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This summer, you have to watch Shen Teng and Ma Li!

Last year's summer movie theaters were extremely popular, with the box office revenue of 20.6 billion yuan breaking the historical box office record.

This summer, movie theaters were very quiet. Halfway through the summer vacation, the total box office was just 4.8 billion.

At this level, the final summer box office will be only half of last year's.

How to relieve worries? Only Shen Teng!

The "Shenma Combination" made another move after two years, creating a box office miracle and saving the summer for movie fans.

Not long ago, "Catching Dolls" starring Shen Teng and Ma Li was released.

With 40% of the screenings on the first day, the film took in over 72% of the box office.

The film started large-scale previews as early as July 13, and the preview schedule has reached nearly 30%, and the box office of previews alone has exceeded 500 million.

At present, the box office of "Catching Dolls" has exceeded 800 million, but this is far from its end.

Maoyan’s final box office forecast is 3.75 billion, which is still low.

According to past rules, a summer season can produce two blockbuster movies with a box office of over 3 billion yuan. This year, the only movie that has a chance to become a blockbuster, apart from "Catching Dolls", is Xu Zheng's "Reverse Life".

If "Reverse Life" is not strong, "Catching Dolls" will absorb that part of the box office and easily break through the 4 billion mark, and even have a chance to knock on the door of 5 billion.

In 2019, "The Eight Hundred" was withdrawn from the schedule, and "Nezha: The Devil Child Comes into the World" lost its biggest competitor and took three months to reach 5 billion yuan.

Behind high box office there must be good reputation.

Brother Pi went to see "Catch the Dolls" as soon as possible and commented in one sentence: I haven't seen such a good movie in the cinema for a long time.

I came back and searched the comments and found that Han Han also went to see this movie.

His comments were even more disgusting.

He said that he has a high sense of humor, but "Catch the Doll" was the happiest laugh he had ever had in a movie theater.

Han Han and Shen Teng have worked together in "Flying Life", "Flying Life 2" and "Four Seas", so they are somewhat related, so he will definitely say something to support them.

But the compliment that made him say "the best in my life" was definitely not just a formality.

In fact, 9 years ago, when "Charlotte's Troubles" was released, Han Han had posted a message as a "tap water" praising the film, which was also an important opportunity for him to cooperate with Shen Teng.

Of course, after laughing and calming down, I found that "Catching Dolls" still has many obvious flaws.

Objectively speaking, it is slightly worse than "Charlotte's Troubles" and much better than "The Richest Man in Xihong City".

Currently, "Catching Dolls" has a Douban score of 7.5, "Charlotte's Troubles" has a score of 7.9, and "The Richest Man in Xihong City" has a score of 6.6. The audience's scores basically conform to this judgment.

Regarding this movie, Pigo has three words to say.

First, the Shenma group yyds.

Let’s talk about Shen Teng first. Whether you admit it or not, Shen Teng is already the comedy king of this era.

Let’s go straight to the data.

In 2015, "Charlotte's Troubles" earned 1.444 billion;

In 2018, "The Richest Man in Xihong City" 2.547 billion;

In 2019, "Crazy Alien" 2.213 billion;

In the same year, "Speeding Life" 1.728 billion;

In 2022, "Alone on the Moon" 3.103 billion;

In 2023, “Man Jiang Hong” 4.544 billion;

In 2024, "Speeding Life 2" will have 3.398 billion.

In the same year, "Catching Dolls" currently has over 3.2 billion.

The movies he starred in received mixed reviews, but the box office performance was never bad.

His total box office has now exceeded 34.2 billion, surpassing Wu Jing's 33.4 billion and Huang Bo's 23.3 billion, ranking first among all Chinese actors.

In the past two years, Shen Teng has been a bit lazy. He has not starred in many movies and often makes cameo appearances for others because he cannot afford to lose face.

He accepted many bad movies and was used by the promoters of these bad movies.

In many films, even though Shen Teng does not have many roles, he is still placed in the most prominent position for promotion.

The most exaggerated one is "Hotel Impossible", in which Shen Teng participated in the performance in the form of a KT board, hence the saying "Teng content".

"Teng content" means that the quality of a film is directly proportional to the proportion of Shen Teng's role.

It was a positive word at first, but later Shen Teng ruined his popularity with one bad movie after another, and the word became a negative word.

This gives people the illusion that Shen Teng is no longer good.

In fact, the opposite is true.

It is true that Shen Teng has made guest appearances in a lot of bad movies in the past two years, but the movies he starred in are still strong.

"The Lone Moon", "Red River", "Speeding Life 2", and "Catching Dolls" have a combined box office of 15 billion.

There are only 12 actors in the Chinese film industry who can break into the 15 billion mark, and Shen Teng did it in just 2 years.

Shen Teng is not no longer as good as he used to be, he is just getting better.

The last person to have such box office dominance was Stephen Chow in 1992. That year was called the Stephen Chow Year.

2024 can be called the year of Shen Teng.

Box office dominance is one aspect, and terrifying national popularity is another.

In "Catching Dolls", Shen Teng made his first appearance without saying a word. He sat on the earthen kang and the whole audience burst into laughter.

The last person who had this kind of audience appeal was Zhao Benshan around 2000.

Shen Teng is already the comedy king of this era.

Many people look down on Ma Li from the Shenma group, saying that she is Shen Teng's strongest pendant. People go to watch the Shenma group mainly to see Shen Teng.

This statement is biased.

Ma Li became popular for her role as Ma Dongmei in “Charlotte’s Troubles”, and the “Ma Dongmei” meme is still popular on the Internet.

But in recent years, she has been ruining her popularity due to two reasons.

First, he takes on a lot of bad movies. Compared with Shen Teng, he is even worse. He even takes on bad movies that are rated 2 on Douban.

Secondly, although he is a comedian, he always plays the role of a stunning beauty, which gives people a very incongruous feeling.

She played the role of a popular goddess in "The Professional" and "The Lone Moon", which gave people a very incongruous feeling.

In the past two years, she realized her shortcomings and began to correct them.

In this year's Spring Festival movie "Article 20", she played opposite Lei Jiayin and played a role similar to Ma Dongmei, a tough and talkative wife, which was very outstanding.

In "Hot and Spicy", he and Wei Xiang played a pair of happy enemies, proving that they can still shine without Shen Teng.

In this movie "Catching Dolls", Shen Teng and Ma Li are evenly matched.

The Shenma combination is definitely not just Shen Teng. The whole film has many flaws, but it is supported by the gags of the two old partners.

If someone else played the role, it would definitely fail. "Catching Dolls" is a typical human protection play.

With this film, Ma Li's box office revenue exceeded 20 billion yuan, making her the first Chinese actress to do so.

The Shenma group has become the top ace in the film industry.

With Pi Ge’s second words, Yan Fei and Peng Damo were deified again.

Many people regard "Catching Dolls" as a work of Happy Twist.

Yes and no.

Happy Twist was once synonymous with new comedy.

They worked on the drama stage for ten years, accumulated a group of good actors and good scripts, and then soared to fame with the play "Charlotte's Troubles".

Unfortunately, he did not make any progress and only relied on one trick to get everything he wanted.

Their routine is nothing more than: homophonic film titles + contrasting funny effects caused by identity dislocation.

"Charlotte's Troubles" is about time travel, "The Shameful Iron Fist" is about gender swapping, "The Richest Man in Xihong City" is about a poor man suddenly becoming rich, "The Killer Is Not So Cool" is about a supporting actor playing a killer, and "The Super Family" is about a mortal gaining super powers.

Almost every Happy Twist movie can be adapted to this formula.

It’s fresh to watch once, but after watching it too many times you’ll get aesthetic fatigue, and now it’s become a physiological aversion.

But what makes "Catching Dolls" different from other Mahua movies is that it is directed by Yan Fei and Peng Damo.

These two people are from Happy Twist and are born with the Twist gene. Although they have not produced many works, their quality rate is extremely high.

In the past ten years, they have made a total of three movies, all of which were collaborations with the Shenma group.

The first one is "Charlotte's Troubles", which has become recognized as the best comedy in the past decade;

The second one is "The Richest Tomato", which has high energy in the early stage and a bit of a bad ending, but it produced countless memes and gave birth to the "Xihong City Universe".

The third one is "Catching Dolls", which is also a hit.

The story of "Catching Dolls" is very simple.

Shen Teng and Ma Li play a wealthy couple. Their eldest son was a failure in his upbringing. In order to help their second son to have a bright future, the couple moved into a dilapidated yard and performed a poor version of "The Truman Show" for their son.

"Rich people pretending to be poor" is another identity dislocation routine that Happy Twist has used too much, but the effect presented is completely different, because this is a work that has been polished for eight years.

Strictly speaking, "Catch the Dolls" should be the second film of the two directors.

In 2015, after the huge success of "Charlotte's Troubles", the two directors launched a new film project the following year, and the original title of the film was "Capital Successor".

During the creative process, they received the task of adapting "Brewster's Millions", which later became "The Richest Man in Westwood", and the production of the new film was put on hold.

"The Richest Man in Xihong City" is a work of reference and also a rushed work. The first half is full of surprises because it stands on the shoulders of others, but the second half has a serious sense of fragmentation. Overall, it is a half-finished product.

In 2023, the two directors restarted their previous film plan and changed its name to "Catching Dolls". The plot outline is basically the same as the previous "Capital Successor".

The film was completed last year. When the official release date was announced, it was changed to "Successor Plan". When it was about to be released, it was changed back to "Catching Dolls".

The constant changes and adjustments made people worried about the future of this film. Some time ago, there was even news that the film would be temporarily withdrawn.

Fortunately, at the critical moment, the film company stood up and said that not only would the film not be withdrawn, but it would also start advanced screenings, so the film finally met the audience.

An idea was shelved for seven years and was constantly polished in the minds of two directors. Even a piece of rotten wood could be carved into the sharpest sword.

Although the idea of ​​"Catching Dolls" is old-fashioned and can be seen in the shadows of classic movies such as "The Truman Show" and "The Starting Line", the overall completion is very high. It is equivalent to putting new wine in the old bottle of Happy Twist. The taste is very familiar, but more mellow.

Pigo’s third sentence is that “Catching Dolls” is not a vulgar comedy.

Let's get back to the movie itself. Putting aside all the gimmicks, this is actually a comedy with a solid script and full of details, which is the most scarce type in the current film market.

The film begins with the familiar smell of fried dough twists, with a rich man pretending to be poor to educate his children.

This setting is very funny, but the problem is that the first part lasts half an hour, and all the jokes are focused on the contrast brought about by "rich people pretending to be poor".

The most typical example is that President Jia, played by Jia Bing, came to Shen Teng's home to express his condolences, but Shen Teng's family smoked high-quality cigars and drank imported coffee beans.

Jia Bing accidentally broke a stool when he sat on it. This clip was an emergency at the scene and was edited into the feature film by the director.

The audience burst into laughter.

But the subsequent plots are all continuations of this kind of jokes.

The audience soon gets tired of the contrast jokes that are used over and over again, and this is where most of Mahua's comedies fail.

The turning point of "Catching Dolls" occurs when the son Xiaoma grows up. The comedy effect is enhanced and the aftereffect comes out.

Credit here goes to two actors.

One is Shi Pengyuan, who plays the son, Yan Liang in "The Bad Kids" and Su Mu in "The Octagonal Cage".

The biggest difference between comedy and farce is that in farce everyone goes crazy and the plot goes off in the beginning but ends up being ruined in the end.

There must be a straight person in a comedy. The plot may go off track at the beginning, but it can be pulled back by the straight person.

Shi Pengyuan is this straight man.

He played the role of his son Xiao Ma in a serious drama style.

He had a frown on his face, looked serious, had almost no sense of humor, and was even a little melancholy. At one point we saw his shadow in "The Bad Kids".

While Shen Teng and Ma Li were acting crazy and stupid in the film, this little Ma was painfully trapped in the mystery.

Frankly speaking, the best comedy effects are based on the suffering of others. The collision between weirdos and straight people is what makes the comedy work.

The reason why "Catching Dolls" was able to rise to prominence in the later period was because of Shi Pengyuan's "unhappiness".

Another is teacher Sarina’s superb acting skills.

Sarina previously played a loving mother in "The World", and many people were worried that she would not be able to adapt to comedy.

But in fact, comedy is the touchstone of a good actor. Real top actors, such as Tony Leung, Tony Leung Ka Fai, and Leslie Cheung, can all shine in comedy.

The same is true for Sarina.

Her character has a dual identity.

One is Xiao Ma’s grandmother, and the other is education expert Teacher Li.

Grandma is actually a straight person, and Teacher Li is a weirdo. Sarina blends the two roles together, performing both scheming and kindness. The sense of contradiction is the source of the hilarious moments.

The Shenma group is responsible for controlling the overall comedy rhythm of the film, and the three biggest laughs in the film all come from Sarina.

The funniest part of the film is the scene where she stands up and runs away with her wheelchair. The embarrassing moment of this loving grandmother immediately causes the whole audience to boil over.

The second hilarious moment was when Xiao Ma ran into her playing basketball, and the grandmother and grandson had a chase scene.

This scene directly opened up the structure of the film. The laughs in the whole film were expanded from language to action scenes. Xiao Ma's line "I saw my grandma playing basketball" made everyone laugh like crazy.

The third hilarious moment was when the old lady pretended to die in cooperation with the acting.

At the funeral, she was moved by the pony and sat up. The fake farce collided with true feelings, and the atmosphere in the theater reached its climax.

The other actors are all wonderful in their own ways, but the soul of the whole film is still Shen Teng.

People always say that Shen Teng has no acting skills and has never won any significant award for Best Actor, and that he relies entirely on audience appeal.

At least in this film, he proved himself, and his most amazing acting was the last emotional scene.

If someone else played this scene, it would turn out to be a "making dumplings" plot, but only Shen Teng performed it in a serious and humorous way.

In the tunnel, Xiao Ma breaks down after learning the truth, and his father goes up to comfort him.

After Shen Teng said a lot of inspiring words, he suddenly shouted "the great love" in a hoarse voice. The weird tone made the audience laugh and also dispelled the didactic feeling of the lines.

After the audience laughed, he continued to give them chicken soup. Xiao Ma didn't listen to his father and left alone.

Shen Teng said behind her, "Don't forget to go home for dinner at night", which made the audience laugh again with just a little effort.

He can switch smoothly between humor and affection, and this ability to capture the essence of the situation makes the film's ending very well-rounded.

In addition to the twists and turns of the comedy structure, the film also lays out other details very well.

There is a twist. The director deliberately misleads the audience at the end. The eldest son threatens to buy the sharpest weapon, making everyone think that he will kidnap Xiao Ma on the day of the college entrance examination, ending with a bloody family drama.

But in fact, the eldest son’s real purpose was not to kill, but to follow the Sherpas to climb Mount Everest and achieve self-salvation.

The one who actually kidnapped Xiao Ma was himself.

An egg broken from the outside in is food.

Breaking from the inside out is life.

The director used this small reversal to reveal the theme.

It's also ironic that many people mistakenly believe that the ending of the film is a happy, family-friendly one.

After performing a farce, the family returned to their happy life.

The eldest son redeemed himself by climbing Mount Everest, Xiao Ma was admitted to the sports university of his choice, and the couple reconciled and planned to have a third child.

But the irony is that no matter how bad the education is in Chinese families, they will work together to cover up the truth. Behind the happy atmosphere is the alienation between each other.

At the end of the film, Shen Teng told Ma Li that he wanted to have a new child, and Ma Li chuckled.

This smile is terrifying when you think about it carefully. Its essence is that the two people's succession plan has failed, and they have no intention of repenting and are planning to have another person to continue this absurd action.

The director stops here and lets the audience judge for themselves.

Finally, I want to say that many people are not used to watching Happy Twist movies. These two days, Lu Chuan made a statement on his personal social media, saying that it is a cultural tragedy that low-quality, alkaline comedies like Happy Twist dominate the film market.

In my opinion, this is because he did not watch the film carefully. The film has already struck a good balance between laughter and thought-provoking, and the audience has already made their choice with their feet.

At this time when the economy is in recession and the film industry is in a slump.

A deification comedy like "The Long Season" is of high quality and profound meaning, but it is somewhat out of reach for the general public.

"Catch the Dolls" is a hilarious movie with a thin skin but big content, dense laughs, and some small twists and turns. It is the savior of the film market.

Four years ago, Chen Sicheng said that there would be two types of cinema movies that would be big hits in the future.

One is to conquer the audience with an unparalleled audio-visual feast.

One is to impress the audience with a fascinating story.

"Catching Dolls" is the latter.

This is how Chinese comedies should be shot!

Text/PiPi Movie Editorial Department: YiLiJi

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