The one who dares to fight Ly Hai

The April 30 - May 1 holiday movie season this year has become more fierce than ever when two famous directors of the Vietnamese film market, Ly Hai and Victor Vu, clashed for the first time. While Ly Hai is a trillion-dong director after 7 parts of the brand Flip side , Victor Vu also built his own "empire" on a 20-year journey of fighting in the Vietnamese film market.

For many years, Ly Hai has dominated the second biggest holiday movie season of the year at the domestic box office. Despite clashes with a number of other film projects, Flip side easily overcome to conquer positive milestones in revenue. However, the situation has changed this year when Victor Vu no longer leaves Ly Hai "alone". On the other hand, Ly Hai cannot be subjective when confronting a big name with a lot of experience in the film industry like Victor Vu.

The competition at the domestic box office during the April 30 holiday season will therefore be the most intense and variable in recent years.

Ly Hai and Victor Vu invest money in the first 'battlefield'

In the Vietnamese film market, the April 30 - May 1 holiday is always the golden time for film projects, just after the Lunar New Year film season. This year, on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Liberation of the South and the reunification of the country, with many exciting activities in Ho Chi Minh City, the films released on this occasion have attracted even greater attention from the public.

The holiday movie race became hotter than ever with the appearance of two names Ly Hai and Victor Vu. Before that, Detective Kien: Headless Mystery, from Victor Vu was originally scheduled to premiere in mid-May. However, more than a month ago, the project suddenly changed its release date, right on April 30, directly competing with Flip 8: Sunny Bracelet by Ly Hai. Victor Vu said this was a joint decision, coming from both the publisher and production unit, he alone did not have enough power to change it.

However, he also believes that "April 30 is a potential market for Vietnamese films and wishes to bring a cinematic feast of many flavors to the audience." Regardless of how it is interpreted, the above calculation of Victor Vu and his crew also shows the ambition to divide the market share of this year's holiday.

Not only that, Victor Vu has completely changed the communication and pre-release promotion campaign. A few weeks before the film was officially released to the audience, the director and crew "played big" by organizing two grand showcase events in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. Notably, this is the first time in nearly two decades of filmmaking that the 50-year-old director has opened a showcase in Hanoi. In recent days, the film crew has also launched a methodical and massive promotion campaign.

Victor Vu and his wife have been actively promoting the film in recent days. Photo: @victorvu.

The director and his wife attended many events to introduce the film, release trailers, short clips, and heavily cover the film's content and cast in the press and social media. On the first "battlefield", Victor Vu is said to be going all-in on a big project, marking the 20th anniversary of entering the Vietnamese film market.

Meanwhile, Ly Hai is also eager to release his first "cards". The "billionaire director" opened a showcase in Ho Chi Minh City in the grounds of the Light Park, Thu Duc City, Ho Chi Minh City, gathering about 10,000 spectators. At the event, the audience can exchange bracelets, receive lightsticks, watch artists perform music, DJ, interact, sing duets with artists and participate in games, receive gifts. This is considered the largest showcase ever in the Vietnamese film market. Coming soon, Ly Hai and his crew will also give away the first 1,000 free screenings to the audience who play extras at the concert in the film. Flip Side 8 , April 18.

The director, producer and cast continued to interact with the audience at a shopping mall in Tan Phu district, Ho Chi Minh City on the same evening.

Ly Hai opened an outdoor showcase, attracting nearly 10,000 spectators. Photo: DPCC.

The first steps of Victor Vu and Ly Hai show that both are focusing on the fierce competition. The duo changed to a new and more creative way of communication to reach their target audience.

"When looking at the current general situation, Flip side 8 is slightly better in terms of communication. Ly Hai's film is aimed at the Southern audience, the general public, while Detective Kien focusing on viewers from the North and south. However, Ly Hai's advantage is that it has a large cast and is stronger in terms of communication than Victor Vu's film. However, both have poured a large amount of money into communication and film promotion in recent times, estimated to be 2-3 times more than other projects," said Mr. Anh Nguyen, an expert in the field of film marketing.

What will happen?

With this participation, Victor Vu will "relieve" movie lovers with a film project in the detective genre. The work is set in the Nguyen Dynasty about 200 years ago, when the detective character Kien (Quoc Huy) was invited to a village to investigate a mysterious disappearance. The detective character Kien and Mrs. Hai Man (Dinh Ngoc Diep) had a previous connection from the movie The Last Wife . The two continue to accompany each other in a new story that takes place 3 years after the events of The Last Wife , related to the disappearance of Nga (Hai Man's niece) which the villagers rumored was related to a ghost and the creepy story of headless corpses floating on the riverbank.

According to the trailer released by Victor Vu, the film combines horror and spiritual elements with many thrilling details. The crew invested in the setting and costumes.

Victor Vu first encountered Ly Hai in the April 30th holiday film season. Photo: NVCC.

With Flip side 8: Vong tay nang , up to now, Ly Hai has not released an official trailer. However, through teasers, behind-the-scenes images and content released by the crew, the film continues to pursue the theme of family, with the plot revolving around a group of young people living in the Central region who are passionate about music and dream of becoming "idols". However, differences in opinions between three generations of grandparents, parents and children cause conflicts.

The film brings together a large cast of many generations, including Kim Phuong, Huu Chau, Tuyet Thu, Chieu Xuan, Ngan Quynh, Kieu Trinh, Tran Kim Hai, Doan The Vinh, Tin Nguyen... The film's setting is also diverse, in many places such as Ho Chi Minh City, Vinh Hy, Phan Rang - Thap Cham (Ninh Thuan), Long An. The theme of family and generation gap was exploited by Ly Hai in his most recent project - Flip 7: One Wish. The work helps the director earn 482 billion VND , the largest in the brand Flip side.

Predicting box office revenue for this year's holiday season, Mr. Nguyen Khanh Duong, founder of Box Office Vietnam assume Flip Side 8 and Ly Hai still easily took the top spot at the box office this holiday season, despite having to compete with Victor Vu.

"Ly Hai is a filmmaker who understands market psychology and knows what audiences want. Audiences love his works. And he knows exactly what to do to please the mass audience. About Detective Kien , this is a product with good visual impression, creating a feeling of high production value. But except Blue Eyes "Adapting the most famous work of writer Nguyen Nhat Anh, Victor Vu's recent projects have not generated explosive revenue. Therefore, I think it will be very difficult for Victor Vu's films to surpass the products of Ly Hai, an experienced person, most importantly, has great appeal to ordinary and mass audiences," Mr. Duong commented.

Sharing the same view, producer Nguyen Cao Tung said that the result of the Vietnamese film competition this holiday year will depend largely on the quality of the two projects. However, Flip Side 8 will be difficult to overcome the milestone 482 billion VND of part 7. He predicted that Ly Hai's latest film will earn about 350 billion dong , while Detective Kien can earn approx. 150 billion dong ."

"The domestic film market is clearly differentiated and becoming more diverse. Opportunities are equally distributed among directors. Tran Thanh no longer monopolizes the Tet film season. Similarly, Ly Hai does not monopolize and dominate the April 30 film season. If there are two good films during the holiday, it is highly likely that the entire market's revenue will increase. However, this also puts pressure on directors like Tran Thanh, Ly Hai... They have to renew themselves, invest more and more carefully in film scripts and project quality," said Mr. Cao Tung.

Source: https://baoquangninh.vn/nguoi-dam-dau-voi-ly-hai-3353810.html