Special feature of 1905 film network Summer file continues to heat up. According to the statistics of ticketing platform, in 2024, the total box office of cinema movies broke 25 billion (including pre-sale). In the summer of 2024, 100 films have been officially finalized. Behind the hundreds of new films are dozens of film companies that are fighting for the front line.
The film was put on file until July 10th. Previously, the cumulative screening and pre-sale box office exceeded 30 million in just three days. As of press time, the cumulative box office has exceeded 40 million, and the number of people watching movies has exceeded one million. The film is also the first work of Bona Film in 2024. Another main production will also be released in July. After a lapse of five years, Bona once again scheduled two main slides for the summer.
Not only that, traditional film companies such as Light Media, Huayi Brothers and Wanda Pictures have also joined the summer file this year, and they are all behind films such as "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century".
While raising the expectations of the audience, it also leaves suspense for the increasingly hot market: What kind of transcripts will traditional film companies harvest in the summer of 2024?
Development of Summer Files for Traditional Film Enterprises
In the summer of 2024, new films from traditional film companies gathered.
According to statistics, among the hundreds of new films, there are about 20 key films to be shown. Among them, more than half of the films are controlled by traditional film companies such as Bona Film, WANDA CINEMAS, Light Media and Huayi Brothers. According to the data of Cat’s Eye Professional Edition, the number of people who want to see these films has exceeded 10,000, among which the number of people who want to see Legend and White Snake: Floating Life has exceeded 150,000.
As the longest track in the whole year, the summer track has a "youth" that is different from other tracks, and this youth now includes not only students, but also people over the age of 25. According to the report of Lighthouse Research Institute, in recent years, the audience under the age of 25 has shown a downward trend, and the audience aged 25-29 is becoming the main audience in the market. This also makes the appearance of new summer films of traditional film companies more diverse.
This time, Bona Film has a proper emphasis on genre themes and has made some progress in film technology. The Legend, which is under its control, has both a sense of heaviness spanning thousands of years and a sense of lightness of "treasure hunting adventure+fantasy love", and the reconciliation of the two forms the unique epic fantasy temperament of this film. On the other hand, Bona’s A Dream of Red Mansions, which is the main producer, simplifies the complexity and refines the motif of conspiracy and love.
"Legend" restored the 27-year-old young version with the blessing of AI technology, and established the image digital assets of young Jackie Chan. This is also an experimental exploration for the film and television industry. President Bona once mentioned at the Shanghai International Film Festival: "In the past, we often said that movies were the art of regret, but the emergence of AI technology made movies no longer the art of regret."
It seems that it is difficult to find similar films in the whole summer file of "Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century" controlled by Light Media. Judging from the materials released at present, the film is positioned as "comedy+science fiction", with "a sneeze crossing the round trip for 20 years" as the science fiction setting, and at the same time touches the "working mentality" of contemporary young people. The author of the film has a strong style, and the director’s previous works and works also have a rough texture and unconstrained story setting similar to "inferior images". The other "Her Little Pear Vortex" combines a small and fresh campus youth drama with a Northeast comedy, which is suitable for the mainstream audience in the summer file and has a clear audience awareness.
After White Snake 2: The Green Snake Robbed, White Snake: A Floating Life brought the classic story of the White Snake to the screen. According to the director, the film shows the traditional folk customs of the Dragon Boat Festival, such as dragon boat racing and drinking realgar wine. The dragon boat design also refers to the modeling and color matching in the ancient paintings of the Song Dynasty, trying to restore the market atmosphere of the Song Dynasty. This is the first time that Wanda has participated in the series as the main producer. At present, the number of people who want to see White Snake: Floating Life is more than 310,000, ranking among the top five summer movies, and the new domestic film Top1 is to be shown.
In addition, after the equity transfer in WANDA CINEMAS in 2023, Confucianism and Italian Film became its first shareholder, so the films produced by them were regarded as the same sequence. In 2024, "Retrograde Life", which was directed by the owner of Confucianism and Italian Film, was one of the few realistic movies in the summer, and it was also a realistic feature film that was once again the core creation. Judging from the trailers released at present, while focusing on the group of takeout workers, the film does not take bitterness as the background, but incorporates comedy elements with higher acceptance through contrasting situations and actor performances.
Another realistic movie in the summer file is Laifu Hotel, which has been released, and is controlled by Huayi Brothers. The film Douban scored 7.3, which is the highest score among the summer movies that have been released so far. It is also controlled by Huayi Brothers, and it was released in the early summer file and won a focus unit award at Cannes International Film Festival.
Generally speaking, this traditional film company not only pays attention to the younger theme, but also meets the needs of the students, and emphasizes the touch of social reality, the exploration of film technology and the avant-garde image style.
Film and enterprise games show their magical powers
At present, in addition to the new films produced by traditional film companies, there are still many popular films produced and controlled by companies with Internet genes or creative individuals.
For example, the reading group under Tencent and Century Changsheng Tian, the director, are the first and second producers; The Chinese film industry with a mature distribution network and Yitong Film and Television, the director, are the first and second producers. It is the bad monkey film industry and the other film industry as the first and second producers; Most of the films such as Decryption are produced by movie companies with Internet genes such as Cat’s Eye and Taobao Film.
When the online ticketing platform with Internet genes keeps growing in the industry, and when the Mesozoic creators set up their own doors to participate in film investment and film projects, the traditional film enterprises that have grown together with the China film industry for more than 20 years seem to face new challenges.
However, taking the summer file of 2024 as an example, it is not difficult to find that behind most films, several producers jointly invest and share risks. At the same time, there are also traditional film companies behind the films controlled by other film companies, such as WANDA CINEMAS, who is also one of the main producers of Silent Killing. In terms of distribution, traditional film companies also cooperate with other companies to jointly promote the market distribution of films. For example, the distribution of "Retrograde Life" was jointly promoted by Taobao Film, Confucianism, Italian Film and Television, and Sichuan Wenyou.
In addition, the pan-entertainment platform in internet plus, such as Cat’s Eye Lithography, not only has the advantages of Internet technology, but also integrates data resources for reference in upstream production, and can rely on the IP resources and production experience of traditional film companies to complete the upward industrial layout.
The re-integration of resources enables traditional film companies and emerging film companies to better face the uncertainty of the future market. Therefore, while meeting the challenges, win-win cooperation has also become an industry consensus. The complementary advantages in business and the risk-sharing in capital jointly maintain the benign ecology in the industry.
Not only that, as a traditional film company that has been deeply involved in the film industry for decades and contributed many excellent films to the China film market, it has gradually defined a more advantageous track in the competition.
Bona has made it clear in the annual report that he wants to keep the theme projects that the company is good at, including the new mainstream movies. In 2024, Bona held a press conference on the 25th anniversary of "Born to the New" in Shanghai. Apart from Legend and A Dream of Red Mansions, he also announced his main creative lineup, while continuing the creative experience of new mainstream films, and also developed epochal drama works such as Shangganling and Haojiang Tide.
After the successful launch of other animated films and the creation of the domestic animation brand "Striped House", Light Media also regards this field as one of the most promising business sectors. According to the annual report of the enterprise, the series of films has entered the pre-planning stage. Among the new films to be shown, in addition to two highly anticipated animated films "Xiaoqian", the starring actor will also be released this year.
While WANDA CINEMAS continues to deepen its core business such as cinema operation, distribution and marketing, in terms of film investment and production, four of the five films controlled by the main investment last year received positive feedback in terms of box office and word of mouth. In the first half of 2024, Wanda’s "Bears: Reversing Time and Space" made 2.45 billion yuan and 1.99 billion yuan at the box office, respectively, and gained good investment returns. In addition, in the report of the first quarter of 2024, it was also revealed that all the films were filmed and produced as planned.
In a word, no matter new or old, differentiated content is the core competitiveness of a film company. Of course, on this basis, it is equally important for the upstream and downstream industries to cooperate with each other, for different enterprises to give full play to their respective advantages, and to identify the audience characteristics of the schedule.
Hundreds of new films fight for the summer, who can laugh at the end? We will wait and see.
