Is the era of foreign blockbusters dominating the Vietnamese box office over?
Foreign blockbusters, especially Hollywood movies, always have a great attraction for audiences. A movie can cost up to hundreds of millions of USD. However, in the second half of 2024, the situation has reversed. The newly released Vietnamese movie "Linh Luc: Quy Nhap Trang" (released on November 22) quickly took the top spot at the box office.
According to data from the Box Office Vietnam website, the film earned more than 41 billion VND in its first week of release. Currently, the project is earning about 81 billion VND (as of the afternoon of December 11), ranking second at the Vietnamese box office after another domestic film, “Cong Tu Bac Lieu”.
At the same time, there were 3 big Hollywood movies in theaters: “Code Red”, “Gladiator 2” and “Wicked”. When shown in the international market, these 3 blockbusters achieved huge revenue, even breaking many records. However, when shown at almost the same time as the project “Lynx: Ghost in the Shell”, these 3 movies were surprisingly ignored by Vietnamese audiences.
Part 2 of the epic film “Gladiator” only earned more than 5 billion VND, while the revenue of the musical film “Wicked” also reached more than 8 billion VND, as of the afternoon of December 11. From the second half of 2024, the number of Hollywood films with breakthrough revenue when shown in Vietnam can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Many popular film brands also saw ticket sales decrease compared to the previous part, for example “Joker 2” only brought in more than 12 billion VND.
Although the movie "The Miracle Medicine" was highly appreciated by international film critics, when shown in Vietnam, the movie left theaters with a revenue of 6.3 billion VND.
Domestic films make a breakthrough, but don't be complacent
The cooling of foreign blockbusters in the Vietnamese film market in the second half of 2024 is said to have many reasons. Partly because some films are not suitable for Vietnamese audiences. Typically, the film "Wicked" is a musical genre that is not popular with viewers, so its revenue in Vietnam cannot break through.
Another part is because it is often less favored in screenings than Vietnamese films. For example, the horror film “The Miracle Medicine” although getting attention from international audiences, when shown in Vietnam, was only scheduled to have about 200 screenings per day.
In particular, with the development of online movie platforms, most Vietnamese audiences tend to watch on platforms, the rate of waiting to go to the cinema to watch blockbusters is not as high as before.
From now until the end of the year, some Hollywood movies that will be released are “Mufasa: The Lion King”, “Kraven: The Huntress”, “Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim”, “Sonic the Hedgehog 3”. Vietnamese movies include: “Cong Tu Bac Lieu”, “Chi Dau”, “Kinh Kinh Hoa”. This will continue to create a box office race between Vietnamese and foreign movies.
However, it must be recognized that although Vietnamese films are getting better and better every day, it cannot be said that "domestic films have surpassed foreign films" in quality. Because besides projects with good revenue, many Vietnamese films in the second half of 2024 left theaters with unimaginable revenue, such as the film "Hot Girl Squad" leaving theaters with only 67 million VND.
The fact that Vietnamese films are welcomed by the audience as a happy signal, but not so subjective.
