Shulou(Shulou.com)06/02 Report--

The epidemic besieged the city for several months may usher in a downward inflection point, but the film and television industry under the epidemic is still silent and sinking.

In the face of the epidemic, various industries have been pressed the "pause button", the Spring Festival holiday has been extended indefinitely. After staying at home for more than a month, practitioners in various industries have changed from complacency to uneasiness. Small and medium-sized enterprises have been hard hit by the epidemic, and the tide of closure and closure is surging. In a howl of unemployment, the catering, tourism, hotel, film and television industries were rated by netizens as the industry with the highest unemployment rate after the epidemic.

The suspension of the Spring Festival is a sign that the film and television industry continues in the cold winter and the tide of unemployment is coming. COVID-19 wreaked havoc the night before New Year's Eve, and the news of Wuhan city closure came out, immediately after the film "Jiang Ziya" announced its withdrawal from the Spring Festival, followed by "Bear haunting the Wild mainland," Chinatown investigation 3, "winning the Spring Festival" and other films one after another. It was supposed to be the Spring Festival in the peak season of the film industry, which was temporarily reduced to "Silent Hill."

In fact, 2019 film and television has sounded the alarm, originally thought that the Spring Festival will be the film and television winter inflection point, but it has become a "reminder" to aggravate the film and television winter.

The operation during the Spring Festival is dismal.

The film and television industry did not get off to a good start in 2020 and can be called the "coldest Spring Festival".

Under the epidemic, popular Spring Festival films such as "Jiang Ziya", "Bear haunting the Wild mainland", "Chinatown investigation 3", "winning the Champion" and "Emergency Rescue" have withdrawn from the Spring Festival. There are no dramas to broadcast during the Spring Festival in 2020, and the film and television market is depressed. It is reported that the national box office on the first day of the Lunar New year is only 1.81 million yuan, compared with 1.458 billion yuan in the same period last year. Both the popularity of the film and the number of moviegoers are 108000 miles apart.

It was thought that the occurrence of the "bleakest Spring Festival" has been the biggest blow to the film and television industry, after which the film and television industry will pick up. Unexpectedly, the collective withdrawal of films during the Spring Festival is not the inflection point but the freezing point of the film and television winter, and the epidemic goes deep into the film and television industry, affecting the entire film and television industry chain, such as film and television companies, film and television production teams, and film and television practitioners.

The film was withdrawn, and the production shutdown of the film and TV series came immediately after.

On January 27, Hengdian Film City, Zhejiang Xiangshan Film City, Wuxi Film City and other film and television cities announced the suspension of filming activities. By January 31, the Television production Committee and the Actors Committee jointly issued a notice: in this special period, if any film and television company or film crew does not suspend filming during this period, the relevant units will bear the relevant responsibilities. In this regard, the film and television industry is out of work, and the losses of film and television companies have intensified.

In 2019, under the big economic environment, the performance of entertainment and film companies is generally poor, and even many enterprises have suffered substantial losses.

Public data show that as of February 3, 9 of the 16 film and television companies that have issued 2019 performance forecasts have lost money. Among them, Wanda Film is expected to lose 3.3 billion yuan to 4.5 billion yuan in 2019, Huayi Brothers is expected to lose about 3.967 billion yuan to 3.962 billion yuan in 2019, and Beijing Culture is expected to lose 1.95 billion to 2.45 billion yuan in 2019. In addition to the film giants, TV series companies such as Huatze Film and Television, Tangde Film and Television, Huanrui Century and so on have also suffered losses.

In 2020, cinemas will be closed, the production crew will be suspended indefinitely, and film and television producers will be unemployed, which will undoubtedly make a number of film and television companies even worse.

The film and television industry is in a deep winter in 2019, and the winter is still or even colder in 2020. The shutdown of the Spring Festival is just the beginning, and the problem of insufficient stock of variety shows and no dramas to broadcast ensues. The film and television industry affected by the epidemic will only be worse in 2020 than in 2019, and it is not known when the market will recover.

Film and television and variety shows are in the doldrums.

The ferocious epidemic, the closure of cinemas, the impact of the Spring Festival, the shutdown of the production crew and the suspension of concerts are only the tip of the iceberg of the offline film and television industry. The resulting problems of film production, funding, and unemployment are becoming prominent with the passage of time.

On the one hand, all kinds of film and television production teams urgently enter a state of shutdown, and the longer the film production process stalls, the greater the loss. The complete suspension of work and variety recording of the film and television crew has directly led to the lack of work in the brokerage company and the decline in the attention of the entertainers. What is more serious is that the shutdown also has to pay the rent of the film and television city, and the constant "expense" also brings huge financial pressure to the producers. Film and television enterprises are suffering huge shutdown losses.

Moreover, in addition to the signed entertainers waiting for employment and the daily rent of the film and television city, the publicity expenses in the early stages of the program will also be wasted due to the postponement of film and television. Under the heavy pressure of labor costs and divestment of advertisers, small and medium-sized production companies may face the risk of bankruptcy. Even if various film and television cities have implemented rent-free measures for the crew because of the epidemic, there are greater expenses such as labor and publicity in addition to the rent, and it is very difficult to receive new projects in the first half of this year, and rent-free is only a drop in the bucket.

On the other hand, zero inventory is unable to record programs, which directly leads to the delay of variety shows such as "singer" and "ace to trump". The resulting problems such as program scheduling and brand divestment are becoming more and more serious.

It is reported that the broadcast of "Ace versus Ace", originally scheduled for January 30, was postponed indefinitely, while the broadcast of Hunan Satellite TV "Singer" was also postponed on January 31. In order to minimize the loss, the "Singer" and "Sound immersive 3" program groups adopted the recording method of "Cloud recording" on February 6, without a live public hearing group. Although this has solved the recording problem, but without the focus of the "drama audience", the program effect has also been reduced accordingly.

In fact, from the use of "cloud recording" to urgently record variety shows, we can also see the problem of urgent inventory of major satellite TV platforms.

Unlike TV dramas or movies, the choreography and recording of variety shows tend to capture the real-time popularity of the entertainment industry. For example, the old variety show "Happy Camp" has always invited actors from real-time movies or TV series to record it. As a result, variety shows are basically broadcast once a season, and the stock is not surplus.

Some programs have been recorded, but the post-production staff are unable to return to work and are unable to prepare for the broadcast because of the epidemic.

Fewer and fewer programs are in stock, recording is suspended, and platform scheduling becomes urgent. "A clever wife cannot make bricks without rice". If the work of the crew stops for a long time, the major satellite TV stations will face the dilemma of having no variety to broadcast. As a result, satellite TV stations are now using various ways to replace live recording to make up for the scheduling crisis caused by the epidemic.

From "the host holds up a party" and "the bullet screen replaces the audience" to "Cloud recording" and "Indoor recording" in Hunan Yuanxiao Gala, it can be found that all major satellite TV stations have tried every means to persist in recording in order to survive the epidemic period. Fortunately, the SARFT issued an overall deployment, calling on national satellite TV to reduce entertainment programs and timely release guidelines for 36 satellite TV all-day programs, alleviating the urgent needs of variety shows.

To sum up, the sudden epidemic made the film and television, variety market completely silent, depressed, film and television giants suffered heavy losses, small and medium-sized production companies closed down, the film and television industry is facing a reshuffle. But the good news is that although offline movies, performances and online variety shows have been cancelled or postponed, the number and duration of users of platforms such as online videos and live broadcasts have increased significantly.

Short videos and games have become popular.

During the severe period of the epidemic, film and television, variety shows are in dire straits, and the entertainment industries such as short videos, long videos and games are booming. In a crowd of howls, short videos and game platforms ushered in a brief outbreak.

According to URORA Aurora Statistics, during the peak of DAU during the Spring Festival in 2020, Tik Tok reached 311 million users, an increase of 93.1% over the previous year, while Kuaishou ranked second with a DAU of 177 million, an increase of 55.8% over the previous year, and watermelon video reached 45.8 million, up 30% from the previous year.

Similarly, public online data show that during the Spring Festival, the peak DAU of "Arena of Valor" reached between 120 million and 150 million, breaking New Year's Eve's record of 1.3 billion in a single day last year, and the peak DAU of "Game for Peace" was also between 120 million and 100 million, both setting record highs.

Under the influence of the epidemic, the short video and game industry performed brilliantly, replacing the offline business frustrated by the epidemic.

First, the offline business is blocked, and the online business takes the opportunity to make up. During the period of SARS in 2003, e-commerce, third-party payment, logistics and other industries grew up. And novel coronavirus's sudden, let online consultation, telecommuting, online classes and other business into people's daily life, opened up a new field of online business.

In the entertainment industry, the parallel situation of online and offline business has also turned into the outbreak of short videos, games and other projects due to the epidemic, while cinemas and other projects are in the doldrums.

Second, the short video industry has become an important window for users to obtain external information. The short video industry exploded rapidly in 2017, and short video products such as Douyin, Kuaishou, Volcano Mini Video and Weishi became popular for a while. Based on the characteristics of simple video production process, low production threshold, strong participation and wide dissemination, short video has become an important channel for users to obtain information.

During the outbreak, the mainstream media of People's Daily, Xinhua News Agency and CCTV promoted the reporting and spread of the epidemic through short video platforms. Official figures from Kuaishou show that from the first live broadcast of the epidemic on January 20 to January 31, central media and a number of regional media conducted nearly 200 live broadcasts on Kuaishou, with a total of more than 1 billion viewers.

Third, fans from film and television, variety shows to short videos, fan economy continues in the field of short videos. Born in the field of film and television, variety fans, the word has been infinitely extended to the field of short videos and games. Well-known online celebrities and game anchors have more fans than third-and fourth-tier stars, and fans pay no less attention to well-known online celebrities than first-tier stars.

During the epidemic, while stars such as Han Hong and Jackie Chan donated money, online celebrities who benefited from fans' financial benefits also extended a helping hand to Wuhan. It is reported that Li Ziqi has donated medical materials such as masks, protective clothing, goggles and medical disinfection spray to Wuhan, Zhejiang and Sichuan, while another post-90s online celebrity named Simba donated 150 million for Wuhan.

For short video and game platforms, 2020 is a good start. However, it needs to be warned that the growth in the number of users and the extension of the duration of use are not the result of product upgrading and service optimization, and the whole industry still needs fine development to retain users in order to realize the temporary market dividend.

Summary:

Throughout the entire entertainment market, the situation of enterprises in the field of entertainment is different. Judging from the short-term performance of film companies, game companies and short video companies, 2020 will still be a happy and sad year for several companies.

The sudden attack of the epidemic is both a crisis and an opportunity for the entertainment industry. The epidemic has caused offline economic losses, broken capital chains, the closure of small and medium-sized enterprises, industry reshuffle and other problems, but also highlighted the online market demand, games, short video traffic will become a catalyst for the further development of online business in the entertainment industry.

All in all, the disadvantages of offline business and the advantages of online business in the offline entertainment market have become clear. Before the turning point of the cold winter in the market, whether online or offline, enterprises in the entertainment field need to accumulate strength and fight again when the epidemic fades and the industry picks up. Only if we stay warm together and survive the winter, can we have the hope of life.

(official account of Liu Kuang / tr. by Phil Newell) ID:liukuang110

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