The total Hong Kong box office for 2006 was better than expected. The year-end gross stabilised at around HK$900m after dropping continuously for the past few years. The market share for non-Hong Kong films even went up, rising from HK$546m to HK$602m.
But the figures also showed that Hong Kong films are still losing market share - the decline of Hong Kong cinema has not stopped. Fifty-one local film took only HK$300m. What’s more, only two Hong Kong films grossed over HK$20m. By contrast, four foreign films grossed over $30m, and 2 foreign films grossed between HK$20m and HK$30. Only six Hong Kong films managed to gross between HK$10m and HK$20m - and this is taking a broad definition of Hong Kong productions which counts co-productions like Fearless and A Battle Of Wits as Hong Kong films.
Quite a number of the 51 local films were ultra-low budget productions which saw very limited distribution. Films like Shaolin VS Evil Dead Ultimate Power, Without Words and Midnight Running both only played at on screen for a week. The two main cinema circuits, Golden Harvest and Newport, continued to find it hard to find decent product to fill their screens. Golden Harvest, which does not keep its circuit running for the whole year, had to distribute a number of sub-standard productions like Bet To Basic to fill the gaps. Newport managed to keep its circuit operational for the whole year with product from Wong Jing productions.
Quality films might help the industry feel better about itself. But even they didn’t do that well at the box office. BMA productions, which distributed Lawrence Lau’s My Name Is Fame and James Yuen’s Heavenly Mission, saw disappointing box office returns of below 5m each. Both films had a fair result in the VCD/DVD market, Results may have been better with stronger promotion. The marketing for both films was very poor - even the posters lacked the necessary focus.
Some thought a market for tougher, adult-themed films would develop after the success of Johnnie To’s Election last year. This might draw older people back into cinemas. But it didn’t happen. Soi Cheang’s stylised Dog Bite Dog was a Category III release in cinemas in summer. But it grossed below HK$2m. It was the only Cat III local film in 2006 other than To’s Election 2.
Still, new production company Sundream Pictures had a good year. With back up from Cable TV, Sundream started production with first-time director Lam Kin-lung’s 49 Days. It had a B Grade cast of Stephen Fung and Gillian Chung, but it still resulted in a surprising box office of over HK$7m. It wasn’t a particularly new take on the horror genre. But it offered an impressive take on love and family values which local audiences enjoyed. The company’s next production Nothing Is Impossible resulted in expectedly low box office. But it managed to develop a kind of sub-genre of bar and pub films which had extremely strong support from local drinking houses. A Battle Of Wits, a major Sundream co-production with Andy Lau and Korean actor Ahn Sung-ki, grossed over HK$15m in November. The promotional methods of Sundream are a bit different from the other film companies. They make use of developed media like Cable TV, and ads on buses and mini-buses. These ensure the message is spread wide over a very short period.
Visual effects based films and big budget movies failed to gross as well as expected. Wilson Yip’s Dragon Tiger Gate worked the best. Based on the most popular local comic book, it still only grossed HK$ 12.1m. That’s a full third less than 1998’s The Storm Riders, another local production from a comic. While audiences enjoyed the action in the movie, they could not take a script that changed the main role, played by Donnie Yen, into one similar to a Korean drama.
The closing of local cinemas also indicated the difficulties of the industry in 2006. Cinema operators could not afford increased rental costs. Cine-Art House, the major art house in Wanchai, closed in November. The Chinachem Cinema, the key cinema in Tsim Sha Tsui, closed half of its screens due to the bad box office. But the critical change was the closing down of an influential film magazine. City Entertainment, a.k.a. Film Biweekly, was the only film magazine in Hong Kong, and its closure is a bellwether for the future of the industry. Everyone’s hoping for better films and box office this year. But Hong Kong’s golden age of cinema now seems like a very long time ago.
Ryan Law