Special feature of 1905 film network The National Day file closed, and the "combat value" of each box office was released.Among them, withWan Li’s ReturnRepresented by the new film accounted for nearly 90%, becoming the main force at the box office. At the same time,"Hello, Brother" and "New God List: Yang Jian"Old films, etc., also show good box office endurance, accounting for 12% of the box office.

In recent years, the phenomenon of old films returning has appeared in various golden files to varying degrees. The old film here refers to the film whose premiere date is more than one week away from the opening date of the schedule.

According to the statistics of Cat’s Eye Professional Edition, during the period from 2019 to 2022 (except 2020), the box office of old movies on New Year’s Day accounted for 28%, 1% and 12% respectively, the Dragon Boat Festival was 6%, 15% and 44% respectively, and the Mid-Autumn Festival was 13%, 24% and 29% respectively.　

The excellent quality of film content, obvious differences in genre and other factors have become the secret of the long-lasting box office endurance of old films. The old and new films are on the same stage, which also gives the audience more choices.

01.Old movies are not "old"

"For films like" Hello, Brother "and" New God List: Yang Jian ",we found that there were still many viewers watching them during the eleventh period, so we increased some times accordingly according to the actual attendance of the films, or adjusted the whole digit and time period appropriately." In an interview with the media, Yu Chao, executive deputy general manager of Capital Cinema, said so. During the eleventh period, old films were still within the range of many viewers’ choices.

In the top ten of the National Day box office in 2022, the number of new and old films on the list was seven and three respectively.

In the new film, The Return of Wan Li earned 1.024 billion yuan at the box office, contributing nearly 70% of the box office, making it a well-deserved box office champion of the National Day. The film is not only the 99th member of the Billion Box Office Club of China Film History, but also the first billion box office work in the director’s career.

In the old films, the box office of "Hello, Brother" and "New God List: Yang Jian" in Moon Man was from high to low, with 78.58 million yuan, 47.32 million yuan and 32.59 million yuan respectively. Under the blessing of the National Day file, the cumulative box office of the first two works exceeded 400 million and 500 million respectively.

These three old films are obviously different from the new ones, which has become one of the important factors for them to take advantage of the box office bonus.

Among them, Moon Man’s Hello Brother belongs to a typical Mahua FunAge-style comedy. No matter the main lineup or narrative style, there are many similarities between the two films, and they are full of laughter. This is different from the new film with plot elements in the schedule.

Although the times are constantly changing, comedies are always just needed by the audience. In the early stage of the Spring Festival in 2021, the comedy films with average quality only made a box office of 235 million yuan by virtue of genre differences.

As an adult-oriented animated film, the New God List: Yang Jian and other new films with low orientation such as New Big Head Son and Little Head Dad 5: My Alien Friends in the schedule have a low overlap rate in the audience. The former is dominated by young audiences, while the latter is dominated by young parents and school-age parents.

These two kinds of animated films have made their own gains in the National Day archives. "New Big Head Son and Little Head Dad 5" took 66.793 million yuan at the box office and became the top animated movie ticket. "New God List: Yang Jian" was the runner-up with a box office of 47.32 million yuan.

Online quality has also become one of the collective characteristics of old films that have achieved good box office results in prime time. The average score of douban reached 6.4 points for the three old films with excellent box office performance in the National Day file.

In the Mid-Autumn Festival of 2022 (from September 10th to September 12th), Moon Man, the "New God List: Yang Jian", became the runner-up and the third runner-up in the box office list due to its excellent content quality. With the help of two films, the box office of old films accounted for 29% in this period.

In 2022, the Qingming file, which was released for more than two months, ranked among the TOP10 at the box office. Excellent content quality and fine visual effects make the film show super box office endurance.

In addition, the relaxed schedule environment is also a necessary condition for old films to play. Under the superposition of these internal and external favorable factors, the phenomenon of old film reflow continues to occur.

02.Reflux has a "priority"

In the head golden file and waist golden file, the phenomenon of old film reflow is divided into "urgent and slow".

According to the past statistical results, among the Spring Festival and National Day files of the seven-day legal holidays, the box office of old movies usually accounts for about 1%. As we all know, these two big head golden files usually have a large number of new films, and it is difficult for old films to have a foothold.

This is most obvious in the Spring Festival file.According to statistics, during the Spring Festival from 2014 to 2021, the box office of old movies accounted for about 1%. Huge publicity expenses, ticket supplements starting at 100 million yuan, etc., have become the box office moat of new films in the Spring Festival. This is also the main reason why the market is easy to form a new film "vacuum" zone in the early stage of the Spring Festival.

During the three-day holiday, the phenomenon of old films reflowing is relatively obvious. As the data mentioned at the beginning of the article shows, between 2020 and 2022, the average proportion of box office of old movies in New Year’s Day, Dragon Boat Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival was 21.6%, 21.6% and 22% respectively.

In addition, the phenomenon of old films reflow is more likely to occur between the golden periods with close time intervals.

For example, the "New God List: Yang Jian" released at the end of the summer file in 2022, in the Mid-Autumn Festival file in early September, also became the runner-up at the box office with 39.6562 million yuan; The Mid-Autumn Festival ticket crown "Hello, Brother" also squeezed into the top three box office in the National Day file.

The length of the release time has become a key factor to determine the level of the box office of the old film.

In 2022, the National Day old films were among the top three at the box office, and the release time of "Hello, Brother" and "New God List: Yang Jian" in Moon Man was from near to far, which echoed the box office from high to low. For many viewers who are busy with their daily work, it is the best time to catch up on old movies when they are in the prime time of legal holidays.

In addition, the reprinting of classic old films in off-season is also a routine operation to enrich the audience’s viewing choices and enhance the market popularity. In mid-July, 2020, at the beginning of the orderly resumption of the China mainland film market, Mermaid and many other classic old films became the pioneers of warm-up.

At present, Wan Li’s Way Home, which is showing a good reputation, is also expected to extend its popularity to the Lunar New Year file. At present, the annual box office of China film market has exceeded 27.3 billion. Under the new and old films, this number will continue to climb.