Someone compares "Hot and Hot" and "100 Yuan Love" like this: they are almost poured out of the same mold.
Why are they so similar?
Because the two have the same plot, the same costumes, the same actions, and even the same scenes.
Jia Ling's remake of the Japanese movie "100 Yuan Love", just like Feng Xiaogang's remake of "Loyal Dog Hachiko", may be seeking and expressing some film concepts and letting the work speak, which also makes the domestic film market more diverse, more vibrant and energetic.
Luckily, they all succeeded.
However, this success is a bit of a mixed bag.
We might as well be bold, so try to dig deeper into the current ecological status of the Chinese film market.
There is no doubt that with the end of the 2024 Spring Festival movie, its box office record has shown an upward trend, and it will even become a new record, but it has not been in a state of blooming.
The gap in box office revenue is too large, so that in addition to the first and second on the list, other films are facing pressure on whether the cost can be recovered, such a market dilemma will undoubtedly dampen the enthusiasm of some filmmakers and is not conducive to the development of Chinese films.
So, what is the reason for this?
We know that there are many factors that affect the box office of a movie, such as the quality of the film, the taste of the audience, the theater schedule, the cast, the ticket price, etc., but the most important factor should be that the decline in the quality of the script and the film cannot really fit the taste of the audience, so it cannot really capture the hearts of the audience.
This, in fact, is also what makes many filmmakers struggling and entangled.
Isn't there a good movie script?
Of course not. A good movie must have good creativity, which requires the film to have a certain degree of novelty in the story content, narrative techniques and subject selection, otherwise it will lead to the audience's aesthetic fatigue.
At the same time, the censorship's restrictions on film content also affect the artistic expression and social criticism of some films, which in turn will affect the overall quality of films, making it difficult for some thematic and creative films to be put on the screen.
In view of this, filmmakers have become more cautious, so some people have found another way to buy foreign copyrights to copy, wanting to make some new attempts.
Therefore, the controversy between Jia Ling and "Hot and Hot", due to the lack of originality caused by the remake, is undoubtedly a big slot.
But it is such a remake that does not show a unique core, and it has also become the highest-grossing film in the 2024 Spring Festival, which cannot but be said to be a pity for Chinese films.
Jia Ling's remake of Japanese movies is actually embarrassing for Chinese film creation, but she still succeeded.
Will this successful model be replicated by others?
In a certain sense, remakes can be regarded as a process of international cultural exchange and content re-creation, and filmmakers can make some stories that happened abroad and accepted and affirmed by foreigners resonate with Chinese audiences through localized adaptations, forming a new attempt to tap the potential of the Chinese cultural market.
Such an attempt cannot be said to be bad, because in a certain sense, it reduces the creative risk of domestic directors, especially the box office risk.
After all, the success rate of these successful foreign film works, based on their verified market acceptance and story appeal, is still quite large.
In the complex and diverse Chinese film market, as an effective means to ensure a return on investment, it is indeed a relatively stable strategy for investors to remake such films.
In light of this, it is difficult to say in the future that such films will not be copied in large quantities.
Of course, such a copy and remake also has a certain practical significance.
For example, it can learn from and absorb advanced foreign film and television production concepts and technologies, and can try to combine foreign stories with China's national conditions, culture and social background to achieve localized innovation.
For example, it is the progress of Chinese films in international cooperation, which can rely on the existing mature IP resources to integrate Chinese films into the global film industry chain on the other hand, so that the audience can quickly contact and understand the current situation of foreign film culture, so that China's film creation has always maintained a high artistic level.
But are these helpless moves of Chinese films?
For the world's largest film market, films need to be more open and diverse to meet the needs of different audiences.
However, in the case of lack of originality, when remakes become a trend, it actually restricts the creative enthusiasm of filmmakers and inhibits the audience's desire to watch movies.
After all, it's better to watch a remake than to watch the original, because it is a regret and a slot of a movie from beginning to end.
Chinese films may not lack talents, and they also have huge market demand and consumption capacity, so it has the conditions to promote the high-quality development of China's film industry.
But why is it not as it should?
Perhaps, in order to change this situation, as a filmmaker, we must make efforts in the excavation of original stories and the creation of scripts, and we must continue to strive to achieve better creative freedom, and we must continue to work hard to find a balance between originality and the pressure of the environment and the market.
It's actually a challenge!
But because of love, because of wanting to love, everything is in time!
Thank you for reading, creative is not easy to expect encouragement.
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Thank you for your attention!