The 8th Beijing International Film Festival (BJIFF) Film Market will kick off on April 18, 2018, with one of its major sections Project Pitches that will be coming to its 7th year. Over the past six years, the BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches platform received a cumulative number of 2,954 entries, from which 60 outstanding entries stood out, including Mountain Cry, The Bodyguard, and The Seventy-Seven Days that gained good results in both box office and reputation.
In the year 2017 witnessing the rapid development of the Chinese film industry, the skyrocketing box-office sales of Chinese films made film makers itch to have a go and investors boost their confidence in Film Market. As one of the key high-profile events and activities at Film Market, the BJIFF Project Pitches attracts a multitude of companies and agencies from the film and television industry and related service sectors to attend every year. At the event, films and the elements of film industry chain can be fully connected to incubate a number of high quality film works with success in both reputation and box office.
Premium Platform to Incubate Quality Film Works In 2017, adapted from the novel Chang Tang, Super Wasteland which describes the real experience of the author Yang Liusong, an explorer, the film The Seventy-Seven Days with outdoor adventure theme attracted much attention. As a film without superstars with high commercial value, intellectual property (IP), or all-star cast, The Seventy-Seven Days as a niche movie that was screened in blockbuster-studded November garnered a miraculous box office at over 100 million yuan. Whether in plot, visual presentation or spiritual connotation, the film was taken to extreme, demonstrating the sustainable vitality of the Chinese film industry.
In as early as 2014, the director Zhao Hantang with the teaser trailer of The Seventy-Seven Days attended the roadshow of the 4th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches, and claimed the “Special Award” for Project Pitches, laying a foundation for the success of this work.
The Seventy-Seven Days, the “Special Award” winner of the 4th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches
Notably, the film Till The End of The World present at the 5th BJIFF Film Market pitches platform will also be screened in the New Year movie season of 2018. With the disaster romantic subject, Wu Youyin’s directorial film Till The End of The World produced by Stanley Kwan and starring Mark Chao and Yang Zhishan involves an investment of over 100 million yuan and adopts the filmmaking approach of incorporating shot on location in the Antarctic with CG after effects, with an attempt to present a commercial audiovisual quality film to the Chinese film market.
Till The End of The World, a Film Work Present at the 5th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches
In recent years, the production of Chinese films is rapidly on the rise with fresh film and television content emerging in an endless stream. The BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches will also continue to make more contributions to the Chinese film industry by incubating more quality genre films.
Talent Output to Create Dark Horse Internet Dramas
In addition to the incubation of film works, the incubation and output of talents from the BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches is also increasingly prominent. Yu Qing and Tian Li, two directors known to the public from the 6th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches are two of the typical representatives.
In 2016, director Yu Qing took his film work The Last Match to Lose to attend the 6th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches, which was awarded as “Outstanding Pitch Project” of the year. Yu Qing commented on the distinction: “This is an important resume, and it will be very helpful to my subsequent projects.” And attending the relevant training during Project Pitches also brought a lot of rewards to Yu, “This allows me to better consider the balance between commerce and art, which will be of great help to my filmmaking.”
Since then, Yu Qing has directed a number of film works again, among which Mystery of Antioues, a self-titled Internet drama adapted from Ma Boyong’s novel, is of the greatest concern. The 150-million-yuan work has now wrapped production, and it is believed that the film will surely bring more attention to Director Yu Qing after its release.
According to Yu Qing, waiting is the least efficient way for a young director. And what the BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches platform can offer is opportunities for rookie directors to rapidly throw themselves into the film industry and turn their blueprints into practice.
Director Yu Qing
Tian Li, another director competing for the 6th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches and making a hit, also made remarkable achievements in recent two years.
After awarded the “Special Award” at the 6th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches event for his film work Perfect Stranger, Tian Li started to shift his focus to the internet drama market. His directorial big-budget internet drama Tientsin Mystic became a hit show in 2017, with the quality of production comparable to American dramas. On top of that, this drama has been rated 8.3 out of 10 on Douban, a Chinese social networking service website, and its current online views on Qiqiyi, a Chinese online video platform, have reached remarkable 930 million.
According to Tian Li, the Project Pitches platform helped him a lot. Above all else, it helped him set a clear objective at that time and improve his communication and promotional capabilities.
Although Tian Li has achieved great progress in the internet drama domain, there remains a film dream deeply in his mind. He said that though his company currently positions itself mainly in internet drama production, making films is still his ultimate goal.
Director Tian Li
In recent years, the line between network and cinema has been increasingly getting blurred because many internet dramas are striving to seek “film-like quality”, while there are more and more internet contents existing in cinemas. And the talent cultivation and incubation offered by the Film Market Project Pitches is not limited to serving the film industry, but even provides talents for the whole industry.
Projects on a Roll in 2017
How to connect capital with industry resources is the first subject new filmmakers with dream are faced with. As the BJIFF Film Market is getting more and more matured, young filmmakers gain resources and capitals here, while obtaining valuable experience and lessons from numerous senior industry players, as is evident by Director Xu Xiangyun, who attended the 7th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches platform.
At the 7th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches event, Xu Xiangyun was awarded the “Best Original Screenplay” for No Killing. Before that, he focused all his attention only on artistic creation and was not familiar with the process of pitches, and No Killing hung in balance due to lack of an investor. By chance, Tian heard from one of his friends that the BJIFF Film Market platform had successfully incubated a great number of film projects, so he took a chance to sign up for the event and was unexpectedly awarded the “Best Original Screenplay”.
Before the roadshow, Xu said frankly that the training at the Project Pitches platform helped him a lot. Ms. Ivy Ho, Managing Director of Irresistible Films and Ms. Qin Haiyan, a senior screenwriter, both of whom are invited trainers of the festival, asked Xu two questions respectively: “There are lots of crime stories today, what’s the most special about No Killing? How should the ‘stream of life’ described in the screenplay be more clearly presented in the film?” The two questions made Xu Xiangyun re-examine his own work and get inspired a lot from subsequent creation and modification.
The roadshow at the Project Pitches platform allowed No Killing to be popular with many investors and finally invested by Tencent Penguin Pictures. As a writer-director, Xu Xiangyun said although the investor offered funds, it did not pose too many stresses and strains on him due to market, box office and other factors. His greatest wish now is to present the story in his mind without compromise in such a favorable environment.
Director Xu Xiangyun on the Scene of the 7th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches
Another film Suburban Birds which also signed up for the BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches event in 2017 is now also progressing well. At that time, the film was nominated among the “Outstanding Pitches Projects”, and currently has completed filming and entered the late stage process.
According to Jingshu, the producer of Suburban Birds, the reason that they chose to attend the 7th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches was because the visibility and appeal of the platform can help his film find a quality partner. And the engagement indeed helped Suburban Birds reaped fruitful results – it not only helped them find Li Chun, the leading actor of the film, at the festival, but also entered into a cooperation agreement with Mr. Li Liangwen through the Project Pitches platform for project investment.
Jingshu also mentioned that Director Yang Shupeng, a judge during the second-round selection process, put forward some important suggestions on budget, execution, shooting and other aspects of Suburban Birds, which helped him get a deep understanding of films. Moreover, Jingshu specially emphasized that Qiu Sheng is a new director, so he, as a producer, needed more patience to project the director’s creating thinking.
Facts proved that all the suggestions from Director Yang Shupeng were very effective. Jingshu and his production team actively adjusted their budgets later, avoiding many possible problems for the film and successfully completing shooting. In addition, the post production of the film is also in steady progress. This year, they plan to attend the Cannes Film Festival, striving to write another new chapter to the journey of domestic films to the international.
Suburban Birds, a Film Work Present at the 7th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches
These young filmmakers who have ever made a hit at the BJIFF Film Market, put forward common advice to the filmmakers who are set to attend the 2018 BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches: value your works, stick to expressing yourself, and do not take advice as a norm; also, be a good listener to others, and particularly take the voice of experience from predecessors participating in the Project Pitches platform seriously.
The registration for the 8th BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches has now been fully opened. As a pitch platform where countless quality projects have been successfully incubated, we will show positive directions for young filmmakers through more perfect training, make them compete on a level playing field in a more rigorous, fair appraisal way, and assist them with richer resources.
The BJIFF Film Market Project Pitches platform expects and encourages young filmmakers with dreams to show their capabilities, turn their stories into images, put their ideas into practice, and convert their blueprints into reality.
URL of Project Pitches Application:http://bfm.bjiff.com/2018/pitches-rule.html
If you have any question or need more help, please contact:
Tel: +86-10-6408 1105 18311109903 (Ms. Zhao)
Email: projectpitches@bjiff.com