As of press time, although the box office of "Sniper", which was released for 12 days, was not particularly outstanding at the box office, with its excellent word-of-mouth and the impact of the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games, it still reached 388 million, and the film's account reached 134 million.
It should be noted that "Sniper" is jointly directed by Zhang Yimou and his daughter Zhang Mo, the two people are responsible for the part of the filming at the same time, but also almost at the same time, of which Zhang Yimou is responsible for the shooting of the volunteer part, and Zhang Mo is responsible for the shooting of the US military part, the film scene itself is single, the two groups of people and horses shooting progress at the same time, according to the on-site photographer, the whole film was only filmed for 50 days, and there are no big scenes and too many special effects, the actors are mostly newcomers, so the total production cost will not exceed 150 million. The box office forecast given by professional software is 555 million, when the box office will exceed 200 million, and the future sale of copyright to video platforms will also have a part of the revenue, so "Sniper" has now returned to the cost and begun to make a profit.
The theme is the same, there is a big-budget movie "Watergate Bridge" in the same period, there are no well-known actors... Why did "Sniper" get such a good reputation and a good box office performance? If you carefully watch the film's behind-the-scenes production special, comb through Zhang Yimou's previous interviews, and his own writings in the People's Daily, you can outline the behind-the-scenes story of the film and find the answer to the success of the film.
Zhang Yimou shed tears twice on the set and threw himself into the real feelings for the shooting
On February 10, the People's Daily published Zhang Yimou's article on Sniper. In the article, he talked about the original intention of the film, condensing the story into a small team and the individuals in it, and said that he has been making movies for so many years, and he is still exercising his ability to tell good character stories in film creation.
And the vivid characters created by the film touched the audience and also touched himself. Zhang Yimou revealed that several actors sang the "battle song of the Chinese People's Volunteer Army" during the filming, the actors were exhausted, and even some out of tune, they were not singing, but shouting, the important thing is to highlight a momentum, in the shooting scene, this section he and the staff are crying.
Another time that made him cry was the scene at the end of the film where the company commander played by Zhang Yi named the scene, which magnified the ordinary name and enlarged a personal character, and director Zhang Yimou really invested in the real feeling.
Zhang Yi did not ask for remuneration and contributed valuable suggestions
Zhang Yi does not play much in the film, the opening and closing points echo each other, and the two scenes in the interview and the dialogue with the soldiers during the battlefield. Zhang Yimou revealed in the interview that Zhang Yiyi gave him great help. On the one hand, Zhang Yi made a cameo for free, not a penny.
On the other hand, Zhang Yi gave him a lot of help. Zhang Yimou was very impressed, after Zhang Yi got off the plane to baishan, the filming place, the two people began to discuss in the evening, needing a emotional ending scene, the end of the original script is not necessarily appropriate. The two people discussed for two nights, and finally talked about the scene of the roll call, after filming, Zhang Yimou felt very satisfied, so he made up the opening roll call scene echo, everyone was very moved. As we all know, Zhang Yi has starred in Zhang Yimou's "One Second" and "On the Cliff" before, this time did not let him play the starring role, just a cameo role, he still gladly went without charging a penny, really a good actor!
Father and daughter co-direct, each with its own division of labor
As mentioned earlier, Zhang Yimou and his daughter Zhang Mo each completed the film shooting according to their own division of labor. In the interview, Zhang Yimou also introduced that his daughter Zhang Mo happened to be a director who studied in the United States and had better English, so he let her guide the US military. At the script level, it is also to transform the Chinese materials written by Chinese screenwriters into the idiomatic language of the US military and then communicate with foreign actors.
So two people set up two battlefields at the same time to start shooting, the two groups are almost at the same time to stop, during the filming process every night two people discuss together, both sides look at their own materials, communicate with each other and adjust the strategy, and fight guerrilla warfare is almost the same, this is also a more special shooting experience. After watching the movie, you will find that the scene of the US military part of "Sniper" is actually very exciting, which can be called a tiger father and no dog.
Finally, I would like to say that I am not very clear about whether director Zhang Yimou is satisfied with the box office performance of "Sniper" today, he wrote in an article in the People's Daily that the film box office looks like a number, but behind the number is the people's heart, and now young people like to watch this kind of movie, which is a gratifying change in the Chinese film market in the past two years. This gives creators a great sense of encouragement. Director Zhang Yimou is 72 years old this year, I don't know if the box office of "Sniper" is enough to encourage him, I hope he can continue to work hard and make better works to give back to the audience!