Shenrancaijing original
Author | Li Qiuhan
Edit | Wei Jia
In the first half of 2021, the most anticipated Hollywood blockbuster "Fast and Furious 9" (hereinafter referred to as "Rapid 9") was finally released, and the box office and word-of-mouth were unexpectedly "ice and fire double days".
Although everyone has full tolerance for this series of movies that have reached the ninth part, fans are still "shocked" by the too illogical plot setting: the protagonist who can go to heaven and earth is becoming more and more like a superpowered human, and the bridge section of "rushing to outer space in order to save the world" has changed from ridicule to reality. From action movies to science fiction films, "the next one can be directly co-branded with Star Wars" and "Newton's coffin board can't be pressed", in the movie Douban comment area, full of such complaints.
This made "Rapid Shock 9" get the lowest rating in the 20 years since the series was released, and 50,000 people on Douban scored 5.6 points, far below the average score of 7.35 in the series, and far from the peak of "Rapid Shock 5" of 8.4 points. However, it seems that "Rapid 9" is still the strongest box office harvester at present.
According to the data of Lighthouse Professional Edition, as of May 22, the second day of the release of "Rapid 9", the box office has reached 681 million, and the box office on that day is nearly 10 times that of the second-ranked "I Want Us Together", accounting for more than 80% of the total box office and more than 60% of the scheduled films. The box office is crushing, the record is also refreshing, "Rapid 9" broke the record of the number of premiere days in Chinese film history with 228,000 shows, and the box office on the opening day reached 290 million, ranking among the top five box offices of imported films in mainland film history, second only to "Avengers 4", "Fast and Furious 8", "Avengers 3" and "Fast and Furious 7".
This is one of the most popular Hollywood veteran big IPs in the country. Especially after experiencing the May Day show, when new films were piled up but did not sell well, "Rapid Shock 9" was once regarded as a "rescue" blockbuster, and many theaters were already waiting for the birth of a new record a month ago. However, more than one theater manager told Shen Yan that the actual sales of "Rapid 9" did not meet expectations, which was not the same as the popularity of the "Reunion" series, "Rapid Shock 7" and "Rapid Shock 8".
Can you watch "Rapid Shock 9" in the end? How did this series get to this point? Can Hollywood blockbusters still be played in China? Deep Burning for you.
(Spoilers included below)
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" how outrageous is data-track="21" >-speed 9? </h1>
What kind of story does "Rush 9" tell?
"Crackle bang bang bang bang BOOM！ We are family！ end. An audience member on Douban summed it up and won 3,000 recognitions.
Objectively speaking, "Rapid Shock 9" tells a complete story, although it is extremely old-fashioned. In the film, because of a piece of intelligence involving human safety, the protagonist "Donald" Dominic once again went out of the mountain, and the team together in the mountains to investigate a crashed plane, and the villain Donald Boss's brother Jacob fought, in a fierce transnational chase, the two brothers fell in love and killed each other, and finally the two reconciled and fought against the ultimate villain Sever.
That's right, another story of the protagonist saving the world. Its exaggeration lies in the fact that while the plot is set to be cool and cool, it has not considered logic.
The first is that the confrontation scene that stimulates adrenaline is too uncommon sense, which is also the place where the audience complains the most. At the beginning of the chapter, Donald and his party crossed the minefield, chased and intercepted their villain fighter jets and armored vehicles, and exploded wildly, killing and injuring them, only they could be unscathed.
On the edge of the cliff, the anti-intellectual design appears, and the villain Jacob drives the car, and when he is forced to fly off the cliff, a plane grabs the car in mid-air like an eagle grabbing a chicken.
The protagonist's side is even more open, and two people not only drive across a more than 100-meter-long collapsing suspension bridge, but also let the chassis of the other two people's cars jam the ropes of the suspension bridge and directly swing the car to the opposite bank. Even if you don't consider whether the plot setting of flying over the cliff is reasonable, when landing, the car flips several times at 360 degrees because of the speed impact, and the people in the car are not only safe and sound, but also have a calm expression.
After this series of operations, the creator may realize that the plot design is too outrageous, and more than once borrow the lines of the characters in the play to laugh at himself: "Can you still live like this?" "Why are we unharmed every time, and what metaphysics is there?"
The next plot setting is to release the self, the protagonist makes his own spacesuit, uses the vehicle rocket thruster, goes into space, and even works together to crash a satellite, likewise, the two are still unscathed.
"We all know that there are no new tricks in the later stages of "Rapid Shock", a fan of the Rapid Shock series for more than 10 years told Deep Burning, in the first few films, although there were super realistic plot settings such as flying cars between two towers and airdropping cars with parachutes, "but this one flew directly into outer space, which is really too ridiculous." He couldn't help but want to complain.
Source / Stills from "Rush 9"
The second is the irrationality of the plot advancement.
The quick-fire series was originally a quick revenge of small people, focusing on the feelings between "family", and later with the expansion of the series of movies, the story still went to the routine of saving the world, but it could not put down the core of "we are family" that laid the foundation for many seasons, and the two were mixed, making the story more and more outrageous.
In order to let Donald out of the mountains and save the world, the creator gave a reason related to the family - to avenge the mother of his son Brian. In fact, this trick was used as early as "Rapid 4", but at that time, to avenge his girlfriend Letty (who was forcibly resurrected in the subsequent series), there was no previous plot, and the reason for going out of the mountain was not sufficient.
The setting of the three villains is even less convincing. "Rapid Shock", which has been filming for 20 years, suddenly arranged a younger brother Jacob who has never been mentioned to the protagonist, and the motivation for wanting to "destroy the world" is only because his father prefers his brother, he does not want to live in the shadow of his brother, and the other villain, Otto, the rich second generation wants to "destroy the world" Because he does not want to live in his father's shadow. The original villain of the rapid series, Sever, was imprisoned for a large amount of time in the film, and the confrontation with the protagonist group in the later stage was also broken in a second.
When talking about the routineization of Hollywood blockbusters, Wang Xiaohui, chief content officer of iQiyi, once said that the reason for the problem lies in the abandonment of the stylized genre of creative stories.
"Rapid Shock 9" is such a movie, why should the protagonist save the world, why should the villain destroy the world, the creators have been too lazy to give reasonable reasons, so that the protagonists can open and hang, the villains collectively reduce their intelligence, a wild bombardment, cool is over.
In fact, popcorn movies do not mean that common sense can be abandoned, when the audience does not feel that iq is respected, when the villain and the protagonist can not be evenly matched, there is no sense of crisis, a wild bombardment is boring, and the sense of coolness will no longer exist.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" Data-track="59" Why did > get to this point? </h1>
Although we all know that the Hollywood series of movies will eventually enter a dead end, the collapse of "Rapid Shock 9" still makes many fans feel sad.
Movie fan Xiao Xin still remembers when he first saw "Fast and Furious" more than a decade ago. "Detective Brian, who loves drag racing, went undercover into the circle of car thieves 'Donald Boss', originally wanted to arrest this gang, but was assimilated by them, and fell in love with the sister of the car thief", not the villain was assimilated by the decent, but the decent joined the "villain", such a story setting makes him feel very new.
He told Deep Burning that the characters in the rapid shock did not want to save the world, they usually raced, bubble sister, accidents will run, this is a small pattern, small vision, is a decisive and brave slum people in the face of events, coupled with luxury cars, beautiful women, the adrenaline-stimulating elements thrown straight and naked, there is a kind of unrestrained violent aesthetics, is the reason why they like "Rapid Shock".
But now "Quick Shock" is obviously not anymore.
In highly industrialized Hollywood, movies are sold around the globe like products on factory assembly lines, with every step precisely calculated and ultimately the product of algorithms. Lin Yibin, the director of "Rapid Shock 9", is also the director of "Rapid Shock 3", "Rapid Shock 4", "Rapid Shock 5" and "Rapid Shock 6", it can be said that he is an important person who takes "Rapid Shock" to the trough and back to the peak, and he knows what the audience wants to see.
What the audience wants to see is creative drag racing and explosion, and what is needed next is a more outrageous drag racing and explosion. Perhaps it is precisely because of this line of thinking that "Rapid Shock" is gradually deformed.
Sources / Public Information Cartography / Deep Burning
In 2001, the newly released "Rush" was only a B-grade film (referring to a low-budget commercial film), investing $38 million and leveraging the global box office of $207 million to have the opportunity to have a sequel. However, due to the second part of the continuation of the protagonist Brian's undercover story routine of catching villains, the plot breakthrough is not much, and the third part uses new characters and actors, setting the scene in Tokyo, Japan, the plot continuity is not enough, the box office is not ideal, once fell to 158 million, setting a record for the lowest in the series.
In the process of serialization, starting from "Rapid Shock 4", weakening the underground racing culture and turning to action blockbusters. According to media statistics, the racing time of the third film is the highest in the series, reaching 15 minutes and 10 seconds, and the driving car chase time accounts for the lowest proportion of 6.4%, to "Fast and Furious 4", these two numbers have become 5 minutes 45 seconds and 15.9% respectively.
Faster speed, more direct sensory stimulation effects are obvious, "Rapid Shock 4" box office pick-up, the series for the first time to introduce Chinese mainland. And "Rapid Shock 5" continues "Rapid Shock 4", pushing this series to the peak, becoming the highest rated one so far.
The film has the fight of muscular macho men, there are rare luxury cars, there are beautiful women, there are profound car chase scene design, tense and exciting plots, galloping cars, smooth and avant-garde film technology, the theme of the story told is also simple and direct and rough, the two male protagonists rob the big drug lord and live the life they want.
Source / Quick Shock 6 poster
"It was really a burst of speed and passion, it was really cool to watch on the big screen at the time", fan Xiao Ke recalled deeply, his favorite is the real shooting sense of this series, looking forward to how the creator can shoot the drag racing scene with new ideas.
However, when it came to "Quick Shock 6", he felt that the series was sacrificing reality more and more for the sake of coolness. What impressed him the most was that Donald's girlfriend Letty was blown up, Donald jumped out of the car and successfully picked up Letty on the viaduct, the two were still intact, "Before everyone only ran on the road, and then they could go to heaven and earth, the scene became bigger and bigger, and the more they were, the more qualified they were to join the Avengers", he sighed.
"The uniqueness of 'Rush' lies in its authenticity. Special effects are just an aid, and I always try to shoot them," Lin Yibin said in an interview with the media. The real shooting of the wild bombing, but does not mean that it is the reality from reality, when more and more distorted plots appear, "Rapid Shock" also loses its uniqueness.
"Rapid Shock 7" was once regarded as the right time for the "Rapid Shock" series to withdraw from the stage, this one was filmed by director Wen Ziren, due to the unexpected death of the lead actor Paul Walker, this film was given more emotional significance, this is the 20th film in the history of the film to break 1 billion US dollars, and the domestic box office has soared from 413 million to 2.427 billion in "Rapid Shock 6", a nearly 5-fold increase, accounting for nearly 25%. The capital behind it is unwilling to let this money-making machine stop.
When Marvel's superhero movies were a big success, "Rush 8" also began to turn to superhero embrace, and the plot setting became more and more outrageous. Although it did not immediately show decline at the box office, word of mouth has been significantly lower. Terrorists want to detonate nuclear bombs, drive sports cars and nuclear submarines, speed car thieves become superheroes, the purpose of action from robbing money to maintain justice, small patterns are raised to save the world's big vision, more and more like Hollywood superhero blockbusters, and based on the film laid the foundation of reality for 20 years, but let the film have a sense of humor from a classic to a "god film".
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="95" > how long can it sell? </h1>
Despite the scolding, theater manager Xiao Qi was still happy for the arrival of "Rapid 9".
"Before the weekend, the number of moviegoers was not more than 100, and this week directly soared to 300 people, doubling several times", he said, originally he also expected the romance film "I want us to be together" and the re-screening of "Love Letters", but they were tepid, or the blockbuster pull on the box office was obvious, ""Rapid 9" is still a hit."
Theater owner Da Fei was worried about the operation of the theater before, and now he is obviously relaxed a lot, "If you can come to one such film a month, the theater will live."
Accumulating an audience base of 20 years, Hollywood blockbusters are still selling well. Even if the reputation of "Rapid 8" in 2017 dropped significantly, it was still able to leverage 2.67 billion box office in China, accounting for nearly one-third of the total global box office, and the Chinese market continued to be hot, which is also an important reason why the film's creator chose to let "Rapid Shock 9" be released in China a month earlier than North America. However, Xiao Qi also admitted that the popularity of "Rapid 9" is actually less than expected, "when the 2019 Reunion 4 was released, people in Wuyang Wuyang were all students", although the influence of these two IPs has a certain gap, but compared with "Rapid 7" and "Rapid 8", the grand situation is not as good as before.
After years in the theater industry, Lao Wang has become more and more obvious to feel that this kind of purely stimulating Hollywood industrial blockbusters are no longer as highly regarded as in the past. In the past two years, Hollywood action blockbusters have not achieved many good results.
For example, "Blood Warrior" starring Van Diesel, starring in the "Rapid Shock" series, the disaster blockbuster "Doomsday Escape" has not exceeded 50 million at the domestic box office, and Nolan's new film "Creed", which has been expected, has not exceeded 500 million at the box office.
According to deep burning statistics, in the domestic film box office TOP50, There are 17 Hollywood blockbusters, 14 released before 2019, and the "Reunion 4", "Fast and Furious: Special Operations" and "Spider-Man: Hero Expedition" released in 2019 and listed are all repeated consumption of large IP series, TOP20, only the "Reunion" series and the "Rapid Shock" series have two on the list, and the rest are all domestic movies.
According to the statistics of the National Film Administration, the total box office of Chinese films in 2020 reached 20.417 billion yuan, of which the domestic film box office was 17.093 billion yuan, accounting for 83.72% of the total box office, and the top 10 films in the annual box office were domestic films for the first time. Although this is also related to the fact that Hollywood films cannot be released simultaneously in China due to the epidemic, it is also an indisputable fact that Hollywood films, which originally occupied half of the country, have lost obvious advantages over domestic films. As early as 2019, China's total box office reached 64.2 billion, and the domestic box office share accounted for 64%.
Source / Pexels
"Movies are consumer goods, and popularity is related to the era and civilization quality of people. In the 1980s and 1990s, people liked the real-life sense of Hong Kong kung fu films, and liked fist-to-flesh fights, but today's children are difficult to like, and even feel particularly lentiful, which is a product of the times. Hollywood blockbusters like "Quick Shock" are the same," Lao Wang said. Xiao Xin also told Shen Yan that the number of times he entered the theater to see blockbusters in the past two years has decreased significantly, but he prefers domestic movies with more exquisite stories such as "Embroidered Spring Knife" and "The Unknown Generation".
When the domestic film industry is still in its infancy, the audience is immersed in the spectacle of Hollywood industrial blockbusters, and with the growth of the post-90s and post-00s, the spectacle scenes are becoming more and more strange, Xiao Xin feels that the audience's taste is not high-tech, high-pressure Hollywood movies, but more interested in social, realistic, and drama movies, "I am not a medicine god", "My sister", "Hello, Li Huanying" And so on, there is not much cost, but the movie that tells a good story is becoming the mainstream of movies.
"Experiencing a different life in a movie, seeing a different world, and being able to accumulate something about yourself is a good movie." To use an analogy, like a tired person, do you choose to get a stimulant, or do you choose to take a good rest and supplement nutrition? A film industry practitioner also mentioned that the level of education, the environment, and the age structure all determine the taste of watching movies, and now Hollywood blockbusters are indeed losing their attractiveness.
"'Reunion 4' has reached a peak in China, but there are actually a lot of fake fans in it. In the next decade, Marvel will be downhill in the Chinese market, unless Marvel comes to a wave of feelings," Lao Wang predicted.
Blindly bombardment, although it can cover up the plot that is not brilliant enough, but it continues to be perfunctory, and the audience also has a day of watching tired. Without paying attention to the connection between each part, the characters need to be suddenly resurrected for the plot, the villain needs to be easily washed white for the plot, and "Rapid 9", which has lost the core of the story, has become an increasingly insincere god film.
On May 17, in the media interview of "Fast and Furious 9", lead actor Van Diesel revealed that "Fast and Furious 10" will have some shots filmed in China, the film has set the release date for 2022, and the "harvest" of blockbusters for Chinese audiences continues.
"This is the progression of the times, "Rapid Shock" has reached this dead end, before the popcorn movie fails, can it find a way to see its fate," one practitioner lamented.
*The title image is from "Rapid Shock 9". At the request of the interviewees, Xiao Xin, Xiao Ke, Xiao Qi, Da Fei and Lao Wang were pseudonyms.