It has been half a month since the beginning of the lively Spring Festival. On the whole, this year's Spring Festival stalls are special. The first is the temporary withdrawal of many movies, such as "Let's Shake the Sun Together" and "Mr. Red Carpet", which have not appeared before. Moreover, there is no dominance this year, and the box office of "Hot and Hot" and "Flying Life 2" is very tight. As of February 25, the box office of "Hot and Hot" has exceeded the 3 billion mark, and "Flying Life 2" is about to reach 3 billion. 
Next is "Article 20", directed by Zhang Yimou and starring Ma Li, Zhao Liying, Lei Jiayin and others. However, the box office of "Article 20" is about 1 billion different from the first two movies, only 1.9 billion, which is barely the same as "Bear Infested", and it seems to be a little insufficient in this year's Spring Festival. 
The movie "Article 20" tells the story of legitimate defense, and director Zhang Yimou and the leading actors have a good reputation and popularity. Ma Li has very good results in the comedy film industry, and Lei Jiayin and Zhao Liying have many works out of the circle in TV series. So, why did a movie with excellent directors and actors lag behind in this Spring Festival? In fact, there are quite a lot of problems with this movie. The first is the hard flaw in the plot. In the early publicity, the filmmaker focused on Zhao Liying's acting skills when she played a mute, as well as the pain of Hao Xiuping's role being violated. The effect is really good, and many people say that they will go to the cinema to support. But after the release, the audience found that when Zhang Yimou was filming the scene where Hao Xiuping was violated, the camera was aimed at the victim's face, highlighting Hao Xiuping's pain and disheveled. 
This kind of expression is more common in domestic movies and TV series, but in recent years, due to the progress of the times and the awakening of women's self-consciousness, the audience has stopped eating this set, and they prefer to see the hideous faces of those wicked people. Especially in the movie "Hot and Hot" in the same period, when Le Ying was violated, the camera was aimed at the face of the criminal. In the comparison of the two films, the flaws of "Article 20" are even more obvious. 
Secondly, the film also has a big problem in terms of publicity. The Spring Festival is such a happy festival for families, and the audience is generally more willing to watch comedy. In fact, "Article 20" has a lot of comedy elements, and it is also a movie with a very rich theme. After the premiere, the key word in the audience's evaluation of Lei Jiayin and Ma Li was "funny", while Zhao Liying, Gao Ye and others developed the plot around legitimate defense to express the theme of the movie. 
But in the whole publicity process, the focus of the film has been on Hao Xiuping played by Zhao Liying, highlighting Zhao Liying's acting skills and Hao Xiuping's suffering, but weakening the comedy scenes of Lei Jiayin, Ma Li and others. There was a period of time when the box office fell backwards, and it looks like it is going all the way forward. The filmmaker listened to the audience's persuasion and arranged a hot search topic such as "Article 20 Box Office Reversal", but there is no follow-up. 
At the same time, the strength of the competitors is also an important reason why the box office of this movie is not satisfactory this time. There are actually pros and cons to choosing the Spring Festival file, the advantage is that you can use the powerful chassis of the Spring Festival, and the disadvantage is that it is very likely to become cannon fodder for the competition of the gods. Under the double pressure of "Hot and Hot" and "Flying Life 2", many movies have been withdrawn. It's just that "Article 20" has the blessing of director Zhang Yimou and "Shuangli", so it will not become cannon fodder, but its sense of existence is relatively weak. If you change the schedule, I believe there will be better results. 
This movie is very important to every creator, it is the accumulation of more excellent works for Zhang Yimou, it is another attack by Ma Li in the Spring Festival, it is Zhao Liying's first challenge to the Spring Festival movie, and it is a very important film work broadcast by Gao Ye after the explosion of "Hurricane". It's true that everyone is good, but we can't have too thick a filter on anyone or anything. Zhang Yimou is a good director, but the camera is aimed at the victim rather than the perpetrator, and such an old and unreasonable expression will still be criticized by the audience. 
Now the audience pays more attention to the quality of the movies and TV series themselves, and other external factors do not have a particularly big impact. No matter how good the director and actor are, as long as there is a problem with the work itself, the audience will not buy it. Therefore, instead of spending a lot of effort to market word-of-mouth and popularity, it is better to calm down, concentrate on studying acting skills, and create better works, which is the king.