The film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" is currently in theaters until the 9th day, and the box office has just exceeded the 6 million mark, and the final box office is predicted to be 6.901 million. Although on a certain scoring platform, the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" only has a score of 3.5, compared with word of mouth, what makes the creators more anxious is that many viewers do not know that this movie has been released.
The drama version starring Zhao Liying posted a friendly call for the film version on Weibo, producer Tang Lijun posted a long post on Weibo about the origin of the film version, and director Zhang Chaoli publicly released an apology video on the 4th day of the film's release to apologize to the producer and team...... These are all efforts made by the filmmakers to let more audiences enter the cinema.
However, the same fate as IP, the drama version of "Flower Thousand Bone" was a hit drama in 2015, but now the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" is facing the dilemma of "red and black are wiped out".
After the success of the drama version, Tang Lijun has begun to do market research and script for the film version, and has also considered inviting the leading actors of the drama version to star, but by the time the preliminary preparations were completed, it was already 2017, and it was difficult to get the schedules of several leading actors at that time.
It wasn't until 2020 that Tang Lijun officially started the project with the idea of using movies to drive tourism in Guangxi, and chose to resume work and start a group during the epidemic, but difficulties followed.
First of all, after the start-up, the main investor withdrew its investment. Judging from public information, the first producer of the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" is Tang Lijun's new faction Culture Media Co., Ltd., and the producers are Shanghai Hanzhousi Cultural Development Co., Ltd. and Xinjiang Xinkasi Films, which are also companies controlled by the new faction. Tang Lijun revealed that the original main investor was a listed company, accounting for 30%-40% of the total share, but because of the epidemic, the investment was almost impossible to enter, and the crew of 600 people had started up at that time. In order to continue the project, Tang Lijun's company became the main investor, accounting for more than 50% of the share. And because there is no basic supporting facilities for film and television shooting in Guangxi, the cost of actual shooting has increased by 30%.
After entering the post-production stage, the crew encountered the collapse of the post-production company, which also delayed the release of the film originally planned for 2022 until 2024. Tang Lijun revealed that during the three-year epidemic, she watched the post-production special effects company change from a large office to a medium office, and then to a small office, and then even the company was gone, but some shots were still not completed, and the post-production visual effects director reorganized the team to complete the film, and the new team needed to run in, which also led to some shots in the movie not achieving the expected results.
This is not a smooth project, and it did not get the expected box office after its release, so it is inevitable that the main creator will feel that there is no return for the effort. But from the audience's point of view, the score of 3.5 points already shows the attitude.
Although some viewers rebuked the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" for its poor quality, it is difficult for us to say that this is a careless movie. After all, producer Tang Lijun is the main investor, and he has also equipped this film with a group of behind-the-scenes teams with experience in fantasy and magic film shooting, such as director Zhang Chaoli was the executive director of "Monster Hunt" and "Mermaid".
However, today's film market obviously does not rely on experience to achieve success, and the creators' perception of the market, audience, IP and genre films is still misaligned with the current environment. Entertainment Studio recently talked to producer Tang Lijun and director Zhang Chaoli, and reviewed and discussed with them what the problem of the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" is.
Was box office Waterloo an accident?
Entertainment Li: Why is the director willing to come out and release that apology video?
Zhang Chaoli: First of all, the producer's investor spent such a large amount of money on me to shoot and produce this film, but the box office on the first day of release was really unsatisfactory, as a director, I felt that I still lived up to the producer's trust, so I felt very guilty, and then I also felt that our team had worked hard for so long and had not been rewarded, so I came out to apologize, I came out to apologize, I was from the bottom of my heart.
In fact, I apologize because I hope that more viewers can pay attention to the news of the release of our movie, because I also noticed that because the pre-publicity is not very good, there are indeed many viewers who really don't know that our movie is there.
I also saw that many self-media only captured the first half of my video when reprinting it, and then many netizens commented that I should apologize to the audience. If the audience has really seen our movie, has an objective evaluation of our movie, and really feels that our movie is not worth this movie ticket, of course I should apologize to the audience.
Entertainment: You mentioned in the video that you were surprised by the box office results, and netizens are asking why you were surprised?
Zhang Chaoli: I must do my best to do a good job in this project, but if you want to say that I predict how much box office and market prospects this film will have, I really haven't considered it. If you care, you will look ahead and backward, and during the filming, you will definitely think about whether you change your fans to accept it or not, and whether it will affect the box office.
At the beginning, I was definitely confident, I think I have an excellent team, although "Flower Thousand Bone" is not easy to shoot, and then there are so many lost scenes, but I have participated in this genre as an executive director before, such as "Monster Hunt", in addition to my own experience in this area, my producer is Hong Kong's gold medal producer Li Jinwen, our director of photography is the director of photography of "Journey to the West, Three Dozen White Bone Spirits", and our art director is the art of "Asura" and "The Legend of Wukong", so we are familiar with this kind of theme.
Entertainment Theory: What is the producer's market prediction for "Flower Thousand Bone"?
Tang Lijun: I haven't thought about it, because this market is difficult to judge, and after the three years of the epidemic, the audience may think differently. The box office was indeed unexpected by us, and we are also thinking about what the reason is, and we are also summing up, how can there be such a big gap.
Entertainment Li: Before the movie was released, the audience who was really concerned about this film was saying that they felt that "Flower Thousand Bone" was "naked" and there was no big action in publicity, what did you think about the publicity at that time?
Tang Lijun: Actually, our marketing expenses are not particularly low, but I don't know why you didn't see it, so I'll go back and discuss it with the marketing team.
Entertainment Li: In recent years, most of the tome IP has been changed into movies, and the results are not very good, I see that some viewers commented that we as viewers know that such a film will not have too many viewers to watch, don't industry insiders know?
Chaoli Zhang: I can't say I don't know, but what surprised me was that there seemed to be fewer people than I thought I might see. Some people may not be interested, because after all, they have watched the drama version, and the drama version of Zhuyu is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, I thought that it might be compared, but we didn't expect to say that the audience was not interested in this theme at all, and they didn't enter the cinema at all, which I didn't expect. Of course, there are other versions of the same type of drama that are very successful, and then after being changed to a film version, the reputation may be very poor, but it is not so bad that no audience enters the cinema to watch it.
Entertainment said: From the director's answer, it can be seen that the creators are worried about the comparison between the movie version and the drama version of "Flower Thousand Bone" in advance, but in fact, the audience is discussing the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" and "Three Lives and Three Worlds Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms", "Zhu Xian", "Step by Step Horror" and other big IP movie versions at one level.
Although "Three Lives, Three Worlds, Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms" released in 2017 and "Zhuxian I" released in 2019 only scored 4 and 4.5 points on a scoring platform, they won 534 million and 405 million box office results respectively. This may have created a false impression that the creator would be able to sell such works.
But the box office success of both works was the result of the right time and place, the former was born in 2017, when hot money poured into the film and television industry and the market rose, and the latter showed the power of fan movies. The star effect plays a big role in this type of movie, and the quality is not enough for the stars to make up.
But "Flower Thousand Bone" filmed in 2020 was born in the cold winter of film and television, and did not eat the dividends of the times, nor did it invite top traffic stars to add points to the movie. By the time "Flower Thousand Bone" was released, this kind of movie had basically been declared dead by fans, and the failure of "Flower Thousand Bone" could be described as "a pre-publicized murder case".
Why did the actor choose this?
Entertainment: Those film versions with a poor reputation but a good box office are all traffic stars with heads. If you choose a very top actor, you can raise the magnitude of the whole project to a higher level, have you considered some more popular artists in the actors?
Zhang Chaoli: I also considered contacting, after all, our producer Li Jinwen was there, and she also helped us contact some male and female artists with traffic, but in the end, many of them retreated.
Entertainment: In the past, when you were an executive director, you needed to provide a plan for the director to choose, but this time as a director, you have to make a decision to make a choice.
Zhang Chaoli: I can't say that I didn't choose the right one, for example, the choice of actors, I think the Hua Qiangu in my mind is Dudu, first of all, our movie version and drama version, including the original novel, are very changed, and the character of Hua Qiangu in the movie version should not be a person who looks smart, very naïve, Silly Bai Tian, I don't think it's like that, because after all, she has suffered all kinds of worldly prejudices since she was a child, and she was born without a mother, and after she grew up with her father, her father also died when she left the village, I think if it is such a background, how can this child have a particularly innocent-looking face.
Entertainment Li: Chen Turin actually only rose last year, she is not as popular as this year in 2020, and the male protagonist is relatively new, why do the producers dare to use such a lineup?
Tang Lijun: She is very attentive, this girl is dedicated to her career, and she studies science and engineering, and she has to figure out the logic of all the plays. I could see her calm and steadfastness in her eyes, and I felt that it was quite close to Xiao Gu.
Including the male lead, now we accept some comments and even questions about our work from the outside, don't blame the director, blame these actors, if you want to blame me, because after all, I'm in charge of this project, so don't blame the actors and directors anymore. At the time of the premiere, some people would say something about the actors and directors, and they felt very uncomfortable when they heard it, but they were all very good, our leading actors, including the directors, were cheering each other on, and they were all saying that we would do a good job in the later release and promotion, and we would be able to increase some box office, and everyone was doing it.
I think Li Chengbin's performance is online throughout the whole process, and the sense of hierarchy is also very clear. He also won a Golden Bell Award last year, he is an actor from Taiwan, China, but he has no accent in Mandarin at all, and we specially found a line teacher for this play. His own personality is in contrast to Bai Zihua, in order to get close to this character, he eats vegetarian, chants, meditates, etc., and he is not only the first to enter the group, but also the last to leave the group.
Entertainment: The director just mentioned the change of the hostess Hua Qiangu, why is there such a change? Because fans of the original book or drama may not accept it.
Zhang Chaoli: The amount of the original work is too large, and it is too difficult to tell the story clearly within 90 minutes, so a lot of deletions must be made, and if you want to restore the original work, you can shoot 10 films. Then I found that the audience's favorite points of the original book, everyone is different, and the characters they want to keep are also different. For the audience of the drama version, the drama version has long been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, why should I shoot an exact same story, right? That's why I made a bold change, that is, the theme is more focused on the transformation and growth of Hua Qiangu, how she went from being slandered and belittled by the world, to living her true self, and finally choosing to sacrifice herself to become the whole world. In addition to this, some changes have also been made to the characters in the original book, and a suspense line has been added, and the promoter behind the scenes is actually not in the original book.
Entertainment: What kind of feeling do you want to be a big heroine, and what kind of growth line do you want to be?
Zhang Chaoli: Hua Qiangu was originally disliked by the world, because she herself had a demon god physique, and was mistaken for a demon girl by the villagers, so she has not lived a normal life since she was a child. I think this type of girl can actually be brought into the kind of emotion of Hua Qiangu and be able to empathize with her.
Entertainment Li: Did you make any adaptations of the characters painted by Bai Zi?
Zhang Chaoli: Actually, I think that if Bai Zihua is played, Cheng Bin doesn't have more room to play, because after all, the whole play is still about the heroine, for example, when Zhu Xiantai Hua Qiangu was tortured, Bai Zihua knew that she was detoxifying for him, so he went to collect all the artifacts to save him, why did you still punish others? I think this person is very excessive, it's very scummy, it's actually a very hurtful thing, but it can't be helped, your story has developed to that point, you have to tell this thing, and then you find that what he said is not right, he admits it is not right, he does not admit it is not right. Actually, I think I didn't have too much solidity when I was making the script, so I had these problems.
Entertainment said: "Three Lives, Three Worlds, Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms", "Why Sheng Xiaomo" and other IP drama versions and film versions are all starring head stars, actors of the same IP are often compared together, and the actors in the film version are often not pleased, and over time, it is also an expected choice for the head stars to retreat from the film version IP.
Betting on rookie actors may be the best solution for investors, and the lucky "Zhuxian I" bet on Xiao Zhan right that year. In 2023, Chen Duling's popularity will soar, and the crew has already borrowed the east wind, and Chen Duling's drama of switching from a small white flower to a villain has been affirmed, and "Flower Thousand Bone" has also continued to amplify her advantage. The male protagonist Li Chengbin emerged in the mainland as early as the period of "July and Ansheng", but unfortunately it has not become popular for so many years and has not become a plus point for this movie.
From the perspective of creative logic, the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" focuses on the heroine. However, it is impossible to have a big heroine who is beautiful alone and everyone else is a tool person, and the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" even has limited space for the male protagonist Bai Zihua to play, losing the wonderful rivalry and character relationship, the so-called big heroine can only be a false proposition.
What exactly is the focus of the adaptation?
Entertainment: I haven't watched the original audience, if I only watch the movie, I think the relationship between the male and female protagonists lacks foreshadowing, and I suddenly fell in love, in fact, for this kind of costume IP audience, I especially like to watch the emotional line of the male and female protagonists, so what did you think about the love line at that time?
Zhang Chaoli: You haven't read the original book, so I think your evaluation is actually more objective, if you don't get the emotional line of the male and female protagonists in our current movie version, I think I should indeed apologize to the audience, or I didn't tell this story well in a limited time, I think the main reason is that the amount of material is too large, and the trade-off is actually quite difficult.
Entertainment Li: Yes, the success of the drama version is also due to the fact that there is a long space to pave the relationship between the two people. There are also two very intense kiss scenes in the movie version, and I said "don't" in the movie theater when the foreshadowing was not enough.
Zhang Chaoli: I think it may be because we deleted some scenes, the bloody kiss scene, originally because Bai Zihua was poisonous, he has bloodthirsty characteristics, he hugged Hua Qiangu, after sucking blood, because Hua Qiangu was so painful that he bit his lips, Bai Zihua actually went to suck blood after seeing blood, so there was a kiss scene.
Entertainment Li: I just mentioned the deleted scenes, but in fact, the length of the film is only 97 minutes, and I think there are a lot of things that can be richer.
Zhang Chaoli: My roughest cut version should be more than 130 minutes. I also noticed that the most commented by the audience was actually how could Kill Qianmo be killed by Ni Mantian, in our rough cut version, it was actually Ni Mantian in order to take revenge, she first went back to practice kung fu hard, waiting for the opportunity, and then got the help of the fake Immortal King, so her skills will improve by leaps and bounds. Kill Qianmo died because he couldn't win the battle with Bai Zihua for a long time, in order to save Xiaogu, he used the power of the demon god in the air, our setting is that the power of the demon god is suspended in the air, and when he uses the power of the demon god, he was counterattacked, so he will be injured, and he will be successfully attacked by Ni Mantian. When the cut was set, these were deleted because of the length.
There is a more important reason that if we show this scene so completely, it actually reduces the personality charm of Baizihua, and we feel that Baizihua is too scummy. So it seems so strange now, and here I should apologize to the audience for not handling this bug well.
The other one is indeed too long in the air, and the scene on Zhuxian Tai is very long, plus such a long fight scene, it will be visually fatigued, and in the end, I really can't bear to cut my love and delete that scene, and it will become fragmented.
Entertainment Li: At the premiere, you introduced that you had been filming the scene where the disciples of Changliu were playing ball for almost three weeks, and you were still not satisfied and wanted to continue filming. But my feeling as an audience is that taking out this scene will not have any impact on the overall plot, and I personally think that I have put too much energy on some side matters, or some so-called big scenes, but ignored the emotional scenes of the male and female protagonists, which is also some of my thoughts when I review this project now.
Zhang Chaoli: Actually, it's a question of the positioning of our story, should we tell a love story, or should we add elements of magical action? If it's pure love, I'm worried that the audience won't seem to be too interested in the love in this kind of costume fantasy story, so that it doesn't look so boring, so I want to add some action.
Entertainment: At this stage, when reviewing the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone", what does the director think?
Zhang Chaoli: First of all, the positioning of the whole story, whether you want to talk about a love-based or action special effects-based. If we clearly want a love story, then we must find a way to make the script solid and do a good job of foreshadowing the emotions of the characters, so as not to say that the audience can't understand it in the cinema now, because it feels that the foreshadowing is not enough, and it feels that the emotions of the two people are very abrupt, and it has not developed to that point and then you kiss.
Entertainment said: The biggest difficulty in adapting a novel like "Flower Thousand Bone" into a movie is how to delete the complicated and simplify and tell a story on the basis of the original work.
Judging from the finished film, the biggest shortcoming of the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" is the script. The crew is equipped with teams with experience in magic and fantasy films in terms of art, photography, editing and other technical jobs, but in terms of scripts, there is no successful precedent before, and there is no successful experience to learn from. If the script fails, it is difficult for other departments to raise the average score.
How to do the script, the first thing to consider is the positioning, and the positioning of the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" is misaligned with the audience's needs from the beginning.
Producer Tang Lijun mentioned that the fighting scenes of movies such as "Monkey King Three Fights the White Bone Spirit" that the director of photography participated in before were very outstanding, and the film was relatively small compared to the movie, which also gave the crew enough time to film, so she hoped to present more fighting scenes to the audience in the movie version.
At the premiere and in the communication with us, the director and producer took the initiative to mention an action scene in the film that was jokingly called "Quidditch for a long time" by the audience, although it was only cut out for one minute, but this drama team filmed seriously for more than two weeks, and the crew shared this behind-the-scenes story in the hope that everyone could feel their intentions.
But is it really flattering? Costume fairy tale dramas have made the audience have long seen enough special effects to fight each other, martial arts films in the film field have long been in decline, and Hong Kong-made action movies have also made the public aesthetically fatigued, the so-called action scenes are not new, and the audience will not be high for this.
Ten years ago, a number of magic films such as "Zhong Kui Fu Demon" could still occupy the market, because the audience's imagination had just been opened at that time, but after ten years of market cultivation, the audience has seen a lot of knowledge, and it is no longer possible to please the audience only by scenes and special effects. In the final analysis, it is still necessary to rely on a solid script and a logical plot to attract the audience.
Some viewers commented that the film version of "Flower Thousand Bone" is very similar to a product of the previous era, indeed, after the word-of-mouth failures of most IP-based movies one after another, few people are willing to make this type of movie anymore.
Can a novel like "Flower Thousand Bone" still be made into a movie version?
Director Zhang Chaoli said that he had reservations about this, "I can't say for sure that it can't, maybe some directors can, but it must not be so easy." ”
Tang Lijun believes, "In the track of mainstream commercial films, magic and fantasy are the main genres, but how to combine Chinese Xianxia dramas and Xianxia novel adaptations with fantasy, I think it is a new topic and it is worth thinking about. ”
In the view of the entertainment studio, the transformation of a tome novel into a movie is bound to have to be accompanied by an outline, or it can only be changed by borrowing the relationship between the characters, which is a thankless choice. Some IPs are destined to be more suitable for the presentation of drama forms, and there is no need to forcibly open up the entire industry chain.
Many online IP IPs have indeed successfully told good stories, created characters, and gained a large number of fans, but it does not mean that these IPs have high literary value and are worthy of being adapted again and again.
Creators always remake IP, and it is also a lazy choice after the creativity is exhausted. Nowadays, there have been many remakes and adaptations in the film field, instead of spending energy on how to adapt these online IPs, it is better to write original scripts, and the audience always wants new ideas.