Wen 丨 Ala Ping, Naranze Self-media Editorial Department
It is hard to believe that the movie "Surging Crowds" co-starring Andy Lau, the superstar Officio Lau, the powerful actor Xiao Yang and the popular Wan Qian, lost in the fierce battle in the Spring Festival film market, completely losing to "Detective Chinatown 3" and the dark horse movie "Hello, Li Huanying".
But what is even more surprising is that "Surging Crowds" once did not even compare with the release of "Samurai Shodown", which was much worse than the lowest-key "New Year goods" "Bear Haunting" every year, and once ranked at the bottom of the box office.
During the Spring Festival, the box office of "Surging Crowds" was only 151 million yuan, ranking at the end of the seven released movies.
However, this does not mean that the quality of "Crowded" is not good. On the contrary, this work of Andy Lau, Xiao Yang and Wan Qian is quite good, with a Douban score of 7.1 points, a praise rate of 54%, and a bad rating rate of only 8.9%, which is completely worth a higher box office performance.
<h1>Interesting story and mature adaptation</h1>
"The Crowd" is adapted from the Japanese film "The Way to Steal the Key". In the original, the cold-blooded killer and the fallen dragon set actor swapped identities in the bathhouse for "soap slipping people".
The dragon set actor spends wildly under the guise of being a killer and falls in love with the woman he was commissioned to kill. The killer lives in the dilapidated rental house of the actor of the dragon set because of his memory loss, and unexpectedly gets a new life. The two people exchanged identities, but because of the difference in worldview and outlook on life, they developed a new life line and led to a series of ridiculous plots.
"The Way to Steal the Key" has a very good reputation, and with its imaginative creativity and the comparison of values integrated into life thinking, the film has won important film awards in Japan such as the Japan Blue Ribbon Award and the Japan Academy Award.
Although it is an original adaptation, "Surging Crowds" is not copied in its entirety, but has undergone a substantial localization adaptation to make the film more grounded.
Andy Lau's killer Zhou Quan and Xiao Yang's dragon set Chen Xiaomeng are still two opposing roles, but Rao Xiaozhi has made the hottest midlife crisis, dreams and reality, and self-worth exploration more dramatically prominent. Andy Lau and Xiao Yang have a bright line and a dark line, but under the new identity life, they once again come out of a different path.
The positive And Energetic Zhou Quan worked hard for the dream of the arranged actor, and finally played from the dragon set to the big role, which was the reward given by Rao Xiaozhi. Chen Xiaomeng, who had received a windfall from heaven, proudly wanted to pretend to be an excellent actor in front of Andy Lau, but was ruthlessly exposed by Zhou Quan that he did not learn any skills, and Ye Gonghaolong, who had hardly read more than ten pages on the bookshelf.
As a reward, the emotional line between Andy Lau and Wan Qian finally blossomed, and the elderly and single mother cultivated positive results. As a punishment, Xiao Yang, who took people's money and money to make others angry, was finally cheated out of money by the fraudsters and was alone.
Although at the end of the film, Andy Lau, Xiao Yang, and Wan Qian have completed their reconciliation with themselves and others, their thinking about dreams, reality, diligence, talent, and responsibility is touching.
<h1>Great performances and dedication</h1>
The cast of "Surging Crowds" is luxurious, and its appeal is actually not inferior to other works in the same period.
"Bomb Disposal Expert 2" starring Andy Lau and Liu Qingyun is still in theaters and has also won more than 1.2 billion yuan at the box office. As an ageless male god, Andy Lau, born in 1961, is now nearly sixty years old, but he is still struggling in the front line of the movie, with a large number of fans and high popularity.
I don't know when, in addition to the films that return human feelings, Andy Lau's works have been difficult to see bad films, but they have repeatedly presented good works. Too far away "Dark War", "Infernal Affairs", "Sister Peach" do not mention, in recent years, "Chasing the Dragon", "Blood Choir", "Bomb Disposal Expert 2" are all works of word of mouth.
Back in "The Crowd", Andy Lau's performance is still wonderful. He and Xiao Yang taught the drama in the luxurious apartment, and every action, look, and even let the audience learn how to act.
Andy Lau wearing a bathrobe, naked in the bathhouse was photographed thoroughly, which is a long-lost scale-breaking performance for the 60-year-old.
Another lead actor, Xiao Yang, would still be classified as a bad actor if it were not for "Manslaughter". Although he also starred in the "Detective Chinatown" series, the pompous performance that responded to the needs of the plot still had no way to justify himself. What's more, the works such as "Old Boy's Raptor Crossing the River" and "Weather Pre-explosion" launched before and after it are difficult to say. If you have to label Xiao Yang, I am afraid it is still the brainwashing magic song "Little Apple".
But in "Manslaughter", Xiao Yang has a wonderful interpretation of the wisdom and cunning of the low-level small people, and his strong composure in the face of the police does not float on the surface, but allows the audience to fully feel the waves in his heart.
In "The Crowd", Xiao Yang once again added a unique understanding of such small people. In addition to the scene where the villain wins the hero makes people want to beat him, Xiao Yang's solo on the end stage is very exciting. Xiao Yang, who plays a perverted killer, licks the blood and fights with Huang Xiaolei, but the inner panic and the pretense on his face can all be felt by the audience.
In order to better shape the role, Andy Lau and Xiao Yang in "The Crowd" also slapped each other. Judging from the tidbits flowing out of the set, the two are really slapping each other. It is said that after this scene, Xiao Yang's face was swollen, and Andy Lau was almost slapped down by Xiao Yang.
Huang Xiaolei, the actor who plays Hui Jie, also cut off her long hair neatly, just to make the image of the character more vivid. Pretending to be Interpol, Andy Lau was exposed in the hot pot restaurant, and Huang Xiaolei's psychological state of being caught and then reversed after being caught was wonderful.
And Liu Tianzuo, as always, played his mixed style of appearance. And Andy Lau pretended to play in the hot pot restaurant and then returned drunk, and joined hands with Andy Lau and Huang Xiaolei to dedicate the biggest dramatic highlight of the film.
As the heroine of this film, Wan Qian's performance can only be regarded as decent. "Surging Crowds" gives Wan Qian a lot of room to perform.
Among them, the clip of Wan Qian pretending to be drunk on the balcony still feels unbelievable. And the end of the film to return to the symbiosis with Andy Lau, even with a strong background music rendering, it still makes people feel a little too strong and superficial. But overall, Wan Qian is not disappointing, and she is still much better than the vase-style actor.
Other guest performances such as Lei Jiayin, Guo Fan, Lu Yang and others also completed their roles well.
<h1>Regretful publicity and spontaneous water army</h1>
I don't know how many times the issue of "Surging Crowds" has been mentioned. This movie is said to have a total publicity budget of 10 million yuan, which is naturally far from being inferior compared to the two top works of the Spring Festival file, "Hello, Li Huanying" and "Tang Detective 3", but it should definitely not be inferior to "Samurai Order" and "Nezha Rebirth".
"Surging Crowds" at the end of the net row on the first day of the Spring Festival file, the first four days also fell to 2.8%, this pot of publicity is not back, I am afraid there is no reason.
Half a month before the Spring Festival, Andy Lau's exposure can be described as the scale of the mountain and the tsunami. on the day of Chinese New Year's Eve, and The topic of Andy Lau's remote participation in the Spring Festival Gala has also become a hot spot for the audience. However, such a large-scale exposure, the publicity is not connected with "Surging Crowds".
On the second day of the Chinese New Year, director Rao Xiaozhi did not come out to give everyone a good New Year's greeting, but instead sold a tragic schedule on social media. The result of the misery is that there is no theater line, still a mess, only the early morning and early morning such a period.
The scheduling and box office pick-up of "Surging Crowds" is due to the word-of-mouth regurgitation of "Detective Chinatown 3" and the word-of-mouth collapse of "Samurai Shodown".
The contrast between the high-profile publicity of "Tang Detective 3" and the audience's word of mouth has made many viewers take out "Surging Crowds" for direct comparison. The direct collapse of "Samurai Shodown" made the audience feel sorry for "The Crowd".
The large proportion of films conceded by the two films and the spontaneous large-scale word-of-mouth publicity of the audience made "Surging Crowds" pick up a big bargain, and the theater line was also happy to be a smooth water, which led to the subsequent rise of the box office of "Surging Crowds".
As of February 28, the box office of "Surging Crowds" in the 17 days of release has reached 450 million yuan. The box office in the first 7 days was only 150 million yuan. In other words, the most popular Spring Festival slot at the box office, the box office revenue of "Surging Crowds" is only one-third of the 10 days after the Spring Festival slot.
If it weren't for the fact that the reputation of passers-by in "Surging Crowds" was really hard enough, he really couldn't turn over this plate.
But in fact, "Surging Crowds" has been pushed to a very high level and is related to the background of some peers, and it is far from being among the gods praised by many audiences. This has nothing to do with whether "The Crowd" is a remake, nor does it have anything to do with whether the actors' performances are excellent, but there are many problems with the script and many of the settings of the film itself.
First of all, the overall "Surging Crowd" is somewhat slow and procrastinating, and the sense of rhythm of the advance is not enough, resulting in it is not easy to replace in the early stage of watching the movie. Secondly, the love drama of "Surging Crowds" is too childlike, the beautiful and golden women in indigenous Shanghai fall in love with the sloppy uncle in the rental house, and the killer falls in love with the pregnancy fraudster. Third, the design of female character tool people is too obvious and does not dig out the charm of the character.
Again, although the name "Surging Crowds" is well explained in the movie, and the theme song or interlude is specially sung by Andy Lau, how does this name look like a film for the New Year's big episode when it is announced, or a short urban film in a noisy parent.
But in any case, the overall level of "Surging Crowds" is by no means bad in recent film works, and the bridge section in the plot where characters with diametrically opposed personalities, occupations, and wealth exchange identities is also a content that Chinese audiences can't get tired of watching. Coupled with the outstanding performance of the actors, "The Crowd" is fully worthy of higher box office results.
I hope that "Surging Crowds" can seize the last opportunity before the next screening, and I hope that the main creative team can create a more delicate and reasonable script next time, and do not live up to the efforts of these good actors.
Now that "The Crowd" has nearly 500 million yuan at the box office, how many box office do you think it has to get is reasonable? In your mind, what kind of rating does it have?