Chinese Entertainment

Chapter 658 Can This Be Considered a Movie?
Although many big-budget movies have been box office hits during this year's Lunar New Year holiday, Gu Wei believes that there will not be any films with particularly high box office.

After all, the scale of the mainland market is there, and even if it explodes, it will be limited. The current environment cannot produce several works with box office revenues of over 1 billion in the same period.

Even though "Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons" achieved a box office of 1 billion yuan in the original time and space by being postponed for 20 days, Gu Wei currently estimates that the other party can only get 600 to 700 million yuan at most.

After all, there are two more high-quality movies, "Chinese Partners" and "Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy", and the two films together should share at least 1.2 billion or 1.3 billion.

In the original time and space, there are many factors that influence the high box office of domestic bad movies. One of them is that there are no other good movies to watch during the major schedules. After all, the number of imported films is limited. In order to protect domestic films, China Film has many restrictions on the schedules of imported films.

Now, thanks to Gu Wei's many films, the domestic audiences have developed a taste for movies and have become accustomed to watching high-quality films produced by Xingchen Films.

The audience discovered that domestic films can also be made like this, and domestic films are no worse than Hollywood blockbusters. Even "The Wandering Earth" produced by Star Film and Television Company is of a quality that crushes a large number of imported films.

But according to the current situation, the movie that was most affected was "Where Are We Going, Dad?". After earning 90 million yuan on the first day, it only earned 60 million yuan on the second day, a direct reduction of one third.

The media used the word "sudden drop" to describe the speed of box office decline of "Where Are We Going, Dad?", and its online reputation was terrible.

"I really didn't expect this kind of movie to have a score of 6.4. To be honest, if you look at it as a parent-child TV show, Dad, Where Are We Going? is actually pretty good. It's warm and non-commercial, and it's perfect for a family to watch together on the weekend after a busy week. But if you look at it as a movie, it's terrible."

"It's totally not worth the money spent. The movie theater was filled with deafening laughter, but what the hell were they laughing at? There was no funny or tear-jerking moment in this movie. It was just boring."

"Come on, this is a movie, honey! Not a TV show, honey! What's the difference between this and spending dozens of dollars to buy a super-sized TV to watch an episode of Where Are We Going, Dad?"

"Fuck, are producers and producers so blatant in defrauding money now?"

Since "Journey to the West: Havoc in Heaven" has not yet been released, the drama that netizens have criticized the most is "Where Are We Going, Dad?"

The plot of this movie is really a mess, it's like playing house.

The movies nowadays in theaters are a hodgepodge, relying entirely on star casts and the gimmicks of variety shows to attract audiences.

Where there are negative reviews, there are naturally positive reviews. A large number of water armies have posted comments on various forums:

"I don't know about cinemas in other places, but the cinemas here are full of Where Are We Going, Dad?" for half of the afternoon, and every show is packed.

“I haven’t had so much fun in the theater for a long time, just like when I watched Lost in Thailand last year, I laughed from beginning to end…

Kimi is cute, Shitou is funny, Sendie is cool, Tiantian is happy, Angela is healing. Real life and emotions are intertwined, which is both funny and warm. At the end, the audience even sang the theme song together...

It’s not strictly a movie, but it’s a good meal for the common people.”

"Haha, I'm dying of laughter." Liu Yifei laughed while reading the comments.

At this moment, Gu Wei felt that the goddess in the hearts of many fans was no different from a mentally retarded person.

"Haha, check out this news. A film critic said that watching 'Where Are We Going, Dad?' can lower one's intelligence. I hope everyone will watch the film with caution..."

Miss Liu held her stomach and continued laughing before she finished speaking, not caring about her image at all.

The corners of Gu Wei's mouth twitched slightly. He totally couldn't understand why the young lady had such a low sense of humor.

With a turn of his eyes, Gu Wei said with a smile, "How about I take you to see it?"

"Ah, do you really want to go and see it?" Liu Yifei stopped smiling and a conflicted expression appeared on her face. "There are all kinds of comments online. I'm afraid I'll regret it after watching it."

"It's okay. If you can't do it, just go watch "Partners" and "Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy"?"

Seeing the weird smile on Gu Wei's face, Liu Yifei decisively chose to refuse, "Forget it, let's go watch Where Are We Going, Dad?"

In order to promote these two movies, Liu Yifei and Su Chang went to the cinema to watch them twice in the past two days, plus the one time at the premiere. Now she feels uncomfortable when she hears these words.

"Okay, I'll go drive, you come out soon." With that, Gu Wei walked towards the door.

"Yeah, I know."

...

outside world.

The lively atmosphere of the New Year continues, and several blockbusters released in the same period are still in fierce competition.

The Dadi Cinema Hesheng Plaza branch is packed with people at the moment. The bar is constantly printing movie tickets and there is a long queue behind it.

"The 6 o'clock IMAX is full, and there are only five seats left for the 9 o'clock show. There are still options for the midnight show. Which one should I buy?"

"6:20, 6:40, 7 is also fine, are there any seats available?"

"There's only the first row left. The second row will be available after 9 o'clock."

"Is there a slightly better seat? It's okay to come later."

"We're all sold out today, how about buying tomorrow's supply?"

At the front desk, many viewers were asking about the remaining seats. It can be said that all the seats with a slightly better location were fully booked, and the employees inside were so busy that they didn’t even have time to eat, it was so popular.

Seeing this situation, the fully armed Gu Wei couldn't help but recall the time when "Avatar", "2012" and "The Wandering Earth" dominated the schedule. The only difference is that those situations were caused by one movie, while the current situation is caused by several movies working together.

Anyway, the market is getting better and better now. Although he was thinking about these things in his mind, he did not slack off in action. Gu Wei took Liu Yifei and went straight to the ticket gate like an ordinary couple.

The ticket in his hand naturally meant a good seat. The boss and his wife came to watch a movie, and the staff had already prepared the seats.

After arriving at her seat, Miss Liu took advantage of the darkness in the theater and pulled half of her mask open, eating snacks noisily, looking like a groundhog.

Gu Wei was thinking about the attendance of the previous few movies. At present, "Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy" has the highest attendance rate, followed by "Chinese Partners". "The Man from Macau" is not bad either. The last ones should be "Ex-Files" and "Where Are We Going, Dad?"

Before they could think about it, Miss Liu came to feed them. When the two were talking in a low voice, someone nearby noticed something was wrong. Seeing this, Gu Wei and Liu Yifei could only watch the movie obediently. If they were recognized on the spot, the publicity department of "Where Are We Going, Dad?" would probably make a big fuss about it.

After a while, the big screen lit up and the only sound in the theater was the sound of the film playing.

...

More than an hour later, when Gu Wei came out of the cinema and got into the car, he couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.

Miss Liu next to her was in a similar state, her eyes looked a little dull.

Whether in his previous life or this life, Gu Wei had only heard that this movie was a bad movie, but he had no idea what was bad about it. Today he was determined to come and see it, and he regretted it after watching it.

"What on earth is this movie about?" the young lady said speechlessly, leaning against the passenger seat, but her eyes were no longer confused.

"Well, it should be about how to raise children. You can watch it again and learn it. It will be useful in the future." Gu Wei said with a smirk on his face.

"You're the one who should watch it. After all, it's 'Where Are We Going, Dad?', not 'Where Are We Going, Mom?'" Liu Yifei retorted angrily.

The two of them exchanged a few words, and then Miss Liu said she was hungry and wanted to eat.

"What do you want to eat?" Gu Wei started the car and asked without turning his head.

“Hot pot, haha.”

……

At this moment, the roadshow promotions for "Chinese Partners" and "Taking Tiger Mountain by Strategy" are still in full swing.

Ning Hao and Xu Ke each took their crew to several cities where universities are concentrated, including the capital, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Sichuan, and Jiangcheng, and held fan meetings to continue to build word-of-mouth for the movie.

After watching the movies, many college students posted on social media platforms such as WeChat Moments and Weibo to express their support for "Partners" and "The Taking of Tiger Mountain".

Coupled with the strong contrast from the bad movies in the same period, the situation of these two movies invested by Star Film and Television Company can be said to be very good.

Gu Wei accompanied the young lady for a hotpot meal. After returning to the villa, she couldn't help but browse the gossip comments on the Internet.

On Weibo, some directors in the industry have spoken out, with many criticizing "Where Are We Going, Dad?" for not being able to be called a movie. Many even believe that this way of shooting movies is hurting the industry.

Xu Zheng also posted a message on Weibo: "When a normal movie has an abnormal box office, it means the audience is abnormal.

The movie "Where Are We Going, Dad?" is not normal at all, and its box office is even more abnormal.

Can this be considered a movie?"

When Miss Liu showed her phone to Gu Wei, Xu Zheng's Weibo had already been commented on by many internet trolls. Needless to say, most of them felt that the other party should not make such remarks.

Some even thought Xu Zheng should make a public apology, with some saying: "Since Director Xu thinks this movie can't be considered a movie, why is the box office still so high?"

“Just because you made a high-grossing movie, you can’t just stand on your pedestal and comment on other movies.”

"By the way, the high box office of Lost in Thailand has nothing to do with you. Without the support of Xingchen Films, who would know who you are?"

"This group of people is really too much." Liu Yifei couldn't stand it anymore and couldn't help but complain.

Gu Wei said nothing, but just silently gave a thumbs up and commented: "You're right!"

Afterwards, Liu Yifei also liked the post. Soon many people in the circle liked it, and the fans directly rushed the internet army into pieces.

After a while, Xu Zheng called Gu Wei directly and asked about the follow-up of the "囧 series".

"We will start filming "Lost in Thailand" after Ning Hao finishes filming. The script is ready."

"I understand. Thank you Director Gu for your support."

On the other side, Xu Zheng breathed a sigh of relief after hanging up the phone.

The words of the internet trolls on Weibo stimulated him greatly, and made him determined to make a high-grossing film independently to prove himself.

.........

(End of this chapter)