Cinema dangerous for money

Why the Russian film industry was on the verge of collapse

After the destructive Lokdown for the industry of the past, due to the subsidy from the state at 4.2 billion rubles, divided between producers and cinemas, the cinema industry began to recover, the viewer to return to the cinema to see the blockbusters returning to the poster, and the cash desk (thank you, first of all, Dune, Venoma 2) returned to the numbers of peaceful times. And they just felt the prospect of restoration how the new Lockdown struck, tearing hopes and the plans of the distributors.

From the end of October to November 7, half of the country's cinemas are closed, no one will say whether or not forced “holidays” will be extended. Needless to say, large companies, like Disney and the Central Partnership, moved the releases of their films, as in a sad joke, “on after”.

What is the danger of a new locaun for the industry? Why do distributors and movie networks are alarming?

The situation is commented by the Chairman of the Council of the Association of Cinemas Owners Oleg Berezin:

- For the period of the autumn locaun, more than 50% of cinemas are closed, 3,000 screens have faded, half works with QR codes. In some regions with a complex epidemiological environment, such as Udmurtia, Tuva, cinemas have been closed for a long time.

After Lokdown, most of the regions introduce in addition to the restrictions on filling the mandatory presentation of QR codes, and some regions, such as Peter, also restrictions on time: spectators must leave the hall until 23 hours. So, the last session is no later than 21 hours. In St. Petersburg, in addition to 50% of filling, sessions, at which more than 40 spectators, must be coordinated with the culture committee: each session must be agreed.

I propose to the Government of the Russian Federation to rename the “List of Economics of Economics that have suffered in the context of coronavirus distribution” in the “List of Economics, Most dangerous for entrepreneurship”.

We are trying to solve an equation with thousands of unknown. With such restrictions that are unknown when they end, it is not clear what to plan further. Talks are already circulating that on New Year's Eve, even if the film distribution resumes, it can again be “turned off” again. But this is not a light bulb! Although the feeling that the authorities are our problems to the light bulb.

The problem is not only that such decisions of the authorities are ruining private business. Municipal cinemas are easier, their city contains, the authorities will help them. With private - a pipe. But it is not cinema that we have high statistics from diseases, low vaccination, that when they build “humanities” around the megacities, do not think about social infrastructure - new hospitals and clinics, the consequences of superior settlement of microdistricts - these are all the tasks that are required to solve regions, this is their zone of responsibility!

Previously, they punished those who were to blame, and sometimes thought what to do. Now you just need to punish someone and take measures at someone's account. For example, at the expense of cinemas.

- What is the logic: theaters work, cinemas close?

-We have a suspicion that in cinemas, restaurants, circuses, concert halls, fitness clubs of some other virus. Hardly different from what is distributed in theaters, alcohol stores or in public transport, airports, clogged to the area of ​​Sapsan. We get under the distribution all the time.

Theaters are either municipal property or federal. It is difficult to guess what exactly they think “upstairs”. It can be assumed that theaters were in a privileged position due to the large depth of the preliminary sale of tickets, it happens that they are bought a few months before the performance. Two weeks before the current Lokdown, tickets for December have already been sold at the large theater. The return of tickets will hit the theaters, the owners will have to solve the problems - municipalities and federals. In addition, the share of the audience of the theater is very small, but the noise that the theater public generates is large.

- Why are the movie networks not noisy?

- The movie networks are mainly private, and from us from communist times it is believed that the merchants are ghouls, they think about income, and not about the good of the people, humanity. It is in the air of society. And theaters - they are exclusively temples of art!

Cinemas, restaurants, fitness - a zone of private entrepreneurship. Last year, it sounded more than once at work meetings: we don’t care what will happen to you, it is easier to pay your former employees to unemployment benefits than to rack their heads, how to help your business.

- Why cinemas were in a particularly difficult situation, even in comparison with restaurants and fitness.

- Because two crises came together. One is associated with pandemia. The second, of course, with the rapid development of the online location. He was brewing for a long time. The pandemic spurred him. Negative trends were flattened. With the development of online services, the audience changes consumption habits. Many have the idea that the cinema is completely replacing online, but I am absolutely convinced that these forms can coexist normally. After all, distance learning is not to replace a living teacher, although from the point of view of the state there are large advantages of online education. This is not only savings, but also controlled knowledge. Nevertheless, you can digitize, and no Dmitry Bykov will allow himself to teach literature as he considers necessary and important. Upstairs they want to know and control what and how a teacher in Norilsk tells students. Everything is connected. Here is a common point of anxiety. In my opinion, the state is not very interested in maintaining the sphere of human activity, associated with joint collective reflection, experiencing. Getting together, watching a movie, discussing it in the community of the same spectators. They ask questions - first to themselves, then to others. From the point of view of the logic of power, there is no good thing in this. The state does not see in this a convenient way of managing the brain.

- Recently, not only convinced anti -Waxers appeared, but also fighters with a cinema show.

- This is due to the misunderstanding of the essence of joint viewing. Generated by individualism inherent in society. We live in cyclopic skyscrapers. We do not want to know the neighbors on the stairwell. There is another danger. The industry rushed to make a movie "either on Oscar or for Netflix." A whole detachment of films is awarded prizes at festivals, this strengthens the positions of producers, they receive funds for new projects. And at the same time, look how much content is created for online platforms! This rage is also heated by state departments, a movie fund, other institutions, giant marketing budgets, and production facilities. There is a systematic capture of the audience.

A normal producer thinks: why take risks, shoot for a cinema, build long -term prospects - a movie is created for a long time. And they will take a cinema and close. Easier for online or “Oscars”.

I see a serious problem here. Russian films imprisoned for mass viewing are less and less. Here the Ministry of Culture would turn on, support the cinema, change policy. But I think that they also do not know how. They declare that one of the main results of the film is the number of spectators in cinemas. But the movie networks are not interested in any cinema in the cinema halls. And here is an interesting question. Cinemas need a movie for collective viewing on a large screen, and not necessarily spectacular. For example, “slave” is not a spectacular movie, a comedy, designed for collective viewing and laughter, which only in Russia raised $ 50 million. Watch the comedy correctly in the hall charged with a general mood. When I looked "bitterly!" At home, I did not enter, and people in the cinema in the general atmosphere of laughter enjoyed. The same applies to many genres of “collective emotion” - a horror, and drama, and science fiction. I am not against online examinations, I myself watch the films of personal perception when I do not want to share emotion with someone. But this is a movie of a certain type.

The spectator film can also be a spectacular blockbuster, like Venom 2, which needs to be watched on a large screen, this is an audiovisual attraction - and the results of its rental set a record in difficult conditions, collecting two billion living money. So, this works, which means that the cinema has not died, you only need a film interesting to a large number of spectators, a film for a large screen and collective viewing.

Forecasts, prospects

- Many difficulties exist without Lockdown. For example, it is difficult to return the audience to the cinema after a large break. The mechanism of regular prime ministers is disturbed, it is difficult to restore. Hollywood cinema barely began to return. And again, the pit: everything rolled, God knows where. Disney transfers films to an boundless future. Davletyarov with his "pilot" flew away from the unknown where. Everyone left this so -called "vacation" of the week. Both festival cinema and spectator.

Let's not forget that open cinemas remained. None of the bosses thinks, but how will they have to? Spectators are asked to stay at home. These cinemas say: “We will not close you! What you will show, since all the films have gone to the dates "after the Lockdown", we do not know. Work! " These cinemas are in the worst situation than closed. The logic is this: you were not closed, and we will not help you! Let's not forget the problem with QR code. Among youth, the percentage of vaccinated is even lower than in the country. With the strengthening of police measures, young people will more and more resist. And we will sit in empty halls and wait for the audience.

The viewer will not specially do PCR for going to the cinema. It is easier for him to stay at home in the company of helpful online stagings.

Due to propaganda from all the irons, about the restrictions introduced in restaurants and cinemas, people are finally confused. And when, after the giant locaun, the cinemas opened, the whole army of the audience did not find out about this. Many first came to the cinema for the recent Venom 2. After November 8, we can get open cinemas with empty halls and an incomprehensible repertoire.

It seems that the resolution on subsidies for small and medium -sized enterprises of the most affected industries, including cinemas, has corrected. But they left overboard large cinema networks. At first, we are all convinced not to crush the business, and then they are left without support. Although any federal cinema network and problems are significantly more due to the scale of business. Large networks are at least a quarter of the entire market of Russian cinemas! If the industry does not receive support, we get a collapse that will have strong consequences.

Cinemas are, first of all, not about budget revenues, this is about the mental health of the nation, about the free time of youth, which as a result finds other ways to gain socialization, and we see it constantly in the news.

If the industry does not receive real support, a collapse with unpredictable consequences will occur. We are already losing personnel who are counting on a stable job,

In the end, we will lose the investment attractiveness of the cinema business, production, the habits of the audience, a lot of concomitant problems related to education, and the development of technology. Perhaps, after decades, everything can be revived, people are “social animals”, someday they will want to look together, laugh, be afraid, cry, discuss what they saw. But everything, alas, is no longer in our lifetime.

- So the main problem is in money?

- Money is an important, but the easiest way to solve problems. Now the main thing is not only to help financially, but to understand and determine how, where the sector of film production and film location will develop, our entire factory of meanings.

- What is the danger of the situation in which Lockdown will extend?

A closed cinema is still salaries, rental costs, maintenance of premises. In the first Lokadun, people still lived with hope: we will survive, slowly will recover, but the wound did not heal, and they were boasted again. I think many entrepreneurs will leave the business at all. Degradation of the entire system will begin, the quality of the service will fall. Cinemas will begin to decay. People rightly say: "We do not want to go to such a cinema." As a result, we get an empty screen, the lack of films for which the audience go to the cinema. Let us return to the situation from the beginning, in the middle of the 90s. Then a generation formed that had no habit of going to the cinema. And when cinemas opened, this generation considered itself too adult to go to the cinema. I remember how my mother -in -law, having finally gathered in a movie with a friend, asked me: “Is it necessary to buy popcorn in the movie, or will they be allowed to do without popcorn?”

The sanctions against certain types of business are talking about Alexei Vasya with Ying, General Director of the United Cinema Sinema Park and Formula Cinema:

- What is happening today, threatens all the business or disaster, bankruptcy, or leaving the shadow.

If we want to call the population to vaccinate, it is necessary to enter QR codes for vital spheres: transport, cult institutions, alcoholic stores. You can stimulate people: reduce the cost of services for vaccinated, arrange draws of cars, apartments. But mostly officials prefer simple ways - to tighten, to suspend businesses.

All this will lead to an economic collapse, there will be no other results.

If the country is critical in the country, everything should be closed. But there is a dissonance: with one hand they close the cinema, the other open Turkey and Egypt. So, after 12 days we get a new surge in the pandemic.

The main problem of what is happening is the lack of a well -thought -out clear plan of action both in the real prevention of the spread of the virus and in real urgent care of business. So far, there is a certain project to support medium and small businesses, but in the amount of 1 minimum wage, that is, 12.8 thousand rubles per employee, and in the form of a loan. It sounds like a mockery of business.

Behind the side of the authorities, not only large business, including socially significant, but also individual entrepreneurs. Nobody thinks about them at all.

The same restaurants and shops will be forced to go into the shadow. After the current closure, part of restaurants and stores work in a dark one. Their owners need to feed families, pay salaries, rent. The state did not take care of them. If they were supported by a subsidy, it would be possible to fine them and select this subsidy, and it should be a really significant amount, and not profanity. Now people are trying to survive. And to close them with a stroke of the pen means to admit the lack of social responsibility.

The film industry has the same chaos and foggy prospects. The issue of assistance to large networks and individual entrepreneurs has not been resolved, but the movie networks are system -forming enterprises.

In the regions where QR codes are introduced, subsidies are canceled. However, the introduction of a QR code for visiting a cinema is minus 70 percent of revenue! Then do not deprive these cinemas of subsidies.

Uncertainty in everything is the main problem of the film industry. If products are brought to the restaurant, you can at least trade them. The cinema is releases, and when the premieres rolled somewhere into the future, there is nothing to show. And if the cinemas suddenly opened - there is no time for marketing. People do not learn about the film screen. The most bad situation for business is to open and close cinemas again. Such waves lead to the transfer of releases, breakdowns of marketing campaigns. This means that the copyright holders, producers will burn out, the film will not work, and there will no longer be enough funds to create a new picture.

The film industry flows into lethargy. Not all cinemas after "frost" will come to life, open. But in comparison, we, for example, with France, are 10 thousand of the population there are more screens, our market is not oversaturated at all. Cinemas in small cities will begin to die, and these are lost funds that the state invested in the program “Cinema of Small and Middle Cities”. Less screens are a decrease in boxing offices. And there will be fewer Russian films. And the number of new products of Hollywood, European cinema will be reduced because our market will cease to be a priority. If you do not change the logic of current events, we are waiting for the degradation of the industry as a whole.