Vietnamese cinema now only has 'Tran Thanh movie season' and 'Ly Hai movie season'?

Consecutive losses in Vietnamese films in the first 6 months of 2024 have led many people to humorously comment that the Vietnamese box office now only has "Ly Hai movie season" and "Tran Thanh movie season".

According to statistics from The Box Office Vietnam (which may have an error of 5% to 10% depending on the film), the revenue of Vietnamese films in the first 6 months of 2024 exceeded 1,500 billion VND. However, of this figure, Ly Hai and Tran Thanh's films accounted for more than 2/3. The remaining films released in theaters all failed miserably.

Audiences continuously witness the painful "falls" of a series of films, including names that were once known as "hundred-billion-dong directors or actors" .

Vietnamese cinema in the first half of 2024 is winning big?

In the first half of 2024, Vietnamese film revenue exceeded 1,500 billion VND, while last year's total only stopped at 1,130 billion VND. This is a good number when we still have 6 more months to continue to set new milestones for Vietnamese cinema.

However, if we analyze this revenue figure, we will see a sad reality. In fact, in the total revenue of 1,500 billion VND in the first half of 2024, the two films of Ly Hai and Tran Thanh account for the majority, in addition to another film, Meet the pregnant woman again with a revenue of more than 100 billion VND. The remaining tens of billions divided among nearly 10 Vietnamese films also released in the same half year is an alarming thing.

The Vietnamese film market opened in early 2024 with a total revenue of nearly 700 billion VND. Of which, the film Tomorrow Tran Thanh's continues to break box office records with over 550 billion VND. At the same time, Meet the pregnant woman again Nhat Trung's film reached 92.7 billion VND (according to Box Office Vietnam).

After a Tet season, Vietnamese cinema continued to be gloomy until Flip Side 7 Ly Hai's film was released on the occasion of April 30 - May 1. As expected, Ly Hai's blockbuster film brand continued to revive the Vietnamese film market after a long period of stagnation and depression.

As of now, Flip Side 7 revenue of nearly 480 billion VND (according to Box Office Vietnam), usurping the throne Mrs. Nu's house to rank second in the top 10 highest-grossing Vietnamese films of all time.

"Mai" won both domestic and foreign markets.

Not only making a splash domestically, Tran Thanh continues to bring his brainchild internationally. Up to this point, the most successful "exported" Vietnamese film is also Tomorrow by Tran Thanh

In addition to 6.5 million tickets sold in the domestic market with revenue of 520 billion VND, Tomorrow also earned 2 million USD (about 50 billion VND) after 2 weeks of simultaneous release in the US and Europe (according to information from the article on Deadline on April 4, 2024).

With the above figure, Tomorrow has become the first Vietnamese film in history to reach this revenue milestone in both continents. Not stopping there, Tran Thanh also announced the film's schedule for screening in Australia, Taiwan (China)...

With Ly Hai, Flip Side 7: A Wish also released in the North American market and 11 other countries including: Canada, Australia, New Zealand, UK, Germany, France, Norway, Sweden, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland from June 14.

According to the producer's announcement, the film holds the record for the Asian film with the highest number of screening locations in the Taiwanese market (China) with 86 (accounting for 95% of the total number of cinemas here) at the end of June. In the coming time, the film will be shown in the markets of Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and Brunei.

Ly Hai continues to prove his appeal with "Flip Side 7".

Also one of the three successful projects of Vietnamese cinema in early 2024, director Nhat Trung brings Meet the Pregnant Sister premieres on VOD and is released in Australia in mid-May 2024.

As of June 17, the film's total revenue was VND105.3 billion, helping the film join the "hundred-billion-dollar film club" of Vietnamese cinema. After Australia, the film is expected to reach many other international markets such as the US, Europe and some markets in Asia.

"Gap lai chi bau" is one of three successful Vietnamese films in the first half of 2024.

The names of "hundred billion" consecutively "fall off the horse"

In fact, in recent years, there have been many cases of films achieving record revenues and also many works that have "hit rock bottom". According to statistics from Box Office Vietnam, in the first 6 months of 2024, Vietnamese cinema has had consecutive films with heavy losses.

Typical examples include: Fragile flower with record low sales of only 430 million VND.

After nearly 2 weeks in theaters, Mai Thu Huyen's film had to be quickly withdrawn due to lack of audience. According to the disclosure, the project needed to earn hundreds of billions of dong to break even because the investment and production costs were very expensive. Withdrawing with a humiliating number, the film was recorded as the heaviest loss-making work in the history of Vietnamese theaters.

"Fragile Flower" is the lowest-grossing Vietnamese film of 2024.

Launching on Lunar New Year 2024, Lights Up - The old-fashioned Cai Luong film quickly had to be rescheduled due to strong competitors. Despite its efforts to return to theaters, director Hoang Tuan Cuong's work still faced a similar sluggish situation, earning only over 3.4 billion VND (including both release times).

Similar is Tea – 18+ work marks the return of director Le Hoang. It is not wrong when many people say Le Hoang is "throwing eggs at rocks" when he recklessly puts his work against Tran Thanh.

The film was forced to leave theaters a few days after its opening on Tet 2024 when it only earned 1.6 billion VND. Although it was announced that it would return, up to now, the director has remained silent about the next release plan.

The Heiress 2 – the work marking the return of actress Trang Nhung after 10 years of absence also left theaters with only over 6 billion VND. Meanwhile, the actress had expected to reach 40 billion VND to break even.

In addition, a series of names also suffered failure. The movie B4S: Before Love With the participation of Jun Vu, Ton Kinh Lam only brought in 3.8 billion VND. Or like The movie "The 4th Floor Murder" starring Truong The Vinh and Luong Bich Huu also left theaters after just over half a month of showing with a revenue of only about 2 billion VND.

Once expected to be a "confrontational project" Flip side 7 , however The Price of Happiness invested by Xuan Lan, with the participation of "box office king" Thai Hoa, also encountered a loss.

Previously, the producer revealed that the film had to earn at least 70 billion VND to break even. However, the project only earned 26.3 billion VND (according to Box Office data). This is considered an alarming number for a film invested in with the participation of famous names.

Thai Hoa had to "taste failure" despite expectations.

Most recently, the movie Claws by director Le Thanh Son also fell into a similar situation. Once expected to create a "box office explosion" with the combination of the "hundred billion duo" of director Le Thanh Son and actor Tuan Tran, however the film still failed.

According to statistics from Box Office Vietnam, the film had to quietly leave theaters after selling only a few tickets a day. The film's total revenue after nearly a month of showing was only 3.8 billion VND.

Previously, the director expected Claw to earn 300 billion VND and join the list of films with revenue of hundreds of billions of VND in 2024. However, actual figures show that the film only achieved 1/100 of the director's expectations.

Released in theaters late last June, The Most Beautiful Summer with the participation of many famous actors such as People's Artist Viet Anh, Meritorious Artist Cong Ninh; or the duo Tran Nghia - Khanh Van (from the movie The success of previous projects could not help their film gain attention.

Typically, the film's revenue only reached 2.2 billion VND in the first week of release. With this number, it is not too surprising that the film will have to quietly withdraw in the near future.

"Claws" lost despite having a beautiful young cast.

From now until the end of 2024, there will still be a few more Vietnamese film projects released. Although there are a few glimmers that will become a "boost" at the end of the year, this is still vague. Vietnamese cinema is still waiting for new revenue breakthroughs.

The revenue contribution of Ly Hai and Tran Thanh to the film market in recent times is very large. However, this shows the huge gap in the Vietnamese film market.

The increasingly large and obvious polarization of Vietnamese cinema also raises questions for directors and producers. They must find a solution to how to create a work worthy of the audience's money, time and effort to go to the theater.

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