Chapter 542 After you sing, I will appear on stage

Chapter 542 After you sing, I will appear on stage

Chapter 542 After you sing, I will appear on stage

Wow!
When the screening of the movie "The Great Wall" ended, there was immediate warm applause at the premiere.

The applause was for both director Zhang Yimou and the movie "The Great Wall".

I have to say that the national master is the national master, and the movie "The Great Wall" is really well made.

It is different from the previous modern science fiction blockbusters of the Galaxy Cinematic Universe. Instead, it is rooted in China's traditional culture and long history, and encompasses the magnificent scenery and unique cultural heritage of the northwest of China within these few hours.

If we look at it from this perspective, Zhang Yimou is indeed the best choice to direct "The Great Wall".

After all, he was born in the northwest, and most of his past films were closely related to the northern region.

In particular, his previous works "The Terracotta Warriors" and "Hero" are very similar in style.

Coupled with the excellent storyline provided by Galaxy Group, the industry's top special effects and team, and the well-known IP, the combination of the two can even be said to have an effect of 1 plus 1 being greater than 2.

Especially the Yumen Pass attack and defense scene at the beginning of the movie, which shows Zhang Yimou's excellent directing skills and can be called the most exciting cold weapon war city attack and defense scene in domestic films in the past 10 years.

After watching the entire movie, some film critics and media reporters even had ideas for writing press releases in their minds.

"The collision of veterans and newcomers in the film industry, classical aesthetics and modern stories, creates a different kind of splendor, giving traditional culture a new lease of life."

Of course, the story of "The Great Wall" is good, and like all works in the "Galaxy Cinematic Universe" series, it also has Easter eggs at the end of the film.

The easter egg story is related to the web drama "Ghost Blows Out the Light 3: The Worm Valley of Yunnan" which will also be broadcast this summer.

"Legend has it that after Huo Qubing stabilized the Hexi Corridor, conquered 36 states in the Western Regions, and reopened the Silk Road, he returned to China and told Emperor Wu of Han about his strange experiences in the Kingdom of Jingjue.

After that, in order to search for the legendary Kunlun sacred tree, Emperor Wu of Han secretly sent people back to the ancient country of Jingjue, but it had been buried by yellow sand and no trace of it had been found.

It was also because of that experience in the ancient country of Jingjue that Huo Qubing, who faced the ghost cave, and his five surviving subordinates who had the same experience as him, were all cursed by the ghost cave and eventually died young.

During this process, Emperor Wu of Han, who valued Huo Qubing very much, also mobilized the power of the court to try to save his beloved general.

At that time, they also found out that the Zhuochen Pearl might be the key to lifting the curse, and they also learned that the pearl seemed to have fallen into the hands of the king of the ancient Dian Kingdom..."

In an old-fashioned conference room, the tomb-raiding trio played by Pan Yueming, Jiang Chao and Ni Ni are studying ancient books together with the notice of the mysterious affairs investigation department, trying to track down the trace of the Zhuchen Pearl.

When the department's expert in history finished his talk, Hu Bayi nodded and agreed:

"This part of history can be corroborated with the content of the Dragon Bone Heavenly Book. It seems that the Zhuchen Pearl is indeed in the tomb of King Xian of the ancient Dian Kingdom in Yunnan."

"Then this operation will be handed over to you, Comrade Hu Bayi."

The head of the Mysterious Affairs Investigation Department gave instructions at this time.

“After all, you have served in the army and have a deep understanding of Feng Shui theory and traditional culture. You are really the only one in the department who can take on this important task.

Don't worry, there will be comrades from the local army to cooperate with you and obey your orders."

"Guaranteed to complete the mission!"

Hu Bayi stood up and saluted with a standard military salute, and the Easter egg of the movie "The Great Wall" ended here.

As for whether the Galaxy Cinematic Universe will launch movies like "The Great Wall" that tell the mysteries of history in the future, we'll have to wait and see how this movie performs at the box office during the entire summer season.

However, regardless of the subsequent results, the box office performance of "The Great Wall" on the first day of its release was still good.

On the first day of its release alone, thanks to Zhang Yimou's fame and the influence of the Galaxy Cinematic Universe, "The Great Wall" earned a box office of 2.37 million yuan.

On the second and third days, its box office performance dropped very little, and all exceeded 200 million.

"Alice in Wonderland 2", which was released at the same time as "The Great Wall", only earned 2800 million yuan on its first day in China. Compared with "The Great Wall", it was completely crushed.

Later, the movie "X-Men: Apocalypse", adapted from the well-known comic IP, was released in China on June 6, which had a certain impact on the performance of "The Great Wall".

As a new chapter after the reboot of the old IP series "X-Men", "X-Men: Apocalypse" performed well in the mainland, earning 1.2 million yuan at the box office on the first day.

In the first week after that, the film also earned 3.83 million RMB, which was 2.46% higher than the 56 million RMB earned by its predecessor X-Men: Days of Future Past. This also allowed it to take away some of the theater schedule from The Great Wall.

But even with Hollywood superhero blockbusters as competitors, "The Great Wall" had a first-week box office of 8.7 million, more than twice that of "X-Men: Apocalypse."

Although the performance of "X-Men: Apocalypse" is acceptable, the reviews of the film are polarized.

People who like it think that the movie has excellent visual effects. The opening Egyptian festival, the final battle and other scenes are very grand. Quicksilver's skills are still a plus, and the slow-motion tuning is even better than the previous one.

People who don't like it think that Hollywood superhero blockbusters have become too formulaic, the plots are always so thin, the characters' motivations are not clear enough, the story advancement is flawed, and the villain Apocalypse looks domineering at first, but is killed in a confused manner in the end.

From this point of view, the reputation of "The Great Wall" in China is much better than that of "X-Men: Apocalypse". After all, this is our Chinese people's own hero and our own story.

Therefore, the box office performance of "The Great Wall" in its second week was still impressive, and it once again won 6 million Chinese yuan. The cumulative box office exceeded 15 billion. It is not impossible to exceed 20 billion or even 25 billion in the future.

As long as "Man Jiang Hong" is not released, this movie will definitely be the best-performing single film in Zhang Yimou's directorial career.

But this was the summer season of 2016 after all. After "The Great Wall" dominated the market for three weeks, "Warcraft", a movie adapted from the well-known online game IP and jointly invested by Hollywood Legendary Pictures, Universal Pictures and Wanda Pictures, was also released in China.

As a classic game, "World of Warcraft" undoubtedly has a very high status in the minds of domestic players, which naturally makes this movie very popular in China. On the first day of its release, "World of Warcraft" won 2.52 million box office, and the box office performance in the first week (five days) of its release was 9.53 million, which exceeded the data of "The Great Wall".

However, as a movie for IP fans, although the theme of "World of Warcraft" has brought it a large number of players and fans, the movie story related to the game has also greatly limited its audience.

After all, no matter how famous a game is, it is impossible for everyone to have played it.

Moreover, this is different from IP works such as [Marvel] and [Galaxy]. The history of the [World of Warcraft] game world is too complicated, so the movie directly extracts a story from it at the beginning.

This is even obviously not as good as "The Lord of the Rings", which is also a fantasy epic. Without the early foreshadowing and background introduction, this movie is extremely unfriendly to ordinary audiences.

Therefore, after the early gamer fans realized its box office potential, the box office performance of the movie "Warcraft" began to decline sharply both in China and in Hollywood, Europe and the United States. Although it was shown at night for three weeks, its box office performance quickly became consistent with that of "The Great Wall".

This situation not only made Zhang Yimou happy, but also made Wanda Pictures extremely uncomfortable because they had invested in "Warcraft".

Moreover, they just acquired Legendary Pictures at a high price a few months ago. Now, the project collapsed as soon as they took over, and the movie in which they invested heavily showed signs of losses. This is undoubtedly extremely bad news.

But the competition in the summer movie season is so fierce that just one week after "Warcraft" was released, another Hollywood sci-fi blockbuster was released.

The movie is called "Independence Day: Resurgence" and is the sequel to the famous science fiction movie "Independence Day". It tells the story that due to the alien technology obtained in the previous film, after long-term cooperative research and development around the world, humans have created the most advanced technology to protect the earth.

But no one expected the aliens to come back and launch an even more violent attack.

When humanity was on the verge of despair, a small number of brave men and women stood up and took on the responsibility of resisting the aliens and defending the human homeland.

Well, a very cliché Hollywood sci-fi movie plot.

This movie, produced and invested by 20th Century Fox, completely copied the routine of the first part. Aliens still invade, and humans still defend the earth. There are no surprises or reversals, let alone novelty.

In addition, for the Chinese market, "Independence Day: Resurgence" also added a lot of Chinese elements into the film.

Just like most Hollywood movies, the creative team of "Independence Day: Resurgence" is arrogant. They want the Chinese market, but are unwilling to take the time to study what Chinese audiences want to see in Hollywood movies.

So what is presented to domestic audiences are the forcibly implanted Chinese advertisements, such as Mengniu and Tencent, which are so embarrassing that it makes people dig their toes into the ground.

There is also the equally embarrassing Chinese star Angelababy making a cameo appearance in the film, and her acting is so stiff that it is difficult to watch.

So "Independence Day: Resurgence" caught up with the decline of "Warcraft" at a faster pace, which may make Wanda feel better.

Anyway, in June, "The Great Wall" was the undisputed box office champion, and its total box office finally reached 6 billion Chinese yuan.

When it comes to July, the competition for the summer season becomes even more intense.

On the 7nd of July, the sequel of a well-known Hollywood IP movie was released.

The movie is called "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows", a sequel to "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2" invested by Paramount. In addition to the four green turtles, the starring role also includes the hot Megan Fox.

But even if it is a sequel movie, with the beautiful Megan Fox, it won’t work.

On the first day of its release, the film only grossed 9700 million in China.

In fact, we can see from here that Hollywood sequels are no longer as popular in China as they used to be.

Everyone is tired of those Hollywood blockbusters that only have special effects but no novelty and are just rehashing old stuff.

Seeing that most of the Hollywood movies in June and even July are not very good, how can domestic filmmakers sit still?

So on July 7, "Rock Mastiff" invested by Huayi and "The Witch" invested by Galaxy Pictures chose to be released at the same time.

The former is an animated film adapted from the original comic of the same name, telling the story of the big-eyed Tibetan mastiff Bodi leaving his hometown to pursue his musical dream and freedom.

Honestly speaking, such a unique music-themed animation is still rare in China today. Perhaps it was because Galaxy Group’s previous “The Return of the Great Sage” and “Nezha” gave the market confidence that Huayi Group invested heavily in it.

Although this animated film did not seek technical assistance from Galaxy Pictures, but instead looked for a Hollywood team, "Rock Mastiff" still has a high standard in terms of graphics and character design, and the cartoon characters are well designed.

It also combines Western rock culture with Chinese Tibetan Mastiffs and Tibetan customs, exporting my country's traditional culture.

But how can I say it? These advantages cannot cover up the problem that the plot of "Rock Mastiff" is simple and childish, especially the overall plot of the movie is relatively bland, the story line is relatively single, and it lacks complex plots and conflicts. For older audiences or those with rich movie-watching experience, it may feel boring and difficult to resonate strongly.

So even during the summer vacation when elementary school students were on break, not many people actually went to the cinema to watch this movie.

In comparison, "The Witch", produced by Galaxy Group and starring Song Zue, has undoubtedly become the first film to spark discussion this summer.

Before this, although movies like "The Great Wall" and "Warcraft" also caused quite a stir in the market, these works were still somewhat mediocre.

But "Witch" is different.

When the movie was released, because the lead actress was just a little-known young actress like Song Zu'e, and it was a co-production between China and South Korea, even though "The Witch" was also a series of works in the [Galaxy Cinematic Universe], its publicity was not great.

However, after the movie was released, with its unique dark and super-powerful style, far exceeding the bloody and large-scale Korean style in China, and the crazy heroine played by Song Zue, the movie "The Witch" caused quite a stir on the Internet.

Even though the mainland version of "The Witch" has cut down on a lot of bloody and violent scenes compared to the Korean version because it will be released in China, the remaining plot scenes are enough to make those who have seen the movie shout "awesome".

(End of this chapter)