【A Family's Word】
The movie "Never Expected" just goes through the path of failure repeated by the predecessors. The gilded membership card of the × billion club is valuable, and it is more meaningful to stand up for the online video creators.
Attack the name of the web drama and lose its spirit
Movies, in a sense, are the most powerful media platforms with the current stage impact. Regardless of the initial beginning of the project, it seems that the final coronation can only be completed by climbing the high mountain of the entertainment industry of film. Therefore, whether it is a TV variety show or an online video program, if you want to achieve the ultimate brand effect, the movie seems to have become the final test link.
"Never Expected" is not exempt from vulgarity.
Only two days of on-demand screening last weekend, the advanced work of this network short drama has grabbed more than 100 million box office, and the power accumulated in the short drama stage has exploded in an instant, which has indeed produced a surprising effect. However, in addition to the predictable commercial victory, it was never expected that the audience feedback of the film suffered a wave of bad reviews. In fact, it is not surprising that the seat is not applauded.
Audiences who did not like this film can be roughly divided into two categories. One is the die-hard fans of its online version, and the other is the movie audience who has not seen the online version. The former feels that the film is another big-name press, but also a pretense, betraying the uninhibited freedom of the online version; the latter will not think so much, just from the film itself, feel that whether when watched as a comedy or as another Journey to the West fandom, this barely structured story is difficult to call perfect, and there is no trace of the 55 modifications claimed by the creator.
Putting the evaluations of these two parties together, the problem is obvious: losing its spirit in the name of the network drama, and grabbing the honor of the movie is difficult to get close to the truth of the movie. It's scary not to stick to both ends.
In fact, in my opinion, the film is not so bad, but the above problem does exist. In fact, this is also a common dilemma when most online short dramas appear on the big screen. Seeing that the problem is simple, it is troublesome to really solve it. The online version of "Never Expected" is less than ten minutes long per episode, and there is no forming story, relying on a four-panel comic interpretation around each topic. If you want to keep the original taste, it is difficult to put together the paragraph, and it is really piled up into a collection of spoof shows, I am afraid that there are only a lot more bad comments. But if you do it according to the general movie routine, no matter what, you have to find a genre template to drill into, but its creativity is derived from freedom, and it is spelled by the tight curse of the template, and the charm is lost, and it is lost to everyone. The big movie we see now is reduced to a not-so-clever Chow Sing Chi routine imitation show.
It is difficult to get close to the movie
So, what should we do in the end, in order to have a good reputation at the box office, and live up to the king?
The first is to determine the general direction. Do you want to make a long online video that's in a movie theater, or do you want to make a real movie? In fact, if you really want to open, do not pay attention to the so-called "cinematicity", do not care about the fame of the clouds, is to keep the brand at the beginning of the establishment of a mouthful of freshness, really make a variety of special editions to the theater, why not? You see Monty Python's "Python and the Holy Grail" and "Seven Steps of Life" are plainly a collection of paragraphs around a big theme. After people have fun, they still stand and earn word of mouth. Don't be afraid of the "shortness" of the form, the key is that the creative fun is overflowing and has a humanistic afterglow? In fact, this is not to insult the film, but to put forward higher requirements for the original work at the creative level, while ensuring the choice of the original work's characteristics.
The second is trade-offs. After all, from the fly house to the five-star hotel, the bigger the business, the bolder it will become. Which elements are indispensable, which elements are "the world may be better with it", and which elements are "concubines can't do it", we must all be clear. Judging from the current movie version, only the title, the protagonist name and several core actors have been taken, and even the original team except for the white guests has basically been reduced to side matches. This will not only cause dissatisfaction among the original fans, but also make the general audience feel tight: you do have a mustache, wear big leather shoes, and carry a civilization stick, but we all know that you are not Chaplin, just Yi Xiaoxing wearing a wig. This is not reluctance, this is self-castration, cutting off one's own characteristics.
The last and most difficult part is to cultivate according to the type model. If big movies keep the special concept of "hanging wire", or follow a series of techniques of network dramas in the design of jokes, then it is better to say now. But the problem is that from the content to the form, the big movie completely follows the inspirational comedy route of the counterattack, especially the last section completely eliminates the sense of comedy and directly turns into a sublime heroic poem, which is not only a vulgarity, but also fundamentally cuts off from the cynicism of the brand of "Never Expected". Although it is difficult to escape the type of mold, at least we should think more about the design of the framework template. For example, the theatrical version of "South Park", although it is inevitably a lot less fun than the TV version, but the core content of "laughing at everything" has been retained, and the original template for saving the world has also been dismantled, which is still a unique comedy.
The existing template is too dependent, and the audience is too lazy to point out the loopholes of the template itself, but only because of this small laziness, directly doubt the creative attitude. Once this top hat is worn, there is still room to turn over.
□ Sydney Cartoons (Film Critic)