October no longer so golden

Wu Yifan stars in Guo Jingming's fantasy epic L.O.R.D Legend of Ravaging Dynasties.[Photo provided to China Daily]

Director Dante Lam, a crime-thriller master in Hong Kong, smartly interweaves police protagonists' humanity struggles into fast car chases, gun fights and bomb explosions.

Most reviews clearly felt Operation Mekong can rival big Hollywood films in storytelling and action scenarios.

But there was no such applause for the other three: All failed to reach the threshold score of 6 points.

I Belonged to You was criticized most for its unrealistic, exaggerated depiction of true love, receiving only 5.6 points.

Meanwhile, L.O.R.D highlights its all-CGI (computer generated imagery)-made characters and sets in nationwide promotions as a first in Chinese film history. All the stars wore digital equipment to transform their facial expressions and activities on screen.

However, many moviegoers complained that the scenes look like an outdated web game, and the characters are not like real humans with their too-perfect physiques. Even driven by a huge fan base, the hit novel-adapted L.O.R.D just scored 4.1 points.

The score for Mission Milano is the lowest of the four top-grossing holiday films. With a cumulative 3.6 rating to date, Hong Kong veteran Wong Jing's latest directorial work again shows his weakness in storytelling, plus the film has stereotyped twists and puns, concur a number of online reviews.

An interesting fact: Operation Mekong was in third place early in the week, but climbed to the top on the fourth day, thanks to a surge of praise in cyberspace.

"Chinese audiences are becoming more picky about movie quality," says Jin Zhichao, research director with Entgroup, an entertainment-research company.

"They are not blinded by stars," he explains, noting that online reaction is overtaking the marketing influence to shape box-office results.

The diversity of movie-watching platforms－including television and streaming sites, as well as shortened theater releases are also affecting box-office performance, according to Jin.

"Most viewers clearly know what kind of movies they must watch in a theater for the big-screen effect, but the comparatively low-budget dramas they would opt to watch on TV," Jin says.

"In the past, it took three months to see a new movie become available on TV. But now the interval is cut to a few weeks."

Television boxes and streaming sites mostly charge 5 yuan for one new film, much less than a theater ticket, he adds.

Although the holiday slide may be disappointing for the box office, it's not a surprise.

After growing at about 30 percent for several years and seeing a rise of 48 percent in the first half of this year, a turning point has come.