Become Famous Another Day

“If the North American awards season schedule is used as the main promotion strategy of "Path of Glory", will the film be questioned for being too foreign?"

"Put it down. If "Path of Glory" can always have a voice and presence in the North American awards season, this will be a shining achievement for Chinese-language films. What are you licking!"

"We have been doing some screenings and not letting go, just to extend the release window period of "Path of Glory". We have calculated that once we release it on a large scale, based on the current domestic response to this type of literary and artistic film, even if it takes If it wins the grand prize, even if it has two top stars, Shang Yongzhou and Lu Yanhe, it will only have a box office of 100 to 200 million at best. "

"Aren't you satisfied with this movie's box office of 100 to 200 million?"

"Would you be satisfied if it had the potential to create even greater miracles?"

"This is so difficult."

"It's very difficult, so our release must be combined with the schedule of "Path of Glory" during the North American awards season. Only the North American awards season in the world can last for several months, and the exposure is so huge. If "Glory" "The Road" can be successfully publicized by the American Green Valley Film Company to enter the awards season, then it will usher in a continuous exposure that lasts for several months, and for the domestic market, a film can continue to win awards abroad or You may not care about a nominated movie if you see it once or twice, but if you see the name "Path of Glory" frequently, you may become interested in the movie."

…

The month-long screening of "Path of Glory" finally began to reveal its minions and intentions at this moment.

In fact, the Russell Film Critics Society Awards are among the least influential awards during the North American awards season.

But it is the first shot of the awards season, which is of great significance.

Mountain Pictures, the domestic producer and distributor of "Path of Glory", does not plan to use award nominations one by one as a promotional point.

Their strategy is to "impact the North American awards season."

Therefore, the domestic slogan of the Russell Film Critics Society Awards is: "Path of Glory" is the first shot of the North American film awards season! The North American awards season journey for the strongest Chinese-language art film of the year has begun!

Of course, many people who know movies, especially American movies, know that the core of the North American awards season lies in the final Oscar nominations.

However, for most viewers, they do not have this concept. When everyone sees this slogan, they will only realize, oh, "Path of Glory" is representing Chinese-language films in the American awards season? Did you get nominated yet?

-

On the first day of National Day, "Path of Glory" only had an additional 6,000 screenings in the National Day period, which is surrounded by blockbusters, and the screening rate was only 2%.

However, with an attendance rate of 27%, it led all released films and successfully won a daily box office of 12.37 million.

This figure is not worth mentioning compared to two blockbusters with a daily box office of over 100 million, but for every film company, this figure shocked them so much that they were speechless for a long time.

What's going on? !

A literary film that has already received RMB 60 million during the Mid-Autumn Festival, after a month-long screening, can it still earn more than RMB 10 million at the box office during the National Day with a 2% film scheduling rate?

This is inconsistent with their understanding of the film market.

Something even more unexpected happened. In the next six days, "Path of Glory" had almost no downward trend. Among the 6,000 screenings every day, the daily box office remained at 8 million. above.

Seven days later, "Path of Glory" grossed more than 70 million at the box office during the National Day.

The total box office of this movie has reached 130 million.

"Path of Glory" returns to small-scale screenings once again after ending its National Day tour.

At this moment, all major film distribution companies suddenly reacted.

"Path of Glory" has completely changed the previous film distribution model. It has created a new way of showing, keeping the market's attention on the film through point screenings, and during important periods, it relies on increasing the number of screenings to attract box office.

The most important thing is that this time "Path of Glory" was able to get more than 10 million box office with only 6,000 screenings. This attendance rate and this box office average are enough to make any film company numb with envy.

There is no publishing company that has not started researching the distribution strategy of "Path of Glory". The industry's evaluation of such a distribution strategy is that "a highly skilled person is bold" and "an extremely bold operation of God".

-

On October 9th, Shang Yongzhou attended an event to endorse a brand and was surrounded by the media.

This top actor, who has appeared less and less in recent years, has made the media both love and hate him.

Weren't you such a reclusive person before?

Weren't you very active before?

Why is it that once your status rises, you gradually stop showing up?

This also makes every public appearance of Shang Yongzhou become precious and will attract the most crazy siege from the media.

This time, Shang Yongzhou's performance in "Path of Glory" has received unanimous praise. Almost every media believes that he will be the strongest competitor for the Best Actor in the Chinese Film Awards this year.

"Yongzhou, this time you are returning to art films with "Path of Glory" after nearly five years. How many trophies are you planning to win?" a familiar media member asked jokingly.

Shang Yongzhou smiled and said: "Of course, the more, the merrier."

"Why does this sentence sound so familiar?"

"Isn't that what Lu Yanhe always says?"

Everyone smiled knowingly.

"This time Lu Yanhe will star with you in "Path of Glory". Do you think he will pose a threat to your Best Actor award?" some media asked.

"Of course." Shang Yongzhou nodded, "Everyone has seen how outstanding his performance in the movie is."

"Will the competition between you two for the Best Actor award this time be fierce? Will you feel embarrassed by this fierce competition?"

Shang Yongzhou said: "Embarrassed? There will never be any embarrassment between me and Yan He. He is happy when he makes me happy, and I am happy when he makes me happy. There is no need to underestimate us. Instead of worrying about us being embarrassed, you should worry about the judges being embarrassed."

After the media reporters heard what Shang Yongzhou said, their faces showed shock and surprise.

What the hell?

—Instead of worrying about us being in trouble, why don’t you worry about the judges being in trouble?

Is this what you, Shang Yongzhou, would say?

What's wrong with you?

You used to be a gentle and humble gentleman, why are you suddenly so... awkward?

What he said seemed very much like it came from Lu Yanhe's mouth.

"The special distribution method of "Path of Glory" has also achieved miraculous box office success this time. Before its release, many people were actually not very optimistic about the box office of a film with such a theme. You even have some fans who are worried about this. The movie failed at the box office, which affected you. When you accepted this movie, did you consider the box office factor? It is his dream to make this movie, and I must support him." Shang Yongzhou said, "The reason why the movie is so good at the box office this time is, as many of you said, because it used an unprecedented distribution model. This is also thanks to Yan He, who came up with the idea.”

After Shang Yongzhou said these words, the media reporters all opened their eyes wide.

What the hell?

The idea proposed by Lu Yanhe?

What international joke are you kidding?

When has a film's distribution model been suggested by an actor?

When Shang Yongzhou said it, everyone's first reaction was that they didn't believe it.

However, Shang Yongzhou didn't mean to be joking at all. He was very serious and his eyes were bright.

The media reporters looked at each other and there was a rare silence.

-

The new distribution method of "Path of Glory" is a clarion call for change for the film industry.

This movie's box office miracle has not only triggered great discussions in the industry, but also triggered discussions in many media.

What everyone is most focused on is whether the box office miracle of "Path of Glory" can be replicated.

Professionals, unprofessionals, knowledgeable people, ignorant people, it’s all here.

Under this situation, the China Film Association immediately decided to hold an industry seminar.

"Yan He, you have to come to this seminar. If you don't come, this seminar will be meaningless." Fu Kai told Lu Yanhe on the phone.

Lu Yanhe smiled and asked, "What should I say?"

Fu Kai said: "Speak whatever you want to say. No matter what you want to say, everyone will want to hear it."

Lu Yanhe scratched his head and said, "When you say that, I feel a lot of pressure."

"You can do it." Because of the success of "Path of Glory" at the box office, Fu Kai has been in high spirits during happy events recently. He told Lu Yanhe, "You are still under a lot of pressure at your level. Others in the entertainment industry should not speak. ”

Lu Yanhe: "Director, please don't flatter me."

Fu Kai: "Haha, I'm not flattering you. No matter who hears these words, they will only agree with me."

The success of a movie at the box office may arouse the envy and jealousy of others, causing other movie companies to ponder and learn the theme of the movie in an attempt to copy a successful movie. But the success of "Path of Glory" is obviously not that simple.

Why is the China Film Association so anxious to hold this seminar?

It's because this allowed them to see that literary films that have always been praised as failing to win box office seem to have a path that can generate box office.

This is something that is good for the entire industry.

Of course everyone wants to eat some meat and drink some soup.

Although Lu Yanhe has always been very modest and said that he had nothing to say, at this time, he still carefully sorted it out based on his own experience and his understanding of this industry.

Before the seminar began, after Lu Yanhe entered the venue, he was taken to greet many people.

Some people have already begun to wonder what Lu Yanhe will say.

The success of "Road to Glory" has made many people hope to hear something truly innovative from Lu Yanhe.

"Literary films should also have box office success."

Lu Yanhe finally set this as the topic of his speech.

"Actually, since I entered the industry, I have discovered that the entire industry actually has a consensus that literary and artistic films do not have box office. For a long time, I have accepted this view, including acting in "Three Mountains" and "Late Spring" " and "Path of Glory", I didn't consider the box office at all - to be honest, as an actor, the expected box office performance is one of the most important factors I consider for these movies. , every one of them has been a success at the box office, with hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office. However, every box office success has been hailed as a miracle that cannot be replicated. Even though there have been many literary and artistic films in the past few years that have done well at the box office. Everyone’s overall impression of art films not doing well at the box office has not changed.”

Lu Yanhe summed it up based on what he saw and felt in this industry.

"This is especially true for the movie "Path of Glory". Even though it won the Best Picture Award in the Horizon section at the Venice International Film Festival, no one from the director to us actors, from the producers to the distributors felt that it was a box office success. It can reach a very good number. The effective release period of a literary film in China is only a dozen days, and it will be difficult to collect box office later. This is because they have to be bigger and louder. The fundamental reason why bigger movies are competing on the same stage and cannot be scheduled is that during those ten days, there are not many effective audiences who are attracted to the cinema to watch the movie. However, if literary films are really unpopular with the audience. Wait and see, there will be works that perform well at the box office from time to time.”

Lu Yanhe said: "At this time, I thought about the operating model of foreign film festivals. Obviously, the award-winning films at the film festival every year do not actually have many domestic audiences, but why do they still attract so much attention every time? It’s not just a few years, it’s a decade or a few decades, and their influence has remained at a very high level, in my opinion, because international film festivals pay special attention to media communication and publicity. Top-level film festivals have more media participating from all over the world. They also attach great importance to these media, set up special areas, and conduct special screenings in advance to reflect the importance of the media group in all aspects and connect stars, media and honors through the film festival. , to create such a model - maybe what I said is not accurate, but this is the most real feeling given to me by major film festivals. Film festivals are actually a distribution model, so that not many people may watch it or only real people may watch it. Movies that can only be watched by hard-core movie lovers. In such an atmosphere, a number of movies have been widely circulated and become 'gods', attracting audiences. "

"In China, our honorary awards, stars and box office are somewhat separated. Honor is honor, and box office is box office. The promotion effect of each other is very small, and there is even a big need to draw a clear line. You play with yours, and I play with mine. Lu Yanhe said, "This actually makes our Chinese-language films lose one of the biggest positions in the market - those who make literary films do not want to win box office, and those who want to win box office do not think they can win awards. , the two lines are clearly distinguished. Therefore, this time "Path of Glory" formulates such a long-term screening model, we can only use the North American awards season to take advantage of its months-long publicity and exposure window. Promote box office sales of select screenings. If there is such a window time in China, where art films can use the influence and publicity of the awards themselves to be known to the public, "Path of Glory" will definitely choose this window time in China, and Not North American awards season.”

"You mean, the number of awards in our country is too few?" someone asked.

"Our domestic film awards are indeed relatively few." Someone immediately nodded.

Lu Yanhe: "..."

He hesitated for a moment, probably because many people looked at him with enthusiasm, but he continued to tell the truth.

"Compared with the issue of more and less, I think the bigger problem with our domestic awards is that the positioning is not clear. I hope that its authoritative awards cannot be authoritative and convincing. As for other awards, they are too porky. They have won consecutive awards. Fans of the TV show think it’s a joke. In fact, as long as many awards have their own clear positioning, they don’t necessarily have to be awarded at an artistic level. If you look at the Asian TV Festival, everyone knows that the awards at this TV festival are for those who are doing well. The most influential TV dramas and creators in Asia are valued for their influence, not their artistic height. Their attitude is clear, and this does not affect the popularity of this award in Asia, or even its authority. Everyone uses whether it wins this award to measure the influence of a work in Asia.”

Lu Yanhe said: "Our domestic awards, movies and TV series are all three pillars. They are not the leader like the Oscars in the United States, and they are not like the four major international film festivals, each occupying a time point and dominating. I am not saying that we are like this It's not as good as them. I'm just talking about the difference. The core thing is that they don't have a strong connection with our own film industry and market, so it really becomes a purely honorary thing, and this honor is. And it’s not convincing enough. In many cases, it’s only recognized by our own industry, because to be honest, most of the audience has not even seen the award-winning films. The things I said are very vulgar, but the industry is the industry, and the lack of influence is not enough. "

What Lu Yanhe talked about today completely exceeded many people's expectations.

Originally, many people wanted to hear from Lu Yanhe about how the long-term screening of "Road to Glory" works and whether it is replicable. No one expected that Lu Yanhe suddenly said a lot about awards and box office.

Lu Yanhe smiled.

"Perhaps all the seniors and teachers are confused after hearing this, wondering what this has to do with our topic today. Speaking so much is actually because of what I usually think about, which made me plan to release the movie "Path of Glory" in China. At that time, I thought that maybe it could be combined with the North American awards season. At that time, a film critic I was very familiar with, Tom, told me that this movie was very suitable for the North American awards season.”

"Commercial films are made for everyone to see what the audience likes, while art films go to the market to find audiences who like it."

"Literary films have their audiences, and we must do our best to find them. As long as we find them, we will still have box office success."

"What I talked about in front of the teachers today is actually my idea about how literary films can find audiences." (End of chapter)