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Text | Mouyu

As the summer season draws to a close, the battle in the film market continues, and Huanxi Media has once again played a "trump card" with "Hedgehog".

The film is directed by Gu Changwei, who has won many film awards at home and abroad, and stars Cannes Film Festival winner Ge You and veteran popular star Wang Junkai. It also won the Best Screenplay Award at the Golden Goblet Awards in the main competition unit of the 26th Shanghai International Film Festival. Whether from the production team or the plot content, "Hedgehog" is indeed a "king bomb" level.

However, this "king bomb" configuration gimmick may not work well in this summer season. As many highly anticipated top commercial blockbusters have failed one after another, an unavoidable market reality is thatHigh-end configuration can certainly protect the film, but if it cannot please the audience, it can only be self-admiring.。

Huanxi Media, one of the main producers of "Hedgehog", is a "typical victim" of this market situation. It played many "trump cards" in 2024 but failed to achieve considerable box office results. The market performance that was not as expected once again confirmed that although a high-quality team can bring higher attention, it cannot be a guarantee of box office.

Faced with this market situation, whether "Hedgehog" can break the curse of this year's summer season and end Huanshi Media's trend of consecutive failures has become the common expectation of the industry.

Audiences no longer trust the industry

It is recognized by the industry that the summer movie market performed poorly this year, especially when the box office of many commercial blockbusters fell short of expectations, the entire industry seemed a little bleak.

An incredible statistic is that as of August 17, the total box office of four commercial blockbusters, Chen Sicheng's "The Decoded", Wuershan's "Under the Stranger", Xu Zheng's "Reverse Life" and Jackie Chan's "Legend", is not as good as that of a niche suspense film "The Silent War".

Among these four commercial blockbusters, except for "Reverse Life" which is a realistic film, the other three are special effects blockbusters. The production team, cost, and IP are all top-notch. Before their release, they were once expected to be the "king bomb" films that would detonate the summer season, but ended regrettably and it may be difficult to make a profit.

The dismal box office performance of summer blockbusters has led to a new industry change:High investment, big production, and strong team cannot completely equate to box office guaranteeIn fact, this change did not occur in the summer season, but there were signs after entering 2024. Huanxi Media, which rushed from the beginning of the year to the middle of the year, was the biggest "victim".

Huanxi Media has released three films since 2024.All the best configurations, all the dismal box office。

"Mr. Red Carpet", which was released during the Spring Festival, had the coldest box office in the hottest period. It was directed by Ning Hao and starred Andy Lau. From the all-star production team to the comedy theme, it was a copy of the 2023 Spring Festival box office champion "Man Jiang Hong". Before its release, it was also expected to replicate the box office performance of "Man Jiang Hong", but it was eventually withdrawn due to poor performance, and the cumulative box office after its re-release failed to exceed 100 million.

The family film "Morning Clouds and Evening Rain" was released in May. It was directed by Zhang Guoli and starred Fan Wei and Zhou Dongyu. It was a full cast of powerful actors. Fan Wei also won the Best Actor Award at the Beijing International Film Festival for this film, but the film's final cumulative box office did not exceed 20 million.

"Safe Evacuation from the 21st Century", which was released in the summer, is a popular science fiction theme in recent years. Starring the popular actor Zhang Ruoyun, it received rave reviews before its release and was once considered to be the dark horse of this summer's season. However, as of press time, the cumulative box office was only 107 million yuan, which is actually the highest box office for Huanshi Media in 2024.

These three films were included in Huanxi Media's 2023 annual report, and are expected to drive the company's revenue growth. However, the fact is that the total box office of the three films is only 200 million yuan, compared with the 5.1 billion box office in 2023 by the two films "Man Jiang Hong" and "Xue Ba".Huanxi Media's performance in the film market in 2024 can indeed be described as a "plummeting performance"。

Why is there such a big gap in the market performance of Huanxi Media in 2023 and 2024?

In fact, the movies released by Huanxi Media in 2024 are basicallyContinuing the consistent "well-known director + star actor" production modelWell-known directors control the level and quality of the film, star actors increase the market attention of the film, and create "blockbuster" with both content and popularity, which drives the audience to enter quickly. The feasibility of this model has been verified by the box office success of "Man Jiang Hong" and "Xue Dad" in 2023.

But completely different from expectations, Huanxi Media achieved three consecutive failures in 2024. Well-known directors, well-known actors, huge investments... these labels that emphasize that the movie is a "big production" and bring high market attention can no longer attract audiences to enter. Essentially, it is becauseAudiences no longer trust the entire film and television industry。

The main reason for the plummeting credibility of the film and television industry among the audience can be seen from this year's summer season. Many commercial blockbusters use the marketing routine of "big investment and big production before screening - explosive word-of-mouth for advance screening - poor box office performance and regret for being a lost gem". However, in fact, the reputation of the plot content is not good or has not met expectations. While the audience shouted "content fraud", the dismal box office was also expected.

The problem of publicity and promotion being more important than content has long caused the film and television industry to lose the trust of the audience., and completely exploded after entering 2024, leading to three consecutive failures of Huanxi Media. The audiences who "learn from their mistakes" promoted the birth of a new viewing trend:

The possibility of relying on the influence accumulated by the director, actors and production team in the past as a gimmick to "trick" the audience into going to the cinema is almost non-existent. The audience will only pay for good content that truly suits their preferences. The era when "Learning to Be a Dad", which has a Douban score of only 5.9, can win a box office of 600 million is gone forever.

Can Huanxi Media end its three-game losing streak?

With the change in movie-watching trends, the impact on Huanxi Media is undoubtedly huge.

Huanxi Media's film creation system revolves around "Director Shareholder System"To create, by deepening cooperation with star directors to drive the improvement of film quality and market attention.

But when the audience no longer trusts the industry, the label of "star director" is no longer an effective aid to attract audiences to the theater. Instead, it becomes a "shackle" for the creators themselves. They are immersed in past excellent achievements, persistently pursue the artistry and depth of the film, and fail to truly understand the audience's preferences, which inevitably leads to the lack of commercial performance of the film. This is actually the common problem of the three films released by Huanxi Media from 2024 to now. Can the upcoming "Hedgehog" break this curse?

In fact, the production team configuration of "Hedgehog" is very similar to that of "Man Jiang Hong".

Gu Changwei is also a star director who started out as a photographer. He has collaborated with Zhang Yimou on many films such as "Red Sorghum" and "Ju Dou". The director's personal creative ability and aesthetics are online. Even the leading actor of "Hedgehog" Wang Junkai and the leading actor of "Man Jiang Hong" Yi Yang Qianxi are from the same group, so he has no shortage of traffic and attention.

butCurrently, on the Lighthouse Professional Edition, the media predicts that the box office will be between 160 million and 230 million before the release.The reasons why the market is not optimistic are:

First, from the perspective of the film itself, the configuration of star directors and popular actors has indeed brought a high level of attention, with a total marketing reach of 5 billion. However, a movie cannot be supported by fan circles. The audience will only pay for truly good content. However, as a niche family-themed movie, "Hedgehog" has a limited audience range and lacks explosive points.

Second, the entire market is relatively cold, especially since "Hedgehog" is scheduled to be released on August 23, which is already the end of the summer vacation season. The main group of students who watch movies are about to start school, and their enthusiasm for watching movies is bound to be greatly reduced by then.

If Hedgehog wants to break the market's pessimistic box office forecast, it can only wait for its release and then make a comeback with high-quality plot content. In fact, this is also a common problem encountered by Huanxi Media's reserve works:Market attention is greater than box office appeal。

According to the subsequent works reserves revealed in Huanxi Media's 2023 annual report, the films that have been completed but not yet released include "Alone on the Court" directed by Chen Kexin and starring Hu Ge, "In the Name of the Father" directed by Chen Daming and starring Zhang Hanyu, and "Going Up the Mountain" produced by Wang Xiaoshuai. Without exception, they are top-level configurations of "star director + star actor".

In the past, this kind of production team would leave the public with a stereotype of "good movies", but as the credibility of the film and television industry among the audience has been greatly reduced, although the audience will still pay high attention to big-budget movies with star teams, they will no longer blindly pay real money to go to the cinema, and the box office appeal of star teams is getting worse and worse.

But objectively speaking, under the new viewing trend, Huanxi Media also has its own advantages.Excellent star directors bring not only market attention, but also outstanding creative ability.After the bubble of "promotion is more important than content" was burst, only truly good content can attract audiences to the cinema, driving the entire film market to start rolling up content. Huanxi Media, which has tied up with many top directors, undoubtedly has greater market advantages.