Earning 100 billion VND, "Air Deathmatch" won big because of low budget?

The film was mainly shot in one location (in an airplane) so it did not cost as much as other films that required filming for many days in many different locations. (Photo: Producer)

“Fight to the Death in the Sky” is considered the next “blockbuster” after the movie “Red Rain.” After about 6 days of release, on the afternoon of September 24, the movie officially earned 100 billion VND according to Box Office Vietnam statistics (with errors). The movie’s revenue is expected to continue to increase.

The work, co-produced by People's Police Cinema and Galaxy Group, fictionally recreates a real plane hijacking in Vietnam in 1978, taking some inspiration from other incidents that occurred during the period from 1975-1980.

To recreate the incident, the film crew built a special model of the plane with its own lift and thrust system, recreating the hovering scenes. According to director Ham Tran, the entire model system cost about 2 billion VND.

Inside the passenger cabin of the model plane with seats borrowed from a real plane. (Photo: DPCC)

Specifically, the model in the film was built at a ratio of nearly 1:1 with the Douglas DC-4 civil aircraft in the actual hijacking. Many details such as the control panel, seats, image color tones... were also recreated to resemble and create a realistic feeling for the viewer. The seats on the plane were borrowed from another plane, located in Hanoi .

Due to the narrow space of the aircraft, the model is divided into 4 parts including the cockpit, navigation compartment, passenger compartment and storage compartment, all of which can be disassembled independently and moved for convenience when filming.

The initial lift system was tested at 30 degrees but was not impressive enough, then the director gradually increased it to 45 degrees and stopped at 60 degrees as in the movie.

One of the heart-stopping plane stunts (CGI image from trailer).

Besides the outdoor scenes shot at Tan Son Nhat airport and CGI (computer-generated imagery), the crew mainly shot in the above-mentioned model. This is also part of the reason why the film's budget was kept quite low compared to the general level.

"The budget of 'Air Deathmatch' is only about 1/3 compared to other films" - director Ham Tran shared.

Although not specifically disclosed, according to some observers' estimates, with the average budget of Vietnamese films currently around 20-25 billion VND, the budget of "Air Deathmatch" fluctuates between 6.6 and 8.5 billion VND.

"Air Battle" is based on a real hijacking incident, although it only lasted 52 minutes, it left a terrifying memory:

According to the director, the film mainly fictionalizes the details related to the humorous details, the relationships between the characters to create motivation, the common thread connecting the film, or details such as the incident that required direct intervention when the wheel got stuck on the nose. The remaining majority of the other elements, including the development of the incident, the torture scene, were recreated by the director quite close to reality./.

Source: https://www.vietnamplus.vn/thu-100-ty-dong-tu-chien-tren-khong-thang-lon-vi-kinh-phi-thap-post1063808.vnp