How to tell a good Chinese story

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2150521 Shi Keke

2150841 Zhang Jiaman

2150851 Zheng Xingjia

2151299 Su Jiaming

Under the Supervision of Hu Ruiyun

December 2022

Tongji University

Contents

1. Introduction 1.1 Background 1.2 The Dilemma of Cross Cultural Communication in Chinese Films 1.2.1 Domestic market demand is still dominated by large films in Europe and America when the international film market is stagnant 1.2.2 Failed to form its own cultural identity 1.2.3 Commercial operation mode needs to be mature 2. Literature Review 3.Methodology 4. Relevant Data Analysis-take Confucius and Hero as examples 4.1 About Confucius 4.2 About Hero 4.2.1 Film production 4.2.2 Marketing Strategy 5.Discussion-Thinking about the success of the above two films 5.1 The secret of Confucius' success 5.1.1 Focusing on Confucian culture 5.1.2 Use simple and sincere dress symbols to express social significance 5.2 The marketing strategy of Hero 5.2.1 Strategic alliance marketing 5.2.2 Brand marketing 5.2.3 Potential marketing 5.2.4 Globalization of market positioning 6.Conclusion 6.1 Enlightenment from the film Confucius 6.2 Enlightenment from the film Hero 6.3 Prospects for better cross-cultural communication of Chinese films in the future 7 References

Abstract: Due to the rising cultural differences between countries, the audience will be unable to understand some living habits, social systems, customs, etc. in some imported foreign films. When Chinese films enter foreign markets, they will also face the problem that cultural differences affect audience's understanding of films.How to tell a good Chinese story in the cultural output represented by film and television works has always been the focus of our worries.This paper analyzes the national and cosmopolitan elements reflected in the Chinese films and explores the acceptance of the Chinese stories told by our films in both domestic and foreign markets,especially in foreign,indicating the weakness of contemporary Chinese films in the process of cross-cultural communication.Based on the analysis of the weakness of Chinese films in cross-cultural communication and the particularity of Chinese stories and aimed at one of the weakness,this paper takes these two films Confucius and Hero as examples and suggests that film and television workers should make further use of existing cultural resources to constantly improve cultural soft power, so as to realize cultural output on the international cultural stage.

Keywords: intercultural communication,Chinese movies,Chinese culture，Confucius,Hero

1. Introduction

1.1 Background

Film is a cultural product, and the film system of modern society is an open dynamic system. The intercultural communication of film includes the interaction of global cultural forces, involving cultural identity and cultural security.By virtue of its unique cultural symbols, the film shows the spiritual world of the nation, which enables viewers from different countries to form unique views on the traditional culture of the nation, and organically combines some content features and form symbols .Through this principle, some western countries with ulterior motives try to achieve their cultural infiltration through the cultural input of films to other countries.And by this and other complex reasons, there are lots of cultural conflicts in the world at present. The characteristics of Chinese culture, which has a long history and is broad and profound, make it always occupy a favorable position in the process of enriching the global cultural pattern.Not only that,China is committed to maintaining world peace and global stability.And with the continuous improvement of China's economic development level and political status, the overseas influence of Chinese culture is also increasingly increasing. Cross-cultural communication has become a general trend, so it is particularly important to enhance cultural soft power.Therefore, it is very necessary to take adequate measures to make the Chinese stories in Chinese films widely known.

1.2 The Dilemma of Cross Cultural Communication in Chinese Films

In fact, Chinese culture has been trying to "go global", but has not been able to achieve satisfactory results. Numerous Chinese filmmakers have encountered many difficulties in trying to spread films across cultures. The following are some of the difficulties Chinese films have encountered in cross-cultural communication.

1.2.1 Domestic market demand is still dominated by large films in Europe and America when the international film market is stagnant

Since the reform and opening up,Chinese film exports have been greatly improved.But from the overall export trade volume,the film and television industry's export share is smaller.Compared with other countries,there is still a big gap between Chinese film and television exports.From the market demand of film consumption in China,people are still keen on large films in Europe and America,especially Hollywood blockbusters.In China,only a small number of commercially successful films have been able to compete with American blockbusters at the box office.Therefore,there is a huge trade deficit in Chinese film trade.

1.2.2 Failed to form its own cultural identity

From the perspective of cultural communication,the success of film culture communication is first reflected in the cultural value of the nation accepted and recognized by the international market.Chinese films started late and experienced social shocks in different political periods. They just stood firmly and faced the challenge of globalization immediately.Therefore,under the dual pressures of unstable industrial foundation and international market competition,it is difficult to release the cultural characteristics of Chinese films perfectly.Hollywood has its own cultural characteristics,and the cultural identity is clear,so that the audience can recognize Hollywood works at a glance.The dilemma of our films is not the choice of culture,but the problem of expression techniques.We can use modern perspective and expression to create the cultural identity of Chinese films and spread Chinese culture in a way that westerners can accept.And this is what we lack in the current film industry.Not only that,a large number of cultural heritages in China have not yet been excavated.All of them can help us get rid of the dilemma,however,we seldom pay much attention on them.

1.2.3 Commercial operation mode needs to be mature

Nowadays,the film industry has entered the development stage of industrialization.From creation to projection,it achieved above mentioned through a series of commercial marketing model.Commercialization is the only way for the reform of Chinese film industry.However,due to historical and political reasons,Chinese film industry entered the market operation in a very late stage,and commercial operation mode is not mature.It mainly reflected in the following aspects:First,it is lack of market evaluation.Before the beginning of film production in the United States,the investment company will undergo detailed risk assessment and market demonstration to ensure the profitability of film production.In China,most of the film production is based on small cost investment,and it often gets scripts to shoot,and often ignores the market research and risk assessment link.On the one hand,it is related to Chinese film industry norms;on the other hand,it also reflects the weak commercial sense of filmmakers.Second,the scale of capital investment is small,and the capital operation mode is immature.Chinese film production is still large,but it can not make much profit.In addition to market evaluation reasons,it is difficult to build an influential commercial blockbuster when funds are scattered.Due to the limited ability to grasp the market,most of the film investor tend to invest in small cost movies.However,they are lack of investment courage and decision on the commercial blockbusters requiring large capital investment.From the operation of funds,due to the imperfections of the market system,our market supervision mechanism is not mature,and the operation mode of funds is not standardized.Therefore,investors can not rashly invest a lot of money in the case of uncontrollable risk.Third,brand awareness is obscure.Brand effect is one of the foothold of Hollywood film industry.It includes the brand effect of the filmmaker,producer,actor and the movie product.Hollywood successfully created a group of film stars,and these film stars have become the guarantee of attendance.

2. Literature Review

The following literature review focuses on discussions thus far available on a single aspect or cultural heritage or marketing means and the current situation of cross cultural communication of Chinese films.

Jinhua Dai, Peter Lang Inc., International Academic Publishers(2019) indicated the move from one generation of filmmakers to the next marks merely the “fleeing from one trap while falling into another”.Now Chinese films are caught in such a "next trap".Jin Zhu(2017),summarized the three major dilemmas of cross cultural communication of Chinese films.They are market, cultural identity and commercial operation.

Meijuan Zhao, Lay Hoon Ang, Florence Haw Ching Toh(2021),carry out the research on how to better integrate Hua Mulan culture into American films.It deeply explores the cultural identity of Hua Mulan, the specific culture.Shixian Huang(2003),made a complete explanation of the marketing strategy of the film Hero case,however, there may be slight negligence in the description of cultural heritage.Xuan Zhou(2013), taking the film Confucius as an example, focuses on the cultural heritage behind the film. Her article focuses on cultural heritage.Yu Liu,Chengxin Liu(2018),similarly,analyzed the story content of the film Confucius and also focused on cultural heritage

3.Methodology

As for Confucius, in order to understand the popularity of overseas audiences, our team investigated the box office data of various countries during the release of Confucius; In order to better understand the popularity of Hero films in 2002, our group listed the mainland box office ranking, overseas box office and the number of people watching films in 2002 through comprehensive comparison of literature and data collection on relevant websites.Because the film Confucius itself has a strong cultural background, our team focused on the cultural heritage behind Confucius when conducting cross-cultural communication analysis

As for Hero,as we all know, the martial arts elements contained in it have always been loved by foreign audiences,so when we collected the materials, we focused on collecting other outstanding places except martial arts elements. In addition, we had the cultural heritage analysis of the film Confucius. When we analyzed the Hero, we mostly discussed his unique marketing plan.

4. Relevant Data Analysis-take Confucius and Hero as examples

Through extensive data collection, our group has obtained more accurate and representative information. The following is a series of data analysis conducted by our group based on the information collected.

4.1 About Confucius

The 2010 epic blockbuster Confucius became a landmark event in China's contemporary film history and cultural history. Since the film Confucius was shot, it has been concerned by fans at home and abroad. It has also been widely concerned by domestic and foreign media because of the particularity and cultural significance of the film theme. In 2008, at the invitation of the AFM Organizing Committee, the film Confucius officially appeared in AFM and became the hot spot of the exhibition. The American Film Market Fair is the largest film market in the world and one of the three major international film market exhibitions. Although Chinese blockbusters have always had the tradition of testing the waters in AFM, in recent years, with the increasing homogenization of ancient costume production and the declining popularity of Hollywood for Oriental action films, ancient costume blockbusters in AFM have long been difficult to regain their former glory. Therefore, the appearance of Confucius attracted the attention of the audience, which was unexpected in the industry. The few publicity materials of Confucius were robbed. Since its release, the film Confucius has gained good economic and social benefits in the film market.

(Figure 1:International box office)

(Figure 2:Domestic box office and daily box office ratio)

As for the reasons for its attention in the international market, first, insiders said that the appearance of Confucius appropriately alleviated the aesthetic fatigue of western audiences. As a representative figure of five thousand years of Chinese culture, Confucius has a wide reputation in the world, and the just concluded Beijing Olympic Games has made the best promotion of Confucian culture to the world with the opening ceremony. Secondly, the film is very particular about the handling of art and props. The overseas media commented on the spot: "Confucius is a breakthrough in Chinese films in recent years in terms of modeling and design to show a broad epic sense. It is no longer marked by gorgeous and dazzling colors. Only simple and sincere Chinese natural color culture can really make people moved and shocked. It is not difficult to see that Confucius The success of this film depends on the exploration and extraction of the income of Chinese culture. From the five thousand years of Chinese cultural heritage, the film Confucius abstracts the essence of Confucian culture, and at the same time, it restores and uses simple and sincere dress symbols to enhance the visual effect.

4.2 About Hero

Before the release of Hero, the film had already recorded 3 million box office receipts. At 0:00 on December 20, 2002, the long-awaited Hero finally started in 42 cinemas across 14 cinemas nationwide. The film reached a box office record of 756000 yuan from zero to 2 o'clock. The revenue of Guangdong cinema line alone is 180,000 yuan; Three days before its release, the box office of the whole country has reached about 50 million yuan, while that of Beijing has exceeded 7 million yuan, leaving behind Titanic, which had the highest box office record before: by the end of 2002, the box office of Hero had reached 130 million yuan in just 11 days after its release. In addition, Miramax, a famous distribution company in the United States, bought out the distribution rights of Hero in Europe and the United States at a price of 20 million dollars: Guangdong Weijia Audio and Video Products Co., Ltd. and Guangdong Yongshi Audio and Video Co., Ltd. purchased Yingxiong DVD and VCD domestic audio and video copyright at a "sky high price" of 17.8 million yuan.

(Figure3:2002 Mainland Film Box Office Ranking)

(Figure 4:Incomplete box office statistics around the world)

(Figure5:Incomplete statistics of the number of moviegoers everywhere)

4.2.1 Film production

A) Audio-visual language

First of all, in terms of the use of color, Hero adopts a combination of subjective color and objective color. The whole film recounts the process of Unknown's assassination of Qin Shihuang three times, each time using a dominant color, namely red, blue and white. The story in the red and blue paragraphs does not happen in the reality of the film itself, while the white paragraphs do. The whole film tells different characters and stories in five colors: black, red, blue, green and white. The colors are not only layered, but also full of subtle differences. The black color symbolizes the majesty and supreme power of the King of Qin. The empty hall exaggerates this sense of oppression to the extreme. Red symbolizes ambiguous and complicated lust, also represents bloody killings, and the loyalty of Zhao people. When Unknown assassinated the King of Qin, the clothes of Unknown and the soldiers with spears and shields were black, and only the feathers on the soldiers' heads were red. The color contrast between red and black is strong, representing the game between the two forces. The main color of the story that King Qin guessed is blue, which is very consistent with his deliberate and suspicious character setting. Green, as the memory and yearning of Canjian Flying Snow, interspersed with it, represents pure love and tenacious vitality. Before the nameless assassination, the remnant sword Feixue once entered the palace, but after the enlightenment, the remnant sword spared the King of Qin, and green represents life. As the main color, white appears in the last story. The colorful front has become pure white, which is closer to the pure truth. It also represents the passing of the old era and the ambition of King Qin to rule the world.

(Figure 6:colour expression in Hero)

At the same time, a very important part of the shot language of Hero is the extensive use of slow shots. For example, the match between the nameless chess house and the long sky chess house resulted in the double expansion of aesthetic time and plot time through slow motion. In particular, the delicate treatment of water drops reflects the spiritual charm of "the world in a drop of water", which has oriental philosophical thinking and cultural atmosphere, and makes the Chinese traditional artistic conception and martial arts spirit perfectly combined.

B) Clothing and character modeling design

The costume designer of the film Hero is Huimei Hota, who won the Best Costume Design Award at the 58th Academy Awards. She has designed clothes for many Chinese films, especially those with martial arts themes, and conveyed oriental aesthetics to the audience through her own design, adding "charm" to the film. The costume of Hero, especially the costume of the heroine, adopts strong colors, such as strong red and blue. It is impressive that such eye-catching clothes can still appear light when the character moves, and red with martial arts elements dance in the wind. It adds charm to the film and shows the beauty of Chinese culture.

(Figure 7:Costume designed by Wada Huimei)

C) Martial arts design

Hero is the first martial arts work directed by Zhang Yimou. Although he had no practical experience in shooting martial arts films before, he invited Hong Kong's gold medal action director Cheng Xiaodong to direct. However, Cheng Xiaodong is a well-known action director in Hong Kong, and has directed a large number of martial arts films, such as the Happy Jianghu series, the 83 version of Legend of the Carved Hero, New Dragon Gate Inn and other action martial arts films.

In the movie Hero, Changkong, Canjian, Feixue and Wuming are all first-class swordsmen. Many martial arts scenes show the chivalrous demeanor. The beautiful landscape of Guilin, the populus euphratica forest in Ejina Banner, Alxa, Inner Mongolia, the lake surface of Jiuzhaigou, and the desolate and boundless desert can be seen from the shooting of many fighting scenes in the film. In front of the book hall, there are arrow blocking, chess hall war, lake war, poplar forest war, Qin army camp war, and the film martial arts design is elegant and flowing, which not only has the visual impact of martial arts scenes, but also integrates martial arts and Chinese aesthetic art. Many martial arts scenes in the film are perfectly integrated with Chinese traditional culture:

(1) Martial arts and Qin rhyme. In the chess hall, first Changkong played chess with people, then Changkong fought with the seven masters of the Qin Palace, and the unknown fought against Changkong. They fought with each other with their ideas, which can be regarded as the forefront of fashion. Although the martial arts of Qin rhyme are different, the principles are the same. They all stress the realm of great music has the faintest notes. In the film, the old man's guqin performance starts at the same time as the martial arts. When the strings break, the fight stops abruptly, killing Changkong without name.

(Figure8:stage photo of Hero)

(2) Martial Arts and Calligraphy. The film discusses calligraphy and swordsmanship through dialogues. Calligraphy and swordsmanship are interlinked, and the mystery depends on understanding. It is proposed that calligraphy and swordsmanship have the same principle, and both stress the strength of the wrist. From the word "sword", we can see a person's level of martial arts and the trend of sword techniques. Unknown attempts to find a way to defeat remnant sword from the word "sword" of remnant sword.

Film soundtracks

The music of Hero is rough, vicissitudes and romantic, emphasizing the feelings of the northern land; The music is deep and far-reaching, which shows the desire for world peace and national unity. The Perlman violin and the Chinese ancient zither are a combination of Chinese and Western, which is very innovative. Let the ears replace the eyes, and feel a quieter sound than the sound in the shadow of the sword.

As an "audio-visual feast", the music of Hero is "tender and bleak". Tan Dun chose Perlman's very affectionate violin as the main character, and the Japanese "Drum Boy" slightly sinister Ghost Taigu as the bedding. What it presents is not the arrogant Heroic demeanor we expected, but more is a deep feeling between masculinity and flexibility. This is not only the passion and emotion between men and women, but also the love for the earth A kind of macro affection for the country, peace and the world; The harmony of bass, the gentleness in masculinity, and the broadness in wildness are the pursuit of eternal peace seen in the film. At the same time, Chinese ancient Yao and guqin are also used; In addition, during the Warring States Period, the most popular musical instrument was the drum.

4.2.2 Marketing Strategy

A) Luxury shooting lineup.

The star is an important weight to attract the audience's attention. Hero is not only directed by Zhang Yimou, an influential director in China, but also brought together stars such as Liang Chaowei, Jet Li, Maggie Cheung, Zhang Ziyi and so on. Therefore, the audience will not only have a deep impression on the film first, but also will go to the cinema without hesitation for the directors and actors.

B) The flattering traditional Chinese martial arts theme.

The choice of theme is also crucial. The martial arts theme selected by Hero is not only popular with Chinese audiences, but also the favorite Chinese film theme of foreigners. So it is not surprising that it has a high box office in North America and Asia.

C) Actively participate in international film festivals.

Once Hero passed the review, it announced that it would compete for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, and took a series of related publicity measures: for example, large-scale invitation to foreign media to watch and interview at the premiere; At the request of Oscar, a small-scale screening was conducted before the premiere, all of which showed the determination and confidence in applying for the Olympic Games. So the third point we can learn is to use the world famous film festivals to promote momentum

D) Media hype.

From the preparation of Hero all the way to its publicity stage, various reports are always coming out, including good news and bad news, such as the actor's car crash, copy theft, click screening and bag searching, which are all full of the audience's eyes. Whether the report is good or bad, it has objectively greatly improved the popularity of Hero, satisfied the audience's curiosity, and stimulated more audience to see the "true face of Lushan Mountain" in the cinema. So what we can learn from this point is that we can skillfully use the media to achieve the effect of publicity.

E) Superior means of anti-theft version.

Hero must be screened before its premiere in Shenzhen because it wants to run for the Oscar. Therefore, the situation of the anti-theft version is very serious. Beijing "New Picture" Cinema Co., Ltd., the marketing party of the film, adopted the world's advanced anti-theft measures at that time, such as: canceling the film viewing parties that have become routine everywhere, signing copy loss compensation contracts with cinemas around the world, and the audience entering the cinema to store their bags; Even the ceiling and wall of the cinema have been specially treated. At the critical moment of developing and printing copies, a unique trick was devised: only one copy was washed, and three copies were put in the hands of three different individuals, who did not know each other... Hero did not pirate until the opening day of the 20th. The determination and measures of the anti-theft version of Hero were not only the key measures for its high box office, but also played a role in encouraging morale and stabilizing the morale of the Chinese film industry at that time.

5.Discussion-Thinking about the success of the above two films

5.1 The secret of Confucius' success

5.1.1 Focusing on Confucian culture

As early as 1982, Ronald Reagan, then President of the United States, praised Confucius for his noble friendship and ethical ideas that had influenced all mankind. The overseas influence of Confucius and his thoughts can be seen. The film Confucius shows in more detail the humanistic consciousness, suffering consciousness, harmonious consciousness, moral consciousness and educational consciousness in the Confucian culture, which has profound humanistic connotation. The film Confucius has created a Confucius image with noble feelings and moral integrity, which is "the journey of the road, the world is public". The concept of "harmony without uniformity" advocated by Confucius is consistent with the diplomatic concept of "seeking common ground while reserving differences" among countries in the context of economic globalization. Hu Mei, the director, embedded the essence of Confucian culture into the theme of the film, pinned "benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom and trust" on the words and deeds of Confucius and his disciples and their speeches, and condensed it into the two image concepts of "peace" and "the world". She called on countries to treat each other with courtesy and form a "brotherly state". The monarch should govern the world with courtesy and law, and promote "benevolence", which has a strong international color element.

It is worth mentioning that the film Confucius has created a brand new image of Confucius for us through the visual angle, and has used camera language to interpret the Confucian culture in the eyes of modern people. From the creation of the play, we can see the good intentions of the play team. They carefully selected the classic deeds related to Confucius, publicized the Confucian culture with the help of Confucius' allusions, and conveyed the broad and profound Confucius thought to the audience with Confucius' aphorisms. The film portrays the image of Confucius from the perspective of educators and cultural inheritors. He is a pioneer in spreading ideas and culture, He made unremitting efforts to promote the political concept of "benevolence and propriety", so the director subdivided the Confucian culture into "propriety, righteousness, benevolence, faith and wisdom" It is described in five parts, connecting these with the film screen, integrating modern thoughts to interpret the Confucian culture, trying to restore a real image of Confucius to the audience through the film, and at the same time, let the audience gain inspiration in the film, and begin to re understand and understand Confucius' Confucianism.

(Figure9:Leishi Lighting and Confucius jointly released posters)

5.1.2 Use simple and sincere dress symbols to express social significance

Confucius

officially appeared in Cannes, France, on May 13, 2009, attracting the attention of many overseas film makers and becoming the most popular Chinese film in Cannes Film Festival. (Figure10:The image of Confucius in the play) The stills and a 2-minute trailer that were first exposed on the day showed a strong Chinese style. No longer marked by gorgeous and dazzling colors, all costumes are simple and sincere. Gradually formed an ideology, which has a profound impact on later generations. At the beginning of the filmConfucius, flashbacks were used to kick off the film from

Confuciusin his white clothes in an ethereal mountain. The brief introduction ofConfucius' costumes is clear, and the characters, artistic conception and scenes are integrated, which profoundly demonstrates Confucius' ideal of benevolence and harmony in rites and music in the turbulent times.

In general, in the film Confucius, clothing, as a cultural symbol, not only has a strong visual effect in the whole film, but also can project the potential female consciousness and traditional etiquette education function, which has multiple and profound social significance. These social meanings can be expressed from the costumes of the characters. Through various costume symbols, these social meanings are condensed and sublimated, which endows the film with more powerful vitality and richer connotation.

In fact, as early as the early 1980s, the fifth generation of filmmakers began to introduce the traditional culture of the Chinese nation to the western world through films, which was widely praised. In recent years, Kung Fu Panda series films with rich Chinese cultural elements have become popular all over the world. It is an action comedy animation film with Chinese kungfu as the main performance object. The film takes ancient China as its background, and its scene design, character modeling and "chivalrous" concept are all influenced by the Chinese national culture. The same is true of the film Confucius. Director Hu Mei hopes to spread the traditional Chinese culture overseas through the film. Then, national elements can be seen from the film theme, character image, and details processing. The etiquette and law system that Confucius has always advocated and practiced in the film is an important part of the Chinese national culture. In addition, big scenes with Chinese national historical characteristics, such as sacrificial activities, will certainly arouse the curiosity of the audience and enhance the enthusiasm of the audience.

5.2 The marketing strategy of Hero

(Figure11:Marketing Strategy of Movie Hero)

5.2.1 Strategic alliance marketing

Domestic films generally operate in the mode of "separation of production and distribution". The production team is responsible for publicity planning, while another unit is responsible for distribution. The publicity, planning and marketing of Hero is completely operated by its producer, New Picture Film Company, in conjunction with China Film Group, which ensures the planning, continuity and effectiveness of the film's marketing operation from the perspective of distribution. According to the division of business, China Film is mainly responsible for the sales, negotiation, contract signing, copy and printing, film supervision, and new picture collection of films in China. China Film is responsible for the publicity planning and all other activities in China. China Film guarantees to complete the tasks with quality and quantity guaranteed in the distribution of films. China Film will pay a certain agency fee for new pictures according to the contract.

China Film Group owns Baiji's cinema line, has established a long-term and stable distribution relationship with various domestic cinema lines, and has an important distribution network to enter the domestic mainstream film market. The use of China Film Group's rich resources and mature market operation system can not only save distribution costs, but also pave the way for the film to successfully enter the domestic market. In fact, it is precisely because of the correctness of this strategic alliance that, under its powerful communication offensive, all cinemas in the country can make profits despite almost nothing in marketing.

5.2.2 Brand marketing

The age of entertainment economy is the age of celebrities. Celebrity is the pass of entertainment economy. In Hollywood, the brand effect of stars is the biggest selling point of a film. In a sense, it is also an important support for box office receipts.

From the current level of Chinese films, the production of Hero has basically reached the acme. The directors, actors, photographers, music, martial arts directors and even costume design are all well-known "big names" at home and abroad: the film's leading actors, Jet Li, Liang Chaowei, Zhang Manyu, Chen Daoming and Zhang Ziyi, in addition to their acting skills to help Zhang Yimou tell a good story, are obviously used to ensure the domestic box office, And strive to catch all levels of the audience. Zhang Yimou himself knows this, too. "Without these stars, the audience of this film will be reduced by two-thirds." Besides the actors, the behind the scenes lineup is also first-rate. The composer is Tan Dun, who is famous both at home and abroad, and the violin master Perlman is invited to play. The composer of the theme song Hero is Zhang Yadong, a very excellent musician from the mainland, and the lyrics are from Lin Xi, a Hong Kong lyricist. The producer of the song is Huang Yaoming, and the singer is Faye Wong, the "Queen of Heaven". The English version of the song is probably performed by Celine Dion. Photography is Du Kefeng, who is familiar to the audience because of his successful cooperation with Wong Kar wai. The martial arts director is Cheng Xiaodong, and the costume design is Heda Huimei, who won the Oscar for Kurosawa's "Luan". Many brilliant stars make it hard to resist the "temptation" of Hero, and the high box office is reasonable.

5.2.3 Potential marketing

According to the new picture, the publicity expense of Hero has invested about 15 million yuan, with a view to maintaining the unity of the film's visual image and appeal core in the promotion, advertising, event marketing and public relations activities through professional design, creativity and effective communication. The core communication strategy formulated by Hero is: with the support of a certain promotion budget, through a month of advertising communication and public relations, the popularity of the film reaches 70% among the core audience, and finally achieves the best results in box office revenue, audience number and advertising revenue in China; Make full use of the three-dimensional coverage of print advertising, film and television advertising, online advertising, outdoor advertising, and the cross cooperation with news, public relations events and other communication tools to create momentum; With news and public relations as the guide and media advertising as the auxiliary, we will expand the audience's contact rate in an all-round and multi frequency way. Hero spent millions of yuan on TV commercials; The premiere of Hero was held in the Great Hall of the People; An audio and video company in Guangdong said that it successfully won the mainland audio and video copyright of Hero with 17.8 million yuan... All these will help improve the image of Hero and create promotional selling points.

5.2.4 Globalization of market positioning

Hero was positioned at the beginning of globalization. As a domestic film positioned in lobalization, if it can win the Oscar, it will undoubtedly be a shortcut to open the mainstream American cinema. Hero has selected Miramax as its overseas distributor for this reason, and many films promoted by Miramax have won Oscar awards. Although Hero did not win the Oscar in 2003, many foreign edia believe that it is the "king without crown" deserving of the Oscar. Its release in North America was delayed for two years, with a total global box office of 177 million US dollars (about 1.4 billion uan). When it was released, it once won the North American box office champion for three consecutive weeks, which has not been broken.

6.Conclusion

On the international stage, each country tries to maintain and grasp its own national culture's international discourse power. However, in the process of external communication of Chinese traditional culture, it is still in a relatively passive position. This is reflected not only in the "going global" of China's film industry, but also in other aspects. The lack of discourse power caused by this weak position is also a huge challenge faced by China's film cross-cultural communication.

6.1 Enlightenment from the film Confucius

Confucius first attracted a large number of overseas audiences before its release because of its special theme and oriental culture. After the release, Confucius also relied on its refinement of Chinese culture, exploration of cultural heritage, and the use of simple and sincere clothing symbols to enhance the visual effect, so as to retain the most classic Chinese culture to the maximum extent. These successful experiences should be learned by Chinese films in the future.

6.2 Enlightenment from the film Hero

Hero shows us the excellent traditional culture of China with great momentum, and it also opens the era of 100 million yuan for Chinese films, making the Chinese film industry take off again at the critical moment of life and death. At the time when Chinese movies fell into a low ebb, filmmakers began to look for a breakthrough in the martial arts theme. China's martial arts culture has a long history. It is a wise choice to look for the narrative resources we are familiar with and write articles from the types of kungfu. In addition to the exploration of cultural resources, Hero's innovative measures in external marketing are also worth learning from later Chinese films, including its alliance marketing model and initial market positioning.

6.3 Prospects for better cross-cultural communication of Chinese films in the future

In the past,Chinese filmmakers had to cater to the exoticized tastes of European intellectuals abroad in order to be visible (while remaining invisible to the Chinese).Now,taking the above two films as an example, our current film industry workers should also pay more attention to our own cultural resources and really draw inspiration from our excellent traditional culture, rather than one-sided hype and blind marketing. Only in this way can we truly improve our cultural soft power, take the story, plot, task and other elements as the basic narrative focus, take the feelings of the characters as the starting point, connect the local culture with the national culture, analyze and reconstruct the culture, show the artistic charm of the characters, and realize the progress of our films to the world stage. Let Chinese films and Chinese culture better go global.

7 References

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