Why is it that novels and online dramas are good, but the movie "Psychological Crimes" has not become popular?

Why is it that novels and online dramas are good, but the movie "Psychological Crime" is not so popular? Because the product behind is a completely different logic.

Wolf Warriors 2 remained at the top of the film market last weekend. With an average box office of more than 150 million yuan a day, Wolf Warriors 2 has surpassed films such as Wolverine 3 and Transformers 5 at the global box office in 2017. And according to the current momentum, it is not impossible for the film to exceed 5 billion yuan in the end.

with such a strong performance of Wolf Warriors 2, the three new films released this week, although each has its own selling points, are unable to get enough market space.

the fantasy movie "the Legend of mackerel beads" is adapted from the "Kyushu" series of novels, and the investment of 250 million yuan can also be regarded as a large-scale production in China. However, the film grossed only about 80 million yuan at the box office in the first weekend, and it is clear that there is no way to recover the investment through the box office.

the Alliance of Grand Theft has the participation of Andy Lau and Shu Qi. This kind of traditional action movies are usually also popular in the market. It took 130 million yuan at the box office in its first weekend.

Psychological sin, starring Li Yifeng and Liao Fan, based on the novel of the same name, also performed well. Its single-day box office is also about 50 million yuan, and the final total box office will be about 300 million yuan. For a film with an investment of 120 million yuan, it is a pass.

but this is a little far from the high expectations of "psychological crime". Two years ago, the producer and Li Chengguang said when the film was launched: "We think it is an excellent IP that can be hatched." The reasons for this judgment by

and Li Chengguang are based on the following two facts. First of all, suspense and reasoning novels represented by "psychological crime" are becoming the most important types of bestsellers in the market. Higano's ability to dominate the best-selling lists of major bookstores and e-commerce all the year round is the best proof.

secondly, Psychological Crime was adapted into an online drama in 2015. Iqiyi and Phoenix Associated Pictures invested 3 million of the production cost and 4 million of the marketing cost per episode, and eventually got more than 800 million hits on iqiyi. As there were very few online dramas with suspense and reasoning themes at that time, the online drama "Psychological Crime" was considered to have opened up a new market.

however, reality has proved that "psychological crime" cannot be regarded as a success in the process from a novel or an online drama to a movie. Apart from the influence of "Wolf Warriors 2", there are many factors that also hinder the "psychological crime".

from the perspective of films in recent years, suspense and reasoning are not the mainstream themes in the film market at present. "Day fireworks", which won the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival, is considered to be the Chinese version of "White Night Walk", but ended up grossing just over 100 million at the box office. After being adapted into a Chinese version of the novel "the dedication of suspect X", which has been a best-selling novel in China for 10 years, the box office is only 370 million yuan.

although suspense and reasoning are the best-selling types of novels, movies and novels are, in the final analysis, two completely different markets. 200000 copies of a book can be regarded as a bestseller, and 1 million copies can be regarded as a huge quantity. But 1 million moviegoers, even based on 40 yuan a movie ticket, grossed only 40 million at the box office.

similarly, people who watch online dramas and movies tend to be two kinds of people. The former is more like a pastime that the audience can easily click and pass the time, while the latter is also entertaining, but the cost is very different, so the audience of the online drama is much larger than the film itself.

different media and platforms do not seem to be able to shape a unified product, or it is extremely demanding to do so. Under this premise, it is not appropriate to speculate "IP" based on the heat of a single platform.

the 2015 online drama "Psychological Crime" also had a good time when it was broadcast. At that time, the boutique process of online dramas had just begun. As the first batch of high-investment online dramas, "Psychological Crime" received a lot of attention, as well as the recommendation of iqiyi. This is a major basis for the good results of the online drama broadcast of "Psychological Crime".

in addition, SARFT's censorship of online dramas is not so strict, so that "psychological crimes" involving sensitive topics such as crime and the public security system can be created with more space. Since then, SARFT has removed a number of online dramas, including "psychological crime". The revised "Psychological Crime" has also been criticized for its chaotic plot and insufficient shaping of the atmosphere of suspense reasoning.

these are all advantages that the movie "Psychological Crime" cannot enjoy. Therefore, for the current film market, "Psychological Crime" is an ordinary film, which needs to rely on Cass's fame, early publicity, and the quality of the film to win over the audience. From this point of view, Psychological Crime may end up grossing about 300 million yuan at the box office, which is slightly lower than the figure of suspect X's dedication, which seems reasonable.

Edit: xiongwei