in which 20% of high-cost films account for more than 80% of the box office. For example, Zeng Wusen, the director of "Narrow Road "Box" Encounter, made a promise to "refund the ticket if it doesn't look good", and even developed a small program for the audience to refund the ticket; They may not have achieved corresponding success, but they are providing valuable experience for Chinese films to explore the future.
The National Film Work Conference held in May 2023 put forward the goal of doing a good job in weekend files and forming market differentiation, which is also helping small and medium-cost films to further open up space. Rao Shuguang, president of the China Film Critics Society, said: "We hope that more small and medium-cost films can occupy the weekend file, because the consumption of movies or people's Xi of watching movies has the most direct relationship with the holiday, and if the weekend file can be made, the development space of Chinese films will be opened." ”
Rao Shuguang said that small and medium-cost films, as the "base" of the film ecology, are not only the "main battlefield" for young creators, but also the "experimental field" for genre and technological innovation. Only by increasing the support and guarantee for the creation of small and medium-cost films can we continue to deliver productivity and creativity to commercial blockbusters, and "cultivate the thickness of the box office soil of Chinese film audiences".
In 2023, we can already see the vitality of many small and medium-cost films, which are adding a hundred flowers to Chinese films and further activating the vitality of the film market.
Text/Beijing Youth Daily reporter Xiao Yang
Editor/Cui Wei