porginchina

For the not super China-fixated, the roster of Spring Festival releases this year, ordered based on their presages and want-to-see indexes on Maoyan: 长津湖之水门桥 (official English title: The Battle at Lake Changjin II; more literally, Lake Changjin’s Watergate Bridge). Sequel to the nominally highest-grossing Chinese movie of all time (Wolf Warrior II had *much* more impressive attendance). Useful box office comparisons include the first Battle at Lake Changjin, which released over National Day; among recent Spring Festival releases, the closest comparison I can think of is the astonishingly violent and bloody Operation Red Sea from 2019, which made 3.65 billion RMB off of a fairly small opening day and really strong word of mouth. Changjin II will open on IMAX/premium format screens (not sure if they've announced anything for the sequel, but I'm pretty sure the entire movie is formatted in IMAX's 1.9 aspect ratio). At 149 minutes, it’s the longest Spring Festival release this year, although it’s a merciful 30 minutes shorter than its predecessor. 奇迹·笨小孩 (official English title: Nice View; more literally, Miracle - Stupid Child). Starring Jackson Yee and a cute kid; plot focuses on migrant workers in China’s tech zone of Shenzhen (I believe that the title refers to the country’s economic miracle). Director Wen Muye’s last movie 我不是药神 (Dying to Survive) grossed 3.1 billion RMB in summer 2018 off of exceptional word of mouth. If this one is similarly crowd-pleasing, could be one to watch; it will release in IMAX, though not sure how many showtimes it’ll get given the competition. 四海 (official English title: Only Fools Rush In; more literally, Four Seas). Starring Liu Haoran (the Detective Chinatown franchise), Liu Haocun (A Little Red Flower, Cliff Walkers), Shen Tang (Hi, Mom), the movie’s a comedy/action/romance centered around motorcycles. This is director Han Han’s third Spring Festival movie after 2017’s Duckweed and 2019’s Pegasus, both of which topped out at just over 1 billion RMB. Like Changjin and Nice View, this one also has an IMAX release, although not sure how meaningful that IMAX release will end up being. 这杀手不太冷静 (official English title: Too Cool to Kill; more literally, This Murderer Isn’t Too Calm). Looks to be playing off China’s affinity for script murder games (similarly to last year’s 扬名立万 (Be Somebody), which made about 900 million RMB). 狙击手 (not sure it has an official English title but the Chinese translates to ‘Snipers’). Directed by Zhang Yimou and his daughter Zhang Mo; so far not at all impressive given the pedigree of the director, the prestige of the release date, and the success of other Korean War movies. Could it receive a boost from the Beijing 2022 opening ceremony, also directed by Zhang Yimou? Not sure… Plus a trio of animations— 熊出没·重返地球 (Boonie Bears: Back to Earth) and 喜羊羊与黑太狼之筐出未来 (Dunk for Future), both installments in long-running domestic Chinese children’s franchises, as well as 小虎墩大英雄 (Run Tiger Run), which is currently on track to place dead last among the Spring Festival releases. None of the animations are likely to be a major box office factor. So far the 2022 box office is down compared to 2021. All the quotes I've seen from Chinese officials indicate that they would rather not relinquish the worldwide box office crown back to the US/Canada; if that's a serious goal, then a strong, preferably record-breaking Spring Festival is going to be critical to achieving success. With that said, this year's roster just isn't that exciting, with only one movie that seems like a surefire blockbuster (Changjin II). China'll need some serious breakout successes if they want to keep up their box office growth… and, barring that, they'll need to let in more foreign releases to keep numbers up (pretty sure Uncharted has been approved but not dated). Anecdotally, living in Shanghai, I haven't heard much excitement for this year's roster of movies (although then again I'm a foreigner so take everything I say with a heaping helping of salt).

As far as measurable online metrics… yes (which does partially explain why DC3 was so epically front-loaded). It's definitely worth noting that Battle at Lake Changjin didn't open astronomically huge on its first day; I also suspect that DC3's blend of broad comedy and murder mystery made for more immediately appealing holiday viewing than Battle at Lake Changjin II's mix of fierce violence and lots of soldiers freezing to death.

I think last year's crazy demand was mostly due to the movies in question… Detective Chinatown 3 was the sequel to the widely-liked, super-successful Detective Chinatown 2 and was supported by a multi-year marketing campaign (thanks in part to Covid-19 delays), plus had years of speculation about its plot/world-building to build the hype, hence the crazy anticipation figures and presales. Hi Mom had popular actors and turned out to be super crowd-pleasing (I think it might have done some strategic pre-release screenings to build online buzz? can't remember for sure). This year's crop is simply not as exciting. Really, the entire Chinese box office has been in the doldrums since summer; a few reasonably impressive successes but nothing that's truly shattered expectations outside of The Battle at Lake Changjin (which, I'd argue, is at least partially offset by relative box office disappointments like 1921, Chinese Doctors, and My Country, My Parents).

Presales for the top five Spring Festival releases, as of the end of the day 1.24 (one week until start of Spring Festival) 长津湖之水门桥 (Battle at Lake Changjin II) — 58.2 million RMB / 9.19 million USD 奇迹·笨小孩 (Nice View) — 23.8 million RMB / 3.76 million USD 四海 (Only Fools Rush In) — 22.0 million RMB / 3.48 million USD 这个杀手不太冷静 (Too Cool to Kill) — 18.9 million RMB / 2.98 million USD 狙击手 (Snipers) — 12.3 million RMB / 1.78 million USD Looks like it'll be an underwhelming year of Spring Festival… assume the week will be large enough to give the overall Chinese box office a commanding lead over the US/Canada through the end of February, but the US should have a good chance of taking the worldwide lead before too much of 2022 is past. Big question is whether anything other than Changjin II can break out as the holiday continues (so far, Changjin II is accounting for about 40% of all presales)

Some factors with Battle at Lake Changjin 2: -the first movie opened impressively on its first day but then grew throughout the National Day week… more of a Hi, Mom pattern than a Detective Chinatown 3 pattern (so expecting the sequel to break all the opening records seems… not the most likely) -the first movie had the advantage of opening during National Day, when more people might feel social pressure to participate in patriotic activities like seeing a patriotic movie -there's more competition during Spring Festival than there was during National Day -quickly browsing through reviews for the first one on social media, much of the praise is directed at elements external to the quality of the movie itself (i.e., the popularity of actors like Wu Jing and Jackson Yee, expressing support for soldiers in the People's Liberation Army, expressing appreciation for the peaceful/prosperous life modern Chinese enjoy thanks to the sacrifices that PLA soldiers made in conflicts like the Korean War/War to Resist American Aggression and Aid Korea (one of the main messages/themes in the movie)) -while the Battle of Choisin Reservoir was a tactical victory for the Chinese, it wasn't a clear-cut strategic victory and I'm not sure how this sequel will handle that (the best military history comparison for Changjin 2 is that it's kinda like making a movie about Dunkirk from the perspective of the Germans; granted, the first movie veered between indifference to historical accuracy and good old-fashioned tactical incomprehensibility, so basically all bets are off for part 2) -the first movie has some flat-out incompetent filmmaking with awful visual effects, atrocious editing, abysmal action sequences, etc. etc. I'm personally not sure how this sequel is going to do overall. The simple fact that it's a big propaganda movie doesn't mean anything since expensive government-endorsed movies don't always break box office records. I'm sure it'll make a lot of money, but I'll be surprised if it equals its predecessor. Going to be an interesting next week or so of pre-sales!