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The author of this article is @吉永绿, who is greedy and lazy, doesn't like to work, and only loves movies.

In the highly-competitive summer season, family comedies are indispensable.

This year is no exception. The new film "Catching Dolls", directed by Yan Fei and Peng Damo ("Charlotte's Troubles" and "The Richest Man in Xihong City"), and starring the golden pair Shen Teng and Ma Li again, is the top player of this summer.

Since its preview last weekend, "Catching Dolls" has grossed over 350 million yuan in two days, helping the market climb to over 300 million yuan a day. As of its official release today, its cumulative box office has exceeded 500 million yuan.

While heating up the market, the film's media predicted that the total box office would hit over 3.5 billion, which is a good start.

Data source @Lighthouse Professional Edition

Continuing the background of "The Richest Man in Xihong City", the story of "Catching Dolls" also takes place in the fictional Xihong City, telling a story of a "poor-raised" child with great contrast.

Ma Chenggang (played by Shen Teng) is a wealthy businessman in Xihong City. He has worked hard since he was a child to achieve his career. In order to enable his children to be self-reliant and to better inherit the family business, he persuaded his wife Chunlan (played by Ma Li) to live in a dilapidated house together, so that his son Ma Jiye can experience poverty from an early age.

Under the cultivation of his parents and grandmother (played by Sarina), Ma Jiye grew up to be a sensible and filial child. He was not only hardworking and thrifty, but also his mind was full of reading and studying, hoping that one day he could change the fate of the Ma family.

But as he grew older, he gradually discovered something strange about the world around him:

His sloppy parents are always hiding something, his warm-hearted neighbors seem to be watching him, his life trajectory seems to be set, and he begins to doubt the reality and illusion of everything around him.

What Ma Jiye didn’t know was that in order to help him become a successful person, this couple had spent years meticulously planning to create a special environment for him to grow up in, which can be described as “explosive parenting.”

What kind of jokes will be generated by the extremely contrasting "double life", how this unique parenting attempt will end, and whether Xiao Ma can understand his parents, all these questions have to be answered in the cinema.

Directors Yan Fei and Peng Damo have always been good at using contrasting situations to create comedic effects:

"Charlotte's Troubles" makes a loser in life become a winner after "time travel and rebirth"; "The Richest Man in Xihong City" gives a frustrated player a 1 billion yuan life experience voucher; the painter Ma Liang in "The Magic Brush of Ma Liang" chooses to return to his hometown to support agriculture, but pretends to be studying in Russia to hide it from his wife.

"Catching Dolls" also continues the funny style of contrast comedy:

In front of others, Ma Chenggang, wearing worn-out leather shoes with broken soles, repaired the roof that was always leaking, while Chunlan, wrapped in a patched cotton-padded jacket, washed tattered old clothes in basins; behind others, they entertained guests with imported coffee and cigars in the most shabby house, and from time to time they would make a gorgeous transformation and drive luxury cars and live in mansions.

The dense laughter design in "Catching Dolls" is inseparable from the cooperation and presentation of Shen Teng and Ma Li.

Following the "Tencent content", Xiao Wan learned a new word - "Shen Ma's frame rate". The closer the ratio is to 100%, the higher the tacit understanding of the film and the better the humor.

In a blink of an eye, Shen Teng and Ma Li have known each other for nearly 20 years, and have been partners on the big screen for exactly 10 years.

The 2014 hit "Charlotte's Troubles" was the starting point. Charlotte and Ma Dongmei performed the love story of "after all the twists and turns, it's still you" in a tearful and funny way. The National Day box office that year exceeded expectations by 1.4 billion yuan, and the national comedy duo was born.

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In the "Magic Brush of Ma Liang" unit short film in the 2020 compilation "My Hometown and Me", Shen Teng and Ma Li once again play a couple, one honest and the other bold, and they continue to create sparks.

In the 2022 summer movie "The Earth Alone", they transformed themselves into maintenance worker Dugu Yue and commander Ma Lanxing. This romantic love story on the moon eventually grossed 3.1 billion yuan at the box office.

In 2024's "Catching Dolls", Shen and Ma's appearance and figure may have changed, but their tacit understanding has increased. On the set, where they are, there are countless laughter and inadvertent warmth.

There is a scene in the film: Old Ma, Chunlan and grandma are reading with Little Ma. Little Ma is really reading, but the three of them are secretly playing with their mobile phones. The sleepy Chunlan puts her head against the light switch and accidentally turns off the light with her face.

It can be seen from the behind-the-scenes footage that this scene was shot multiple times because it was difficult to get the right angle for turning off the lights. After the two of them laughed together because of the NG, Shen Teng was concerned about whether Ma Li's head was hurt.

In another scene, Shen Teng mispronounced "family business" as "effusion". Ma Li reacted quickly and followed his lines, "Who wants to inherit your stuff?", directly bypassing the original lines. The silky tacit understanding made all the staff laugh.

In Ma Li's words, the reunion of old friends after many years "is not about filming, but about the joy of being together."

In fact, when Shen and Ma stand together, it's already very funny without any acting.

The audience loves to watch the Shen-Ma combination acting together, and they did not disappoint, exploring different roles time and time again and bringing different surprises.

In addition to Shen Teng and Ma Li partnering up again, the other cast of "Catching Dolls" are all comedians.

Wei Xiang plays Ma Jiye's high school politics teacher. The football coach he played in "The Richest Man in Xihong City" is full of humor from his accent to his body language. The black comedy "The Killer Is Not So Calm" starring him and Ma Li also created a box office of 2.3 billion.

Wang Chengsi and Zhang Yiming, the "dragons and phoenixes of the investment world" in "The Richest Man in Xihong City", are also old fans of Mahua. Wang Chengsi was also the host of Qiuya's wedding in "Charlotte's Troubles", and Zhang Yiming was the flyer distribution expert in "The Shameful Iron Fist". They made a guest appearance together in "Catching Dolls" this time.

Comedians such as Jia Bing (The Last Thing Called Money), Li Jiaqi (The Moon Walks Alone), and Yu Yang (The Last Thing Called Money) respectively play the home visiting wealthy businessman, the pony female classmate, and the owner of an electrical appliance store in "Catching Dolls", adding more humor to the film.

In addition, Shi Pengyuan, who walked out of "The Hidden Corner", plays the young Ma Jiye. This is also his another summer movie after "The Octagon" last year; Teacher Sarina, who is used to acting in serious dramas (such as "Crossing the Guandong" and "The World"), challenges comedy performance for the first time, and her new image is highly anticipated.

Behind the scenes, "Catching Dolls" is the third feature film co-produced by directors Yan Fei and Peng Damo.

The two have been deeply involved in comedy creation for many years. When they were directors and screenwriters at Happy Twist, they created the stage play script of "Charlotte's Troubles", which was later adapted into a blockbuster movie.

They later founded Xihong City Films, and since then "Xihong City" has become an important landmark and visual symbol of their works. From "Charlotte's Troubles" to "The Richest Man in Xihong City", "Magic Brush Ma Liang" to "Catching Dolls", it is not difficult to find small easter eggs with the same origin and the same universe view.

For example, the heroines of the four films are named Ma Dongmei, Xia Zhu, Qiuxia and Chunlan, which represents spring, summer, autumn and winter.

The stories all take place in Xihong City. The short film "The Magic Brush of Ma Liang" does not state it explicitly, but there is also the "Xi H" license plate and "Xihong Soda"; Qiuya Road (echoing "Charlotte's Troubles") and the words Xihong City Middle School and test papers appear in "Catching Dolls". You can pay attention to similar small easter eggs when watching the movie.

The audience who followed "Charlotte's Troubles" ten years ago and "Catching Dolls" should be able to understand the meaning of the Easter egg linkage. Behind the emotional memories is the expansion of the "Xihong City Universe" and the memories of the ten years of cooperation between Shen Teng and Ma Li.

The newly-started "Shen Ma Combination" has sent out another invitation letter from Xihong City, welcoming everyone to come to the cinema to witness this hit comedy film in the 2024 summer season.

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Note: Some of the pictures in this article are from Douban and the Internet. If there is any infringement, please contact us.