Preach in words. - Don Tears
It's been five years since the release of Chill II.
Director Leung Lok-man spoke about "Cold War III" in a recent interview, saying that society is changing too fast and the film may be far away.
If this is the case, the Hong Kong box office record of "Cold War II" may continue to hang alone.
After all, the record has been held for five years.
Although it is not as long as the seven years of "Kung Fu", the further back the record, the more difficult it is to break.
But there is another possibility.
In the past decade, Hong Kong films have reached new highs at the box office on the mainland.
From barely over 100 million at the beginning to six Hong Kong films that have grossed more than a billion so far, the new champion "Fury Case" has just been released.
And how long can the championship position be maintained?
This question has to be answered by the successive big-budget Hong Kong films.
For example, "When the Wind Rises Again" and "Wind Forest Volcano", although these two movies have repeatedly released the audience's pigeons, but the release plan has always been like an arrow, the patch advertisement of "When the Wind Rises Again" has been repeatedly released, and there is news in the near future that there will be the latest movements. According to Mai Junlong's words, "Wind Forest Volcano" will most likely be scheduled to be released next year, and it will not be far away.
Another big-budget movie, "Sweeping Drugs III," was released last month. Hong Kong media have repeatedly reported the series of fights between Aaron Kwok and Liu Qingyun, these two actors who have not cooperated for a long time, the roles in the play love and kill each other, director Qiu Litao has rarely filmed for nearly four months, sweeping away the previous one or two months of rapid style, it is estimated that he is also hesitant and full of ambition, and he wants to use "SweepIng Drugs III" to sweep away the haze of the collapse of the reputation of the previous work.
There is also a "Goldfinger" directed by Zhuang Wenqiang, which is known as the return of the "Infernal Affairs" lineup, in fact, Director Zhuang is a screenwriter in "Infernal Affairs", and there is still a big difference between himself and his own directing.
These are the four large-scale Hong Kong films to be screened, and in terms of lineup and expectations, they all have the opportunity to hit the new record of the mainland box office.
Back to the question of Hong Kong box office records.
In fact, everyone may have overlooked the question of how the annual crown and record-breaking films came about.
Take the historical box office list of Chinese films to observe.
There are four sequels in the first ten, "Cold War II", "Ip Man III", "Police Story 4" and "God of Gamblers II", all of which belong to the situation of the previous work, and the previous game's reputation is relatively strong. For example, in 1989's "God of Gamblers" annual crown, in 2008's "Ip Man" annual champion, in 2012's "Cold War" annual crown, Jackie Chan's "Police Story" series has always been strong.
Other films, Stephen Chow's "Shaolin Soccer" and "Kung Fu" shed their "nonsense" shells, combined with special effects and plot advantages, shined, and "Mermaid" soared with the audience popularity and feelings accumulated over the years. Jackie Chan's "Red Fan District" is a symbol of the internationalization of his films, "Infernal Affairs" is known as a rescue work, and "The Girl Who Chased Together in Those Years" is a big hit in three places.
In addition, in 1998, "The Mighty Storm Dominates the World" pioneered the computer special effects of fantasy films, and Chow Xingchi and Jackie Chan's other works have always been strong, they are also record-breaking characters, and "Color Ring" is also a phenomenon-level work.
In other words, with a few exceptions, high-grossing works are not accidental.
As soon as "Cold War" appeared, it was shocked and hailed as "the best police film after "Infernal Affairs", without exaggeration, it also has a result that "Infernal Affairs" has not achieved, that is, it has been recognized by the real police high-level. Therefore, on the basis of the previous work, the second part of the series achieved an earth-shattering leap and broke the record of film history in one fell swoop.
Breaking records is actually the cumulative effect of film quality and audience expectations.
Back to the four big-budget films mentioned above.
Director Weng Ziguang's previous work, 2015's "Blood and Plums", won more than 8 million at the box office with a niche genre, and became the only film in the history of the Academy Awards to win all acting awards. The new work "When the Wind Rises Again" is his "love letter to Hong Kong films", although it is also an old era theme, but with this attitude, it is a world away from the cold rice that director Wang Jing has fried over and over again.
Mai Junlong made his first shot in 2013, filming the amazing industry's "Zombie", the box office soared to 17.16 million, and its image language was mature and sophisticated, it was really not like the handiwork of a new director, and this also brought him a strong audience base, so the new work "Wind Forest Volcano" was highly anticipated.
As far as "Sweeping Drugs III" is concerned, the boss of Huanyu must have a deeper consideration in the case of "Sweeping Drugs II" breaking 1.3 billion.
Throughout the history of film, we can also see that the films that truly achieve explosive box office growth are usually both word-of-mouth, such as the previous "Cold War" and "Peerless", which are different from "Macau Storm 3" breaking through a billion in a scolding, and are relying on a strong audience reputation to go all the way up.
Therefore, this time "Sweeping Drugs III" actually carries the triple ambition of investors, directors and actors.
Zhuang Wenqiang waited two years for 2018's "Peerless" to shoot this "Goldfinger" again, and from the fact that he did not shoot the sequel to "Peerless", he knew that his sense of innovation was very strong, and he was not a director who made a bad film on a certain subject.
All four films have the possibility of a breakthrough at some level.
Therefore, while they break the box office record of Hong Kong films in the mainland, they also have the probability of winning the Record in hong Kong film history.
Innovation and breakthrough will be the mainstream.
The practice of stir-frying cold rice is difficult to have another chance, and it is like the sun.
Breaking box office records.
Within two years.
Or it will be known.