Behind the Blowout of Summer Box Office (I)： The Road to Commercialization of Chinese Films
1905 movie network exclusive feature 5.49 billion! This is the monthly box office of China film market in July. How awesome is this number? Converted into US$ 884 million, the domestic market in the United States grossed US$ 1.09 billion in July, which means that China’s box office in July was equivalent to 81% of that in the United States. In vertical comparison, the box office in the same period last year was 3.693 billion yuan, an increase of 1.8 billion yuan, with an increase rate as high as 48%. Based on this growth rate, next year’s summer box office is expected to reach 8 billion yuan, surpassing the United States just around the corner.
The United States has the largest movie market in the world, but the total box office tends to be stable, and summer vacation is the most profitable period in a year. The last monthly record of China market was 4.134 billion yuan in February 2015, equivalent to 556 million US dollars, surpassing the box office in the United States for the first time. But at that time, China was a strong file because of the Spring Festival file; The same period in the United States is a low season. If we can surpass the United States in the summer file, it is estimated that China can really replace the United States as the world’s largest film market.
In the same period last year, Transformers 4: Extinction and Rebirth and breakup guru — — One big and one small, one outside and one middle dual-core drive are different. July this year is the July of domestic films, and the market share of domestic films accounts for 95.6%. What’s the secret behind this dazzling number and this blowout? Why did the market and audience suddenly get out of control? What is the doorway behind this seemingly lively movie midsummer carnival?
Watching blockbusters is fun: comedy is in power
There were three phenomenal films in July, namely monster hunt, Pancake Man and The Return of the Great Sage on the Journey to the West. The box office of "monster hunt" exceeded 2 billion, which not only secured the box office champion of Chinese movies in the Mainland, but also launched an impact on the box office champion "Speed and furious 7" (2.424 billion). Pancake Man also broke through 1.1 billion at the box office, successfully entering the top 10 of the mainland box office charts, while The Return of the Great Sage successfully surpassed Kung Fu Panda 2 to become the box office champion of the mainland animation. It is worth mentioning that all three films have got the extension key and are on the way to set a new record.
Looking through the box office rankings of Chinese movies, you will find an interesting phenomenon: six domestic films with box office exceeding 1 billion ("monster hunt" is 2.138 billion.<上映中>1.267 billion, 1.246 billion, 1.127 billion, 1.127 billion.<上映中>(1.169 billion) and "Journey to the West" 1.046 billion are comedies, and two are related to Journey to the West. If the standard is enlarged to 500 million box office Chinese films, the proportion of comedy films and films with strong comedy elements can still account for 50%.
From the data, it is not difficult to see the mainland audience’s love for comedies. Compared with foreign films, all of them have achieved a bumper box office in China, but they are not comedies. The advantage of domestic comedies lies in their grounding. There is only the question of whether the laughter is cold or not, and there is no situation where you can’t get it, and you don’t have to think twice about details such as culture and translation. Both comedies and special effects blockbusters are based on their powerful entertainment functions, which is also the purpose of the vast majority of viewers entering the cinema. In the blockbuster era when entertainment is king, there is nothing wrong with watching movies happily, and no one has the right to blame. However, at present, the mode of domestic commercial films is still in its infancy, which is simple and rude, and the types are still relatively single. The audience stratification is not clear, and small and medium-sized productions and art films cannot find their own audience, which will restrict the comprehensive development of domestic films.
Today, the polarization between comedy films and special effects films is gradually taking shape, and youth films are a spent force. Movies that focus on the youth market, such as Everything is Growing, Why Shengxiao Mo, Tiny Times 4: The End of the Soul, and Gardenia Blossoms, have achieved good box office results in the first week of release, but fans’ impulsive consumption and low reputation are difficult to provide energy for the follow-up income of the films. If the quality of youth films is not improved, they may become sub-box office films in the future market.
Cost-effective calculation: How many billions can a movie like monster hunt make money?
The most successful movie this summer is monster hunt, but monster hunt is not the movie with the highest return on investment, or even the most profitable movie. The domestic box office revenue is divided by the producer, the cinema and the issuer according to the proportion, and the producer gets 43% of the final box office (the proportion will be slightly adjusted for a single film). According to producer Jiang Zhiqiang, monster hunt invested 350 million yuan. If it includes publicity expenses, the box office must reach the profit and loss line of 810 million, and the producers can barely recover the cost. If it does not, the profit and loss line may be above 900 million. In the latter case, even if the total box office of "monster hunt" reaches 2 billion, the producer’s profit is only about 460 million, and the return on investment is about 110%, which is actually not high.
On the other hand, Pancake Man, which was released at the same time as monster hunt, had a total production and publicity cost of about 50 million, a break-even line of 116 million and a box office of 1 billion, which brought 380 million profits to the producers and a return on investment of 760%. Although monster hunt is slightly better than Pancake Man in terms of the amount of profit, the risks brought by high investment and other uncontrollable factors will multiply, and it is not uncommon for a blockbuster to ruin a production company. For example, the fiasco of Whisperwind sent MGM, which had been in a bleak business for many years, to the auction house, and Final Fantasy: Deep in the Soul also drove Sakaguchi Hironobu and SQUARE off the altar.
"monster hunt" is a gamble, making a Chinese special effects blockbuster is a gamble, and spending 70 million yuan to remake it is a gamble, but its victory is the victory of producer Jiang Zhiqiang. Before the release, the debate was whether the film could recover its cost through box office revenue, and no one dared to say that its box office would fall above 2 billion yuan. Regardless of the cost of investment, even to the point of risking one’s life, while admiring Jiang Zhiqiang’s courage, I have to stop and think: What if monster hunt fails? How many Jiang Zhiqiang can win the bet? Maybe the future market will give the answer.