Zhao Jun: "The box office may have ceilings, but the progress of the film industry has no ceilings."

The end of the year is approaching, and no matter which number the box office ultimately stays at, China filmmakers have reached a consensus: 2016 is a cooling-off period for the film industry to eliminate inferior production capacity. In the future, we will truly use excellent film products to establish a positive interaction with consumers. The stable stage of relationship is coming soon.

During this cooling-off period, Zhao Jun, vice president of the China Film Critics Society, saw that innovation was surging. Zhao Jun said: "There may be ceilings at the box office, but the progress of contemporary life has no ceilings. The film industry will also keep pace with this era."

In Zhao Jun's view, changes in technological means have brought more innovation opportunities to China filmmakers. The changes in China's environment over the past 30 years have made the values of China more diverse. Filmmakers must also know how to pay attention to contemporary life, an inexhaustible source of creation.

He believes that 2017 is the year to break through the bottleneck, and is optimistic that the industry will take off in 2017 and will return to a state of rapid growth.

Capital is short-sighted, film practitioners cannot be short-sighted.

Capital has boosted the growth of the film industry over the past decade. How to face the temptation brought by the capital boom remains a difficult problem for filmmakers.

Without the driving force of capital, the industry will grow arithmetically. With the driving force of capital, it will grow geometrically. Capital has brought about the entry of high-tech, the increase in the number of screens, the expansion of theaters into third-and fourth-tier cities, and the expansion of production scale. For China films at this stage, it is positive energy.

But there are two sides to everything. Capital comes for financial value, pursuing not product value and industrial value, but the value of money. Generally speaking, capital is relatively short-sighted, just looking at the present, but cultural industries cannot be short-sighted.

Capital parties may say that the data proves that a movie can make money by adopting this method and using this star-the chaos of star salaries also proves capital's short-sightedness. But film practitioners know that audiences may not necessarily pay for movies that burn with hot money and quick money.

The irrational behavior of investors is very harmful to the content of the movie. The mentality of "making quick money" has led the entire industry to frantically grab IP and follow suit. As a result, the movies produced in batches are shoddy and shoddy. Taking youth films as an example, the "IP+ fresh meat" model has formed a routine. Too many investors in youth films believe that they must follow this routine to make money. Once the screenwriter comes up with a new idea, he excitedly looks for capital. During the talks, he was severely refuted by the management. Films belong to the cultural and creative industries, and such rejection of innovative thinking is not harmful to China's film industry.

There is no right or wrong in capital's pursuit of profits, but the short-sighted behavior of investors behind capital deserves vigilance.

Filmmakers should make calm judgments. Don't just want to get the favor of capital. Instead, they should make the best shots of your films, do the best distribution, and perform their duties.

Film products must find cultural labels on their own values.

"Good films" must resonate emotionally and values with the audience. In the new stage of development, how can China films find cultural labels on their own values?

Under the changes of the times, filmmakers should be keenly aware of the contradictions between the individuals around them and the environment in which they live. For example, environmental protection issues, medical issues, education issues, employment issues, and family issues are all new survival and development issues brought about by changes in the surrounding environment.

Under the various challenges given by the general environment, new value choices will continue to emerge, which provides filmmakers with inexhaustible themes. Showing the values of truth, goodness and beauty in movies will always be welcomed by the audience.

Although the growth rate of China's film industry slowed down in 2016, I still saw the precipitation of thoughts in some films this year, condensing a more solid, richer and more mature crystallization than in previous years.

For example,"Life Gate", which breaks through the traditional documentary paradigm, has strong internal power. It will appear in theaters at the end of 2016, and I believe that such documentary films will increase in the future.

Cultivate the market with cultural ideals

After the tide of "ticket compensation" ebbed, some viewers gave up theater consumption because they felt that ticket prices exceeded their psychological price.

Theatres can use low ticket prices to organize movies in student and elderly venues, but if the film company sets the lowest ticket price too high, it will not be able to meet the movie viewing needs of non-income and low-income groups. In addition, the population structure of third-and fourth-tier cities is different from that of first-tier cities. In order to allow more consumers in small towns to see movies, we can encourage local theaters to show more low-fare films by increasing the proportion of theaters.

In addition to ticket subsidies, we have many means to cultivate the market. In March 2017, the formal implementation of the Film Industry Promotion Law will also greatly promote the film industry. In the future, refinements may be carried out in accordance with the spirit of the Film Promotion Law, and market regulations may be stronger.

Engaging in the film industry is not entirely about doing business. We are doing culture. Culture has an industrial direction and a career direction. We must find a balance between these two directions.

From a purely industrial perspective, everything is business and maximize profits; but from a career perspective, I hope that distributors can attach importance to the diversity of film distribution and the level of film production, and cultivate the market with cultural ambitions.

China's cultural industry practitioners should think more from a career perspective and have an ideal ambition and sense of responsibility for culture.

Cinema must have innovative operation management and marketing methods

. Cinema innovation is the same as film innovation, and someone needs to change the status quo. In recent years, some extensive cinemas have emerged. The next step in the integration of cinemas will eliminate the shoddy cinemas and transform them into the future cinemas we look forward to, providing audiences with a higher-quality experience.

The construction of future studios first requires builders to love the film industry and devote themselves to improving the level of construction, management and design.

Secondly, we must keep up with the concept of the times. In the future, cinemas can establish the functions of booking and competing films with the support of the Internet and big data, and many niche films can find space for their release. For example, if a film has a low schedule rate, you can use Internet research to understand the audience's needs and open new sessions for the audience in a timely manner. In fact, as long as theaters have an App, they can issue invitations to watch movies.

Finally, studios must have proactive and innovative operational management and marketing methods to the market. Nowadays, most theaters are not good at taking the initiative to find films on their own. Cinemas should cater to the market atmosphere. Each theater line displays a different film selection style, which guides and adapts to the needs of market diversification.

Any studio is an exception for the builders. At present, most movie studios and theaters do not have personalized characteristics. They are all one-sided and cannot tell who owns the theater, which makes it impossible to join the competition of our era.

Editor: vian