The first year of domestic sports movies in 2020.

Editor’s note: This article is from the WeChat public account “一 娱乐 电影 ” (ID : Yiyuguancha), author Dewey Poetry Yang.

2020 is doomed to usher in a new year in sadness.

The situation of “pneumonia epidemic” is still severe. As of 17:00 on January 29, the number of confirmed cases nationwide reached 6078. The number of cases of “new pneumonia” in just 30 days exceeded the number of confirmed cases of SARS in 2003.

Affected by the “epidemic”, the Chinese film and television industry has already undergone earth-shaking changes. The complete disappearance of the “Chinese New Year files” will bring 15 billion yuan in box office losses to the entire film industry. “Aunt” “Apostasy” became “Internet University”, bringing the most severe test to the national cinema. Hengdian Film and Television City is also nearing a “shutdown”, and several project teams have stopped work successively. The “paralysis” of the overall entertainment industry has locked up citizens at home.

The disaster is not alone. On January 27, Beijing time, basketball star Kobe Bryant was killed and killed in a helicopter crash in Los Angeles, USA. A generation of legendary superstars fell like this, leaving countless fans around the world in deep grief. They took out their treasured Kobe jerseys, sneakers, and wanted to go to the basketball court to vent their grief. Helpless, the “pneumonia epidemic” was frustrated and had to stay at home. Watch the basketball animated short film “Dear Basketball” which Kobe participated in.

Can sports theme save the 2020 box office?

▲ Stills from “Dear Basketball”

In the short film, the “rough” line freeze animation outlines Kobe’s legendary career. The main thing for fans is Kobe’s affectionate monologue. At the same time, sports movies and documentaries about basketball, “When Kobe’s Work is In Progress”, “Glorious Road”, “Single Head” and so on have been revisited by fans.

2020 is also an important year for Chinese sports movies. Combined with the Chinese Women’s Volleyball Team winning the World Cup again last year, the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics will be held. The strong sports atmosphere gave birth to more sports movies.

2019The domestically produced films based on multiple themes have made breakthroughs in milestones, such as “Street Earth” on science fiction, “The Child of Nezha” on animation, “You on You” on youth, and “Me and Me” on the theme of the theme. Motherland “and so on.

Compared with the above-mentioned domestic “weak subjects”, sports subjects have paid less attention, produced fewer films, got worse word of mouth, and made the box office performance even worse. The popular “Sports films” in the world have few “sports” tags in the detailed type classification of Douban and ticketing platforms, which has an important relationship with the domestic sports theme that has been in a “blank period” for a long time.

In 2020, this situation can be greatly improved. With the high reputation of “Winning the Championship” (formerly the Chinese Women’s Volleyball Team), and driven by Chen Kexin’s follow-up sports films “Li Na” and “China Table Tennis”, will 2020 become the “first year of Chinese sports movies”? Will the “sports theme” stimulate the non-mainstream audience like the “main theme” theme last year and boost the annual ticket storehouse?

Can sports theme save the 2020 box office?

▲ Stills from “Winning the Championship”

However, despite the bright prospects, the market environment for domestic sports is still very grim. What is the current market environment for domestic sports themes? What factors do an excellent sports-themed movie need, and what are the essential factors for the rise of “sport-themed” movies in 2020?

Current situation of domestic sports subjects: no works, no achievements, no ideals

“Dedicated to the soldiers who work hard for the true spirit of sports.”

In 1934, the first representative work of the Chinese sports film “Queen of Sports”, in the opening film for sports Jianer has such an incentive.

This black and white silent film, although the plot is relatively weak, but the “fashionable” sports scene opened the eyes of the audience. What’s more profound is that it shows the people’s far-reaching awareness of the situation of long-term poverty and passive beatings. Make the concept of “sports power” more popular. The charm and significance of “sports movies” lies in this.

Can sports theme save the 2020 box office?

▲ Stills from “Queen of Sports”

In 1952, led by the slogan “Develop sports and strengthen people’s physique”, a large number of sports movies appeared around the 1960s, including the “Women’s Basketball Number Five” and “Sisters on the Ice”. “Female Diver” and so on. After the reform and opening up, sports films such as “Sand Gull” and “Fans’ Minds” have appeared. These works are influenced by ideology. Although they can maintain the vitality of “sport movies”, they have not been able to make further breakthroughs in the creative field.

Since then, domestic sports films have entered a long period of empty windows until the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The Chinese market has again made new attempts at sports movies. A series of movies around sports themes such as “Dream Team”, “Ice Breaking”, “12 Seconds 58”, “Mai Maiti 2008” and “Slam Dunk” appeared during this period.

A large number of creations have not yet produced a representative work. Among the above works, digital movies and TV movies with low cost are the main forms of creation. Only “Slam Dunk”, under the name of Jay Chou, won 113 million yuan at the box office. China-made sports films failed to revive against the backdrop of China’s first Olympic sports chronicle.

Today, 86 years have passed since the release of “Queen of Sports”. Chinese sports athletes have repeatedly achieved good results in international competitions. Although there have been many years of lack of mainstream sports events, there is still a long way to go for the country to become a “sports power.” But it has already emerged from the shadow of the “weak sports nation.”

Compared to the lack of “mainstream sports events”, the loss of “mainstream sports movies” should be even more ashamed. To this day, domestic sports movies are still in place.

One Entertainment Watch (ID: yiyuguancha) has compiled the top ten works of domestic sports box office. According to the chart, we can see that domestic sports The highest box office of the movie was the 248 million yuan China-US co-produced “The Thief” in 2015. There are only five box office of over 100 million, and the tenth place is only 8.24 million yuan. The overall box office potential is low.
Can the sports theme save the 2020 box office?