On February 7, the state film administration released the latest statistics. During the Spring Festival in 2022 (from New Year’s Eve to the sixth day of the first month, and from January 31 to February 6), the box office of urban cinemas nationwide was 6.035 billion yuan and the number of film viewers was 114 million.
Judging from the total box office performance, the Spring Festival in the year of the tiger broke through the 6 billion mark again after 2021, and the number of film viewers exceeded 100 million for four consecutive years (excluding the special circumstances in 2020). However, compared with the record high in 2021, the box office of this year’s Spring Festival decreased by 23% compared with last year’s 7.842 billion, and the number of film viewers decreased significantly, more than 40 million less than last year’s 160 million, a year-on-year decrease of 28.75%, even losing to 132 million in 2019 and 145 million in 2018.
Some analysts said that the box office performance of this year’s Spring Festival did not exceed that of last year, which has a certain relationship with the epidemic. At that time, there were new confirmed cases in Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Shaanxi, Henan and other places. These places are also the key box office cities of the Spring Festival, so they will naturally have an impact on the box office.
However, in addition to the epidemic situation, there are other reasons for the regression of the results of this year’s Spring Festival. On the surface, the biggest reason is the ticket price. The “ridiculously high” ticket price has caused many audiences to have a rebellious psychology, and even once was “scolded and searched”; Behind the high ticket prices, the film quality of this year’s Spring Festival is not good enough to make the audience have to enter the cinema. The highest score of Douban in this year’s spring festival film is 7.7 points for “sniper”, while last year’s “Hello, Li Huanying” rose to 8.3 points during the Spring Festival.
not all movies are suitable for Spring Festival
In the past few years, the number of head films in popular schedules and non key schedules and the decline of box office have become more and more obvious. Especially after the epidemic, film companies have further deepened their dependence on popular schedules for the sake of insurance. This was reflected in last year’s film box office. According to the 2021 China Film Co.Ltd(600977) market annual report jointly released by lighthouse Research Institute and lighthouse professional edition, there were 27 films with a box office of more than 200 million in the whole year, of which up to six were released in large schedule.
This year’s Spring Festival archives continued this trend. Before the Spring Festival archives, there were once 14 films to impact the Spring Festival archives. Under the fierce competition, some films with no obvious “explosion” decided to withdraw the archives, and finally formed a competitive situation in which five live action films and three animated films competed for the Spring Festival archives.
In terms of achievements, the box office of the eight films released during the Spring Festival is: the shuimen bridge of Changjin lake is 2.528 billion yuan, the killer is not too calm is 1.387 billion yuan, the miracle stupid child is 667 million yuan, the bear haunts and returns to the earth is 568 million yuan, the sniper is 262 million yuan, the four seas is 474 million yuan, the pleasant goat and the gray wolf basket out of the future is 97.7281 million yuan “Little tiger pier hero” 17.5166 million yuan.
Before the release of the Spring Festival, many institutions gave optimistic predictions. It is expected that the box office performance of “shuimen bridge of Changjin Lake” is expected to exceed that of the previous film, and several other live action films can reach the 1 billion mark. However, from the results, except that the box office of the two films “this killer is not too calm” and “bear haunt · return to earth” slightly exceeded expectations, the box office of many other films fell short of expectations.
Ding Daoshi, an Internet industry analyst, told reporters that judging from the box office performance of the Spring Festival in the past few years and the success of “Hello, Li Huanying”, the popcorn comedy film of hejiahuan is more suitable to be released in the Spring Festival. The crew level of this year’s “this killer is not too calm” is not the best among the Spring Festival films, but its box office trend has fallen inversely for several consecutive days, It also illustrates this point. “Shuimen bridge in Changjin Lake” would not have such a high box office without the foreshadowing of the previous film. This film is more suitable for release at a specific time, such as the national day or the anniversary of the war to resist US aggression and aid Korea. The theme of miracle stupid child is mainly to highlight the motivation of small people, and the comic atmosphere is not strong. “Four Seas” previously estimated that the box office performance could reach 2 billion +, but the film is more an expression of the director Han Han’s personal style. The whole form is relatively loose, there is no compact plot setting, and there are some mistakes. “This killer is not too calm” and “bear haunt · return to earth” are small explosions, and others did not exceed expectations
(source: cat’s Eye Research Institute)
According to the 2022 Spring Festival data insight released by cat’s Eye Research Institute today, comedy is just needed for the Spring Festival and is the most popular theme for passers-by. In the ninth Spring Festival in ten years, comedy films won the championship five times. In the past three years (2018, 2019 and 2022), the champion of Spring Festival is not comedy films, but the runner up is also comedy films.
As the only pure comedy film in this year’s Spring Festival, “this killer is not too calm” has enjoyed the dividend of scarcity and universality of themes, which also makes many viewers feel sorry for the withdrawal of “super family”. Previously, the comedy film “super family” starring Shen Teng was considered to be a strong competitor for the title of the Spring Festival, but it was announced to withdraw before the Spring Festival.
movie watchers diving at high ticket prices
In addition to the impact of the epidemic and the film theme is not suitable for the Spring Festival, the box office of the Spring Festival in the year of the tiger fell by 23% year-on-year, and the issue of “ticket price” has to be mentioned, which is also the topic most discussed by the outside world this year
(source: 2021 China Film Co.Ltd(600977) annual market report)
In fact, it is a market rule that the price of popular film tickets is higher than usual. With the improvement of living standards, the overall box office of the national film market is also rising. According to the above annual report on China Film Co.Ltd(600977) market in 2021, in the six years from 2016 to 2021, the national average ticket price rose from 33.1 yuan to 40.3 yuan, an increase of 7.2 yuan, an increase of 21%, and the annual compound growth rate was 3.3%, which was relatively stable; Among them, the fourth tier cities have developed rapidly. From 2020, the average ticket price has exceeded that of the third tier cities by 383000, with a total increase of 8.5 yuan.
However, the rise in movie ticket prices during the Spring Festival this year has made many viewers rebellious and give up going to the cinema. Netizens in many cities said that it is not a special case that the ticket price of popular films in prime time exceeds 100 yuan. In previous years, you can watch two or three films, but only one this year.
According to the report and statistics of cat’s Eye Research Institute, the national average ticket price on the first day of the Spring Festival in 2022 reached 56 yuan, an increase of 6.9 yuan compared with the same period of the Spring Festival in 2021 and 18 yuan compared with the third day of the lunar new year. The average ticket price for the following four days (from the second day of the lunar new year to the fifth day of the Lunar New Year) remained above 50 yuan, and the average ticket price for the sixth day of the lunar new year fell to 49.4 yuan.
Under the high ticket price, many movie audiences directly gave up the Spring Festival file. According to the data of cat’s Eye Research Institute, there were 25.93 million film viewers on the first day of the new year, a decrease of 8.52 million compared with the same period in 2021. Although the number of people watching has been rising since the beginning of the second year, the audience make complaints about high ticket prices. Finally, the number of film viewers in the Spring Festival in 2022 was fixed at 114 million, a decrease of more than 40 million compared with 160 million last year, a significant decrease of 28.75% year-on-year, and even lost to 132 million in 2019 and 145 million in 2018
(source: cat’s Eye Research Institute)
Xiang Kai, a young playwright and director, told reporters that the industry believes that the films in this year’s Spring Festival are high-quality or above medium works, but in fact, they overestimate the quality of their films and will be recognized and paid by the audience. The ticket price this year has reached an all-time high, which has aroused the audience’s plan. Even after the third day of the lunar new year, the industry and cinemas have reacted, The ticket price was cut urgently, but it was too late at that time, and most of the audience had decided to leave the cinema, which was also the main reason for the decline in the box office this year.
As a person in the industry, Xiang Kai believes that the film industry needs to return to calm and rational thinking. We can’t just look at our own works and think their works are good. We will win good profits in the high box office period of the Spring Festival. This idea is wrong. Now the audience’s consumption mentality is relatively calm and rational, The mentality of the audience and the performance of the film market cannot be estimated by the mentality of the industry.
