New direction for short films after the success of "Wooden Fish"

The short film "Wooden Fish" by director Nguyen Pham Thanh Dat was released in theaters on July 15, shown for a week until July 21, earning more than 4.4 billion VND.

With a duration of 30 minutes and a ticket price of only 39,000 VND, "Wooden Fish" surprised everyone and achieved sales. At one point, the film even led in the number of tickets sold in a day with more than 50,000 tickets. The work is the graduation project of director Nguyen Pham Thanh Dat at the Hanoi Academy of Theatre and Cinema, and won the 2024 Golden Kite Award for the category "Outstanding Short Film".

Short film “School of Wooden Fish”. (Photo provided by the producer)

The film is about Cuong - a coastal boy who is passionate about music but is prevented by his father. Cuong gives up his passion and follows the seafaring profession to take care of his family. Gradually, the seafaring profession also faces difficulties due to the depletion of fish and shrimp, making Cuong hesitate whether to give up everything to follow his passion or keep the boat to make a living for him and his friends.

The film was filmed in the coastal area of ​​Quynh Luu ( Nghe An ), bringing together the cast: Nguyen Quoc Hung, Nguyen Minh Ha, Lanh Thanh... The work created good word of mouth on social networks, many mixed opinions but more praise than criticism.

An important factor that helped the film gain attention and much discussion was the previous success of the theme song "Miracle" - the debut music product of the band MAYDAYs, composed and performed by the film's main actor Nguyen Quoc Hung.

The music video for "Miracle" was uploaded to YouTube in February and has so far garnered over 41 million views and many positive comments. The initial success of the soundtrack was the motivation for Nguyen Pham Thanh Dat to bring "Wooden Fish" to theaters. The positive signals from the revenue of a pioneering short film shown commercially on the big screen open up a new direction for Vietnamese short films.

For a long time, Vietnamese short films have been produced in large numbers, but they are not easy to be shown in commercial theaters due to many objective factors. The films are mainly shown for free at short film festivals, awards, related exchange programs or short film weeks...

"Wooden Fish" with only 1 week of theatrical release shows that short films can also be shown commercially and reap better revenue than just being produced to compete at film festivals or to introduce the filmmaker's own abilities.

Source: https://baoquangninh.vn/huong-moi-cho-phim-ngan-sau-thanh-cong-cua-dan-ca-go-3369150.html