This summer, a "Journey to the West: The Return of the Great Sage" became popular all over the country, and the box office has exceeded 900 million so far, becoming the highest-grossing animated film in China. In this regard, Tencent Animation interviewed Mr. Sun Lijun, a well-known animation critic in China, and asked him to talk about his interpretation of "The Return of the Great Sage".

Introduction: Sun Lijun, graduated from Beijing Film Academy with a major in animation, has been engaged in teaching since 1988, and is currently the dean, professor and master's tutor of the Animation School of Beijing Film Academy, the executive director of the China Animation Society, the director of the Cartoon Art Committee of the China Television Association, and the chairman of the Comic Book Branch of the China Oriental Culture Research Association.

Question 1: Do you think the success of "The Return of the Great Sage" is accidental or inevitable?

Sun Lijun (hereinafter referred to as "Sun"): This is difficult to answer, because in China there is neither chance nor necessity, and its success must be both chance and inevitability. Just like "Pleasant Goat" and "Bear Infested" back then, both chance and necessity actually exist, including the team of "The Return of the Great Sage", did not expect such success.

Teng: There have been interviews with their team online, and that's true.

Sun: Why do you say that it is inevitable, because it seizes a so-called period of opportunity? First of all, it has a good work itself, and then it chooses a better schedule, including various other opportunities, including online marketing and so on. Therefore, success is also inevitable, and success is only possible if you have both. In addition, the rapid increase in the number of screens is also an important factor in the birth of this high box office. Ten years ago, when we only had 10,000 or 20,000 screens, how could such a result occur?

Question 2: What impact do you think the success of "The Return of the Great Sage" has had on the entire Chinese animation industry?

Sun: I don't think the overall impact will be big in the long run. This is the inevitable way of this development. Just like when I made the first "Little Soldier Zhang Ga" ten years ago, although it was not released, the 05 "Little Soldier Zhang Ga" has shown that in addition to Shanghai Fine Arts Film Studio, there are more production companies and private companies that can be made into animated films.

Teng: What do you mean is that the success of one company doesn't mean much to the industry as a whole?

Sun: That's right. And now our media has a problem: as long as it does well at the box office, it is considered a success. I think this kind of thinking is too one-sided. It has not promoted the Chinese animation industry, and it will not make Chinese animated films do anything because of this one. We also need to reflect on the current market environment, which is not scientific and standardized. For example, if it has a good box office, other movies will give it the green light, extend its key period, etc., which should not be marketized.

Question 3: After "The Return of the Great Sage" became popular, the Propaganda Department of the CPC Central Committee and the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television officially praised it, what do you think of this?

Sun: What I want to praise is not this film, but the Central Propaganda Department should praise the unknown and original team behind it. Because this film is not driven by one or two people or one or two films, it is actually the efforts of all aspects of the entire animation industry for more than ten years. How many people have accumulated, continued to grow, and constantly improved (only to have today's achievements), it is not enough to praise it.

Question 4: Regarding the success of the remake of Journey to the West, there is a view that the choice of the theme in China has been stirring up cold rice, and there is no real national and innovative thing, what do you think?

Sun: I do feel this way. In terms of advantages, we have a rich cultural history, and there are so many accumulations and materials. But on the other hand, I am worried that when people are still only focusing on these, it is actually the problem that I often talk about "the fashion of Chinese culture". If we can't solve the fashion of culture, it will be difficult to make Chinese animation a leader. That's why I still prefer to see works that are truly innovative.

Question 5: In your opinion, how should domestic animation go? What goals have been achieved to be regarded as a kind of progress and improvement in the entire domestic animation field?

Sun: Animation and the animation industry are two different concepts. Animation revolves around the animation work itself, and the animation industry looks at animation as a product from the perspective of some markets.

First, from the perspective of animation, the emergence of an excellent animation work is a sign of the maturity of an animated film industry. For example, "Pleasant Goat", "Bear Infested", "The Return of the Great Sage" and other excellent works, only a few more companies with their own benign creative production capacity can prove that China's animation industry as a whole is developing, (with) mature, or stable, just like Pixar Dreamworks. Since it's a production organization, it has to have the sustainable production capacity of good work. If you can't produce one in seven or eight years, and one after two or three years, it means that your creative team, market operation, planning ability, and artistic quality are not stable, and you only have the first generation, not the second and third generations, then your factory does not have the qualifications of a century-old store.

Second, I pay more attention to the audience. Since our audience is a consumer group cultivated by Japanese and American animation. Therefore, I hope to make a long-term plan in terms of market cultivation, so that those young audiences under the age of 12 can also see excellent domestic animation earlier, so that when he becomes an adult, or when he really becomes a consumer, he will consume his own original animation. It is also unrealistic to talk about the original originality today, and the cultivation of taste and consumer groups still needs a long process.

Third, we know that cartoons are the most "international", and national borders are the most unclear. Animation is not like our own feature films in China, which are all yellow-skinned and yellow-faced, and the images in cartoons are easy to internationalize. How our animation faces the internationalization of the future and promotes Chinese works to the international market is also an important indicator of maturity. Our works must learn to go out, and what we go out is naturally Chinese characteristics. If you don't get out, whether it's your vision, the subject matter, or your ability, there will be a big gap with the first-class.

Fourth, our policies should be changed, such as the stability of talents in the industrial chain. As I've said before, animation creators are now busy working overtime every day, and when they're idle, they're empty-minded and facing the dilemma of not being able to support their families. Therefore, we should formulate some tax exemptions for creative talents, such as individual income tax reduction, individual assessment, and original enterprise tax reduction, not just individual or corporate income tax reduction. Because their income itself is unstable, they may have received 100,000 yuan in the first half of the year and paid 30,000 yuan, and confiscated a cent in the second half of the year, so what should he do with his livelihood? There are also those that make follow-up product development enterprises are also facing problems such as logistics, combating piracy, and strengthening intellectual property protection, and policies in these areas should be strengthened, not just the current formal subsidies.

Teng: Thank you, Mr. Sun Lijun, for accepting our interview.

Reading behind the high box office of "Journey to the West: The Return of the Great Sage" (Author: Sun Lijun)

No accumulation of steps, no thousands of miles, no accumulation of small streams, no rivers and seas. In this summer's file, a great sage can be said to have won a full house, igniting the animation fever of many people, and setting off a boom in paying attention to Chinese animation in a small area. "Journey to the West: The Return of the Great Sage" exceeded 500 million at the box office within 10 days of its release, and the key was extended by 1 month, and the box office has exceeded 900 million, all of which have set multiple highs in Chinese animation. All of a sudden, the remarks of "Chinese animation is coming back strongly" and "Chinese animation is blooming gorgeously" are also surging. "The Return of the Great Sage" is like a brightly colored fruit, everyone wants to pick it and eat it, but few people explore how the fruit grows and what kind of pruning it undergoes during its germination and fruit-bearing period. Few people have verified whether the fruit of this seemingly ripe movie is a real delicacy or flashy, after all, it is not enough to just bloom brightly, you must concentrate your energy in one place for a long time. To read the Great Sage, we should also talk about it from many aspects.

1. Cultivation of fertile soil

Under the background of national policies, funds, university investment, and base construction, China's animation content production strength has been rapidly improved, and the cultivation of animation production clusters and industrial zones has begun to emerge, at present, there are more than 4,600 animation enterprises in China, with more than 500,000 employees. In 2014, the total box office of domestic animated films has exceeded 1.1 billion yuan, and the annual total box office is more than double that of more than 660 million yuan in 2013.

In recent years, the rapid development of animation-related students in China to about 300,000 people, at the end of 2013, there are 468 art colleges and comprehensive colleges and universities in China that offer animation majors, involving 1,251 departments of animation majors, and the number of colleges and universities with undergraduate animation majors has increased to 143. The training of animation professionals in colleges and universities has played an important role in the development of Chinese animation. With the establishment of the Digital Media Arts and Technology major, the number of colleges and universities related to film and television animation is still increasing.

At the same time, an unwritten rule of "Domestic Film Protection Month" has been formed between June and July every year, aiming to encourage the broadcast of domestic films. It achieved a box office of 160 million in 2004 for "Ambush on All Sides", protected "Seven Swords" and "Initial D" in 2005, and launched "Small Times 3" and "There Will Be No Future" in 2014. The unwritten "Protection Month" also provides fertile soil for the box office blowout of the movie, throughout this year's summer file, "The Return of the Great Sage", "Monster Hunt", "Pancake Man" and other super high box office are all created by domestic films, more than 95% of the box office proportion, the extension of the key. Under the nourishment of this fertile soil, the strong eruption of the box office of an animated film in the summer of this year seems to be an inevitable thing to happen in the surprise. But behind the gratifying results, how competitive are our domestic film industry products compared with similar films in the world? It remains to be studied.

Second, digital technology + classic IP make it possible

The development of digital technology has promoted the rapid growth of the film industry, and film is an audio-visual art that combines time and space. From "Avatar" to "Life of Pi", to a number of commercial visual effects films in recent years, the application of mature digital technology has made great contributions to its breakthrough at the high box office. The majestic and gorgeous space experience, the flowing fighting shots, the mottled colors, and the traditional 2D pictures can capture the hearts of the audience more than film films, shorten the distance with the audience, and make them immerse themselves in it and reverie. Looking at the summer movies that created a box office miracle this year, whether it is "The Return of the Great Sage" or "Monster Hunt", without exception, a large number of digital special effects technology are used.

At the same time, Journey to the West itself is a classic allusion rooted in the hearts of Chinese. Whether it is China's first color animated feature film "Havoc in the Heavenly Palace" directed by Mr. Wan Xiaoming in 1961, or the smash hit TV series "Journey to the West" broadcast by CCTV later, it has to be said that every Chinese has a Journey to the West plot in their hearts. If you ask Chinese if there are heroes in their hearts, eight or nine out of ten people will say the name "Monkey King", "Journey to the West: The Return of the Great Sage" is based on the classic theme of Journey to the West, and it already has a certain fan base. At the same time, it is worth mentioning that with the development of digital technology, the film has issued international standards in terms of art, story, animation, and audio-visual, and the emotional portrayal of the Monkey King and the little monk Jiang Liuer, who has been sleeping for 500 years, is ingenious and charming. At the same time, the grass, trees, rivers and rivers in the movie, the way the characters speak, and the portrayal of the scenes also show unique Chinese elements, which also allows many audiences to naturally integrate into it. The compact plot and the Nirvana of the Great Sage are all more exciting, laying the foundation for the good reputation of the movie.

3. The distribution model of Internet +

In the relatively boiling summer film theater this year, the distribution model of Internet + has indeed made a lot of contributions to the box office record, and "Journey to the West: The Return of the Great Sage" is also one of the beneficiaries. It is reported that "The Return of the Great Sage" was screened nationwide on July 4 and 5 before it was released on July 10, breaking through the distribution model of traditional animated films, and the overnight well-being of good reputation laid a solid foundation for the later outbreak of the box office. At the same time, at the summer file promotion ceremony of China's new film power at the end of June, led by Ma Yun, a representative of the Internet, many film and television stars such as John Woo, Huang Xiaoming, Feng Xiaogang and other film and television stars took photos with the Daisheng dolls, which also set off a great response on the Internet for a while. The film was not released and the derivative products became popular, which also played a positive role in promoting the growth of the film box office.

The popularity of the Tongguò online platform has made many cartoons, or Tongguò works themselves or Tongguò derivative products, synchronously or in advance on the Internet to warm up on the Internet has become an emerging form of development. At the same time, crowdfunding and other models are also reflected in the distribution of films. During the release period of the film, continuous word-of-mouth marketing, emotional marketing, and a series of topic marketing have all contributed a lot to the surge in the box office of the film.

Fourth, the follow-up effect of the Great Sage

As of now, the box office of "The Return of the Great Sage" has exceeded 900 million, and the number of moviegoers has exceeded 1.7 million, and the film "The Return of the Great Sage", which has been produced for 8 years, has also been confirmed to launch the second part. In recent years, with the development of Chinese animation, the number of series of films on top of the original brand has been increasing. For example, DreamWorks Animation and Hollywood Animation usually release sequels 3-5 years after the release of the previous work. On the other hand, most of China's "sequel" animated films have been released at a frequency of one per year or two years, and bad methods such as poor quality and excessive marketing have overdrawn the audience, exhausting the development power of a brand with potential, and there are almost no high-quality film brands that are more than 10 years old. Although "The Return of the Great Sage" is a temporary glory, can it be continued? Or whether there are strong succession of animation works, it is worth continuing to explore. At the same time, according to the current return on investment ratio of Chinese films, the direct connection between the box office and the creator is not large, how to better protect the enthusiasm of original animators, so that animation professionals can better contribute to Chinese animation, is also what we need to continue to improve and urgently need to think about.

The super high box office of "The Return of the Great Sage" can be said to have come into being under the current good animation form, although the results are gratifying, but it should not become an example in the history of the development of Chinese animated films, excessive admiration and extreme stampede are not suitable for the benign development of Chinese animation. We should have more original animation works vying to come out. Although there is still a gap between China's animation and the United States, Japan and other countries, the strong support of national policies, the rapid development of digital technology, the continuous cultivation of talents in colleges and universities, the increasingly profound theory, the continuous development of original content and brand competitiveness, and the continuous improvement of the market all indicate new opportunities. Animation has an unparalleled charm, and it is also attracting more and more people to devote themselves to it. I believe that in the future development, Chinese animation will also accumulate steps to thousands of miles, converge small streams into rivers and seas, go international, and shine.