Unprecedented Tet movie season at Vietnamese box office
Báo Lao Động•23/02/2024
The Tet Giap Thin film market is in an unbalanced state when Tran Thanh's "Mai" is far ahead of other competitors in terms of revenue, screenings and media effects.
Movie "Mai" by Tran Thanh. Photo: ProducerSpecial things As of February 22, the movie "Mai" has surpassed 387 billion VND in revenue, far surpassing the remaining works shown at the same time, according to data from Box Office Vietnam. The second-ranked movie is "Gap lai chi bau" which earned 67 billion VND, only 1/5 of Tran Thanh's movie's revenue. The gap in revenue and screenings between "Mai" and the remaining movies has been large since the first day of Tet. The Tet movie race saw Tran Thanh break his own record, while "Mai" extended its achievements with each day of release. The great pressure from "Mai" forced "Sang den" and "Tra" to withdraw from theaters after 3 days of release. The third work directed by Tran Thanh has almost absolute dominance in the market. Unlike “Nha Ba Nu” which had to compete with “Chi Chi Em Em” 2 times in the 2023 Tet season, “Mai” was released in a favorable time and place, without facing any competitors of equal quality, effects, or actors’ names. Right before the peak of Valentine’s Day, “Mai” lost 2 competitors and was even more favored in terms of screenings. In a conversation with Lao Dong, critic Nguyen Phong Viet assessed the Vietnamese cinema market for Tet this year: “The 2024 Tet film season has two special things. First, for the first time, two films withdrew from theaters after showing for three days. They knew they were not able to compete with “Mai”, which only had about 400 screenings per day and had no way to recover their capital. I think the film crew leaving the theater was slow, they should have temporarily stopped showing it from the first day when they were assigned 400 screenings per day. Second, the gap between “Mai” and the remaining films was too far. “Gap lai chi bau” is just an average film. It cannot be said that “Mai” is an excellent film, but “Mai” is excellent compared to the rest”. A new ticket fever appears Tet season is a very special time for the Vietnamese box office. Audiences have a long holiday and are financially well-off. There are many people who do not watch movies all year but will go to the cinema during Tet because they have free time and want to be entertained. Movie revenue partly reflects the quality of the movie and the taste of the audience. It is understandable that "Gap lai chi bau" is inferior and bland when it clashes with "Mai" when the movie still has limitations in content and script. In recent days, a name that seemed to be forgotten suddenly came back strongly thanks to the word-of-mouth effect on social networks. That is "Dao, pho va piano" - a movie ordered by the State that used to have only 3 screenings/day. In response to public interest, Mr. Vu Duc Tung - Acting Director of the National Cinema Center - said that there will be a change in the screening schedule in the direction of reducing 50% of the number of screenings of "Mai" to switch to "Dao, pho va piano". Experts call the explosion of "Dao, pho va piano" an unprecedented phenomenon. But for this historical work to be able to compete with "Mai" is unthinkable. There is no way that a film completed in 2023 but released for more than 10 days with an official trailer, no fanpage, no promotion, shown at only 1 theater with a small number of screenings... will become a rival of "Mai". As Mr. Nguyen Phong Viet commented, "Peach, Pho and Piano" is just a strange and hard-to-find dish, temporarily creating a ticket fever with Hanoi audiences. In reality, only a few State films are commercially released and reach the audience. Private films have come a long way and created a big gap with State films in making films to serve the audience. Obviously, comparing Tran Thanh's film "Mai" with "Peach, Pho and Piano" directed by Phi Tien Son is lame because the two films have their own missions, characteristics and strategies. However, the ticket fever of "Peach, Pho and Piano" is a positive sign for the film genre ordered by the State./.
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