Original title: The recovery of the national film market is expected to continue!The box office of Qingming stalls exceeded the same period last year
The Paper reporter Qin Yixiao
The box office of the Qingming Festival this year surpassed last year, and the national film market continues to recover.
The data shows that the total box office of the Qingming file in 2023 (a single day on April 5) exceeded 196 million yuan, surpassing the total box office of the 3-day Qingming file last year. The top three films at the box office are “Journey to Bud”, “Hachiko” and “Super Mario Bros. The Movie”. Among them, “Journey to Bud” exceeded 600 million yuan at the box office, surpassing “Your Name” It became the number one box office of Japanese animation films in Chinese film history.
Some industry insiders said that the box office level of the Qingming Festival reflects the strong demand of the audience for watching movies, and the mass release of films shows that the film producers are interested in the market growth of this period. The reserve films in April and May are also abundant.
The box office in the first quarter was nearly 16 billion yuan, and the Spring Festival movies contributed about 70%
According to statistics from the National Film Specialty Office, in the first quarter of this year, the national film box office (including service fees) totaled 15.858 billion yuan, an increase of 13.5% from 13.975 billion yuan in the same period of the previous year, but lower than the 18.1 billion yuan in the same period the year before. Among them, the cumulative box office in January was 10.09 billion yuan, the cumulative box office in February was 3.861 billion yuan, and the cumulative box office in March was 1.907 billion yuan.
In the first quarter of this year, the average daily box office of movies across the country reached 176 million yuan, the same as the highest annual box office in history in 2019. Taking the box office performance of 18.7 billion yuan in the first quarter of 2019 as a reference, the box office performance in the first quarter of this year has recovered to about 85% of that before the epidemic.
As of press time, the total box office of the national film market this year is 16.55 billion yuan, with a total of 355 million tickets issued and a total of 32.956 million screenings. The top five films at the box office are “Man Jianghong” (4.544 billion yuan), “The Wandering Earth 2” (4.026 billion yuan), “Bear Infested: Stay with me “Bear Core”” (1.492 billion yuan), “No Name” (9.3 100 million yuan), “Deep Sea” (918 million yuan).
Boosted by the upsurge of watching movies during the Spring Festival, the annual box office market broke through the 15 billion mark in less than three months, about two months earlier than the previous year. According to data from the National Film Administration, the movie box office for the 2023 Spring Festival (January 21 to January 27) is 6.758 billion yuan. At present, the five leading films at the box office were all released during the Spring Festival period. The box office revenue of the five films totaled 11.91 billion yuan, accounting for about 70% of the total annual box office. Among them, only two films, “Man Jianghong” and “Wandering Earth 2”, contributed 51.8% of this year’s box office revenue.
There are more than 100 fixed-file films, and the unpopular schedule is showing a trend of recovery
According to market rules, the annual movie box office performance mainly depends on the performance of several popular schedules. The first quarter is mainly for Spring Festival, the second quarter is mainly for May Day, the third quarter is mainly for summer vacation, and the fourth quarter is mainly for National Day. Therefore, March to April between the Spring Festival stalls and the May 1st stalls is recognized as a “unpopular schedule” in the industry.
What is different this year is that the enthusiasm for the Spring Festival stalls continues in theaters, and the release time of many Spring Festival movies has been extended. Previously, 6 films in the Spring Festival file were extended to late March. On March 17, “Man Jianghong”, “The Wandering Earth 2”, “Bear Infested: Stay with me “Bear Core”” and “Deep Sea” announced that the key has been postponed for the second time until April 15. On March 20th, “Nameless” announced that the key was postponed for the second time until April 16th. After the second extension of the key, the release time of the above five films will be as long as nearly three months.
In addition to the Spring Festival movies, there are more than 100 new movies scheduled to be released from February to April this year, the number hitting a new high in the past three years. According to the data of Maoyan Professional Edition, a total of 32 films were released in February, 38 films were released in March, and 46 films are currently scheduled for April.
The box office performance of new films in February was slightly weak. The box office of imported films such as “Ant-Man 3: Quantum Frenzy”, “Black Panther 2” and “Mad Tongue Lawyer” did not exceed 300 million yuan. The highest-grossing new films in March are the Japanese animation “Journey to Bell Bud” and the comedy “Keep You Safe” produced by Ruyi Film and Television (0136.HK) and directed by Dapeng. The current box office has exceeded 600 million yuan, respectively. The annual box office ranks 7th and 8th.
A total of 20 new films were released around the Qingming Festival in April, and the competition for the schedule was fierce. There are “Universe Exploration Editorial Department” produced by China Film (600977.SH), Guo Fan Films, and Maoyan Entertainment (1896.HK), and “Loyal Dog” produced by iQiyi (IQ.O) Films and Hengye Films. Hachiko, Ali Pictures (1060.HK), Hengdian Film and Television (603103.SH) and other popular domestic films such as “Spirit of the Dragon Horse”, as well as classic imports such as “Titanic” and “Detective Conan: The Ghost of Baker Street” Film reruns. In addition, “The King of the Sky”, “Unfamiliar Life” and more than ten May 1st films, which Tingdong Films and Ali Department cooperated, are also officially scheduled for the end of April.
This year’s movie box office is expected to exceed 50 billion
“This year’s Spring Festival basically laid the foundation for the recovery and prosperity of movies throughout the year. We predict that in 2023, there will be a blowout retaliatory consumption trend in the Chinese movie market.” Zhang Zhang, CEO and chief analyst of iiMedia Consulting Group Yi told The Paper that the entire film and television industry is currently working overtime to prepare for several important schedules this year, and the competition is fierce. For enterprises, being able to make good use of the usual weekends plus the concentrated festival files will be a better multi-product layout route for the annual revenue.
Chen Jin, a data analyst for Beacon Professional Edition, said that this year’s films are not only more evenly scheduled, but also have a longer lead time, which is very good for the market. In fact, the weekday stalls are also valuable market resources. Although they are not as explosive as the Spring Festival stalls and National Day stalls, the weekday stalls are very suitable for the long-term box office. On the whole, maintaining the rhythm of new films being released every weekend is very important for the sustained and sound development of the market.
Regarding the recovery of the film market, Liu Zhenfei, an analyst at Maoyan Research Institute, is optimistic that under the continued benign operation, the Chinese film market will usher in a more significant recovery than in the past three years. After 2020-2022, the number of moviegoers and per capita moviegoers in the Chinese film market will drop by about 30%. In the first half of 2023, the number of films supplied has increased significantly compared to the past two years. The orderly and stable operation of theaters across the country has also provided stable recovery conditions for the market.
The Capital Securities Research Report pointed out that the suppression of the epidemic’s demand for movie viewing will gradually fade in the second and third quarters. Looking forward to 2023, the domestic film market is expected to usher in a big year of content supply. The May 1st and summer holidays will gradually get rid of the impact of the epidemic. Driven by the supply of high-quality explosive content and popular schedules, the enthusiasm for watching movies is expected to be catalyzed, the demand for watching movies is expected to be substantially improved, and the industry is expected to enter a positive cycle. Leading content production companies and theaters with sufficient reserves of high-quality content The leader is expected to continue to benefit.
According to the forecast of East Asia Qianhai Securities, combined with the sufficient high-quality content on the domestic supply side, it is expected that the box office will pick up in 2023, and the production cost and production cycle are expected to be shortened, and normalized creation is expected to resume. It is predicted that the box office revenue of the movie market for the whole year of 2023 will be 54.6 billion yuan, and the recovery of revenue will reach 85.18% of the average box office level in 2019.